V.
THE
GUARDIAN.
Being a continuation of some former Papers on the
Subject of Pastorals.
Monday, April 27, 1713.
Compulerantque greges Corydon & Thyrsis in unum.
Ex illo Corydon, Corydon est tempore nobis.
I Designed to have troubled the reader with no farther discourse of Pastoral; but being informed that I am taxed of partiality, in not mentioning an author whose Eclogues are published in the same volume with Mr. Philips's; I shall employ this paper in observations upon him, written in the free spirit of criticism, and without any apprehension of offending that gentleman, whose character it is, that he takes the greatest care of his works before they are published, and has the least concern for them afterwards.
I have laid it down as the first rule of Pastoral, that its idea should be taken from the manners of the Golden Age, and the moral form'd upon the representation of innocence; 'tis therefore plain that any deviations from that design degrade a poem from being truly pastoral. In this view it will appear that Virgil can only have two of his Eclogues allowed to be such: his first and ninth must be rejected, because they describe the ravages of armies, and oppressions of the innocent; Corydon's criminal passion for Alexis throws out the second; the calumny and railing in the third are not proper to that state of concord; the eighth represents unlawful ways of procuring love by inchantments, and introduces a shepherd whom an inviting precipice tempts to self-murder: As to the fourth, sixth, and tenth, they are given up by Heinsius, Salmasius, Rapin[1], and the critics in general. They likewise observe that but eleven of all the Idyllia of Theocritus are to be admitted as Pastorals; and even out of that number the greater part will be excluded for one or other of the reasons above mentioned. So that when I remark'd in a former paper, that Virgil's Eclogues taken altogether are rather select poems than Pastorals; I might have said the same thing with no less truth of Theocritus. The reason of this I take to be yet unobserved by the critics, viz. They never meant them all for pastorals.
Now it is plain Philips hath done this, and in that particular excelled both Theocritus and Virgil.
As Simplicity is the distinguishing characteristic of Pastoral, Virgil hath been thought guilty of too courtly a style; his language is perfectly pure, and he often forgets he is among peasants. I have frequently wondered that since he was so conversant in the writings of Ennius, he had not imitated the rusticity of the Doric, as well by the help of the old obsolete Roman language, as Philips hath by the antiquated English: For example, might not he have said quoi instead of cui, queijum for cujum, volt for vult, &c. as well as our modern hath welladay for alas, whilome for of old, make mock for deride, and witlsess younglings for simple lambs, &c. by which means he had attained as much of the air of Theocritus, as Philips hath of Spencer.
Mr. Pope hath fallen into the same error with Virgil. His clowns do not converse in all the simplicity proper to the country; his names are borrowed from Theocritus and Virgil, which are improper to the scene of his Pastorals: He introduces Daphnis, Alexis, and Thyrsis on British plains, as Virgil hath done before him on the Mantuan. Whereas Philips, who hath the strictest regard to propriety, makes choice of names peculiar to the country, and more agreeable to a reader of delicacy, such as Hobbinol, Lobbin, Cuddy, and Colin-Clout.
So easy as pastoral writing may seem (in the simplicity we have described it) yet it requires great reading, both of the ancients and moderns, to be a master of it. Philips hath given us manifest proofs of his knowledge of books. It must be confessed his competitor hath imitated some single thoughts of the ancients well enough (if we consider he had not the happiness of an University education) but he hath dispersed them, here and there, without that order and method which Mr. Philips observes, whose whole third Pastoral is an instance how well he hath studied the fifth of Virgil, and how judiciously reduced Virgil's thoughts to the standard of Pastoral; as his contention of Colin-Clout and the Nightingale shows with what exactness he hath imitated every line in Strada.
When I remarked it as a principal fault to introduce fruits and flowers of a foreign growth, in the descriptions where the scene lies in our own country, I did not design that observation should extend also to animals, or the sensitive life; for Mr. Philips hath with great judgment described Wolves in England in his first Pastoral. Nor would I have a poet slavishly confine himself (as Mr. Pope hath done) to one particular season of the year, one certain time of the day, and one unbroken scene in each Eclogue. 'Tis plain Spencer neglected this pedantry, who in his Pastoral of November mentions the mournful song of the Nightingale.
Sad Philomel her song in tears doth sleep.
And Mr. Philips, by a poetical creation, hath raised up finer beds of flowers than the most industrious gardiner; his roses, endives, lillies, king-cups, and daffidils blow all in the same season.
But the better to discover the merits of our two contemporary Pastoral writers, I shall endeavour to draw a parallel of them, by setting several of their particular thoughts in the same light, whereby it will be obvious how much Philips hath the advantage. With what simplicity he introduces two shepherds singing alternately!
Hobb. Come, Rosalind, O come, for without thee
Hobb. What pleasure can the country have for me!
Hobb. Come, Rosalind, O come; my brinded kine,
Hobb. My snowy sheep, my farm, and all are thine.
Lanq. Come, Rosalind, O come; here shady bow'rs,
Lanq. Here are cool fountains, and here springing flow'rs,
Lanq. Come, Rosalind; here ever let us stay,
Lanq. And sweetly waste our live-long time away.
Our other Pastoral writer, in expressing the same thought, deviates into down right Poetry:
Streph. In spring, the fields, in autumn, hills I love;
Streph. At morn the plains, at noon the shady grove;
Streph. But Delia always; forc'd from Delia's sight,
Streph. Nor plains at morn, nor groves at noon delight.
Daph. Sylvia's like autumn ripe, yet mild as May,
Daph. More bright than noon, yet fresh as early day;
Daph. Ev'n spring displeases when she shines not here,
Daph. But blest with her 'tis spring throughout the year.
In the first of these authors, two shepherds thus innocently describe the behaviour of their mistresses:
Hobb. As Marian bath'd, by chance I passed by,
Hobb. She blush'd, and at me cast a side-long eye;
Hobb. Then swift beneath the crystal wave she try'd
Hobb. Her beauteous form, but all in vain to hide.
Lanq. As I to cool me bath'd one sultry day,
Lanq. Fond Lydia lurking in the sedges lay;
Lanq. The wanton laugh'd, and seem'd in haste to fly;
Lanq. Yet often stopp'd, and often turn'd her eye.
The other modern (who, it must be confessed, hath a knack of versifying) hath it as follows:
Streph. Me gentle Delia beckons from the plain,
Streph. Then, hid in shades, eludes her eager swain;
Streph. But feigns a laugh, to see me search around,
Streph. And by that laugh the willing fair is found.
Daph. The sprightly Sylvia trips along the green,
Daph. She runs, but hopes she does not run unseen,
Daph. While a kind glance at her pursuer flies,
Daph. How much at variance are her feet and eyes!
There is nothing the writers of this kind of poetry are fonder of, than descriptions of pastoral presents. Philips says thus of a sheep-hook:
Of season'd elm, where studs of brass appear,
To speak the giver's name, the month and year;
The hook of polish'd steel, the handle turn'd,
And richly by the graver's skill adorn'd.
The other of a bowl embossed with figures:
where wanton ivy twines,
And swelling clusters bend the curling vines;
Four figures rising from the work appear,
The various seasons of the rolling year;
And what is that which binds the radiant sky,
Where twelve bright signs in beauteous order lie?
The simplicity of the swain in this place, who forgets the name of the zodiac, is no ill imitation of Virgil: but how much more plainly and unaffectedly would Philips have dressed this thought in his Doric?
And what that bight which girds the welkin seen,
Where twelve gay signs in meet array are seen?
If the reader would indulge his curiosity any farther in the comparison of particulars, he may read the first Pastoral of Philips with the second of his contemporary; and the fourth and sixth of the former with the fourth and first of the latter; where several parallel places will occur to every one.
Having now shown some parts in which these two writers may be compared, it is a justice I owe to Mr. Philips, to discover those in which no man can compare with him. First, that beautiful rusticity, of which I shall only produce two instances of an hundred not yet quoted:
O woeful day! O day of woe! quoth he;
And woeful I, who live the day to see!
The simplicity of the diction, the melancholy flowing of the numbers, the solemnity of the sound, and the easy turn of the words in this dirge (to make use of our author's expression) are extremely elegant.
In another of his Pastorals, a shepherd utters a dirge not much inferior to the former, in the following lines:
Ah me, the while! ah me! the luckless day!
Ah luckless lad! the rather might I say!
Ah silly I! more silly than my sheep,
Which on the flow'ry plain I once did keep.
How he still charms the ear with these artful repetitions of the epithets; and how significant is the last verse! I defy the most common reader to repeat them without feeling some motions of compassion.
In the next place I shall rank his Proverbs, in which I formerly observed he excels. For example:
A rolling stone is ever bare of moss;
And, to their cost, green years old proverbs cross.
—He that late lies down, as late will rise,
And, sluggard-like, 'till noon-day snoring lies.
—Against ill luck all cunning foresight fails;
Whether we sleep or wake, it nought avails.
—Nor fear, from upright sentence, wrong.
Lastly, his elegant dialect, which alone might prove him the eldest born of Spencer, and our only true Arcadian. I should think it proper for the several writers of Pastoral to confine themselves to their several counties. Spencer seems to have been of this opinion; for he hath laid the scene of one of his Pastorals in Wales; where with all the simplicity natural to that part of our island, one shepherd bids the other good-morrow, in an unusual and elegant manner:
Diggon Davy, I bid hur God-day;
Or Diggon hur is, or I mis-say.
Diggon answers,
Hur was hur while it was day-light;
But now hur is a most wretched wight, &c.
But the most beautiful example of this kind that I ever met with, is in a very valuable piece which I chanced to find among some old manuscripts, entituled a Pastoral Ballad, which I think, for its nature and simplicity, may (notwithstanding the modesty of the title) be allowed a perfect Pastoral. It is composed in the Somersetshire dialect, and the names such as are proper to the country people. It may be observed, as a farther beauty of this Pastoral, the words Nymph, Dryad, Naiad, Fawn, Cupid, or Satyr, are not once mentioned throughout the whole. I shall make no apology for inserting some few lines of this excellent piece. Cicily breaks thus into the subject as she is going a milking:
Cicily.Rager, go vetch tha kee[2], or else tha zun
Will quite be go, bevore c'have half a don.
Roger. Thou shouldst not ax ma tweece, but I've a bee
To dreave our bull to bull tha parson's kee.
It is to be observed, that this whole dialogue is formed upon the passion of jealousy; and his mentioning the parson's kine naturally revives the jealousy of the shepherdess Cicily, which she expresses as follows:
Cicily.Ah Rager, Rager! ches was zore avraid
When in yon vield you kiss'd the parson's maid;
Is this the love that once to me you zed,
When from the wake thou brought'st me ginger-bread?
Roger. Cicily, thou charg's me valse—I'll zwear to thee
The parson's maid is still a maid for me.
In which answer of his are expressed at once that spirit of Religion, and that Innocence of the Golden age, so necessary to be observed by all writers of Pastoral.
At the conclusion of this piece, the author reconciles the lovers, and ends the eclogue the most simply in the world:
So Rager parted, vor to vetch tha kee;
And vor her bucket in went Cicily.
I am loth to shew my fondness for antiquity so far as to prefer this ancient British author to our present English writers of Pastoral; but I cannot avoid making this obvious remark, that Philips hath hit into the same road with this old West-country bard of ours.
After all that hath been said, I hope none can think it any injustice to Mr. Pope, that I forbore to mention him as a Pastoral writer; since upon the whole, he is of the same class with Moschus and Bion, whom we have excluded that rank; and of whose eclogues, as well as some of Virgil's, it may be said, that (according to the description we have given of this sort of poetry) they are by no means Pastorals, but something better.