Marcellinus fays, that fome who did deteft learning, did, notwithstanding, in their most profound retiredness, diligently employ themselves in his works. The attentive reader of Juvenal may fee, as in a glafs, a true portraiture of the Roman manners in his time: here he may fee, drawn to the life, a people funk in floth, luxury, and debauchery, and exhibiting to us the fad condition of human nature, when untaught by divine truth, and uninfluenced by a divine principle. However polite and refined this people was, with respect to the cultivation of letters, arts, and Sciences, beyond the most barbarous nations; yet, as to the true knowledge of God, they were upon a footing with the most uninformed of their cotemporaries, and confequently were, equally with them, funk into al. manner of wickedness and abomination. The description of the Gentiles in general, by St. Paul, Rom. i. 19-32. is fully verified as to the Romans in particular. Juvenal may be looked upon as one of those rare me teors, which shone forth even in the darkness of Heathenism. The mind and confcience of this great man were, though from * whence he knew not, so far enlightened, as to perceive the ugliness of vice, and fo influenced with a desire to reform it, as to make him, according to the light he had, a fevere and able re prover, a faithful and diligent witness against the vices and follies of the people among which he lived; * Rom. ii. 15. Comp. If. xlv. 5. See Sat. x. 1. 363, and note. and a 2 and, indeed, against all, who, like them, give a loose to their depraved appetites, as if there were no other liberty to be fought after, but the most unrestrained indulgence of vicious pleasures and gratifications. How far Rome-Chriftian, poffeffed of divine revelation, is better than Heathen Rome without it, is not for me to determine: but, I fear, that the perufal of Juvenal will furnish us with too ferious a reason to obferve, that, not only modern Rome, but every metropolis in the Christian world, as to the generality of its manners and pursuits, bears a most unhappy reSemblance to the objects of the following Satires. They are, therefore, too applicable to the times in which we live, and, in that view, if rightly understood, may perhaps be ferviceable to many, who will not come within the reach of higher instruction. ८८ Bishop Burnet obferves, that the "fatirical poets, Horace, Juvenal, and Perfius, may contribute wonderfully to give a man a detestation of vice, and a contempt of the common methods of mankind; which they have fet cut in fuch true colours, that they must give a very generous sense to those who delight in reading them often." Paft. Care, c. vii. This translation was begun fome years ago, at hours of leisure, for the Editor's own amusement : when, on adding the notes as he went along, be found it useful to himself, he began to think that it might be so to others, if pursued to the end on the same plan. The work was carried on, till it increased to a confiderable buík. The addition of Perfius enlarged it to its present size, in which it appears in print, with a design to add its assistance in explaining these difficult authors, not only to school-boys and young beginners, but to numbers in a more advanced age, who, by having been thrown into various Scenes of life, remote from classical improvement, have so far forgotten their Latin, as to render these elegant and instructive remains of antiquity almost inaccessible to their comprehenfion, however defirous they may be to renew their acquaintance with them. As to the old objection, that translations of the Classics tend to make boys idle, this can never happen, but through the fault of the master, in not properly watching over the method of their studies. A master should never fuffer à boy to construe bis lesson in the School, but from the Latin by itself, nor without making the boy parse, and give an account of every necessary word; this will drive him to his grammar and dictionary, near as much as if he had no tranflation at all: but in private, when the boy is preparing his lesson, a literal tranflation, and explanatory notes, fo facilitate the right comprehenfion, and understanding, of the author's language, meaning, and design, as to imprint them with ease on the learner's mind, to form his taste, and to enable him, not only to construe and explain, but to get those portions of the author by heart, which he is, at certain periods, to repeat in the school, and which, if judiciously felected, he may find useful, as well as ornamental to him, all his life. To this end, I have confidered, that there are three purpojes } purposes to be answered. First, that the reader should know what the author fays; this can only be attained by * literal translation : as for poetical versions, which are so often mifcalled translations, paraphrases, and the like, they are but ill calculated for this fundamental and necessary purpose. They remind one of a performer on a musical instrument, who shews his skill, by playing over a piece of mufic, with so many variations, as to disguise, almost entirely, the original fimple melody, infomuch that the bearers depart as ignorant of the merit of the composer, as they came. All translators should transfer to themselves the directions which our Shakespeare gives to actors, at leaft, if they mean to assist the student, by helping him to the construction, that he may understand the language of the author. As the actor is not " to o'erstep the modesty of nature"-so a translator is not to o'erstep the fimplicity of his text.-As an actor is “ not to speak more than is fet down for him"-fo a translator is not to exercise his own fancy, and let it loofe into phrases and expreffions, which are totally foreign from those of the author. He should therefore facrifice vanity to usefulness, and forego the praise of elegant writing, for the utility of faithful tranflation. * I trust that I shall not be reckoned guilty of inconfiftency, if, in some few passages, I have made use of paraphrafe, which I have so studiously avoided through the rest of the work, be. cause the literal sense of these is better obscured than explained, especially to young minds. The The next thing to be confidered, after knowing what the author fays, is how he says it; this can only be learnt from the original itself, to which I refer the reader, by printing the Latin, line for line, opposite to the English, and, as the lines are numbered, the eye will readily pass from the one to the other. The information which has been received from the tranflation, will readily assist in the grammatical construction. The third particular, without which the reader would fall very short of understanding the author, is, to know what he means; to explain this is the intention of V the notes, for many of which, I gratefully acknowledge myself chiefly indebted to various learned commentators, but who, having written in Latin, are almost out of the reach of those for whom this work is principally intended. Here and there, I have selected fome notes from English writers: this indeed the student might have done for himself; but I hope he will not take it amiss, that I have brought so many different commentators into one view, and faved much trouble to him, at the expence of my own labour. The rest of the notes, and those no inconfiderable number, perhaps the most, are my own, by which, if I have been happy enough to Jupply any deficiencies of others, I shall be glad. Upon the whole, I am, from long obfervation, most perfectly convinced, that the early disgust, which, in too many instances, youth is apt to conceive against laffical learning (So that the school-time is passed in a State |