[18] He is described as a rake in "The Pacificator," a poem bought by Mr. Luttrell, 15th Feb. 1699-1700, which gives an account of a supposed battle between the men of wit and men of sense, as the poet calls them:
"M——n, a renegade from wit, came on,
And made a false attack, and next to none;
The hypocrite, in sense, could not conceal
What pride, and want of brains, obliged him to reveal.
In him, the critic's ruined by the poet,
And Virgil gives his testimony to it.
The troops of wit were so enraged to see
This priest invade his own fraternity,
They sent a party out, by silence led,
And, without answer, shot the turn-coat dead.
The priest, the rake, the wit, strove all in vain,
For there, alas! he lies among the slain.
Memento mori; see the consequence,
When rakes and wits set up for men of sense."
[19] This, Mr. Malone has proved by the following extract from Motteux's "Gentleman's Journal." "That best of poets (says Motteux) having so long continued a stranger to tolerable English, Mr. Milbourne pitied his hard fate; and seeing that several great men had undertaken some episodes of his Aeneis, without any design of Englishing the whole, he gave us the first book of it some years ago, with a design to go through the poem. It was the misfortune of that first attempt to appear just about the time of the late Revolution, when few had leisure to mind such books; yet, though by reason of his absence, it was printed with a world of faults, those that are sufficient judges have done it the justice to esteem it a very successful attempt, and cannot but wish that he would complete the entire translation."—Gent. Journ. for August 1692.
[20] See the Preface to "A Funeral Idyll, sacred to the glorious Memory of King William III.," by Mr. Oldmixon.
"In the Idyll on the peace, I made the first essay to throw off rhymes, and the kind reception that poem met with, has encouraged me to attempt it again. I have not been persuaded by my friends to change the Idyll into Idyllium; for having an English word set me by Mr. Dryden, which he uses indifferently with the Greek, I thought it might be as proper in an English poem. I shall not be solicitous to justify myself to those who except against his authority, till they produce me a better: I have heard him blamed for his innovations and coining of words, even by persons who have already been sufficiently guilty of the fault they lay to his charge; and shown us what we are to expect from them, were their names as well settled as his. If I had qualifications enough to do it successfully, I should advise them to write more naturally, delicately, and reasonably themselves, before they attack Mr. Dryden's reputation; and to think there is something more necessary to make a man write well, than the favour of the great, or the success of a faction. We have every year seen how fickle Fortune has been to her declared favourites; and men of merit, as well as he who has none, have suffered by her inconstancy, as much as they got by her smiles. This should alarm such as are eminently indebted to her, and may be of use to them in their future reflections on others' productions, not to assume too much to themselves from her partiality to them, lest, when they are left like their predecessor, it should only serve to render them the more ridiculous."
[21] "Homer in a Nutshell," (16th Feb.) 1700-9, by Samuel Parker, Gent.
"Preface.—Ever since I caught some termagant ones in a club, undervaluing our new translation of Virgil, I've known both what opinion I ought to harbour, and what use to make of them; and since the opportunity of a digression so luckily presents itself, I shall make bold to ask the gentlemen their sentiments of two or three lines (to pass over a thousand other instances) which they may meet with in that work. The fourth Aeneid says of Dido, after certain effects of her taking shelter with Aeneas in the cave appear,
Conjuijium vocat, hoc proetexit lomine culpam, V. 172,
which Mr. Dryden renders thus:
She called it marriage, by that specious name
To veil the crime, and sanctify the shame.