s, their features, and the very dress, as distinctly
as if I had supped with them at the Tabard in Southwark: yet even there
too the figures in Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better
light; which though I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the
reader, and am sure he will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and
words remain to be considered in the comparison of the two poets; and I
have saved myself one half of that labour, by owning that Ovid lived
when the Roman tongue was in its meridian; Chaucer, in the dawning of
our language: therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an
equal foot, any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid; or of Chaucer
and our present English. The words are given up as a post not to be
defended in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying.
The thoughts remain to be considered; and they are to be measured only
by their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from
the persons described, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges,
which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and
jingles wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether without
them, will think me little less than mad for preferring the Englishman
to the Roman; yet, with their leave, I must presume to say, that the
things they admire are only glittering trifles, and so far from being
witty, that in a serious poem they are nauseous, because they are
unnatural. Would any man, who is ready to die for love, describe his
passion like Narcissus? Would he think of _inopem me copia fecit_, and a
dozen more of such expressions, poured on the neck of one another, and
signifying all the same thing? If this were wit, was this a time to be
witty, when the poor wretch was in the agony of death? This is just John
Littlewit in Bartholomew Fair, who had a conceit (as he tells you) left
him in his misery; a miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet
should endeavour to raise pity; but instead of this, Ovid is tickling
you to laugh. Virgil never made use of such machines, when he was moving
you to commiserate the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was
building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the
pursuit of it; yet when he came to die, he made him think more
reasonably: he repents not of his love, for that had altered his
character; but acknowledges the injustice of his proceedings, and
resigns Emilia to Palamon. What would Ovid ha