The Amyntas of Tasso/Dedication
TO THE
RIGHT HONOURABLE
THE
EARL of MORAY.
MY LORD,
This address, I hope, will have nothing of usual dedication except the name. The motives which induce me to request your attention to the following translation, will secure me from offering you any gross incense; which, though it may be agreeable to the great vulgar, must always be offensive to a delicate, and ingenuous mind. I should be loth to be guilty of such an irreverence to you, or myself. The farther I deviate on this occasion from almost all the models of other writers, the more worthy I shall be of your Lordship's approbation and esteem.
Many have politically prostituted praise to unworthy objects, with a view to their future establishment in life. I have not their prudence; nor do I wish to have it. Others, with a more airy, more innocent, and more mistaken folly, have imagined that a sounding title, and the flaming ensigns of heraldry prefixed to their works, would procure them success, and awe the world into an admiration of dulness. Whereas, in a free community like ours, where tyranny cannot check the generous impression of the Muses, it is certainly more the privilege of the poet to ennoble the peer, than of the peer to give credit to the poet.
The early excellence of your abilities, and morals at the University, and my intimacy with you there, have dictated to me this publick testimony of the respect I have for the Earl of Moray. We were happily acquainted in the best season of life, and friendship. We roved then, at large, through the sacred groves of poetry, and philosophy; the fiend, Care, had not yet diverted our attention to meaner objects. Our connection was not formed by the frail bands of interest, but by the stronger tie of congenial sentiments. Your Lordship chose me for a companion in those hours in which you unlocked your soul; and I admired it's brightness, without glancing one thought on the inferiour lustre of your birth, and fortune.
With regard to myself, I cannot dedicate this translation with more propriety to any one than to your Lordship, with whom I formerly had the honour to cultivate a most agreeable friendship, which was begun, cherished, and dignified by our love of letters. And I surely pay due veneration to the memory of Tasso, by intoducing his Amyntas in an English dress to one, who in reading a great poet, catches all that ethereal warmth which gives birth to his ideas.
I am,
My Lord,
With the greatest respect,
Your LORDSHIP's
Most faithful,
And obedient servant,
London,
Jan. 15, 1770.