The PREFACE.

So many are the Qualifications, as well natural as acquir'd, that are essentially requisite to the making of a good Poet, that 'tis in vain for any Man to aim at a great Reputation on account of his Poetical Performances, by barely following the Rules of others, and reducing their Speculations into Practice. It may not be impossible indeed for Men, even of indifferent Parts, by making Examples to the Rules hereafter given, to compose Verses smooth, and well-sounding to the Ear; yet if such Verses want strong Sense, Propriety and Elevation of Thought, or Purity of Diction, they will be at best but what Horace calls them, Versus inopes rerum, nugæque canoræ, and the Writers of them not Poets, but versifying Scriblers. I pretend not therefore by the following Sheets to teach a Man to be a Poet in spight of Fate and Nature, but only to be of Help to the few who are born to be so, and whom audit vocatus Apollo.

To this End I give in the first Place Rules for making English Verse: And these Rules I have, according to the best of my Judgment, endeavour'd to extract from the Practice, and to frame after the Examples of the Poets that are most celebrated for a fluent and numerous Turn of Verse.

Another Part of this Treatise, is a Dictionary of Rhymes: To which having prefix'd a large Preface shewing the Method and Usefulness of it, I shall trouble the Reader in this place no farther than to acquaint him, that if it be as useful and acceptable to the Publick, as the composing it was tedious and painful to me, I shall never repent me of the Labour.

What I shall chiefly speak of here, is the largest Part of this Treatise, which I call a Collection of the most natural and sublime Thoughts that are in the best English Poets. And to be ingenuous in the Discovery, this was the Part of it that principally induc'd me to undertake the Whole: The Task was indeed laborious, but pleasing; and the sole Praise I expected from it, was, that I made a judicious Choice and proper Disposition of the Passages I extracted. A Mixture of so many different Subjects, and such a Variety of Thoughts upon them, may possibly not satisfy the Reader so well, as a Composition perfect in its Kind on one intire Subject; but certainly it will divert and amuse him better; for here is no Thread of Story, nor Connexion of one Part with another, to keep his Mind intent, and constrain him to any Length of Reading. I detain him therefore only to acquaint him, why it is made a Part of this Book, and how Serviceable it may be to the main Design of it.

Having drawn up Rules for making Verses, and a Dictionary of Rhymes, which are the Mechanick Tools of a Poet; I came in the next Place to consider, what other human Aid could be offer'd him; a Genius and Judgment not being mine to give. Now I imagin'd that a Man might have both these, and yet sometimes, for the sake of a Syllable or two more or less, to give a Verse its true Measure, be at a stand for Epithets and Synonymes, with which I have seen Books of this Nature in several Languages plentifully furnish'd.

Now, tho' I have differ'd from them in Method, yet I am of Opinion this Collection may serve to the same End, with equal Profit and greater Pleasure to the Reader. For, what are Epithets, but Adjectives that denote and express the Qualities of the Substantives to which they are join'd? as Purple, Rosie, Smiling, Dewy, Morning: Dim, Gloomy, Silent, Night. What Synonymes, but Words of a like Signification? as Fear, Dread, Terrour, Consternation, Affright, Dismay, &c. Are they not then naturally to be sought for in the Descriptions of Persons and Things? And can we not better judge by a Piece of Painting, how Beautifully Colours may be dispos'd; than by seeing the same several Colours scatter'd without Design on a Table? When you are at a Loss therefore for proper Epithets or Synonymes, look in this Alphabetical Collection for any Word under which the Subject of your Thought may most probably be rang'd; and you will find what have been imploy'd by our best Writers, and in what Manner.

It would have been as easie a Task for me as it has been to others before me, to have threaded tedious Bead-rolls of Synonymes and Epithets together, and put them by themselves: But when they stand alone, they appear bald, insipid, uncouth, and offensive both to the Eye and Ear. In that Disposition they may indeed help the Memory, but cannot direct the Judgment in the Choice.

But besides, to confess a Secret, I am very unwilling it should be laid to my Charge, that I have furnish'd Tools, and given a Temptation of Versifying, to such as in spight of Art and Nature undertake to be Poets; and who mistake their Fondness to Rhyme, or Necessity of Writing, for a true Genius of Poetry, and lawful Call from Apollo. Such Debasers of Rhyme and Dablers in Poetry would do well to consider, that a Man would justly deserve a higher Esteem in the World by being a good Mason or Shoo-maker, or by excelling in any other Art that his Talent inclines him to, and that is useful to Mankind, than by being an indifferent or second-Rate Poet. Such have no Claim to that Divine Appellation:

Neque enim concludere Versum Dixeris esse satis: Neque, si quis scribat, uti nos, Sermoni propiora, putes hunc esse Poetam. Ingenium cui sit, cui Mens divinior, atque Os Magna sonaturum, des Nominis hujus Honorem.Horat.

I resolv'd therefore to place these, the principal Materials, under the awful Guard of the immortal Shakespear, Milton, Dryden, &c.

Procul o procul este Profani!Virg.

But let Men of better Minds be excited to a generous Emulation.

I have inserted not only Similes, Allusions, Characters, and Descriptions; but also the most Natural and Sublime Thoughts of our Modern Poets on all Subjects whatever. I say, of our Modern; for tho' some of the Antient, as Chaucer, Spencer, and others, have not been excell'd, perhaps not equall'd, by any that have succeeded them, either in Justness of Description, or in Propriety and Greatness of Thought; yet their Language is now become so antiquated and obsolete, that most Readers of our Age have no Ear for them: And this is the Reason that the good Shakespear himself is not so frequently cited in this Collection, as he would otherwise deserve to be.

I have endeavour'd to give the Passages as naked and stript of Superfluities and foreign Matter, as possibly I could: but often found my self oblig'd for the sake of the Connexion of the Sense, which else would have been interrupted, and consequently obscure, to insert some of them under Heads, to which every Part or Line of them may be thought not properly to belong: Nay, I sometimes even found it difficult to chuse under what Head to place several of the best Thoughts; but the Reader may be assur'd, that if he find them not where he expects, he will not wholly lose his Labour; for

The Search it self rewards his Pains; And if like Chymists his great End he miss, Yet things well worth his Toil he gains; And does his Charge and Labour pay With good unsought Experiments by the way.Cowley.

That the Reader may judge of every Passage with due Deference for each Author, he will find their Names at the End of the last Line; and as the late Versions of the Greek and Roman Poets have not a little contributed to this Collection, Homer, Anacreon, Lucretius, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Juvenal, &c. are cited with their Translators: And after each Author's Name are quoted their Plays and other Poems, from whence the Passages are extracted.

The Reader will likewise observe, that I have sometimes ascrib'd to several Authors the Quotations taken from one and the same Play. Thus to those from the first and third Act of Oedipus, I have put Dryden; to those from the three other, Lee: Because the first and third Act of that Play were written by Dryden, the three other by Lee. To those from Troilus and Cressida I have sometimes put Shakespear, sometimes Dryden; because he having alter'd that Play, whatever I found not in the Edition of Shakespear, ought to be ascrib'd to him. And in like manner of several other Plays.

As no Thought can be justly said to be fine, unless it be true, I have all along had a great regard for Truth; except only in Passages that are purely Satirical, where some Allowance must be given: For Satire may be fine and true Satire, tho' it be not directly and according to the Letter, true: 'tis enough that it carry with it a Probability or Semblance of Truth. Let it not here be objected, that I have from the Translators of the Greek and Roman Poets, taken some Descriptions meerly fabulous: for the well-invented Fables of the Antients were design'd only to inculcate the Truth with more Delight, and to make it shine with greater Splendour.

Rien n'est beau que le Vrai. Le Vrai seul est Aimable: Il doit regner par tout; & meme dans la Fable: De toute Fiction l'adroite Fausseté Ne tend qu' à faire aux yeux briller la Verité.Boileau.

I have upon every Subject given both Pro and Con whenever I met with them, or that I judg'd them worth giving: and if both are not always found, let none imagine that I wilfully suppress'd either; or that what is here uncontradicted must be unanswerable.

If any take Offence at the Loosness of some of the Thoughts, as particularly upon Love, where I have given the different Sentiments which Mankind, according to their several Temperaments, ever had, and ever will have of it; such may observe, that I have strictly avoided all manner of Obscenity throughout the whole Collection: And tho' here and there a Thought may perhaps have a Cast of Wantonness, yet the cleanly Metaphors palliate the Broadness of the Meaning, and the Chastness of the Words qualifies the Lasciviousness of the Images they represent. And let them farther know, that I have not always chosen what I most approv'd, but what carries with it the best Stroaks for Imitation: For, upon the whole matter, it was not my Business to judge any farther, than of the Vigour and Force of Thought, of the Purity of Language, of the Aptness and Propriety of Expression; and above all, of the Beauty of Colouring, in which the Poet's Art chiefly consists. Nor, in short, would I take upon me to determine what things should have been said; but have shewn only what are said, and in what manner.