Essays on Taste | Page 5

no very great Artist, but being a faithful Disciple of Nature, having delineated every Object in a Camera Obscura, he has not failed of gaining the uncontested Applause, which the Followers of that unerring Mistress will ever receive from Mankind. My EUDOCIA calls me to administer with her Comfort to a little fatherless Family in the District of our Hamlet, therefore must conclude myself,
Your sincere Friend, &c.
LETTER

TASTE:
AN
EPISTLE
TO A
YOUNG CRITIC.
Range from Tower-hill all London to the Fleet, Thence round the Temple, t'utmost Grosvenor-street: Take in your route both Gray's and Lincoln's Inn; Miss not, be sure, my Lords and Gentlemen; You'll hardly raise, as I with[A] Petty guess, } 5 Above twelve thousand men of taste; unless } In desperate times a Connoisseur may pass. }
"A Connoisseur! What's that?" 'Tis hard to say: But you must oft amidst the fair and gay Have seen a wou'd-be rake, a fluttering fool, 10 Who swears he loves the sex with all his soul. Alas, vain youth! dost thou admire sweet Jones? Thou be gallant without or blood or bones! You'd split to hear th' insipid coxcomb cry Ah charming Nanny! 'tis too much! I die!-- 15 Die and be d--n'd, says one; but let me tell ye I'll pay the loss if ever rapture kill ye.
[Footnote A: Sir William Petty, author of the Political Arithmetic.]
'Tis easy learnt the art to talk by rote: At Nando's 'twill but cost you half a groat; The Redford school at three-pence is not dear, Sir; At White's--the stars instruct you for a tester. 21 But he, whom nature never meant to share One spark of taste, will never catch it there:-- Nor no where else; howe'er the booby beau Grows great with Pope, and Horace, and Boileau.
Good native Taste, tho' rude, is seldom wrong, Be it in music, painting, or in song. But this, as well as other faculties, Improves with age and ripens by degrees. I know, my dear; 'tis needless to deny 't, 30 You like Voiture, you think him wondrous bright; But seven years hence, your relish more matur'd, What now delights will hardly be endur'd. The boy may live to taste Racine's fine charms, Whom Lee's bald orb or Rowe's dry rapture warms: But he, enfranchis'd from his tutor's care, 36 Who places Butler near Cervantes' chair; Or with Erasmus can admit to vie Brown of Squab-hall _of merry memory_; Will die a Goth: and nod at [A]Woden's feast, 40 Th' eternal winter long, on [B]Gregory's breast.
Long may he swill, this patriarch of the dull, The drowsy Mum--But touc not Maro's skull! His holy barbarous dotage sought to doom, Good heaven! th' immortal classics to the tomb!-- Those sacred lights shall bid new genius rise 45 When all Rome's saints have rotted from the skies. Be these your guides, if at the ivy crown You aim; each country's classics, and your own. But chiefly with the ancients pass your prime, 50 And drink Castalia at the fountain's brim. The man to genuine Burgundy bred up, Soon starts the dam of Methuen in his cup.
[Footnote A: Alluding to the Gothic heaven, Woden's hall; where the happy are for ever employed in drinking beer, mum, and other comfortable liquors out of the skulls of those whom they had slain in battle.]
[Footnote B: Pope Gregory the VIth, distinguished by the name of St. Gregory; whose pious zeal, in the cause of barbarous ignorance and priestly tyranny, exerted itself in demolishing, to the utmost of his power, all the remains of heathen genius.]
Those sovereign masters of the Muses skill Are the true patterns of good writing still, 55 Their ore was rich and seven times purg'd of lead; Their art seem'd nature, 'twas so finely hid. Tho' born with all the powers of writing well, What pains it cost they did not blush to tell. Their ease (my Lords!) ne'er lowng'd for want of fire, Nor did their rage thro' affectation tire. 61 Free from all tawdry and imposing glare They trusted to their native grace of air. Rapt'rous and wild the trembling soul they seize, } Or sly coy beauties steal it by degrees; } 65 The more you view them still the more they please. }
Yet there are thousands of scholastic merit Who worm their sense out but ne'er taste their spirit. Witness each pedant under Bentley bred; Each commentator that e'er commented. 70 (You scarce can seize a spot of classic ground, With leagues of Dutch morass so floated round.) Witness--but, Sir, I hold a cautious pen, Lest I should wrong some honourable men. They grow enthusiasts too--_'Tis true! 'tis pity!_ 75 But 'tis not every lunatic that's witty. Some have run Maro--and some Milton--mad, Ashley once turn'd a solid barber's head: Hear all that's said or printed if you can, Ashley has turn'd