Note 55 — PREFACE ON TRANSLATION, PREFIXED TO DRYDEN's SECOND MISCELLANY, PUBLISHED IN 1685.

Thomas Creech, a particular friend of our author. He was born in 1659, and in June 1700 committed suicide; for which rash action no adequate cause has been assigned. Besides the translation of Lucretius, which is his principal work, he executed an indifferent version of Horace, and translated parts of Theocritus, Ovid, Juvenal, Virgil, &c. In his translation of Lucretius, he omitted the indelicate part of the Fourth Book; a deficiency which Dryden thought fit to supply, for which he has above assigned some very inadequate reasons. Creech's Lucretius first appeared at Oxford, in 8vo, 1682, and was reprinted in the year following. The annotations, to which our author alludes a little lower, were originally attached to a Latin edition of Lucretius, superintended by Creech, and afterwards transferred to his English version. They display great learning, and an intimate acquaintance with the Epicurean philosophy.