"And this would lead me to the consideration of their Wit, had not CRITES given me sufficient warning, not to be too bold in my judgement of it; because (the languages being dead, and many of the customs and little accidents on which it depended lost to us [p. 518]) we are not competent judges of it. But though I grant that, here and there, we may miss the application of a proverb or a custom; yet, a thing well said, will be Wit in all languages: and, though it may lose something in the translation; yet, to him who reads it in the original, 'tis still the same. He has an Idea of its excellency; though it cannot pass from his mind into any other expression or words than those in which he finds it. "When _PHAEDRIA_, in the _Eunuch_, had a command from his mistress to be absent two days; and encouraging himself to go through with it, said, _Tandem ego non illa caream, si opus sit, vel totum triduum? PARMENO_ to mock the softness of his master, lifting up his hands and eyes, cries out, as it were in admiration, _Hui! universum triduum!_ The elegancy of which _universum_, though it cannot be rendered in our language; yet leaves an impression of the Wit on our souls. "But this happens seldom in him [_i.e., TERENCE_]; in PLAUTUS oftner, who is infinitely too bold in his metaphors and coining words; out of which, many times, his Wit is nothing. Which, questionless, was one reason why HORACE falls upon him so severely in those verses. "_Sed Proavi nostri Plautinos el numeros et Laudavere sales, nimium patienter utrumque Ne dicam stolidè_. "For HORACE himself was cautious to obtrude [_in obtruding_] a new word upon his readers: and makes custom and common use, the best measure of receiving it into our writings, "_Multa renascentur quae nunc cecidere, cadentque Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus Quem penes, arbitrium est, et jus, et norma loquendi_. "The not observing of this Rule, is that which the World has blamed in our satirist CLEVELAND. To express a thing hard and unnaturally is his New Way of Elocution. Tis true, no poet but may sometimes use a _catachresis_. VIRGIL, does it, "_Mistaque ridenti Colocasia fundet Acaniho_-- "in his Eclogue of _POLLIO_. "And in his Seventh AEneid-- "_Mirantur et unda, Miratur nemus, insuetam fulgentia longe, Scuta virum fluvio, pictaque innare carinas_. "And OVID once; so modestly, that he asks leave to do it. "_Si verbo audacia, detur Haud metuam summi dixisse Palatia coeli_ "calling the Court of JUPITER, by the name of AUGUSTUS his palace. Though, in another place, he is more bold; where he says, _Et longas visent Capitolia pompas_.