reproduced] not [Greek text which cannot be reproduced]--that is,
prodigies, not words. It must be granted to Casaubon that the
knowledge of many things is lost in our modern ages which were of
familiar notice to the ancients, and that satire is a poem of a
difficult nature in itself, and is not written to vulgar readers;
and (through the relation which it has to comedy) the frequent
change of persons makes the sense perplexed, when we can but divine
who it is that speaks--whether Persius himself, or his friend and
monitor, or, in some places, a third person. But Casaubon comes
back always to himself, and concludes that if Persius had not been
obscure, there had been no need of him for an interpreter. Yet when
he had once enjoined himself so hard a task, he then considered the
Greek proverb, that he must [Greek text which cannot be reproduced]
(either eat the whole snail or let it quite alone); and so he went
through with his laborious task, as I have done with my difficult
translation.

Thus far, my lord, you see it has gone very hard with Persius. I
think he cannot be allowed to stand in competition either with
Juvenal or Horace. Yet, for once, I will venture to be so vain as
to affirm that none of his hard metaphors or forced expressions are
in my translation. But more of this in its proper place, where I
shall say somewhat in particular of our general performance in
making these two authors English. In the meantime I think myself
obliged to give Persius his undoubted due, and to acquaint the
world, with Casaubon, in what he has equalled and in what excelled
his two competitors.

A man who is resolved to praise an author with any appearance of
justice must be sure to take him on the strongest side, and where he