"Multa renascentur quae nunc cecidere, cadentque
Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus
Quem penes, arbitrium est, et jus, et norma loquendi.
"The not observing of this Rule, is that which the World has blamed in our satirist CLEVELAND. To express a thing hard and unnaturally is his New Way of Elocution. Tis true, no poet but may sometimes use a catachresis. VIRGIL, does it,
"Mistaque ridenti Colocasia fundet Acaniho—
"in his Eclogue of POLLIO.
"And in his Seventh AEneid—
"Mirantur et unda, Miratur nemus, insuetam fulgentia longe, Scuta virum fluvio, pictaque innare carinas.
"And OVID once; so modestly, that he asks leave to do it.
"Si verbo audacia, detur Haud metuam summi dixisse Palatia coeli
"calling the Court of JUPITER, by the name of AUGUSTUS his palace. Though, in another place, he is more bold; where he says, Et longas visent Capitolia pompas.
"But to do this always, and never be able to write a line without it, though it may be admired by some few pedants, will not pass upon those who know that Wit is best conveyed to us in the most easy language: and is most to be admired, when a great thought comes dressed in words so commonly received, that it is understood by the meanest apprehensions; as the best meat is the most easily digested. But we cannot read a verse of CLEVELAND's, without making a face at it; as if every word were a pill to swallow. He gives us, many times, a hard nut to break our teeth, without a kernel for our pains. So that there is this difference between his Satires and Doctor DONNE's: that the one [DONNE] gives us deep thoughts in common language, though rough cadence; the other [CLEVELAND] gives us common thoughts in abtruse words. 'Tis true, in some places, his wit is independent of his words, as in that of the Rebel Scot—