author:René le Bossu

“ Society in time was brought to perfection, or rather declin'd and was perverted; and Men took up Employments that seem'd to them of greater consequence; more weighty affairs fill'd their Minds, Towns and Cities were built every where, and mighty States at last were founded and establisht. Then those who liv'd in the Country became Slaves to those who dwelt in Cities, and the Pastoral Life being grown the Lot of the most wretched sort of People, no longer inspir'd any delightful Thought. ”

“ No, doubtless; but indeed that Character of the Shepherds is not false after all, if we look upon it one way: For we do not mind the meanness of the Concerns that are their real Employment, but the little trouble which those Concerns bring. This meanness would wholly exclude Ornaments and Gallantry, but on the other hand the quiet state promotes them; and 'tis only on that tranquility that whatever pleases in a Pastoral Life is grounded.
Our Imagination is not to be pleased without Truth; but it is not very hard to please it; for, often 'tis satisfied with a kind of half Truth. ”

“ As for the Italian Authors, they are always so full of false and pointed Thoughts, that we must resolve right or wrong to give them leave to indulge themselves in that darling Stile of theirs, as natural to them as their Mother Tongue. They never take the pains to make their Shepherds speak in a Pastoral Stile, but make use of as bold and exaggerated Figures, and are as full of Conceipts in that sort of Poetry, as they are in others. ”

“ The chief advantage of Poetry consists in representing to us in a lively manner the things that concern us, and in striking strongly a Heart which is pleas'd with being mov'd.
Here's enough, and perhaps too much against these Shepherds of Theocritus, and those who, like 'em, have too much of the Shepherd in 'em. What we have left of Moschus and Bion in the Pastoral kind, makes me extreamly lament what we have lost of theirs. They have no manner of Rusticity, but rather a great deal of Delicacy and Grace, and some Ideas wholly new and pleasing. They are accus'd of being too florid ”

“ Even those who are most stirring are not precisely such for Business sake, or because they love to be in action, but because they cannot easily satisfie themselves.
Ambition, as it is too much an Enemy to this natural Laziness, is neither a general Passion nor very Delicious. A considerable part of Mankind is not ambitious; many have begun to be such, but by the means of some undertakings and ties that have determin'd them before they seriously reflected on what they did, and that have made them unfit ever to return to calmer Inclinations ”

“ If those who are resolved to find no faults in the Ancients, tell us that Theocritus had a mind to draw Nature just such as it is, I hope that according to those principles, we shall have some Idyllia of Porters, or Watermen discoursing together of their particular Concerns: Which will be every whit as good as some Idyllia of Shepherds speaking of nothing but their Goats or their Cows. ”

“ If you go never so little from them, you go at the same time from Nature and Truth; and I shall not be afraid to affirm, that it wou'd not be more difficult to see without Eyes, or Light, than 'tis impossible to acquire a solid Merit, and to form the Understanding by other means, than by those that the Greeks and Romans have traced for us: whether it be that we follow them by the only force of Natural Happiness, or Instinct, or that Art and Study have conducted us thither. ”

“ This consider'd, 'tis not to be admir'd why the Pictures which are drawn of a Pastoral Life, have always something so very smiling in them, and indulge our Fancies more than the Pompous Description of a splendid Court and of all the Magnificence that can shine there. A Court gives us no Idea but of toilsome and constrain'd Pleasures: For, as we have observ'd, the Idea is all in all: Cou'd the Scene of this quiet Life, with no other business but Love, be plac'd any where but in the Country, so that no Goats nor Sheep shou'd be brought in, I fansie it would be never the worse ”

“ The Business is not purely to describe, we must describe such Objects as are delightful: When the quiet that reigns in the Country, and the simplicity and tenderness which are discover'd there in making Love, are represented to me, my Imagination, mov'd and affected with these pleasing Ideas, is fond of a Shepherd's Life; but tho' the vile and low Employments of Shepherds, were describ'd to me with all the exactness possible, I shou'd never be taken with 'em, and my Imagination wou'd not in the least be touch'd. ”

“ So the Mind hath the double Pleasure, first of getting an easie Idea, then of penetrating, whenever such Cases as that of Galatæa are laid before it. The Action, and, in a manner, the Soul of the Action all at once strike the Eyes of the Mind; it can see nothing more in the matter, nor more quickly, neither can it ever be put to less expence. ”

“ But for fear of falling into Admiration, which they look upon as the Child of Ignorance, they do not perceive that they go from that Admiration, which Plato calls the Mother of Wisdom, and which was the first that opened Mens Eyes. I do not wonder that the Celestial Beauties, which we find in the Writing of these incomparable Men, lose with them all their Attractives and Charms, because they have not the Strength to keep their Eyes long enough upon them. Besides, it is much easier to despise than understand them. ”

“ I acknowledge, that there are a great many who are an Honour to our Age, and who would have adorn'd the Ages past. But amongst these great Men I speak of, I do not know one, and there cannot be one, who does not esteem and honour the Ancients who is not of their taste, and who follows not their Rules. ”

“ As the Pastoral Life is the most idle of all others, 'tis also the most fit to be the Ground work of those Ingenious Representations of which we are speaking. So that no Ploughmen, Reapers, Vine-dressers or Hunts men, can by any means be so properly introduc'd in Eclogues, as Shepherds: Which confirms what I said, that what makes this kind of Poetry please, is not it's giving an Image of a Country Life, but rather the Idea which it gives of the tranquility and Innocence of that Life.
Yet there is an Idyllium of Battus and Milo, two Reapers in Theocritus, which has Beauties. ”

“ Those whose Mind is more refin'd, more capacious and more improv'd by Study or Conversation do, while they express their Sentiments, and something that hath the air of a Reflection, and that is not inspir'd by the Passion alone; whereas the others speak their Minds more simply, and add, in a manner, nothing that's foreign: Any ordinary Man will easily say; I so Passionately desir'd that my Mistress might be faithful, that I believ'd her such ”

“ The Men who have the most Wit, and those who have but an indifferent share of it, do not differ so much in the sense which they have of Things as they do in their manner of expressing it. The Passions, amidst all the Disturbance which they cause, are attended by a kind of Light, which they impart almost equally to all those whom they possess. There is a certain Penetration, certain Ideas, which, without any regard to the difference of the Minds, are always found in Men in whatever concerns and affects them. ”

“ But I don't know how Theocritus having sometimes rais'd his Shepherds in so pleasing a manner above their native Genius, could let them so very often fall to it again: I wonder he did not perceive 'twas fit that a certain gross Clownishness, which is always very unbecoming, should be omitted. When Daphnis in the first Idyllium is ready to die for Love, and a great number of Deities are come to visit him, in the midst of that honourable Company, he is reprov'd for being like the Goat-herds, who envy the pleasure of their Copulating Goats, and are Jealous of them ”

“ To please others in ingenious Composures, Men ought to be in a condition to free themselves from pressing want; and their Minds ought to be refin'd through a long use of Civil Society: Now a Pastoral Life has always wanted one of these two Circumstances: The primitive Shepherds, of whom we have spoken, liv'd indeed in plenty enough, but in their Times the World had not yet had leisure to grow polite. ”

“ For, to hear one speak of Sheep and Goats, and of the care that ought to be taken of those Animals, has nothing which in it self can please us; what is pleasing is the Idea of quietness, which is inseparable from a Pastoral Life. ”

“ In Virgil's second Eclogue, Corydon, to commend his Pipe, tells us that Damætas gave it him when he died, and said to him, Thou art the second Master it hath had, and Amyntas was jealous, because it was not bequeath'd him: All these Circumstances are altogether Pastoral: It might not perhaps be disagreable to bring in a Shepherd who is puzzled in the midst of his Story, and who finds some difficulty in recovering himself; but this wou'd require some Art in the management.
There are no persons whom it becomes better to lengthen a little their Narrations with Circumstances than Lovers. ”

“ It does not belong to Shepherds to speak of all sorts of Matters, and when a Poet has a mind to raise his Style, he may make use of other Persons. When Virgil desir'd to give a pompous Description of the imaginary Return of the Golden Age, which he promises to the World at the Birth of Pollio's Son, he should not have excited the Pastoral Muses to leave their natural Strain, and raise their Voices to a pitch which they can never reach ”

“ Another Thing that suits with the Pastoral Stile is to run only on Actions, and never almost on Reflections. Those who have a middling share of Wit, or a Wit but little improv'd by a Converse with polite Books or Persons, use to discourse only of those particular Things of which they have had a Sense; while others raising themselves higher, reduce all things into general Ideas: The Minds of the latter have work'd and reflected upon their Sentiments and experiments, it happens that what they have seen hath led them to what they have not seen ”

“ The Barbarians who ravag'd Greece, and Italy, and who laboured with so much Fury to destroy all things that were fine and noble, have never done any thing so horrible as this. But I hope that the false Taste of some particular Men without Authority, will not be imputed to the whole Age, nor give the least Blemish to the Ancients. 'Twas to no purpose that a certain Emperour declar'd himself an Enemy to Homer, Virgil, and Titus Livius. ”

“ Besides, 'tis most certain that Love is the most general and the most agreable of all the Passions. So, in the State of Life which we have now describ'd, there is a concurrence of the two strongest Passions, Laziness and Love; which thus are both satisfied at once; and, that we may be as happy as 'tis possible we should by the Passions, 'tis necessary that all those by which we are mov'd, agree together in us. ”

“ For, singing, and above all, an Idle life becomes none but Shepherds: Besides methinks 'tis prettier and more genteel to send Flowers or Fruit to one's Mistress, than send her Oysters as Sannazarius's Lyco doth to his.
'Tis true that Theocritus hath an Idyllium of two Fishermen; but it doth not seem to me so beautiful as to have deserv'd to tempt any Man to write one of that kind. ”

“ At the same time I have a great Respect for Posterity, and I always think with more Fear than Confidence, on the Judgment that will pass on my Works, if they are happy enough to reach it. All this does not hinder me from esteeming the great Men that live now. ”

“ Lucilius was born in the time when Pacuvius was in most Reputation. He also wrote Satyrs. But he gave 'em a new Turn, and endeavoured to imitate, as near as he could, the Character of the old Greek Comedy, of which we had but a very imperfect Idea in the ancient Roman Satyr, and such, as one might find in a Poem, which Nature alone had dictated before the Romans had thought of imitating the Grecians, and enriching themselves with their Spoils. 'Tis thus you must understand this Passage of the first Satyr of the second Book of Horace. ”

“ Of all kinds of Poetry the Pastoral is probably the most Ancient, as the keeping of Flocks was one of the first Employments which Men took up. 'Tis very likely that these primitive Shepherds, amidst the Tranquility and Leisure which they enjoy'd, bethought themselves of singing their Pleasures and their Loves; and then their Flocks, the Woods, the Springs, and all those Objects that were most familiar to them naturally came into the Subject of their Songs. They liv'd in great plenty after their way, without any controul by Superiour Power, being in a manner the Kings of their own Flocks ”

“ Seneca's Book on the Death of Claudius, Boetius his Consolation of Philosophy, and that of Petronius Arbiter, are Satyrs entirely like those of Varro.
This is what I have in general to say on Satyr; nor is it necessary I insist any more on this Subject. This the Reader may observe, that the Name of Satyr in Latin, is not less proper for Discourses that recommend Virtue, than to those which are design'd against Vice. It had nothing so formidable in it as it has now, when a bare Mention of Satyr makes them tremble, who would fain seem what they are not ”

“ In a Word, He endeavours to make us happy for our selves, agreeable, and faithful to our Friends, easie, discreet, and honest to all, with whom we are oblig'd to live. To make us understand the Terms he uses, to explain the Figures he employs, and to conduct the Reader safely through the Labyrinth of a difficult Expression, or obscure Parenthesis, is no great Matter to perform: And as Epictetus says, There is nothing in That beautiful, or truly worthy a wise Man. ”