nations, who call conceits and jingles wit, who see Ovid full of
them, and Chaucer altogether without them, will think me little less
than mad, for preferring the Englishman to the Roman. Yet, with their
leave, I must presume to say, that the things they admire are only
glittering trifles, and so far from being witty, that in a serious
poem they are nauseous, because they are unnatural. Would any man who
is ready to die for love, describe his passions like Narcissus; would
he think of _inopem me copia fecit_, and a dozen more of such
expressions, poured on the neck of one another, and signifying all
the same thing? This is just John Littlewit, in 'Bartholomew Fair,'
who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a
miserable conceit. On these occasions, the poet should endeavour to
raise pity; but, instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh.
Virgil never made use of such machines when he was moving you to
commiserate the death of Dido; he would not destroy what he was
building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the
pursuit of it; yet when he came to die, he made him think more
reasonably: he repents not of his love, for that had altered his
character; but acknowledges the injustice of his proceedings, and
resigns Emilia to Palamon. What would Ovid have done on this
occasion? He would certainly have made Arcite witty on his
deathbed;--he had complained he was farther off from possession by
being so near, and a thousand such boyisms, which Chaucer rejected as
below the dignity of the subject. They who think otherwise, would by
the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and Virgil, and
Martial to all four of them. As for the turn of words, in which Ovid
particularly excels all poets, they are sometimes a fault, and
sometimes a beauty, as they are used properly or improperly; but in
strong passions always to be shunned, because passions are serious,
and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; and
I confess they are often what they call delicate, when they are
introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more simplicity, and
followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to
the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties
in competition, not meddling with