IV..

On JAMES CRAGGS, Efq;
in Westminster-Abbey.

JACOBUS CRAGGS,

REGI MAGNAE BRITANNIAE A SECRETIS

ET CONSILIIS SANCTIORIBVS

PRINCIPIS PARITER AC POPULI AMOR ET DELICIAE: VIXIT TITULIS ET INVIDIA MAJOR,

ANNOS HEV PAVCOS, XXXV.

OB. FEB. XVI. MDCCXX.

Statesman, yet friend to truth! of foul fincere,
In action faithful, and in honour clear !
Who broke no promife, ferv'd no private end,
Who gain'd no title, and who loft no friend;
Ennobled by himself, by all approv'd,

Prais'd, wept, and honour'd, by the Mufe he lov'd.

The lines on Craggs were not originally intended for an epitaph; and therefore fome faults are to be imputed to the violence with which they are torn from the poem that first contained them. We may, however, obferve fome defects. There is a redundancy of words in the firft couplet: it is fuperfluous to tell of him, who was fincere, true, and faithful, that he was in honour clear.

There seems to be an oppofition intended in the fourth line, which is not very obvious: where is the relation between the two pofitions, that he gained no title and loft no friend?

It may be proper here to remark the abfurdity of joining, in the fame infcription, Latin and Englith,

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lish, or verfe and profe. If either language be preferable to the other, let that only be ufed; for no reafon can be given why part of the information fhould be given in one tongue, and part in another, on à tomb, more than in any other place, on any other occafion; and to tell all that can be conveniently told in verfe, and then to call in the help of profe, has always the appearance of a very artlefs expedient, or of an attempt unaccomplished. Such an epitaph resembles the converfation of a foreigner, who tells part of his meaning by words, and conveys part by figns.

V.

Intended for Mr. Rowe.
In Westminster-Abbey.

Thy reliques, Rowe, to this fair urn we truft,
And, facred, place by Dryden's awful duft:
Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,
To which thy tomb fhall guide inquiring eyes.
Peace to thy gentle fhade, and endless reft!
Bleft in thy genius, in thy love too bleft!
One grateful woman to thy fame fupplies
What a whole thanklefs land to his denies.

Of this infcription the chief fault is, that it belongs lefs to Rowe, for whom it was written, than to Dryden, who was buried near him; and indeed gives very little information concerning either.

To wifh, Peace to thy fhade, is too mythological to be admitted into a chriftian temple: the ancient worship has infected almost all our other compositions, and might therefore be contented to spare our epitaphs.

Let

Let ftion, at least, cease with life, and let us be feri

ous over the grave.

VI.

On Mrs. CORBET,

who died of a Cancer in her Breaft *.

Here refts a woman, good without pretence,
Bleft with plain reason, and with fober sense:
No conquest she, but o'er herself defir'd;
No arts effay'd, but not to be adınir'd.
Paffion and pride were to her foul unknown,
Convinc'd that Virtue only is our own.
So unaffected, fo compos'd a mind,
So firm, yet soft, fo ftrong, yet fo refin❜d,
Heaven, as its pureft gold, by tortures try'd ;
The faint fuftain'd it, but the woman dy'd.

I have always confidered this as the most valuable of all Pope's epitaphs; the fubject of it is a character not difcriminated by any fhining or eminent peculiarities; yet that which really makes, though not the fplendor, the felicity of life, and that which every wife man will choose for his final and lafting companion in the languor of age, in the quiet of privacy, when he departs weary and difgufted from the oftentatious, the volatile, and the vain. Of fuch a character, which the dull overlook, and the gay defpife, it was fit that the value should be made known, and the dignity eftablished. Domeftick virtue, as it is exerted without great occafions, or confpicuous confequences, in an even unnoted tenor, required the genius of Pope to difplay it in fuch a manner as might attract regard, and enforce re

* In the north aile of the parish church of St. Margaret Weftminster.

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verence.

verence. Who can forbear to lament that this amiable woman has no name in the verses?

If the particular lines of this infcription be examined, it will appear lefs faulty than the reft. There is fcarce one line taken from common places, unless it be that in which only Virtue is faid to be our own. I once heard a Lady of great beauty and excellence object to the fourth line, that it contained an unnatural and incredible panegyrick. Of this let the Ladies judge.

VII.

On the Monument of the Hon. ROBERT DIGBY, and of his Sifter MARY, erected by their Father the Lord DIGBY, in the Church of Sherborne in Dorfetshire, 1727.

Go! fair example of untainted youth,
Of modest wisdom, and pacific truth:
Compos'd in fufferings, and in joy fedate,
Good without noife, without pretenfion great.
Juft of thy word, in every thought fincere,
Who knew no with but what the world might hear:
Of foftest manners, unaffected mind,

Lover of peace, and friend of human kind:
Go, live! for heaven's eternal year is thine,
Go, and exalt thy mortal to divine.

And thou, blest maid' attendant on his doom,
Penfive haft follow'd to the filent tomb,
Steer'd the fame courfe to the fame quiet fhore,
Not parted long, and now to part no more!
Go, then, where only blifs fincere is known!
Go, where to love and to enjoy are one!

Yet take these tears, Mortality's relief,
And till we share your joys, forgive our grief:
Thefe little rites, a ftone, a verfe receive,
'Tis all a father, all a friend can give!

This epitaph contains of the brother only a general indifcriminate character, and of the fifter tells nothing but that he died. The difficulty in writing epitaphs is to give a particular and appropriate praife. This, however, is not always to be performed, whatever be the diligence or ability of the writer; for the greater part of mankind have no character at all, have little that diftinguishes them from others equally good or bad, and therefore nothing can be faid of them which may not be applied with equal propriety to a thousand more. It is indeed no great panegyrick, that there is inclosed in this tomb one who was born in one year, and died in another; yet many useful and amiable lives have been spent, which yet leave little materials for other memorial. These are however not the any proper fubjects of poetry; and whenever friendship, or any other motive, obliges a poet to write on fuch fubjects, he must be forgiven if he fometimes wanders in generalities, and utters the fame praises over different tombs.

The fcantinefs of human praises can scarcely be made more apparent, than by remarking how often Pope has, in the few epitaphs which he compofed, found it neceffary to borrow from himself. The fourteen epitaphs, which he has written, comprise about an hundred and forty lines, in which there are more repetitions than will eafily be found in all the rest of his works. In the eight lines which make the character of Digby, there is fcarce any thought, or word, which may not be found in the other epitaphs,

The ninth line, which is far the strongest and most elegant, is borrowed from Dryden. The conclufion is