King. A miserable clench, in my opinion, for Horace to record;
I have heard honest Mr. Swan make many a better, and yet have had
the grace to hold my countenance. But it may be puns were then in
fashion, as they were wit in the sermons of the last age, and in the
court of King Charles the Second. I am sorry to say it, for the
sake of Horace; but certain it is, he has no fine palate who can
feed so heartily on garbage.
But I have already wearied myself, and doubt not but I have tired
your lordship's patience, with this long, rambling, and, I fear,
trivial discourse. Upon the one-half of the merits, that is,
pleasure, I cannot but conclude that Juvenal was the better
satirist. They who will descend into his particular praises may
find them at large in the dissertation of the learned Rigaltius to
Thuanus. As for Persius, I have given the reasons why I think him
inferior to both of them; yet I have one thing to add on that
subject.
Barten Holyday, who translated both Juvenal and Persius, has made
this distinction betwixt them, which is no less true than witty--
that in Persius, the difficulty is to find a meaning; in Juvenal, to
choose a meaning; so crabbed is Persius, and so copious is Juvenal;
so much the understanding is employed in one, and so much the
judgment in the other; so difficult is it to find any sense in the
former, and the best sense of the latter.
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