words,
and his placing them for the sweetness of the sound. On this last
consideration I have shunned the _caesura_ as much as possibly I could:
for, wherever that is used, it gives a roughness to the verse; of which
we have little need in a language which is overstocked with
consonants."[428] Views like these contribute much to an adequate
conception of what faithfulness in translation demands.

From the lucid, intelligent comment of Dryden it is disappointing to
turn to the body of doctrine produced by his successors. In spite of the
widespread interest in translation during the eighteenth century, little
progress was made in formulating the theory of the art, and many of the
voluminous prefaces of translators deserve the criticism which Johnson
applied to Garth, "his notions are half-formed." So far as concerns the
general method of translation, the principles laid down by critics are
often mere repetitions of the conclusions already reached in the
preceding century. Most theorists were ready to adopt Dryden's view that
the translator should strike a middle course between the very free and
the very close method. Put into words by a recognized authority, so
reasonable an opinion could hardly fail of acceptance. It appealed to
the eighteenth-century mind as adequate, and more than one translator,
professing to give rules for translation, merely repeated in his own
words what Dryden had already said. Garth declares in the preface
condemned by Johnson: "Translation is commonly either verbal, a
paraphrase, or an imitation.... The manner that seems most suitable for
this present undertaking is neither to follow the author too close out
of a critical timorousness, nor abandon him too wantonly through a
poetic boldness. The original should always be kept in mind, without too
apparent a deviation from the sense. Where it is otherwise, it is not a
version but an imitation."[429] Grainger says in the introduction to his
_Tibullus_: "Verbal translations are always inelegant, because always
destitute of beauty of idiom and language; for by their fidelity to an
author's words, they become treacherous to his reputation; on the other
hand, a too wanton departure from the letter often varies the sense and
alters the manner. The translator chose the middle way, and meant
neither to tread on the heels of Tibullus nor yet to lose sight of
him."[430] The preface to Fawkes' _Theocritus_ harks back to Dryden: "A
too faithful translation, M