the book; I fhall only add fomewhat concerning the feveral parts of it, and some other pieces, which I have thought fit to reject in this publication: as, first, all those which I wrote at fchool, from the age of ten years, till after fifteen; for even fo far backward there remain yet fome traces of me in the little footsteps of a child; which, though they were then looked upon as commendable extravagancies in a boy (men setting a value upon any kind of fruit before the ufual season of it) yet I would be loth to be bound now to read them all over myself; and therefore fhould do ill to expect that patience from others. Befides, they have already past through feveral editions, which is a longer life than uses to be enjoyed by infants that are born before the ordinary terms. They had the good fortune then to find the world fo indulgent (for, confidering the time of their production, who could be so hard-hearteḍ to be fevere ?) that I fcarce yet apprehend fo much to be cenfured for them, as for not having made advances afterwards proportionable to the speed of my fetting out; and am obliged too in a manner by difcretion to conceal and fupprefs them, as promises and inftruments under my own hand, whereby I ftood engaged for more than I have been able to perform; in which truly if I have failed, I have the real excufe of the honestest fort of bankrupts, which is, to have been made unfolvable not fo much by their own negligence and illhusbandry, as by fome notorious accidents and public difafters. In the next place, I have caft away all fuch pieces as I wrote during the time of the late troubles,

with any relation to the differences that caused them; as, among others, three books of the civil war itself, reaching as far as the firft battle of Newbury, where the fucceeding misfortunes of the party stopt the work. As for the enfuing book, it confifts of four parts. The first is a Mifcellany of feveral subjects, and some of them made when I was very young, which it is perhaps fuperfluous to tell the reader: I know not by what chance I have kept copies of them; for they are but a very few in comparifon of thofe which I have loft; and I think they have no extraordinary virtue in them, to deferve more care in prefervation, than was bestowed upon their brethren; for which I am so little concerned, that I am afhamed of the arrogancy of the word, when I faid I had loft them.

The fecond, is called, "The Miftrefs," or "Love"Verfes;" for fo it is, that poets are fcarce thought. freemen of their company, without paying fome duties, and obliging themselves to be true to love. Sooner or later they must all pass through that trial, like fome Mahometan monks, that are bound by their order, once at least in their life, to make a pilgrimage to

Mecca:

"In furias ignemque fuunt: amor omnibus idem †.”

*In the prefent collection, there are five parts; the first of which contains the juvenile Poems mentioned in p. 15. Their history may be feen in the prefaces. prefixed to them. N.

t. Virg. Georg. iii. 2444

But

But we must not always make a judgment of their manners from their writings of this kind; as the Romanists uncharitably do of Beza, for a few lascivious fonnets compofed by him in his youth. It is not in this fenfe that poefy is said to be a kind of painting; it is not the picture of the poet, but of things and perfons imagined by him. He may be in his own practice and difpofition a philofopher, nay a Stoic, and yet speak fometimes with the foftness of an amorous Sappho,

ferat & rubus afper amomum

He profeffes too much the use of fables (though with out the malice of deceiving) to have his teftimony taken even against himself. Neither would I here be misunderstood, as if I affected fo much gravity as to be ashamed to be thought really in love. On the con→ trary, I cannot have a good opinion of any man, who is not at least capable of being fo. But I fpeak it to excufe fome expreffions (if such there be) which may happen to offend the feverity of fupercilious readers : for much excefs is to be allowed in love, and even more in poetry; so we avoid the two unpardonable vices in both, which are obfcenity and profaneness, of which, I am fure, if my words be ever guilty, they have ill reprefented my thoughts and intentions. And if, notwithstanding all this, the lightness of the matter here difpleafe any body, he may find wherewithal to content his more ferious inclinations in the weight and height of the ensuing arguments.

VOL. I,

*.Virg. Ecl. iii. 89.

C

For

:

For, as for the "Pindaric Odes" (which is the third part), I am in great doubt whether they will be understood by most readers; nay, even by very many who are well enough acquainted with the common roads and ordinary tracts of poefy. They either are, or at least were meant to be, of that kind of style which Dion. Halicarnadeus calls, Μεγαλοφυὲς καὶ ἡδὺ μετὰ SELVÓTATOs, and which he attributes to Alceus. The digreffions are many, and fudden, and sometimes long, according to the fashion of all lyriques, and of Pindar above all men living the figures are unufual and bold, even to temerity, and fuch as I durst not have to do withal in any other kind of poetry: the numbers are various and irregular, and fometimes (especially fome of the long ones) seem harsh and uncouth, if the juft measures and cadences be not observed in the pronunciation. So that almost all their sweetness and numerofity (which is to be found, if I mistake not, in the rougheft, if rightly repeated) lies in a manner wholly at the mercy of the reader. I have briefly defcribed the nature of these verses, in the Ode intituled, "The Refurrection :" and though the liberty of them may incline a man to believe them easy to be compofed, yet the undertaker will find it otherwise—

"Ut fibi quivis

"Speret idem; fudet multùm, fruftráque laboret "Aufus idem *.

Hor. A. P. 240.

I come now to the laft part, which is " Davideis," or an heroical poem of the troubles of David: which I defigned into twelve books; not for the tribes' fake, but after the pattern of our mafter Virgil; and intended to close all with that moft poetical and excellent elegy of David on the death of Saul and Jonathan : for I had no mind to carry him quite on to his anointing at Hebron, because it is the custom of heroic poets (as we fee by the examples of Homer and Virgil, whom we fhould do ill to forfake to imitate others) never to come to the full end of their story: but only so near, that every one may fee it; as men commonly play not out the game, when it is evident that they can win it, but lay down their cards, and take up what they have won. This, I fay, was the whole defign: in which there are many noble and fertile arguments behind; as the barbarous cruelty of Saul to the priests at Nob; the feveral flights and efcapes of David, with the manner of his living in the Wilderness; the funeral of Samuel; the love of Abigail; the facking of Ziglag; the lofs and recovery of David's wives from the Amalekites the witch of Endor; the war with the Philiftines; and the battle of Gilboa: all which I meant to interweave, upon feveral occafions, with most of the illuftrious ftories of the Old Testament, and to embellish with the most remarkable antiquities of the Jews, and of other nations before or at that age.

But I have had neither leifure hitherto, nor have appetite at present, to finish the work, or fo much as to

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revife