Page:The Works of Ben Jonson - Gifford - Volume 9.djvu/100

 ] This translation, which was probably among the earliest works of Jonson, was not given to the press till some time after his death, when it was published in 1640, with some other pieces in 12mo. by John Benson, with a dedication to lord Winsor, who, as the writer says, "rightly knew the worth and true esteem both of the author and his learning, being more conspicuous in the judgment of your lordship and other sublime spirits than my capacity can describe."

Many transcripts of this version got abroad; these differed considerably from one another, and all perhaps, from the Original copy. In the three which have reached us, though all were published nearly at the same time, variations occur in almost every line. To notice them would be both tedious and unprofitable: suffice it to say that I have adopted the text of the folio 1640, as, upon the whole, the most correct, though exceptions may occasionally be met with in the smaller editions.

It was for this poem that our author compiled the vast body of notes which was destroyed in the conflagration of his study. After this, he seems to have lost all thoughts of the press—indeed age and disease were advancing fast upon him, if, as I conjecture, the fire took place about 1623, and left him as little heart as power to venture again before a public not, in general, too partial to his labours.

The small edition is prefaced by several commendatory poems, one of which only appears to be written on occasion of the present version. This is by the celebrated lord Herbert of Cherbury, and is addressed "to his friend master Ben Jonson, on his Translation."

'Twas not enough, Ben Jonson, to be thought Of English poets best, but to have brought, In greater state, to their acquaintance, one Made equal to himself and thee; that none Might be thy second: while thy glory is To be the of our times, and his."

Jonson was followed (at unequal periods) by three writers, who in the century succeeding his death (for I have neither leisure nor inclination to go lower,) published their respective versions of the Art of Poetry. It may amuse the reader, perhaps, to listen for a moment to what they say of our poet, and of one another. Roscommon begins—

"I have kept as close as I could both to the meaning, and the words of the author, and done nothing but what I believe