his earliest poetry, as well as in his lateft. The English Du Bartas reads with a high fpirit of originality; and I am fully I * The teftimony of Ben Jonfon's Encomiaftic Verfes may here well be adduced. EPIGRA M, To Mr. Joshua Sylvefter. If to admire were to commend, my praise Might then both thee, thy work, and merit raise ; But as it is, (the child of ignorance, And utter stranger to all airs of France,) How can I fpeak of thy great pains but err? Since they can only judge, that can confer. B. JONSON, Ben Jonfon indeed, in a general cenfure of the poets of his time, (recorded from his converfation by fully perfuaded, that it ftrongly caught the willing attention of the young poet. Nothing can be farther from my intention than to infinuate that Milton was a plagiarift, or fervile imitator; but I conceive, that, having read thefe facred poems of very high merit, at the immediate age when his own mind was just beginning to teem with poetry, he retained by Drummond of Hawthornden,) fays, "Sylvef"ter's tranflation of Du Bartas was not well done; "but he wrote his verses, before he understood to "confer. By which we may understand Jonfon cenfuring the exactness of the tranflation: which he must have done on the report of others, as his verfes confefs that he did not understand the original. The poetry of Sylvefter (which is my object) ftands unimpeached. 66 Drummond himself commends Sylvefter's tranflation of Du Bartas's Judith as excellent, and speaks of his happy tranflations in fundry places equalling the original." Drummond is great authority; efpecially for that age.-The works of Drummond were published in 1656, with a preface by Edward Phillips the nephew of Milton. numberlefs numberlefs thoughts, paffages, and expreffions therein, fo deeply in his mind, that they hung inherently on his imagination, and became, as it were, naturalized there. Hence many of them were afterwards infenfibly tranfufed into his own compofitions. In common converfation we, imperceptibly to ourselves, adopt the particular phrafeology or tone of voice of those persons whom we peculiarly admire ; and we frequently catch their characteriftic manners, without meaning in any refpect to copy them, or being at all aware of any obfervable refemblance between us. From Milton's frequent adoption of Sylvefter's language, I fimilarly infer his having been much converfant with it, and his earneft admiration of his poetry. Du Bartas's principal poem, intitled DAYS AND WEEKS, was well calculated, both from its plan and execution, to attach the attention of Milton. - Having for its argument argument the moft weighty and interefting fubjects of fcripture hiftory ; commencing with the Creation and the Fall; proceeding, as the poet marks his plan, through the types of the Law and Jewish History, to the completion of them in the Meffias; and meaning, (had he lived to complete his fubject,) to have wound up all in the eternal happiness of the Heavenly Sabbath; - decorated and enriched with every ornament of claffic literature and scientific knowledge, not without collateral aid from the gothic ages and legendary tales; how could it fail to ftrike a young mind, ardently difpofed to learning, poetry, and devotion? The verfification of our tranflator, Jofhua Sylvefter, has in it, it must be confeffed, numerous highly obfolete and vulgarifed expreffions; frequent difcordant and difgufting rhymes; and, very often, a moft offenfive jingle of adjunct rhyming, or |