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CONCERNING

OVID'S EPISTLES.

HE life of Ovid being already written in our

Tlanguage before the tranflation of his Metamor

phofes, I will not prefume fo far upon myself, to think I can add any thing to Mr. Sandys his undertaking. The English reader may there be fatisfied, that he flourished in the reign of Auguftus Cæfar; that he was extracted from an ancient family of Roman Knights; that he was born to the inheritance of a fplendid fortune; that he was defigned to the study of the law, and had made confiderable progress in it, before he quitted that profeffion, for this of Poetry, to which he was more naturally formed. The caufe of his banishment is unknown; because he was himfelf unwilling further to provoke the emperor, by afcribing it to any other reason, than what was pretended by Auguftus, which was, the lafcivioufnefs of his Elegies, and his Art of Love. It is true, they are not to be excufed in the feverity of manners, as being able to corrupt a larger empire, if there were any, than that of Rome: yet this may be faid in behalf of Ovid, that no man has ever treated the paffion of love with fo much delicacy of thought, and of expreffion, or fearched into the nature of it more philofophically than he. And the emperor, who condemned him, had as little reafon as another man to punish that fault with so much severity, if at leaft he were the author of a certain Epigram, which is afcribed to him, relating to the caufe of the firft civil war betwixt himself and Marc Antony the triumvir,

which is more fulfome than any paffage I have met with in our Poet. To pass by the naked familiarity of his expreffions to Horace, which are cited in that author's life, I need only mention one notorious act of his, in taking Livia to his bed, when she was not only married, but with child by her husband then. living. But deeds, it seems, may be justified by arbitrary power, when words are queftioned in a Poet. There is another guefs of the grammarians, as far from truth as the firft from reafon: they will have him banished for fome favours, which, they fay, he received from Julia the daughter of Auguftus, whom they think he celebrates under the name of Corinna in his Elegies: but he, who will obferve the verses, which are made to that miftrefs, may gather from the whole contexture of them, that Corinna was not a woman of the highest quality. If Julia were then married to Agrippa, why fhould our Poet make his petition to Ifis, for her fafe delivery, and afterwards condole her miscarriage; which, for ought he knew, might be by her own hufband? Or, indeed, how durft he be fo bold to make the least discovery of fuch a crime, which was no lefs than capital, especially committed against a perfon of Agrippa's rank? Or, if it were before her marriage, he would fure have been more difcreet, than to have published an accident which must have been fatal to them both. But what most confirms me against this opinion, is, that Ovid himself complains, that the true perfon of Corinna was found out by the fame of his verses to her: which if it had been Julia, he durft not have owned; and, befides, an immediate punishment must have followed. He feems himself more truly to have touched at the cause of his exile in those obscure verses;

Cur aliquid vidi, cur noxia Lumina feci? &c.

Namely, that he had either feen, or was conscious to fomewhat, which had procured him his difgrace. But neither am I fatisfied, that this was the inceft of

the

the emperor with his own daughter: for Auguftus was of a nature too vindicative, to have contented himself with so small a revenge, or fo unfafe to himfelf, as that of fimple banishment; but would certainly have fecured his crimes from public notice, by the death of him who was witness to them. Neither have hiftorians given us any fight into such an action of this emperor: nor would he (the greatest politician of his time) in all probability, have managed his crimes with fo little fecrecy, as not to fhun the obfer vation of any man. It feems more probable, that Ovid was either the confident of fome other passion, or that he had ftumbled by fome inadvertency upon the privacies of Livia, and feen her in a bath: for the words

Sine vefte Dianam

agree better with Livia, who had the fame of chastity, than with either of the Julia's, who were both noted of incontinency, The firft verfes, which were made by him in his youth, and recited publicly, according to the custom, were, as he himself affures us, to Corinna: his banishment happened not till the age of fifty; from which it may be deduced, with probability enough, that the love of Corinna did not occafion it: nay, he tells us plainly, that his offence was that of error only, not of wickednefs; and in the fame paper of verfes alfo, that the caufe was notoriously known at Rome, though it be left so obfcure to afterages.

But to leave conjectures on a fubject fo uncertain, and to write fomewhat more authentic of this Poet: that he frequented the court of Auguftus, and was well received in it, is moft undoubted; all his Poems bear the character of a court, and appear to be written, as the French call it, Cavalierement: add to this, that the titles of many of his Elegies, and more of his letters in his banishment, are addrefled to perfons well known to us, even at this distance, to have been confiderable in that court.

Nor

Nor was his acquaintance lefs with the famous Poets of his age, than with the noble men and ladies. He tells you himself, in a particular account of his own life, that Macer, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, and many others of them, were his familiar friends, and that fome of them communicated their writings to him; but that he had only seen Virgil.

If the imitation of nature be the business of a Poet, I know no author, who can juftly be compared with ours, especially in the defcription of the paffions. And, to prove this, I fhall need no other judges than the generality of his readers: for all paffions being inborn with us, we are almoft equally judges, when we are concerned in the representation of them. Now I will appeal to any man, who has read this Poet, whether he finds not the natural emotion of the fame paffion in himfelf, which the Poet describes in his feigned perfons? His thoughts, which are the pictures and refults of thofe paffions, are generally fuch as naturally arife from thofe diforderly motions of our fpirits. Yet, not to speak too partially in his behalf, I will confefs, that the copiousness of his wit was fuch, that he often writ too pointedly for his subject, and made his perfons speak more eloquently than the violence of their paffion would admit: fo that he is frequently witty out of feafon; leaving the imitation of nature, and the cooler dictates of his judgment, for the falfe applause of fancy. Yet he feems to have found out this imperfection in his riper age: for why elfe fhould he complain, that his Metamorphofes was left unfinished? Nothing fure can be added to the wit of that Poem, or of the reft: but many things ought to have been retrenched; which, I fuppofe would have been the bufinefs of his age, if his misfortunes had not come too faft upon him. But take him uncorrected, as he is tranfmitted to us, and it must be acknowledged, in fpite of his Dutch friends, the commentators, even of Julius Scaliger himself, that Seneca's cenfure will ftand good against him;

3

Nefcivit

Nefcivit quod bene ceffit relinquere;

he never knew how to give over, when he had done well, but continually varying the fame fenfe an hundred ways, and taking up in another place, what he had more than enough inculcated before, he fometimes cloys his readers inftead of fatisfying them; and gives occafion to his tranflators, who dare not cover him, to blush at the nakedness of their father. This then is the allay of Ovid's writings, which is fufficiently recompenfed by his other excellencies: nay, this very fault is not without its beauties; for the moft fevere cenfor cannot but be pleafed with the prodigality of his wit, though at the fame time he could have wished that the mafter of it had been a better manager. Every thing, which he does, becomes him; and, if fometimes he appears too gay, yet there is a fecret gracefulness of youth, which accompanies his writings, though the ftaidnefs and fobriety of age be wanting. In the most material part, which is the conduct, it is certain that he feldom has mifcarried: for if his Elegies be compared with those of Tibullus and Propertius, his cotemporaries, it will be found, that thofe poets feldom defigned before they writ: and though the language of Tibullus be more polifhed, and the learning of Propertius, efpecially in his fourth book, more fet out to oftentation; yet their common practice was to look no further before them than the next line; whence it will inevitably follow, that they can drive to no certain point, but ramble from one fubject to another, and conclude with somewhat, which is not of a piece with their beginning:

Pupureus latè qui fplendeat unus & alter
Afuitur pannus,

as Horace fays: though the verses are golden, they
are but patched into the garment.
But our Poet has
always the goal in his eye, which directs him in his
race; fome beautiful defign, which he first establishes,

and

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