John Dryden - Delphi Poets Series

by John Dryden

  For, after all, a Translator is to make his Author appear as charming as possibly he can, provided he maintains his Character, and makes him not unlike himself. Translation is a kind of Drawing after the Life, where every one will acknowledge there is a double sort of likeness, a good one and a bad. ’Tis one thing to draw the Out-lines true, the Features like, the Proportions exact, the Colouring it self perhaps tolerable, and another thing to make all these graceful, by the posture, the shadowings, and chiefly by the Spirit which animates the whole. I cannot, without some indignation, look on an ill Copy of an excellent Original. Much less can I behold with patience Virgil, Homer, and some others, whose beauties I have been endeavouring all my Life to imitate, so abused, as I may say, to their Faces, by a botching Interpreter. What English Readers, unacquainted with Greek or Latin, will believe me, or any other Man, when we commend those Authors, and confess we derive all that is pardonable in us from their Fountains, if they take those to be the same Poets, whom our Ogleby’s have Translated? But I dare assure them, that a good Poet is no more like himself, in a dull Translation, than his Carcass would be to his living Body. There are many, who understand Greek and Latin, and yet are ignorant of their Mother Tongue. The proprieties and delicacies of the English are known to few: ’tis impossible even for a good Wit to understand and practise them, without the help of a liberal Education, long Reading, and digesting of those few good Authors we have amongst us, the knowledge of Men and Manners, the freedom of habitudes and conversation with the best company of both Sexes; and, in short, without wearing off the rust which he contracted, while he was laying in a stock of Learning. Thus difficult it is to understand the purity of English, and critically to discern not only good Writers from bad, and a proper stile from a corrupt, but also to distinguish that which is pure in a good Author, from that which is vicious and corrupt in him. And for want of all these requisites, or the greatest part of them, most of our ingenious young Men take up some cry’d up English Poet for their Model, adore him, and imitate him, as they think, without knowing wherein he is defective, where he is Boyish and trifling, wherein either his thoughts are improper to his Subjects, or his Expressions unworthy of his Thoughts, or the turn of both is unharmonious. 2

  Thus it appears necessary that a Man shou’d be a nice Critick in his Mother Tongue, before he attempts to Translate a foreign Language. Neither is it sufficient, that he be able to Judge of Words and Stile; but he must be a Master of them too: He must perfectly understand his Authors Tongue, and absolutely command his own: So that, to be a thorow Translator, he must be a thorow Poet. Neither is it enough to give his Authors sence in good English, in Poetical expressions, and in Musical numbers; For, though all these are exceeding difficult to perform, there yet remains a harder task; and ’tis a secret of which few Translators have sufficiently thought. I have already hinted a word or two concerning it; that is, the maintaining the Character of an Author, which distinguishes him from all others, and makes him appear that individual Poet, whom you wou’d interpret. For example, not only the thoughts, but the Style and Versification of Virgil and Ovid, are very different: Yet I see, even in our best Poets, who have Translated some parts of them, that they have confounded their several Talents; and, by endeavouring only at the sweetness and harmony of Numbers, have made them both so much alike, that if I did not know the Originals, I should never be able to Judge by the Copies, which was Virgil, and which was Ovid. It was objected against a late noble Painter, that he drew many graceful Pictures, but few of them were like. And this happen’d to him, because he always studied himself, more than those who sat to him. In such Translatours I can easily distinguish the hand which performed the Work, but I cannot distinguish their Poet from another. Suppose two Authors are equally sweet, yet there is as great distinction to be made in sweetness, as in that of Sugar, and that of Honey. I can make the difference more plain, by giving you (if it be worth knowing) my own method of proceeding, in my Translations out of four several Poets in this volume — Virgil, Theocritus, Lucretius, and Horace. In each of these, before I undertook them, I consider’d the Genius and distinguishing Character of my Author. I looked on Virgil, as a succinct and grave Majestick writer; one who weigh’d not only every thought, but every Word and Syllable: who was still aiming to crowd his sence into as narrow a compass as possibly he cou’d; for which reason he is so very Figurative, that he requires (I may almost say) a Grammar apart to construe him. His Verse is every where sounding the very thing in your Ears, whose sence it bears: yet the Numbers are perpetually varied, to increase the delight of the Reader; so that the same sounds are never repeated twice together. On the contrary, Ovid and Claudian, though they Write in Styles differing from each other, yet have each of them but one sort of Musick in their Verses. All the versification and little variety of Claudian is included within the compass of four or five Lines, and then he begins again in the same tenour; perpetually closing his sence at the end of a Verse, and that Verse commonly which they call golden, or two Substantives and two Adjectives, with a Verb betwixt them to keep the peace. Ovid with all his sweetness, has as little variety of Numbers and sound as he: He is always, as it were, upon the Hand-gallop, and his Verse runs upon Carpet ground. He avoids, like the other, all Synalæpha’s, or cutting off one Vowel when it comes before another, in the following word: So that minding only smoothness, he wants both Variety and Majesty. But to return to Virgil: though he is smooth where smoothness is requir’d, yet he is so far from affecting it, that he seems rather to disdain it; frequently makes use of Synalæpha’s, and concludes his sence in the middle of his Verse. He is every where above conceits of Epigrammatick Wit, and gross Hyperboles: He maintains Majesty in the midst of plainess; he shines, but glares not; and is stately without ambition, which is the vice of Lucan. I drew my definition of Poetical Wit from my particular consideration of him: For propriety of thoughts and words are only to be found in him; and, where they are proper, they will be delightful. Pleasure follows of necessity, as the effect does the cause; and therefore is not to be put into the definition. This exact propriety of Virgil I particularly regarded, as a great part of his Character; but must confess to my shame, that I have not been able to Translate any part of him so well, as to make him appear wholly like himself. For where the Original is close, no Version can reach it in the same compass. Hannibal Caro’s, in the Italian, is the nearest, the most Poetical, and the most Sonorous of any Translation of the Æneids: yet, though he takes the advantage of blank Verse, he commonly allows two lines for one of Virgil, and does not always hit his sence. Tasso tells us, in his Letters, that Sperone Speroni, a great Italian Wit, who was his Contemporary, observed of Virgil and Tully; that the Latin Oratour endeavoured to imitate the Copiousness of Homer, the Greek poet; and that the Latine Poet made it his business to reach the conciseness of Demosthenes, the Greek Oratour. Virgil therefore, being so very sparing of his words, and leaving so much to be imagined by the Reader, can never be translated as he ought, in any modern Tongue. To make him Copious, is to alter his Character; and to Translate him Line for Line is impossible; because the Latin is naturally a more succinct Language than either the Italian, Spanish, French, or even than the English (which, by reason of its Monosyllables, is far the most compendious of them.) Virgil is much the closest of any Roman Poet, and the Latin Hexameter has more Feet than the English Heroick. 3

  Besides all this, an Author has the choice of his own thoughts and words, which a Translatour has not; he is confin’d by the sence of the Inventor to those expressions which are the nearest to it: So that Virgil, studying brevity, and having the command of his own Language, could bring those words into a narrow compass, which a Translatour cannot render without circumlocutions. In short, they, who have call’d him the torture of Grammarians, might also have called him the plague of Translatours; for he seems to have studied not to be Translated. I own that, endeavouring to turn his Nisus and Euryalus as close as I was able, I have performed that Episode too literally; that,
giving more scope to Mezentius and Lausus, that Version, which has more of the Majesty of Virgil, has less of his conciseness; and all that I can promise for myself is only that I have done both better than Ogleby, and perhaps as well as Caro. So that, methinks, I come like a Malefactor, to make a Speech upon the Gallows, and to warn all other Poets, by my sad example, from the Sacrilege of Translating Virgil. Yet, by considering him so carefully as I did before my attempt, I have made some faint resemblance of him; and, had I taken more time, might possibly have succeeded better; but never so well, as to have satisfied myself. 4

  He who excels all other Poets in his own Language, were it possible to do him right, must appear above them in our Tongue; which, as my Lord Roscommon justly observes, approaches nearest to the Roman in its Majesty: Nearest indeed, but with a vast interval betwixt them. There is an inimitable grace in Virgils words, and in them principally consists that beauty which gives so unexpressible a pleasure to him who best understands their force. This Diction of his, I must once again say, is never to be Copied; and, since it cannot, he will appear but lame in the best Translation. The turns of his Verse, his breakings, his propriety, his numbers, and his gravity, I have as far imitated as the poverty of our Language and the hastiness of my performance wou’d allow. I may seem sometimes to have varied from his sence; but I think the greatest variations may be fairly deduc’d from him; and where I leave his Commentators, it may be I understand him better: At least I Writ without consulting them in many places. But two particular lines in Mezentius and Lausus I cannot so easily excuse; they are indeed remotely allied to Virgil’s sence; but they are too like the trifling tenderness of Ovid and were printed before I had consider’d them enough to alter them: The first of them I have forgotten, and cannot easily retrieve, because the Copy is at the Press: the second is this;

  When Lausus dy’d, I was already slain.

  5

  This appears pretty enough at first sight; but I am convinc’d for many reasons, that the expression is too bold; that Virgil wou’d not have said it, though Ovid wou’d. The Reader may pardon it, if he please, for the freeness of the confession; and instead of that, and the former, admit these two Lines, which are more according to the Author:

  Nor ask I Life, nor fought with that design;

  As I had us’d my Fortune, use thou thine.

  6

  Having with much ado got clear of Virgil, I have, in the next place, to consider the genius of Lucretius, whom I have translated more happily in those parts of him which I undertook. If he was not of the best age of Roman Poetry, he was at least of that which preceded it; and he himself refin’d it to that degree of perfection, both in the Language and the thoughts, that he left an easy task to Virgil; who as he succeeded him in time, so he Copy’d his excellencies: for the method of the Georgicks is plainly deriv’d from him. Lucretius had chosen a Subject naturally crabbed; he therefore adorn’d it with Poetical descriptions, and Precepts of Morality, in the beginning and ending of his Books. Which you see Virgil has imitated with great success, in those four Books, which in my opinion, are more perfect in their kind than even his Divine Æneids. The turn of his Verse he has likewise follow’d, in those places which Lucretius has most labour’d, and some of his very lines he has transplanted into his own Works, without much variation. If I am not mistaken, the distinguishing Character of Lucretius (I mean of his Soul and Genius) is a certain kind of noble pride, and positive assertion of his Opinions. He is every where confident of his own reason, and assuming an absolute command, not only over his vulgar Reader, but even his Patron Memmius. For he is always bidding him attend, as if he had the Rod over him, and using a Magisterial authority, while he instructs him. From his time to ours, I know none so like him as our Poet and Philosopher of Malmsbury. This is that perpetual Dictatorship, which is exercis’d by Lucretius; who, though often in the wrong, yet seems to deal bonâ fide with his Reader, and tells him nothing but what he thinks: in which plain sincerity, I believe, he differs from our Hobbs, who cou’d not but be convinc’d, or at least doubt of some eternal Truths, which he has oppos’d. But for Lucretius, he seems to disdain all manner of Replies, and is so confident of his cause, that he is beforehand with his Antagonists; Urging for them whatever he imagin’d they cou’d say, and leaving them, as he supposes, without an objection for the future; all this too, with so much scorn and indignation, as if he were assur’d of the Triumph, before he entered into the lists. From this sublime and daring Genius of his, it must of necessity come to pass, that his thoughts must be Masculine, full of argumentation, and that sufficiently warm. From the same fiery temper proceeds the loftiness of his Expressions, and the perpetual torrent of his Verse, where the barrenness of his Subject does not too much constrain the quickness of his Fancy. For there is no doubt to be made, but that he cou’d have been every where as Poetical, as he is in his Descriptions, and in the Moral part of his Philosophy, if he had not aim’d more to instruct, in his Systeme of Nature, than to delight. But he was bent upon making Memmius a Materialist, and teaching him to defie an invisible power: In short, he was so much an Atheist, that he forgot sometimes to be a Poet. These are the considerations which I had of that Author, before I attempted to translate some parts of him. And accordingly I lay’d by my natural Diffidence and Scepticism for a while, to take up that Dogmatical way of his, which, as I said, is so much his Character, as to make him that individual Poet. As for his Opinions concerning the mortality of the Soul, they are so absurd, that I cannot, if I wou’d, believe them. I think a future state demonstrable even by natural Arguments; at least, to take away rewards and punishments, is only a pleasing prospect to a Man, who resolves beforehand not to live morally. But on the other side, the thought of being nothing after death is a burthen unsupportable to a vertuous Man, even though a Heathen. We naturally aim at happiness, and cannot bear to have it confin’d to the shortness of our present Being, especially when we consider, that vertue is generally unhappy in this World and vice fortunate: so that ’tis hope of Futurity alone that makes this Life tolerable, in expectation of a better. Who wou’d not commit all the excesses, to which he is prompted by his natural inclinations, if he may do them with security while he is alive, and be uncapable of punishment after he is dead! if he be cunning and secret enough to avoid the Laws, there is no band of morality to restrain him: for Fame and Reputation are weak ties: many men have not the least sence of them: Powerful men are only aw’d by them, as they conduce to their interest, and that not always, when a passion is predominant: and no Man will be contain’d within the bounds of duty, when he may safely transgress them. These are my thoughts abstractedly, and without entering into the Notions of our Christian Faith, which is the proper business of Divines. 7

  But there are other Arguments in this Poem (which I have turned into English) not belonging to the Mortality of the Soul, which are strong enough to a reasonable Man, to make him less in love with Life, and consequently in less apprehensions of Death. Such as are the natural Satiety proceeding from a perpetual enjoyment of the same things; the inconveniences of old age, which make him uncapable of corporeal pleasures; the decay of understanding and memory, which render him contemptible, and useless to others. These, and many other reasons, so pathetically urged, so beautifully express’d, so adorn’d with examples, and so admirably rais’d by the Prosopopeia of Nature, who is brought in speaking to her Children, with so much authority and vigour, deserve the pains I have taken with them, which I hope have not been unsuccessful, or unworthy of my Author. At least I must take the liberty to own, that I was pleased with my own endeavours, which but rarely happens to me; and that I am not dissatisfied upon the review of any thing I have done in this Author. 8

  ’Tis true, there is something, and that of some moment, to be objected against my Englishing the Nature of Love, from the fourth book of Lucretius; and I can less easily answer why I Translated it, than why I thus Translated it. The Objection arises from the Obscenity of the Subject; which is aggravate
d by the too lively and alluring delicacy of the Verses. In the first place, without the least Formality of an excuse, I own it pleas’d me: and let my enemies make the worst they can of this Confession: I am not yet so secure from that passion, but that I want my Authors Antidotes against it. He has given the truest and most Philosophical account both of the Disease and Remedy, which I ever found in any Author: For which reasons I Translated him. But it will be ask’d why I turned him into this luscious English, (for I will not give it a worse word:) Instead of an answer, I wou’d ask again of my Supercilious Adversaries, whether I am not bound, when I translate an author, to do him all the right I can, and to Translate him to the best advantage? If, to mince his meaning, which I am satisfi’d was honest and instructive, I had either omitted some part of what he said, or taken from the strength of his expression, I certainly had wrong’d him; and that freeness of thought and words being thus cashier’d in my hands, he had no longer been Lucretius. If nothing of this kind be to be read, Physicians must not study nature, Anatomies must not be seen, and somewhat I cou’d say of particular passages in Books, which, to avoid prophaneness, I do not name. But the intention qualifies the act; and both mine and my Authors were to instruct as well as please. ’Tis most certain that barefac’d Bawdery is the poorest pretence to wit imaginable: If I shou’d say otherwise, I should have two great authorities against me: The one is the Essay on Poetry, which I publickly valu’d before I knew the Author of it, and with the commendation of which my Lord Roscommon so happily begins his Essay on Translated Verse: The other is no less than our admir’d Cowley, who says the same thing in other words: For in his Ode concerning Wit, he writes thus of it: