THE

ART OF PAINTING,

OF

CHARLES ALPHONSE DU FRESNOY;

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH VERSE

BY WILLIAM MASON, M. A.

WITH ANNOTATIONS

BY SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

VOL. III.

EPISTLE

то

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

WHEN Dryden, worn with sickness,

bow'd with years,

Was doom'd (my friend, let pity warm thy tears,)
The galling pang of penury to feel,

For ill-placed loyalty, and courtly zeal,
To see that laurel, which his brows o'erspread,
Transplanted droop on Shadwell's barren head,
The Bard oppress'd, yet not subdued by fate,
For very bread descended to translate:

And he, whose fancy, copious as his phrase,
Could light at will expression's brightest blaze,
On Fresnoy's lay employ'd his studious hour;
But niggard there of that melodious power,
pen in haste the hireling task to close
Transform'd the studied strain to careless

His

prose,

Which, fondly lending faith to French pretence, Mistook its meaning, or obscur'd its sense.

Yet still he pleas'd, for Dryden still must

please,

Whether with artless elegance and ease

He glides in prose, or from its tinkling chime, By varied pauses, purifies his rhyme,

And mounts on Maro's plumes, and soars his heights sublime.

This artless elegance, this native fire Provok'd his tuneful heir* to strike the lyre, Who, proud his numbers with that prose to join, Wove an illustrious wreath for friendship's shrine.

How oft, on that fair shrine when Poets bind The flowers of song, does partial passion blind Their judgment's eye! How oft does truth disclaim

The deed, and scorn to call it genuine fame!

* Mr. Pope, in his epiftle to Jervas, has these lines:

Read these instructive leaves, in which conspire
Fresnoy's close art with Dryden's native fire.