Art of Poetry an Epistle to the Pisos | Page 6

quid hoc, si fractis enatat exspes

Extravagant conceits throughout prevail,
Gross and fantastick, neither
head nor tail.
"Poets and Painters ever were allow'd
Some daring
flight above the vulgar croud."
True: we indulge them in that daring
flight,
And challenge in our turn, an equal right:
But not the soft
and savage to combine,
Serpents to doves, to tigers lambkins join.
Oft works of promise large, and high attempt,
Are piec'd and guarded,
to escape contempt,
With here and there a remnant highly drest,

That glitters thro' the gloom of all the rest.
Then Dian's grove and
altar are the theme,
Then thro' rich meadows flows the silver stream;

The River Rhine, perhaps, adorns the lines,
Or the gay Rainbow in
description shines.
These we allow have each their several grace;
But each and several
now are out of place.
A cypress you can draw; what then? you're hir'd,
And from your art a
sea-piece is requir'd;
Navibus, aere dato qui pingitur amphora coepit

Institui: currente rotâ cur urceus exit?
Denique sit quidvis simplex
duntaxat et unum.

Maxima pars vatum, (pater, et juvenes patre digni)
Decipimur specie
recti. Brevis esse laboro,
Obscurus sio: sectantem laevia, nervi

Desiciunt animíque: prosessus grandia turget:
Serpit humi tutus
nimiùm timidùsque procellae.
Qui variare cupit rem prodigaliter
unam,
Delphinum silvis appingit, fluctibus aprum.
In vitium dycit
culpae fuga, si caret arte.
A shipwreck'd mariner, despairing, faint,
(The price paid down) you

are ordain'd to paint.
Why dwindle to a cruet from a tun?
Simple be
all you execute, and one!
Lov'd fire! lov'd sons, well worthy such a fire!
Most bards are dupes
to beauties they admire.
Proud to be brief, for brevity must please,
I
grow obscure; the follower of ease
Wants nerve and soul; the lover of
sublime
Swells to bombast; while he who dreads that crime,
Too
fearful of the whirlwind rising round,
A wretched reptile, creeps
along the ground.
The bard, ambitious fancies who displays,
And
tortures one poor thought a thousand ways,
Heaps prodigies on
prodigies; in woods
Pictures the dolphin, and the boar in floods!

Thus ev'n the fear of faults to faults betrays,
Unless a master-hand
conduct the lays.
Aemilium circa ludum faber imus et ungues

Exprimet, et molles imitabitur aere capillos,
Infelix operis summâ,
quia ponere totum
Nesciet: hunc ego me, si quid componere curem,

Non magis esse velim, quàm pravo vivere naso,
Spectandum nigris
oculis, nigroque capillo.

Sumite materiam vostris, qui scribitis, aequam
Viribus: et versate diu,
quid ferre recusent
Quid valeant humeri. Cui lecta potenter erit res,

Nec facundia deferet hunc, nec lucidus ordo.

Ordinis haec virtus erit et venus, aut ego fallor,
Ut jam nunc dicat,
jam nunc debentia dici
Pleraque differat, et praesens in tempus
omittat.
An under workman, of th' Aemilian class,
Shall mould the
nails, and trace the hair in brass,
Bungling at last; because his narrow
soul
Wants room to comprehend a perfect whole.
To be this man,
would I a work compose,
No more I'd wish, than for a horrid nose,

With hair as black as jet, and eyes as black as sloes.

Select, all ye who write, a subject fit,
A subject, not too mighty for
your wit!
And ere you lay your shoulders to the wheel,
Weigh well
their strength, and all their weakness feel!
He, who his subject
happily can chuse,
Wins to his favour the benignant Muse;
The aid
of eloquence he ne'er shall lack,
And order shall dispose and clear his
track.
Order, I trust, may boast, nor boast in vain,
These Virtues and these
Graces in her train.
What on the instant should be said, to say;

Things, best reserv'd at present, to delay;
Hoc amet, hoc spernat,
promissi carminis auctor.

In verbis etiam tenuis cautusque ferendis,
Dixeris egregié, notum si
callida verbum
Reddiderit junctura novum: si forté necesse est

Indiciis monstrare recentibus abdita rerum;
Fingere cinctutis non
exaudita Cethegis
Continget: dabiturque licentia sumpta pudenter.

Et nova factaque nuper habebunt verba fidem, si
Graeco fonte cadant,
parcé detorta. Quid autem?
Caecilio, Plautoque dabit Romanus,
ademptum
Virgilio, Varioque? ego cur acquirere pauca
Guiding the
bard, thro' his continu'd verse,
What to reject, and when; and what
rehearse.
On the old stock of words our fathers knew,
Frugal and cautious of
engrafting new,
Happy your art, if by a cunning phrase
To a new
meaning a known word you raise:
If 'tis your lot to tell, at some
chance time,
"Things unattempted yet in prose or rhime,"
Where
you are driv'n perforce to many a word
Which the strait-lac'd Cethegi
never heard,
Take, but with coyness take, the licence wanted,
And
such a licence shall be freely granted:
New, or but recent, words shall
have their course,
If drawn discreetly from the Graecian source.

Shall Rome, Caecilius, Plautus, fix your claim,
And not to Virgil,
Varius, grant the same?
Or if myself should some new words attain,


Shall I be grudg'd the little wealth I gain?
Si possum, invideor; cùm

lingua Catonis et Ennî
Sermonem patrium ditaverit, et nova rerum

Nomina protulerit? Licuit, semperque licebit
Signatum praesente notâ
procudere nomen.
Ut silvae foliis pronos mutantur in annos;
Prima
cadunt: ita verborum vetus interit aetas,
Et juvenum ritu florent modò
nata vigentque.
Debemur morti nos, nostraque; sive receptus
Terrâ
Neptunus, classes Aquilonibus arcet,
Regis opus; sterilisve diu palus,
aptaque remis,
Vicinas urbes alit, et grave sentit aratrum:
Seu
cursum mutavit iniquum frugibus amnis,
Doctus iter melius: mortalia
facta peribunt,
Tho' Cato, Ennius, in the days of yore,
Enrich'd