Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/312

302 Theſe pieces with many more, were printed in quarto; beſides which he wrote the following, viz. The Hiſtory of the Plot in Folio. Caveat to the Cavaliers. He tranſlated into Engliſh Cicero’s Offices; Seneca’s Morals, Eraſmus’s Colloquies; Quevedo’s Viſions; Bona’s Guide to Eternity; Five Love Letters from a Nun to a Cavalier; Joſephus’s Works; Æſop’s Fables.

Mr. Gordon, author of the Independent Whig, and tranſlator of Tacitus, has very freely cenſured L’Eſtrange. He beſtows very freely upon him the epithet of a buffoon, an ignorant droll, &c.He charges him with having no knowledge of the Latin tongue; and ſays, he is unfit to be read by any perſon of taſte. That his ſlile is full of technical terms, and of phraſes picked up in the ſtreets, from apprentices and porters.

Sir Roger L’Eſtrange tranſlated the third Rook of Tacitus, an author of whom Mr. Gordon made an entire tranſlation. To raiſe the reputation of his own performance, he has abuſed that of L’Eſtrange, in terms very unfit for a gentleman to uſe, ſuppoſing the cenſure had been true. Sir Roger’s works indeed are often calculated for the meaneſt capacities, and the phraſe is conſequently low; but a man muſt be greatly under the influence of prejudice, who can diſcover no genius in his writings; nor an intimate acquaintance with the ſtate of parties, human life, and manners.

Sir Roger was but ill-rewarded by the Tories, for having been their champion; the latter part of his life was clouded with poverty, and though he deſcended in peace to the grave, free from political turmoils, yet as he was bowed down with age and diſtreſs, he cannot be ſaid to have died in comfort. He