 | Hippolitus |  |
To his Honoured and Ingenious Friend Mr. Edmund Prestwich on his Translation of Hippolitus.
To say that now the Pedant understands
Words, which no comment open'd to his hands
Or sense, his brains less able to obey,
Than patience, or the forgotten quarter-day,
Were praises of a pestilence more dead
Than thunder, t' blast thy Laurel 'bout thy head.
To bring thee commendations from their schools
Were to translate the wisemen into fools
As if we added unto Books more state
By Imprimaturs fetch'd from Billinsgate.
Words, which no comment open'd to his hands
Or sense, his brains less able to obey,
Than patience, or the forgotten quarter-day,
Were praises of a pestilence more dead
Than thunder, t' blast thy Laurel 'bout thy head.
To bring thee commendations from their schools
Were to translate the wisemen into fools
As if we added unto Books more state
By Imprimaturs fetch'd from Billinsgate.
No, to praise thee's to shew this age of ours
How far thy Fancy, outwings Cesars powers,
He, who joynd seas, & piniond Neptuns arms
Affrighted Nature with the wild alarms
Of his Triumphant madness might transfer
His hand ore th' life of that Philosopher,
Thy Poets Ancestor, which to restore
Must make ev'n vanquish'd Nero cry no more
Here all my Powers make Alt; but thou hast made
Thy Poet a new body to his Shade;
Not the long sleep of fifteen hundred yeers,
Nor the confusion of inrich't Sepulchers,
Where's better part lay gnawn on by those moths
Of happy Spirits, ignorance & goths;
Affright thy daring Genius thou dost state
The laws of Nature, and decrees of Fate
Bidst massie Marble, her entomb'd up give:
Command'st ev'n dust, re-animate and live:
Mak'st this Tragedian, by new life be known
Less signall in all Tragedies than's own.
He lives in greater beauty than whē th'throng
Of ravish'd Romans fed their ears with's song.
How far thy Fancy, outwings Cesars powers,
He, who joynd seas, & piniond Neptuns arms
Affrighted Nature with the wild alarms
Of his Triumphant madness might transfer
His hand ore th' life of that Philosopher,
Thy Poets Ancestor, which to restore
Must make ev'n vanquish'd Nero cry no more
Thy Poet a new body to his Shade;
Not the long sleep of fifteen hundred yeers,
Nor the confusion of inrich't Sepulchers,
Where's better part lay gnawn on by those moths
Of happy Spirits, ignorance & goths;
Affright thy daring Genius thou dost state
The laws of Nature, and decrees of Fate
Bidst massie Marble, her entomb'd up give:
Command'st ev'n dust, re-animate and live:
Mak'st this Tragedian, by new life be known
Less signall in all Tragedies than's own.
He lives in greater beauty than whē th'throng
Of ravish'd Romans fed their ears with's song.
Thus Poets, (if their happy thought can clime
But to as high an excellence as thine)
Like the last Angel in th'dissolvent skies,
Bid but the dead awake, and they arise.
But to as high an excellence as thine)
Like the last Angel in th'dissolvent skies,
Bid but the dead awake, and they arise.
Edward Williams.
| Hippolitus | |