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diff --git a/5101-h/5101-h.htm b/5101-h/5101-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7f7697b --- /dev/null +++ b/5101-h/5101-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7042 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>The Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore and Pope, by Samuel Johnson</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + P.gutsumm { margin-left: 5%;} + P.poetry {margin-left: 3%; } + .GutSmall { font-size: 0.7em; } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4, H5 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + table { border-collapse: collapse; } +table {margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto;} + td { vertical-align: top; border: 1px solid black;} + td p { margin: 0.2em; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: small; + text-align: right; + font-weight: normal; + color: gray; + } + img { border: none; } + img.dc { float: left; width: 50px; height: 50px; } + p.gutindent { margin-left: 2em; } + div.gapspace { height: 0.8em; } + div.gapline { height: 0.8em; width: 100%; border-top: 1px solid;} + div.gapmediumline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + div.gapmediumdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; + margin-left: 40%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid; } + div.gapdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 50%; + margin-left: 25%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; margin-left:40%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + img.floatleft { float: left; + margin-right: 1em; + margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.floatright { float: right; + margin-left: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.clearcenter {display: block; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em} + --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Lives of the English Poets: Prior, +Congreve, Blackmore and Pope, by Samuel Johnson, Edited by Henry Morley + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: The Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore and Pope + + +Author: Samuel Johnson + +Editor: Henry Morley + +Release Date: February 8, 2015 [eBook #5101] +[This file was first posted on April 26, 2002] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIVES OF THE ENGLISH POETS: +PRIOR, CONGREVE, BLACKMORE AND POPE*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1891 Cassell and Company edition by David +Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">CASSELL’S NATIONAL LIBRARY.</span></p> + +<div class="gapshortline"> </div> +<h1>LIVES<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">OF THE</span><br /> +<span class="smcap">English Poets</span></h1> +<p style="text-align: center"><b>Prior</b> +<b>Congreve</b> <b>Blackmore</b> +<b>Pope</b></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY</span><br +/> +SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/tpb.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Decorative graphic" +title= +"Decorative graphic" + src="images/tps.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p style="text-align: center">CASSELL & COMPANY. <span +class="smcap">Limited</span>:<br /> +<span class="GutSmall"><i>LONDON</i></span><span +class="GutSmall">, </span><span +class="GutSmall"><i>PARIS</i></span><span class="GutSmall"> & +</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>MELBOURNE</i></span><span +class="GutSmall">.</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">1891.</span></p> +<h2>INTRODUCTION.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">When</span>, at the age of sixty-eight, +Johnson was writing these “Lives of the English +Poets,” he had caused omissions to be made from the poems +of Rochester, and was asked whether he would allow the printers +to give all the verse of Prior. Boswell quoted a censure by +Lord Hailes of “those impure tales which will be the +eternal opprobrium of their ingenious author.” +Johnson replied, “Sir, Lord Hailes has forgot. There +is nothing in Prior that will excite to lewdness;” and when +Boswell further urged, he put his questionings aside, and added, +“No, sir, Prior is a lady’s book. No lady is +ashamed to have it standing in her library.” Johnson +distinguished strongly, as every wise man does, between offence +against convention, and offence against morality.</p> +<p>In Congreve’s plays he recognised the wit but condemned +the morals, and in the case of Blackmore the regard for the +religious purpose of Blackmore’s poem on “The +Creation” gave to Johnson, as to Addison, an undue sense of +its literary value.</p> +<p>With his “Life of Pope,” which occupies more than +two-thirds of this volume, Johnson took especial pains. +“He wrote it,” says Boswell, “‘<i>con +amore</i>,’ both from the early possession which that +writer had taken of his mind, and from the pleasure which he must +have felt in for ever silencing all attempts to lessen his +poetical fame. . . . I remember once to have heard Johnson say, +‘Sir, a thousand years may elapse before there shall appear +another man with a power of versification equal to that of +Pope.’”</p> +<p>Pope’s laurel, since Johnson’s days, has +flourished, without showing a dead bough, for all the frosts of +hostile criticism.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">H. M.</p> +<h2>PRIOR.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Matthew Prior</span> is one of those that +have burst out from an obscure original to great eminence. +He was born July 21, 1664, according to some, at Wimborne, in +Dorsetshire, of I know not what parents; others say that he was +the son of a joiner of London: he was perhaps willing enough to +leave his birth unsettled, in hope, like Don Quixote, that the +historian of his actions might find him some illustrious +alliance. He is supposed to have fallen, by his +father’s death, into the hands of his uncle, a vintner near +Charing Cross, who sent him for some time to Dr. Busby, at +Westminster; but, not intending to give him any education beyond +that of the school, took him, when he was well advanced in +literature, to his own house, where the Earl of Dorset, +celebrated for patronage of genius, found him by chance, as +Burnet relates, reading Horace, and was so well pleased with his +proficiency, that he undertook the care and cost of his +academical education. He entered his name in St. +John’s College, at Cambridge, in 1682, in his eighteenth +year; and it may be reasonably supposed that he was distinguished +among his contemporaries. He became a Bachelor, as is +usual, in four years, and two years afterwards wrote the poem on +the Deity, which stands first in his volume.</p> +<p>It is the established practice of that College to send every +year to the Earl of Exeter some poems upon sacred subjects, in +acknowledgment of a benefaction enjoyed by them from the bounty +of his ancestor. On this occasion were those verses +written, which, though nothing is said of their success, seem to +have recommended him to some notice; for his praise of the +countess’s music, and his lines on the famous picture of +Seneca, afford reason for imagining that he was more or less +conversant with that family.</p> +<p>The same year he published “The City Mouse and Country +Mouse,” to ridicule Dryden’s “Hind and +Panther,” in conjunction with Mr. Montague. There is +a story of great pain suffered, and of tears shed, on this +occasion by Dryden, who thought it hard that “an old man +should be so treated by those to whom he had always been +civil.” By tales like these is the envy raised by +superior abilities every day gratified. When they are +attacked every one hopes to see them humbled; what is hoped is +readily believed, and what is believed is confidently told. +Dryden had been more accustomed to hostilities than that such +enemies should break his quiet; and, if we can suppose him vexed, +it would be hard to deny him sense enough to conceal his +uneasiness.</p> +<p>“The City Mouse and Country Mouse” procured its +authors more solid advantages than the pleasure of fretting +Dryden, for they were both speedily preferred. Montague, +indeed, obtained the first notice with some degree of discontent, +as it seems, in Prior, who probably knew that his own part of the +performance was the best. He had not, however, much reason +to complain, for he came to London and obtained such notice that +(in 1691) he was sent to the Congress at the Hague as secretary +to the embassy. In this assembly of princes and nobles, to +which Europe has perhaps scarcely seen anything equal, was formed +the grand alliance against Louis, which at last did not produce +effects proportionate so the magnificence of the transaction.</p> +<p>The conduct of Prior, in this splendid initiation into public +business, was so pleasing to King William, that he made him one +of the gentlemen of his bedchamber; and he is supposed to have +passed some of the next years in the quiet cultivation of +literature and poetry.</p> +<p>The death of Queen Mary (in 1695) produced a subject for all +the writers—perhaps no funeral was ever so poetically +attended. Dryden, indeed, as a man discountenanced and +deprived, was silent; but scarcely any other maker of verses +omitted to bring his tribute of tuneful sorrow. An +emulation of elegy was universal. Mary’s praise was +not confined to the English language, but fills a great part of +the <i>Musæ Anglicanæ</i>.</p> +<p>Prior, who was both a poet and a courtier, was too diligent to +miss this opportunity of respect. He wrote a long ode, +which was presented to the king, by whom it was not likely to be +ever read. In two years he was secretary to another embassy +at the Treaty of Ryswick (in 1697), and next year had the same +office at the court of France, where he is said to have been +considered with great distinction. As he was one day +surveying the apartments at Versailles, being shown the +“Victories of Louis,” painted by Le Brun, and asked +whether the King of England’s palace had any such +decorations: “The monuments of my master’s +actions,” said he, “are to be seen everywhere but in +his own house.”</p> +<p>The pictures of Le Brun are not only in themselves +sufficiently ostentatious, but were explained by inscriptions so +arrogant, that Boileau and Racine thought it necessary to make +them more simple. He was in the following year at Leo with +the king, from whom, after a long audience, he carried orders to +England, and upon his arrival became Under Secretary of State in +the Earl of Jersey’s office, a post which he did not retain +long, because Jersey was removed, but he was soon made +Commissioner of Trade.</p> +<p>This year (1700) produced one of his longest and most splendid +compositions, the “Carmen Seculare,” in which he +exhausts all his powers of celebration. I mean not to +accuse him of flattery; he probably thought all that he writ, and +retained as much veracity as can be properly exacted from a poet +professedly encomiastic. King William supplied copious +materials for either verse or prose. His whole life had +been action, and none ever denied him the resplendent qualities +of steady resolution and personal courage. He was really in +Prior’s mind what he represents him in his verses; he +considered him as a hero, and was accustomed to say that he +praised others in compliance with the fashion, but that in +celebrating King William he followed his inclination. To +Prior, gratitude would dictate praise, which reason would not +refuse.</p> +<p>Among the advantages to arise from the future years of +William’s reign, he mentions a Society for Useful Arts, and +among them:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Some that with care true eloquence shall +teach,<br /> +And to just idioms fix our doubtful speech;<br /> +That from our writers distant realms may know<br /> + The thanks we to our monarchs owe,<br /> +And schools profess our tongue through every land<br /> +That has invoked his aid, or blessed his hand.”</p> +<p>Tickell, in his “Prospect of Peace,” has the same +hope of a new academy:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“In happy chains our daring language +bound,<br /> +Shall sport no more in arbitrary sound.”</p> +<p>Whether the similitude of those passages, which exhibit the +same thought on the same occasion, proceeded from accident or +imitation, is not easy to determine. Tickell might have +been impressed with his expectation by Swift’s +“Proposal for Ascertaining the English Language,” +then lately published.</p> +<p>In the Parliament that met in 1701 he was chosen +representative of East Grinstead. Perhaps it was about this +time that he changed his party, for he voted for the impeachment +of those lords who had persuaded the king to the Partition +Treaty, a treaty in which he himself had been ministerially +employed.</p> +<p>A great part of Queen Anne’s reign was a time of war, in +which there was little employment for negotiators, and Prior had, +therefore, leisure to make or to polish verses. When the +Battle of Blenheim called forth all the verse-men, Prior, among +the rest, took care to show his delight in the increasing honour +of his country by an epistle to Boileau. He published, soon +afterwards, a volume of poems, with the encomiastic character of +his deceased patron, the Earl of Dorset. It began with the +College exercise, and ended with the “Nutbrown +Maid.”</p> +<p>The Battle of Ramillies soon afterwards (in 1706) excited him +to another effort of poetry. On this occasion he had fewer +or less formidable rivals, and it would be not easy to name any +other composition produced by that event which is now +remembered.</p> +<p>Everything has its day. Through the reigns of William +and Anne no prosperous event passed undignified by poetry. +In the last war, when France was disgraced and overpowered in +every quarter of the globe, when Spain, coming to her assistance, +only shared her calamities, and the name of an Englishman was +reverenced through Europe, no poet was heard amidst the general +acclamation; the fame of our counsellors and heroes was entrusted +to the <i>Gazetteer</i>. The nation in time grew weary of +the war, and the queen grew weary of her ministers. The war +was burdensome, and the ministers were insolent. Harley and +his friends began to hope that they might, by driving the Whigs +from court and from power, gratify at once the queen and the +people. There was now a call for writers, who might convey +intelligence of past abuses, and show the waste of public money, +the unreasonable conduct of the allies, the avarice of generals, +the tyranny of minions, and the general danger of approaching +ruin. For this purpose a paper called the <i>Examiner</i> +was periodically published, written, as it happened, by any wit +of the party, and sometimes, as is said, by Mrs. Manley. +Some are owned by Swift; and one, in ridicule of Garth’s +verses to Godolphin upon the loss of his place, was written by +Prior, and answered by Addison, who appears to have known the +author either by conjecture or intelligence.</p> +<p>The Tories, who were now in power, were in haste to end the +war, and Prior, being recalled (1710) to his former employment of +making treaties, was sent (July, 1711) privately to Paris with +propositions of peace. He was remembered at the French +court; and, returning in about a month, brought with him the +Abbé Gaultier and M. Mesnager, a minister from France, +invested with full powers. This transaction not being +avowed, Mackay, the master of the Dover packet-boat, either +zealously or officiously, seized Prior and his associates at +Canterbury. It is easily supposed they were soon +released.</p> +<p>The negotiation was begun at Prior’s house, where the +queen’s ministers met Mesnager (September 20, 1711), and +entered privately upon the great business. The importance +of Prior appears from the mention made of him by St. John in his +letter to the queen:—</p> +<p>“My Lord Treasurer moved, and all my Lords were of the +same opinion, that Mr. Prior should be added to those who are +empowered to sign; the reason for which is because he, having +personally treated with Monsieur de Torcy, is the best witness we +can produce of the sense in which the general preliminary +engagements are entered into; besides which, as he is the best +versed in matters of trade of all your Majesty’s servants +who have been trusted in this secret, if you shall think fit to +employ him in the future treaty of commerce, it will be of +consequence that he has been a party concerned in concluding that +convention, which must be the rule of this treaty.”</p> +<p>The assembly of this important night was in some degree +clandestine, the design of treaty not being yet openly declared +and when the Whigs returned to power was aggravated to a charge +of high treason; though, as Prior remarks in his imperfect answer +to the Report of the Committee of Secrecy, no treaty ever was +made without private interviews and preliminary discussions.</p> +<p>My business is not the history of the peace, but the life of +Prior. The conferences began at Utrecht on the 1st of +January (1711–12), and the English plenipotentiaries +arrived on the 15th. The ministers of the different +potentates conferred and conferred; but the peace advanced so +slowly that speedier methods were found necessary, and +Bolingbroke was sent to Paris to adjust differences with less +formality. Prior either accompanied him or followed him, +and after his departure had the appointments and authority of an +ambassador, though no public character. By some mistake of +the queen’s orders the court of France had been disgusted, +and Bolingbroke says in his letter, “Dear Mat,—Hide +the nakedness of thy country, and give the best turn thy fertile +brain will furnish thee with to the blunders of thy countrymen, +who are not much better politicians than the French are +poets.”</p> +<p>Soon after, the Duke of Shrewsbury went on a formal embassy to +Paris. It is related by Boyer that the intention was to +have joined Prior in the commission, but that Shrewsbury refused +to be associated with a man so meanly born. Prior therefore +continued to act without a title till the duke returned next year +to England, and then he assumed the style and dignity of +ambassador. But while he continued in appearance a private +man, he was treated with confidence by Louis, who sent him with a +letter to the queen, written in favour of the Elector of +Bavaria. “I shall expect,” says he, “with +impatience, the return of Mr. Prior, whose conduct is very +agreeable to me.” And while the Duke of Shrewsbury +was still at Paris, Bolingbroke wrote to Prior +thus:—“Monsieur de Torcy has a confidence in you; +make use of it, once for all, upon this occasion, and convince +him thoroughly that we must give a different turn to our +Parliament and our people according to their resolution at this +crisis.”</p> +<p>Prior’s public dignity and splendour commenced in +August, 1713, and continued till the August following; but I am +afraid that, according to the usual fate of greatness, it was +attended with some perplexities and mortifications. He had +not all that is customarily given to ambassadors: he hints to the +queen in an imperfect poem that he had no service of plate; and +it appeared by the debts which he contracted that his remittances +were not punctually made.</p> +<p>On the 1st of August, 1714, ensued the downfall of the Tories +and the degradation of Prior. He was recalled, but was not +able to return, being detained by the debts which he had found it +necessary to contract, and which were not discharged before +March, though his old friend Montague was now at the head of the +Treasury. He returned, then, as soon as he could, and was +welcomed on the 25th of March by a warrant, but was, however, +suffered to live in his own house, under the custody of the +messenger, till he was examined before a committee of the Privy +Council, of which Mr. Walpole was chairman, and Lord Coningsby, +Mr. Stanhope, and Mr. Lechmere were the principal interrogators, +who, in this examination, of which there is printed an account +not unentertaining, behaved with the boisterousness of men elated +by recent authority. They are represented as asking +questions sometimes vague, sometimes insidious, and writing +answers different from those which they received. Prior, +however, seems to have been overpowered by their turbulence; for +he confesses that he signed what, if he had ever come before a +legal judicature, he should have contradicted or explained +away. The oath was administered by Boscawen, a Middlesex +justice, who at last was going to write his attestation on the +wrong side of the paper. They were very industrious to find +some charge against Oxford, and asked Prior, with great +earnestness, who was present when the preliminary articles were +talked of or signed at his house? He told them that either +the Earl of Oxford or the Duke of Shrewsbury was absent, but he +could not remember which, an answer which perplexed them, because +it supplied no accusation against either. “Could +anything be more absurd,” says he, “or more inhuman, +than to propose to me a question, by the answering of which I +might, according to them, prove myself a traitor? And +notwithstanding their solemn promise that nothing which I should +say should hurt myself, I had no reason to trust them, for they +violated that promise about five hours after. However, I +owned I was there present. Whether this was wisely done or +no I leave to my friends to determine.” When he had +signed the paper, he was told by Walpole that the committee were +not satisfied with his behaviour, nor could give such an account +of it to the Commons as might merit favour; and that they now +thought a stricter confinement necessary than to his own +house. “Here,” says he, “Boscawen played +the moralist, and Coningsby the Christian, but both very +awkwardly.” The messenger, in whose custody he was to +be placed, was then called, and very indecently asked by +Coningsby “if his house was secured by bars and +bolts.” The messenger answered, “No,” +with astonishment. At which Coningsby very angrily said, +“Sir, you must secure this prisoner; it is for the safety +of the nation: if he escape, you shall answer for it.”</p> +<p>They had already printed their report; and in this examination +were endeavouring to find proofs.</p> +<p>He continued thus confined for some time; and Mr. Walpole +(June 10, 1715) moved for an impeachment against him. What +made him so acrimonious does not appear; he was by nature no +thirster for blood. Prior was a week after committed to +close custody, with orders that “no person should be +admitted to see him without leave from the Speaker.” +When, two years after, an Act of Grace was passed, he was +excepted, and continued still in custody, which he had made less +tedious by writing his “Alma.” He was, however, +soon after discharged. He had now his liberty, but he had +nothing else. Whatever the profit of his employments might +have been, he had always spent it; and at the age of fifty-three +was, with all his abilities, in danger of penury, having yet no +solid revenue but from the fellowship of his college, which, when +in his exaltation he was censured for retaining it, he said he +could live upon at last. Being, however, generally known +and esteemed, he was encouraged to add other poems to those which +he had printed, and to publish them by subscription. The +expedient succeeded by the industry of many friends, who +circulated the proposals, and the care of some who, it is said, +withheld the money from him lest he should squander it. The +price of the volume was two guineas; the whole collection was +four thousand; to which Lord Harley, the son of the Earl of +Oxford, to whom he had invariably adhered, added an equal sum for +the purchase of Down Hall, which Prior was to enjoy during life, +and Harley after his decease. He had now, what wits and +philosophers have often wished, the power of passing the day in +contemplative tranquillity. But it seems that busy men +seldom live long in a state of quiet. It is not unlikely +that his health declined, he complains of deafness; +“for,” says he, “I took little care of my ears +while I was not sure if my head was my own.”</p> +<p>Of any occurrences of his remaining life I have found no +account. In a letter to Swift, “I have,” says +he, “treated Lady Harriet, at Cambridge (a Fellow of a +College treat!) and spoke verses to her in a gown and cap! +What, the plenipotentiary, so far concerned in the damned peace +at Utrecht; the man that makes up half the volume of terse prose, +that makes up the report of the committee, speaking verses! +<i>Sic est</i>, <i>homo sum</i>.”</p> +<p>He died at Wimpole, a seat of the Earl of Oxford, on the 18th +of September, 1721, and was buried in Westminster; where on a +monument, for which, as the “last piece of human +vanity,” he left five hundred pounds, is engraven this +epitaph:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">Sui Temporis Historiam +meditanti,<br /> +Paulatim obrepens Febris<br /> +Operi simul et Vitæ filum abrupit,<br /> +Sept. 18. An. Dom. 1721. Ætat. 57.<br /> +H.S.E.<br /> +Vir Eximius Serenissimis<br /> +Regi <span class="smcap">Gulielmo</span> Reginæque <span +class="smcap">Mariæ</span><br /> +In Congressione Fœderatorum<br /> +Hagæ anno 1690 celebrata,<br /> +Deinde Magnæ Britanniæ Legatis<br /> +Tum iis,<br /> +Qui anno 1697 Pacem <span class="smcap">Ryswicki</span> +confecerunt,<br /> +Tum iis,<br /> +Qui apud Gallos annie proximis Legationem obierunt<br /> +Eodem etiani anno 1657 in Hiberniâ<br /> +<span class="smcap">Secretarius</span>;<br /> +Necnon in utroque Honorabili consessu<br /> +Eorum,<br /> +Qui anno 1700 ordinandis Commercii negotiis,<br /> +Quique anno 1711 dirigendis Portorii rebus,<br /> +Præidebant,<br /> +<span class="smcap">Commissionarius</span>;<br /> +Postremo ab <span class="smcap">Anna</span>,<br /> +Felicissimæ memoriæ Reginâ,<br /> +Ad <span class="smcap">Ludovicum</span> XIV. Galliæ +Regem<br /> +Missus anno 1711<br /> +De Pace stabiliendâ<br /> +(Pace etiam num durante<br /> +Diuque ut boni jam omnes sperant duraturâ),<br /> +Cum sunmâ potestate Legatus;<br /> +MATTHÆS PRIOR Armiger<br /> +Qui<br /> +Hos omnes, quibus cumulates est, Titulos<br /> +Humanitatis, Ingenii, Ereditionis laude<br /> +Superavit;<br /> +Cui enim nascenti faciles arriserant Mesæ.<br /> +Hunc Puerum Schola hîc Regia perpolivit;<br /> +Jevenem in Collegio S’ti Johannis<br /> +Cantabrigia optimis Scientiis instruxit;<br /> +Virum denique auxit, et perfecit,<br /> +Multa cum viris Principibus censuetudo;<br /> +Ita natus, ita institutus,<br /> +A Vatam Choro avelli numquam potuit,<br /> +Sed solebat sæpe rerum civilium gravitatem<br /> +Amœniorum Literarum Studiis condire:<br /> +Et cum omne adeo Poeticës genus<br /> +Haud infeliciter tentaret,<br /> +Tum in Fabellis concinne lepideque texendis<br /> +Mirus Artifex<br /> +Neminem habuit parem.<br /> +Hæc liberalis animi oblectamenta:<br /> +Quam nullo illi labore constiterint,<br /> +Facile ii perspexêre, quibus usus est Amici;<br /> +Apud quos Urbanitatem et Leporum plenus<br /> +Cum ad rem, quæcunque forte inciderat,<br /> +Aptè varie copiosèque alluderet,<br /> +Interea nihil quæsitum, nihil vi expressum<br /> +Videbatur,<br /> +Sed omnia ultro effluere,<br /> +Et quasi jugi è foote affatim exuberare,<br /> +Ita suos tandem dubios reliquit,<br /> +Essetne in Scriptis, Poeta Elegantior,<br /> +An in Convictu, Comes Jocundior.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Of Prior, eminent as he was, both by his abilities and +station, very few memorials have been left by his contemporaries; +the account, therefore, must now be destitute of his private +character and familiar practices. He lived at a time when +the rage of party detected all which it was any man’s +interest to hide; and, as little ill is heard of Prior, it is +certain that not much was known. He was not afraid of +provoking censure; for when he forsook the Whigs, under whose +patronage he first entered the world, he became a Tory so ardent +and determinate, that he did not willingly consort with men of +different opinions. He was one of the sixteen Tories who +met weekly, and agreed to address each other by the title of +<i>Brother</i>; and seems to have adhered, not only by +concurrence of political designs, but by peculiar affection, to +the Earl of Oxford and his family. With how much confidence +he was trusted has been already told.</p> +<p>He was, however, in Pope’s opinion, fit only to make +verses, and less qualified for business than Addison +himself. This was surely said without consideration. +Addison, exalted to a high place, was forced into degradation by +the sense of his own incapacity; Prior, who was employed by men +very capable of estimating his value, having been secretary to +one embassy, had, when great abilities were again wanted, the +same office another time; and was, after so much experience of +his own knowledge and dexterity, at last sent to transact a +negotiation in the highest degree arduous and important, for +which he was qualified, among other requisites, in the opinion of +Bolingbroke, by his influence upon the French minister, and by +skill in questions of commerce above other men.</p> +<p>Of his behaviour in the lighter parts of life, it is too late +to get much intelligence. One of his answers to a boastful +Frenchman has been related; and to an impertinent he made another +equally proper. During his embassy he sat at the opera by a +man who, in his rapture, accompanied with his own voice the +principal singer.</p> +<p>Prior fell to railing at the performer with all the terms of +reproach that he could collect, till the Frenchman, ceasing from +his song, began to expostulate with him for his harsh censure of +a man who was confessedly the ornament of the stage. +“I know all that,” says the ambassador, “mais +il chante si haut, que je ne sçaurois vous +entendre.”</p> +<p>In a gay French company, where every one sang a little song or +stanza, of which the burden was “Bannissons la +Mélancolie,” when it came to his turn to sing, after +the performance of a young lady that sat next him, he produced +these extemporary lines:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Mais cette voix, et ces beaux yeux,<br +/> +Font Cupidon trop dangereux,<br /> +Et je suis triste quand je crie<br /> +Bannissons la Mélancolie.”</p> +<p>Tradition represents him as willing to descend from the +dignity of the poet and statesman to the low delights of mean +company. His Chloe probably was sometimes ideal: but the +woman with whom he cohabited was a despicable drab of the lowest +species. One of his wenches, perhaps Chloe, while he was +absent from his house, stole his plate and ran away, as was +related by a woman who had been his servant. Of his +propensity to sordid converse, I have seen an account so +seriously ridiculous, that it seems to deserve insertion.</p> +<p>“I have been assured that Prior, after having spent the +evening with Oxford, Bolingbroke, Pope, and Swift, would go and +smoke a pipe and drink a bottle of ale with a common soldier and +his wife in Long Acre before he went to bed, not from any remains +of the lowness of his original, as one said, but I suppose that +his faculties—</p> +<p class="poetry">“‘—strained to the height,<br +/> +In that celestial colloquy sublime,<br /> +Dazzled and spent, sunk down, and sought +repair.’”</p> +<p>Poor Prior; why was he so <i>strained</i>, and in such <i>want +of repair</i>, after a conversation with men not, in the opinion +of the world, much wiser than himself? But such are the +conceits of speculatists, who <i>strain</i> their +<i>faculties</i> to find in a mine what lies upon the +surface. His opinions, so far as the means of judging are +left us, seem to have been right; but his life was, it seems, +irregular, negligent, and sensual.</p> + +<div class="gapshortline"> </div> +<p><span class="smcap">Prior</span> has written with great +variety, and his variety has made him popular. He has tried +all styles, from the grotesque to the solemn, and has not so +failed in any as to incur derision or disgrace. His works +may be distinctly considered as comprising Tales, Love Verses, +Occasional Poems, “Alma,” and +“Solomon.”</p> +<p>His tales have obtained general approbation, being written +with great familiarity and great sprightliness; the language is +easy, but seldom gross, and the numbers smooth, without +appearance of care. Of these tales there are only four: +“The Ladle,” which is introduced by a preface, +neither necessary nor pleasing, neither grave nor merry. +“Paulo Purganti,” which has likewise a preface, but +of more value than the tale. “Hans Carvel,” not +over-decent; and “Protogenes and Apelles,” an old +story mingled, by an affectation not disagreeable, with modern +images. “The Young Gentleman in Love” has +hardly a just claim to the title of a tale. I know not +whether he be the original author of any tale which he has given +us. The adventure of Hans Carvel has passed through many +successions of merry wits, for it is to be found in +Ariosto’s “Satires,” and is perhaps yet +older. But the merit of such stories is the art of telling +them.</p> +<p>In his amorous effusions he is less happy; for they are not +dictated by nature or by passion, and have neither gallantry nor +tenderness. They have the coldness of Cowley, without his +wit, the dull exercises of a skilful versifier, resolved at all +adventures to write something about Chloe, and trying to be +amorous by dint of study. His fictions, therefore, are +mythological. Venus, after the example of the Greek +epigram, asks when she was seen <i>naked and bathing</i>. +Then Cupid is <i>mistaken</i>; then Cupid is <i>disarmed</i>; +then he loses his darts to Ganymede; then Jupiter sends him a +summons by Mercury. Then Chloe goes a-hunting with an +<i>ivory quiver graceful at her side</i>; Diana mistakes her for +one of her nymphs, and Cupid laughs at the blunder. All +this is surely despicable; and even when he tries to act the +lover without the help of gods or goddesses, his thoughts are +unaffecting or remote. He talks not “like a man of +this world.”</p> +<p>The greatest of all his amorous essays is “Henry and +Emma,” a dull and tedious dialogue, which excites neither +esteem for the man nor tenderness for the woman. The +example of Emma, who resolves to follow an outlawed murderer +wherever fear and guilt shall drive him, deserves no imitation; +and the experiment by which Henry tries the lady’s +constancy is such as must end either in infamy to her or in +disappointment to himself.</p> +<p>His occasional poems necessarily lost part of their value, as +their occasions, being less remembered, raised less emotion, Some +of them, however, are preserved by their inherent +excellence. The burlesque of Boileau’s ode on Namur +has in some parts such airiness and levity as will always procure +it readers, even among those who cannot compare it with the +original. The epistle to Boileau is not so happy. The +“Poems to the King,” are now perused only by young +students, who read merely that they may learn to write; and of +the “Carmen Seculare,” I cannot but suspect that I +might praise or censure it by caprice without danger of +detection; for who can be supposed to have laboured through +it? Yet the time has been when this neglected work was so +popular that it was translated into Latin by no common +master.</p> +<p>His poem on the Battle of Ramillies is necessarily tedious by +the form of the stanza. An uniform mass of ten lines +thirty-five times repeated, inconsequential and slightly +connected, must weary both the ear and the understanding. +His imitation of Spenser, which consists principally in <i>I +ween</i> and <i>I weet</i>, without exclusion of later modes of +speech, makes his poem neither ancient nor modern. His +mention of Mars and Bellona, and his comparison of Marlborough to +the eagle that bears the thunder of Jupiter, are all puerile and +unaffecting; and yet more despicable is the long tale told by +Louis in his despair of Brute and Troynovante, and the teeth of +Cadmus, with his similes of the raven and eagle and wolf and +lion. By the help of such easy fictions and vulgar topics, +without acquaintance with life, and without knowledge of art or +nature, a poem of any length, cold and lifeless like this, may be +easily written on any subject.</p> +<p>In his epilogues to Phædra and to Lucius he is very +happily facetious; but in the prologue before the queen the +pedant has found his way with Minerva, Perseus, and +Andromeda.</p> +<p>His epigrams and lighter pieces are, like those of others, +sometimes elegant, sometimes trifling, and sometimes dull; among +the best are the “Chamelion” and the epitaph on John +and Joan.</p> +<p>Scarcely any one of our poets has written so much and +translated so little: the version of Callimachus is sufficiently +licentious; the paraphrase on St. Paul’s Exhortation to +Charity is eminently beautiful.</p> +<p>“Alma” is written in professed imitation of +“Hudibras,” and has at least one accidental +resemblance: “Hudibras” wants a plan because it is +left imperfect; “Alma” is imperfect because it seems +never to have had a plan. Prior appears not to have +proposed to himself any drift or design, but to have written the +casual dictates of the present moment.</p> +<p>What Horace said when he imitated Lucilius, might be said of +Butler by Prior; his numbers were not smooth nor neat. +Prior excelled him in versification; but he was, like Horace, +<i>inventore minor</i>; he had not Butler’s exuberance of +matter and variety of illustration. The spangles of wit +which he could afford he knew how to polish; but he wanted the +bullion of his master. Butler pours out a negligent +profusion, certain of the weight, but careless of the +stamp. Prior has comparatively little, but with that little +he makes a fine show. “Alma” has many admirers, +and was the only piece among Prior’s works of which Pope +said that he should wish to be the author.</p> +<p>“Solomon” is the work to which he entrusted the +protection of his name, and which he expected succeeding ages to +regard with veneration. His affection was natural; it had +undoubtedly been written with great labour; and who is willing to +think that he has been labouring in vain? He had infused +into it much knowledge and much thought; had often polished it to +elegance, often dignified it with splendour, and sometimes +heightened it to sublimity: he perceived in it many excellences, +and did not discover that it wanted that without which all others +are of small avail—the power of engaging attention and +alluring curiosity.</p> +<p>Tediousness is the most fatal of all faults; negligence or +errors are single and local, but tediousness pervades the whole; +other faults are censured and forgotten, but the power of +tediousness propagates itself. He that is weary the first +hour is more weary the second, as bodies forced into motion, +contrary to their tendency, pass more and more slowly through +every successive interval of space. Unhappily this +pernicious failure is that which an author is least able to +discover. We are seldom tiresome to ourselves; and the act +of composition fills and delights the mind with change of +language and succession of images. Every couplet, when +produced, is new, and novelty is the great source of +pleasure. Perhaps no man ever thought a line superfluous +when he first wrote it, or contracted his work till his +ebullitions of invention had subsided. And even if he +should control his desire of immediate renown, and keep his work +<i>nine years</i> unpublished, he will be still the author, and +still in danger of deceiving himself: and if he consults his +friends he will probably find men who have more kindness than +judgment, or more fear to offend than desire to instruct. +The tediousness of this poem proceeds not from the uniformity of +the subject, for it is sufficiently diversified, but from the +continued tenor of the narration; in which Solomon relates the +successive vicissitudes of his own mind without the intervention +of any other speaker or the mention of any other agent, unless it +be Abra; the reader is only to learn what he thought, and to be +told that he thought wrong. The event of every experiment +is foreseen, and therefore the process is not much +regarded. Yet the work is far from deserving to be +neglected. He that shall peruse it will be able to mark +many passages to which he may recur for instruction or delight; +many from which the poet may learn to write and the philosopher +to reason.</p> +<p>If Prior’s poetry be generally considered, his praise +will be that of correctness and industry, rather than of compass +of comprehension or activity of fancy. He never made any +effort of invention: his greater pieces are only tissues of +common thoughts; and his smaller, which consist of light images +or single conceits, are not always his own. I have traced +him among the French epigrammatists, and have been informed that +he poached for prey among obscure authors. The “Thief +and Cordelier” is, I suppose, generally considered as an +original production, with how much justice this epigram may tell, +which was written by Georgius Sabinus, a poet now little known or +read, though once the friend of Luther and Melancthon:—</p> +<p style="text-align: center" class="poetry">“De +<i>Sacerdote Furem consolante</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry">“Quidam sacrificus furem comitatus +euntem<br /> + Huc ubi dat sontes carnificina neci.<br /> +Ne sis mœstus, ait; summi conviva Tonantis<br /> + Jam cum coelitibus (si modo credis) eris.<br /> +Ille gemens, si vera mihi solatia præbes,<br /> + Hospes apud superos sis meus oro, refert.<br /> +Sacrificus contra; mihi non convivia fas est<br /> + Ducere, jejunas hac edo luce nihil.”</p> +<p>What he has valuable he owes to his diligence and his +judgment. His diligence has justly placed him amongst the +most correct of the English poets; and he was one of the first +that resolutely endeavoured at correctness. He never +sacrifices accuracy to haste, nor indulges himself in +contemptuous negligence, or impatient idleness; he has no +careless lines, or entangled sentiments; his words are nicely +selected, and his thoughts fully expanded. If this part of +his character suffers an abatement, it must be from the +disproportion of his rhymes, which have not always sufficient +consonance, and from the admission of broken lines into his +“Solomon;” but perhaps he thought, like Cowley, that +hemistichs ought to be admitted into heroic poetry.</p> +<p>He had apparently such rectitude of judgment as secured him +from everything that approached to the ridiculous or absurd; but +as law operates in civil agency, not to the excitement of virtue, +but the repression of wickedness, so judgment in the operations +of intellect can hinder faults, but not produce excellence. +Prior is never low, nor very often sublime. It is said by +Longinus of Euripides, that he forces himself sometimes into +grandeur by violence of effort, as the lion kindles his fury by +the lashes of his own tail. Whatever Prior obtains above +mediocrity seems the effort of struggle and of toil. He has +many vigorous, but few happy lines; he has everything by +purchase, and nothing by gift; he had no <i>nightly +visitations</i> of the Muse, no infusions of sentiment or +felicities of fancy. His diction, however, is more his own +than of any among the successors of Dryden; he borrows no lucky +turns, or commodious modes of language, from his +predecessors. His phrases are original, but they are +sometimes harsh; as he inherited no elegances, none has he +bequeathed. His expression has every mark of laborious +study, the line seldom seems to have been formed at once; the +words did not come till they were called, and were then put by +constraint into their places, where they do their duty, but do it +sullenly. In his greater compositions there may be found +more rigid stateliness than graceful dignity.</p> +<p>Of versification he was not negligent. What he received +from Dryden he did not lose; neither did he increase the +difficulty of writing by unnecessary severity, but uses triplets +and alexandrines without scruple. In his preface to +“Solomon” he proposes some improvements by extending +the sense from one couplet to another with variety of +pauses. This he has attempted, but without success; his +interrupted lines are unpleasing, and his sense, as less +distinct, is less striking. He has altered the stanza of +Spenser as a house is altered by building another in its place of +a different form. With how little resemblance he has formed +his new stanza to that of his master these specimens will +show:—</p> +<p style="text-align: center">SPENSER.</p> +<p class="poetry"> “She flying fast from +Heaven’s fated face,<br /> +And from the world that her discovered wide,<br /> +Fled to the wasteful wilderness space,<br /> +From living eyes her open shame to hide,<br /> +And lurked in rocks and caves long unespied.<br /> +But that fair crew of knights, and Una fair,<br /> +Did in that castle afterwards abide,<br /> +To rest themselves, and weary powers repair,<br /> +Where store they found of all that dainty was and +rare?”</p> +<p style="text-align: center">PRIOR.</p> +<p class="poetry"> “To the close rock the +frightened raven flies,<br /> +Soon as the rising eagle cuts the air;<br /> +The shaggy wolf unseen and trembling lies,<br /> +When the hoarse roar proclaims the lion near.<br /> +Ill-starred did we our forts and lines forsake,<br /> +To dare our British foes to open fight:<br /> +Our conquest we by stratagem should make;<br /> +Our triumph had been founded in our flight.<br /> +’Tis ours by craft and by surprise to gain;<br /> +’Tis theirs to meet in arms, and battle in the +plain.”</p> +<p>By this new structure of his lines he has avoided +difficulties; nor am I sure that he has lost any of the power of +pleasing, but he no longer imitates Spencer. Some of his +poems are written without regularity of measures; for, when he +commenced poet, he had not recovered from our Pindaric +infatuation; but he probably lived to be convinced that the +essence of verse is order and consonance. His numbers are +such as mere diligence may attain; they seldom offend the ear, +and seldom soothe it; they commonly want airiness, lightness, and +facility. What is smooth is not soft. His verses +always roll, but they seldom flow.</p> +<p>A survey of the life and writings of Prior may exemplify a +sentence which he doubtless understood well when he read Horace +at his uncle’s, “The vessel long retains the scent +which it first receives.” In his private relaxation +he revived the tavern, and in his amorous pedantry he exhibited +the college. But on higher occasions and nobler subjects, +when habit was overpowered by the necessity of reflection, he +wanted not wisdom as a statesman, or elegance as a poet.</p> +<h2>CONGREVE.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">William Congreve</span> descended from a +family in Staffordshire of so great antiquity, that it claims a +place among the few that extend their hue beyond the Norman +Conquest, and was the son of William Congreve, second son of +Richard Congreve, of Congreve and Stratton. He visited, +once at least, the residence of his ancestors; and, I believe, +more places than one are still shown in groves and gardens, where +he is related to have written his <i>Old Bachelor</i>.</p> +<p>Neither the time nor place of his birth is certainly +known. If the inscription upon his monument be true, he was +born in 1672. For the place, it was said by himself that he +owed his nativity to England, and by everybody else that he was +born in Ireland. Southern mentioned him with sharp censure +as a man that meanly disowned his native country. The +biographers assigned his nativity to Bardsa, near Leeds, in +Yorkshire, from the account given by himself, as they suppose, to +Jacob. To doubt whether a man of eminence has told the +truth about his own birth is, in appearance, to be very deficient +in candour; yet nobody can live long without knowing that +falsehoods of convenience or vanity, falsehoods from which no +evil immediately visible ensues, except the general degradation +of human testimony, are very lightly uttered, and once uttered +are sullenly supported. Boileau, who desired to be thought +a rigorous and steady moralist, having told a pretty lie to Louis +XIV., continued it afterwards by false dates; thinking himself +obliged <i>in honour</i>, says his admirer, to maintain what, +when he said it, was so well received. [Congreve was +baptised at Bardsey, February 10, 1670.]</p> +<p>Wherever Congreve was born, he was educated first at Kilkenny, +and afterwards at Dublin, his father having some military +employment that stationed him in Ireland; but after having passed +through the usual preparatory studies, as may be reasonably +supposed, with great celerity and success, his father thought it +proper to assign him a profession, by which something might be +gotten, and about the time of the Revolution sent him, at the age +of sixteen, to study law in the Middle Temple, where he lived for +several years, but with very little attention to statutes or +reports. His disposition to become an author appeared very +early, as he very early felt that force of imagination, and +possessed that copiousness of sentiment, by which intellectual +pleasure can be given. His first performance was a novel +called “Incognita; or, Love and Duty Reconciled;” it +is praised by the biographers, who quote some part of the +preface, that is, indeed, for such a time of life, uncommonly +judicious. I would rather praise it than read it.</p> +<p>His first dramatic labour was <i>The Old Bachelor</i>, of +which he says, in his defence against Collier, “That comedy +was written, as several know, some years before it was +acted. When I wrote it I had little thoughts of the stage; +but did it to amuse myself in a slow recovery from a fit of +sickness. Afterwards, through my indiscretion it was seen, +and in some little time more it was acted; and I, through the +remainder of my indiscretion suffered myself to be drawn into the +prosecution of a difficult and thankless study, and to be +involved in a perpetual war with knaves and fools.”</p> +<p>There seems to be a strange affectation in authors of +appearing to have done everything by chance. <i>The Old +Bachelor</i> was written for amusement in the languor of +convalescence. Yet it is apparently composed with great +elaborateness of dialogue, and incessant ambition of wit. +The age of the writer considered, it is indeed a very wonderful +performance; for, whenever written, it was acted (1693) when he +was not more than twenty-one years old; and was then recommended +by Mr. Dryden, Mr. Southern, and Mr. Maynwaring. Dryden +said that he never had seen such a first play; but they found it +deficient in some things necessary to the success of its +exhibition, and by their greater experience fitted it for the +stage. Southern used to relate of one comedy, probably of +this, that when Congreve read it to the players he pronounced it +so wretchedly, that they had almost rejected it; but they were +afterwards so well persuaded of its excellence that, for half a +year before it was acted, the manager allowed its author the +privilege of the house.</p> +<p>Few plays have ever been so beneficial to the writer, for it +procured him the patronage of Halifax, who immediately made him +one of the commissioners for licensing coaches, and soon after +gave him a place in the Pipe-office, and another in the Customs, +of six hundred pounds a year. Congreve’s conversation +must surely have been at least equally pleasing with his +writings.</p> +<p>Such a comedy, written at such an age, requires some +consideration. As the lighter species of dramatic poetry +professes the imitation of common life, of real manners, and +daily incidents, it apparently presupposes a familiar knowledge +of many characters, and exact observation of the passing world; +the difficulty, therefore, is to conceive how this knowledge can +be obtained by a boy.</p> +<p>But if <i>The Old Bachelor</i> be more nearly examined, it +will be found to be one of those comedies which may be made by a +mind vigorous and acute, and furnished with comic characters by +the perusal of other poets, without much actual commerce with +mankind. The dialogue is one constant reciprocation of +conceits or clash of wit, in which nothing flows necessarily from +the occasion, or is dictated by nature. The characters, +both of men and women, are either fictitious and artificial, as +those of Heartwell and the ladies, or easy and common, as Wittol, +a tame idiot; Bluff, a swaggering coward; and Fondlewife, a +jealous Puritan; and the catastrophe arises from a mistake, not +very probably produced, by marrying a woman in a mask. Yet +this gay comedy, when all these deductions are made, will still +remain the work of very powerful and fertile faculties; the +dialogue is quick and sparkling, the incidents such as seize the +attention, and the wit so exuberant that it +“o’er-informs its tenement.”</p> +<p>Next year he gave another specimen of his abilities in <i>The +Double Dealer</i>, which was not received with equal +kindness. He writes to his patron the Lord Halifax a +dedication, in which he endeavours to reconcile the reader to +that which found few friends among the audience. These +apologies are always useless: <i>de gestibus non est +disputandem</i>. Men may be convinced, but they cannot be +pleased, against their will. But though taste is obstinate, +it is very variable, and time often prevails when arguments have +failed. Queen Mary conferred upon both those plays the +honour of her presence; and when she died soon after, Congreve +testified his gratitude by a despicable effusion of elegiac +pastoral, a composition in which all is unnatural and yet nothing +is new.</p> +<p>In another year (1695) his prolific pen produced <i>Love for +Love</i>, a comedy of nearer alliance to life, and exhibiting +more real manners, than either of the former. The character +of Foresight was then common. Dryden calculated nativities; +both Cromwell and King William had their lucky days; and +Shaftesbury himself, though he had no religion, was said to +regard predictions. The Sailor is not accounted very +natural, but he is very pleasant. With this play was opened +the New Theatre, under the direction of Betterton, the tragedian, +where he exhibited two years afterwards (1687) <i>The Mourning +Bride</i>, a tragedy, so written as to show him sufficiently +qualified for either kind of dramatic poetry. In this play, +of which, when he afterwards revised it, he reduced the +versification to greater regularity; there is more bustle than +sentiment; the plot is busy and intricate, and the events take +hold on the attention; but, except a very few passages, we are +rather amused with noise and perplexed with stratagem, than +entertained with any true delineation of natural +characters. This, however, was received with more +benevolence than any other of his works, and still continues to +be acted and applauded.</p> +<p>But whatever objections may be made either to his comic or +tragic excellence, they are lost at once in the blaze of +admiration, when it is remembered that he had produced these four +plays before he had passed his twenty-fifth year, before other +men, even such as are some time to shine in eminence, have passed +their probation of literature, or presume to hope for any other +notice than such as is bestowed on diligence and inquiry. +Among all the efforts of early genius, which literary history +records, I doubt whether any one can be produced that more +surpasses the common limits of nature than the plays of +Congreve.</p> +<p>About this time began the long-continued controversy between +Collier and the poets. In the reign of Charles I. the +Puritans had raised a violent clamour against the drama, which +they considered as an entertainment not lawful to Christians, an +opinion held by them in common with the Church of Rome; and +Prynne published “Histriomastix,” a huge volume in +which stage-plays were censured. The outrages and crimes of +the Puritans brought afterwards their whole system of doctrine +into disrepute, and from the Restoration the poets and players +were left at quiet; for to have molested them would have had the +appearance of tendency to puritanical malignity. This +danger, however, was worn away by time, and Collier, a fierce and +implacable non-juror, knew that an attack upon the theatre would +never make him suspected for a Puritan; he therefore (1698) +published “A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness +of the English Stage,” I believe with no other motive than +religious zeal and honest indignation. He was formed for a +controvertist, with sufficient learning, with diction vehement +and pointed, though often vulgar and incorrect, with +unconquerable pertinacity, with wit in the highest degree and +sarcastic, and with all those powers exalted and invigorated by +just confidence in his cause. Thus qualified and thus +incited, he walked out to battle, and assailed at once most of +the living writers, from Dryden to Durfey. His onset was +violent; those passages, which, while they stood single, had +passed with little notice, when they were accumulated and exposed +together, excited horror. The wise and the pious caught the +alarm, and the nation wondered why it had so long suffered +irreligion and licentiousness to be openly taught at the public +charge.</p> +<p>Nothing now remained for the poets but to resist or fly. +Dryden’s conscience or his prudence, angry as he was, +withheld him from the conflict. Congreve and Vanbrugh +attempted answers. Congreve, a very young man, elated with +success, and impatient of censure, assumed an air of confidence +and security. His chief art of controversy is to retort +upon his adversary his own words: he is very angry, and hoping to +conquer Collier with his own weapons, allows himself in the use +of every term of contumely and contempt, but he has the sword +without the arm of Scanderbeg; he has his antagonist’s +coarseness but not his strength. Collier replied, for +contest was his delight. “He was not to be frighted +from his purpose or his prey.”</p> +<p>The cause of Congreve was not tenable; whatever glosses he +might use for the defence or palliation of single passages, the +general tenour and tendency of his plays must always be +condemned. It is acknowledged, with universal conviction, +that the perusal of his works will make no man better, and that +their ultimate effect is to represent pleasure in alliance with +vice, and to relax those obligations by which life ought to be +regulated.</p> +<p>The stage found other advocates, and the dispute was +protracted through ten years: but at last comedy grew more +modest, and Collier lived to see the reformation of the +theatre.</p> +<p>Of the powers by which this important victory was achieved, a +quotation from <i>Love for Love</i>, and the remark upon it, may +afford a specimen:—</p> +<p><i>Sir Samps</i>. “Sampson’s a very good +name; for your Sampsons were strong dogs from the +beginning.”</p> +<p><i>Angel</i>. “Have a care—if you remember, +the strongest Sampson of your name pulled an old house over his +head at last.”</p> +<p>“Here you have the sacred history burlesqued, and +Sampson once more brought into the house of Dagon, to make sport +for the Philistines!”</p> +<p>Congreve’s last play was <i>The Way of The World</i>, +which, though, as he hints in him dedication it was written with +great labour and much thought, was received with so little +favour, that being in a high degree offended and disgusted, he +resolved to commit his quiet and his fame no more to the caprices +of an audience.</p> +<p>From this time his life ceased to be public; he lived for +himself and his friends, and among his friends was able to name +every man of his time whom wit and elegance had raised to +reputation. It may be therefore reasonably supposed that +his manners were polite, and his conversation pleasing. He +seems not to have taken much pleasure in writing, as he +contributed nothing to the <i>Spectator</i>, and only one paper +to the <i>Tatler</i>, though published by men with whom he might +be supposed willing to associate: and though he lived many years +after the publication of his “Miscellaneous Poems,” +yet he added nothing to them, but lived on in literary indolence, +engaged in no controversy, contending with no rival, neither +soliciting flattery by public commendations, nor provoking enmity +by malignant criticism, but passing his time among the great and +splendid, in the placid enjoyment of his fame and fortune.</p> +<p>Having owed his fortune to Halifax, he continued, always of +his patron’s party, but, as it seems, without violence or +acrimony, and his firmness was naturally esteemed, as his +abilities were reverenced. His security therefore was never +violated; and when, upon the extrusion of the Whigs, some +intercession was used lest Congreve should be displaced, the Earl +of Oxford made this answer:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Non obtusa adeo gestamus pectora +Pœni,<br /> +Nec tam aversus equos Tyriâ sol jungit ab urbe.”</p> +<p>He that was thus honoured by the adverse party might naturally +expect to be advanced when his friends returned to power, and he +was accordingly made secretary for the island of Jamaica, a +place, I suppose without trust or care, but which, with his post +in the Customs, is said to have afforded him twelve hundred +pounds a year. His honours were yet far greater than his +profits. Every writer mentioned him with respect, and among +other testimonies to his merit, Steele made him the patron of his +“Miscellany,” and Pope inscribed to him his +translations of the “Iliad.” But he treated the +muses with ingratitude; for, having long conversed familiarly +with the great, he wished to be considered rather as a man of +fashion than of wit; and, when he received a visit from Voltaire, +disgusted him by the despicable foppery of desiring to be +considered not as an author but a gentleman; to which the +Frenchman replied, “that, if he had been only a gentleman, +he should not have come to visit him.”</p> +<p>In his retirement he may be supposed to have applied himself +to books, for he discovers more literature than the poets have +commonly attained. But his studies were in his later days +obstructed by cataracts in his eyes, which at last terminated in +blindness. This melancholy state was aggravated by the +gout, for which he sought relief by a journey to Bath: but, being +overturned in his chariot, complained from that time of a pain in +his side, and died at his house in Surrey Street in the Strand, +January 29, 1728–9. Having lain in state in the +Jerusalem Chamber, he was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a +monument is erected to his memory by Henrietta Duchess of +Marlborough, to whom, for reasons either not known or not +mentioned, he bequeathed a legacy of about ten thousand pounds, +the accumulation of attentive parsimony, which, though to her +superfluous and useless, might have given great assistance to the +ancient family from which he descended, at that time, by the +imprudence of his relation, reduced to difficulties and +distress.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p><span class="smcap">Congreve</span> has merit of the highest +kind; he is an original writer, who borrowed neither the models +of his plot nor the manner of his dialogue. Of his plays I +cannot speak distinctly, for since I inspected them many years +have passed, but what remains upon my memory is, that his +characters are commonly fictitious and artificial, with very +little of nature, and not much of life. He formed a +peculiar idea of comic excellence, which he supposed to consist +in gay remarks and unexpected answers; but that which he +endeavoured, he seldom failed of performing. His scenes +exhibit not much of humour, imagery, or passion: his personages +are a kind of intellectual gladiators; every sentence is to ward +or strike; the contest of smartness is never intermitted; his wit +is a meteor playing to and fro with alternate coruscations. +His comedies have, therefore, in some degree, the operation of +tragedies, they surprise rather than divert, and raise admiration +oftener than merriment. But they are the works of a mind +replete with images, and quick in combination.</p> +<p>Of his miscellaneous poetry I cannot say anything very +favourable. The powers of Congreve seem to desert him when +he leaves the stage, as Antæus was no longer strong than +when he could touch the ground. It cannot be observed +without wonder, that a mind so vigorous and fertile in dramatic +compositions should on any other occasion discover nothing but +impotence and poverty. He has in these little pieces +neither elevation of fancy, selection of language, nor skill in +versification: yet, if I were required to select from the whole +mass of English poetry the most poetical paragraph, I know not +what I could prefer to an exclamation in the “Mourning +Bride”:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">ALMERIA.</p> +<p> It was a fancied noise; for all is +hushed.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">LEONORA.</p> +<p> It bore the accent of a human voice.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">ALMERIA.</p> +<p> It was thy fear, or else some transient +wind<br /> +Whistling through hollows of this vaulted isle:<br /> +We’ll listen—</p> +<p style="text-align: center">LEONORA.</p> +<p> Hark!</p> +<p style="text-align: center">ALMERIA.</p> +<p> No, all is hushed and still as +death.—’Tis dreadful!<br /> +How reverend is the face of this tall pile,<br /> +Whose ancient pillars rear their marble heads,<br /> +To bear aloft its arched and ponderous roof,<br /> +By its own weight made steadfast and immovable,<br /> +Looking tranquillity! It strikes an awe<br /> +And terror on my aching sight; the tombs<br /> +And monumental caves of death look cold,<br /> +And shoot a chillness to my trembling heart.<br /> +Give use thy hand, and let me hear thy voice;<br /> +Nay, quickly speak to me, and let me hear<br /> +Thy voice—my own affrights me with its echoes.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He who reads these lines enjoys for a moment the powers of a +poet; he feels what he remembers to have felt before, but he +feels it with great increase of sensibility; he recognises a +familiar image, but meets it again amplified and expanded, +embellished with beauty and enlarged with majesty. Yet +could the author, who appears here to have enjoyed the confidence +of Nature, lament the death of Queen Mary in lines like +these:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“The rocks are cleft, and new-descending +rills<br /> +Furrow the brows of all the impending hills.<br /> +The water-gods to floods their rivulets turn,<br /> +And each, with streaming eyes, supplies his wanting urn.<br /> +The fauns forsake the woods, the nymphs the grove,<br /> +And round the plain in sad distractions rove:<br /> +In prickly brakes their tender limbs they tear,<br /> +And leave on thorns their locks of golden hair.<br /> +With their sharp nails, themselves the satyrs wound,<br /> +And tug their shaggy beards, and bite with grief the ground.<br +/> +Lo Pan himself, beneath a blasted oak,<br /> +Dejected lies, his pipe in pieces broke<br /> +See Pales weeping too in wild despair,<br /> +And to the piercing winds her bosses bare.<br /> +And see yon fading myrtle, where appears<br /> +The Queen of Love, all bathed in flowing tears;<br /> +See how she wrings her hands, and beats her breast,<br /> +And tears her useless girdle from her waist:<br /> +Hear the sad murmurs of her sighing doves!<br /> +For grief they sigh, forgetful of their loves.”</p> +<p>And many years after he gave no proof that time had improved +his wisdom or his wit, for, on the death of the Marquis of +Blandford, this was his song:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“And now the winds, which had so long +been still,<br /> +Began the swelling air with sighs to fill;<br /> +The water-nymphs, who motionless remained<br /> +Like images of ice, while she complained,<br /> +Now loosed their streams; as when descending rains<br /> +Roll the steep torrents headlong o’er the plains.<br /> +The prone creation who so long had gazed<br /> +Charmed with her cries, and at her griefs amazed,<br /> +Began to roar and howl with horrid yell,<br /> +Dismal to hear, and terrible to tell!<br /> +Nothing but groans and sighs were heard around,<br /> +And echo multiplied each mournful sound.”</p> +<p>In both these funeral poems, when he has <i>yelled</i> out +many <i>syllables</i> of senseless <i>dolour</i>, he dismisses +his reader with senseless consolation. From the grave of +Pastora rises a light that forms a star, and where Amaryllis wept +for Amyntas from every tear sprung up a violet. But William +is his hero, and of William he will sing:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“The hovering winds on downy wings shall +wait around,<br /> +And catch, and waft to foreign lands, the flying +sound.”</p> +<p>It cannot but be proper to show what they shall have to catch +and carry:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“’Twas now, when flowery lawns the +prospect made,<br /> +And flowing brooks beneath a forest shade,<br /> +A lowing heifer, loveliest of the herd,<br /> +Stood feeding by; while two fierce bulls prepared<br /> +Their arméd heads for light, by fate of war to prove<br /> +The victor worthy of the fair one’s love;<br /> +Unthought presage of what met next my view;<br /> +For soon the shady scene withdrew.<br /> +And now, for woods, and fields, and springing flowers,<br /> +Behold a town arise, bulwarked with walls and lofty towers;<br /> +Two rival armies all the plain o’erspread,<br /> +Each in battalia ranged, and shining arms arrayed<br /> +With eagle eyes beholding both from far,<br /> +Namur, the price and mistress of the war.”</p> +<p>The “Birth of the Muse” is a miserable +fiction. One good line it has which was borrowed from +Dryden. The concluding verses are these:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“This said, no more remained. The +ethereal host<br /> +Again impatient crowd the crystal coast.<br /> +The father now, within his spacious hands,<br /> +Encompassed all the mingled mass of seas and lands;<br /> +And, having heaved aloft the ponderous sphere,<br /> +He launched the world to float in ambient air.”</p> +<p>Of his irregular poems, that to Mrs. Arabella Hunt seems to be +the best; his Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day, however, had some +lines which Pope had in his mind when he wrote his own. His +imitations of Horace are feebly paraphrastical, and the additions +which he makes are of little value. He sometimes retains +what were more properly omitted, as when he talks of +<i>vervain</i> and <i>gums</i> to propitiate Venus.</p> +<p>Of his Translations, the “Satire of Juvenal” was +written very early, and may therefore be forgiven, though it had +not the massiness and vigour of the original. In all his +versions strength and sprightliness are wanting; his “Hymn +to Venus,” from Homer, is perhaps the best. His lines +are weakened with expletives, and his rhymes are frequently +imperfect. His petty poems are seldom worth the cost of +criticism; sometimes the thoughts are false and sometimes +common. In his verses on Lady Gethin, the latter part is in +imitation of Dryden’s ode on Mrs. Killigrew; and +“Doris,” that has been so lavishly flattered by +Steele, has indeed some lively stanzas, but the expression might +be mended, and the most striking part of the character had been +already shown in “Love for Love.” His +“Art of Pleasing” is founded on a vulgar, but perhaps +impracticable principle, and the staleness of the sense is not +concealed by any novelty of illustration or elegance of +diction. This tissue of poetry, from which he seems to have +hoped a lasting name, is totally neglected, and known only as it +is appended to his plays.</p> +<p>While comedy or while tragedy is regarded, his plays are +likely to be read; but, except what relates to the stage, I know +not that he has ever written a stanza that is sung, or a couplet +that is quoted. The general character of his +“Miscellanies” is that they show little wit and +little virtue. Yet to him it must be confessed that we are +indebted for the connection of a national error, and for the cure +of our Pindaric madness. He first taught the English +writers that Pindar’s odes were regular; and though +certainly he had not the lire requisite for the higher species of +lyric poetry, he has shown us that enthusiasm has its rules, and +that in mere confusion there is neither grace nor greatness.</p> +<h2>BLACKMORE.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Sir Richard Blackmore</span> is one of +those men whose writings have attracted much notice, but of whose +life and manners very little has been communicated, and whose lot +it has been to be much oftener mentioned by enemies than by +friends. He was the son of Robert Blackmore, of Corsham in +Wiltshire, styled by Wood <i>Gentleman</i>, and supposed to have +been an attorney, having been for some time educated in a country +school, he was at thirteen sent to Westminster, and in 1668 was +entered at Edmund Hall in Oxford, where he took the degree of MA. +June 8, 1676, and resided thirteen years, a much longer time than +is usual to spend at the university, and which he seems to have +passed with very little attention to the business of the place; +for, in his poems, the ancient names of nations or places, which +he often introduces, are pronounced by chance. He +afterwards travelled. At Padua he was made doctor of +physic, and, after having wandered about a year and a half on the +Continent, returned home.</p> +<p>In some part of his life, it is not known when, his indigence +compelled him to teach a school, a humiliation with which, though +it certainly lasted but a little while, his enemies did not +forget to reproach him, when he became conspicuous enough to +excite malevolence; and let it be remembered for his honour, that +to have been once a schoolmaster is the only reproach which all +the perspicacity of malice, animated by wit, has ever fixed upon +his private life.</p> +<p>When he first engaged in the study of physic, he inquired, as +he says, of Dr. Sydenham, what authors he should read and was +directed by Sydenham to “Don Quixote”: +“which” said he, “is a very good book; I read +it still.” The perverseness of mankind makes it often +mischievous to men of eminence to give way to merriment; the idle +and the illiterate will long shelter themselves under this +foolish apophthegm. Whether he rested satisfied with this +direction, or sought for better, he commenced physician, and +obtained high eminence and extensive practice. He became +Fellow of the College of Physicians, April 12, 1687, being one of +the thirty which, by the new charter of King James, were added to +the former fellows. His residence was in Cheapside, and his +friends were chiefly in the City. In the early part of +Blackmore’s time a citizen was a term of reproach; and his +place of abode was another topic, to which his adversaries had +recourse in the penury of scandal.</p> +<p>Blackmore, therefore, was made a poet not by necessity but +inclination, and wrote not for a livelihood but for fame; or, if +he may tell his own motives, for a nobler purpose, to engage +poetry in the cause of virtue.</p> +<p>I believe it is peculiar to him that his first public work was +an heroic poem. He was not known as a maker of verses till +he published (in 1695) “Prince Arthur,” in ten books, +written, as he relates, “by such catches and starts, and in +such occasional uncertain hours as his profession afforded, and +for the greatest part in coffee-houses, or in passing up and down +the streets.” For the latter part of this apology he +was accused of writing “to the rumbling of his chariot +wheels.” He had read, he says, “but little +poetry throughout his whole life; and for fifteen years before +had not written a hundred verses except one copy of Latin verses +in praise of a friend’s book.” He thinks, and +with some reason, that from such a performance perfection cannot +be expected; but he finds another reason for the severity of his +censurers, which he expresses in language such as Cheapside +easily furnished. “I am not free of the Poet’s +Company, having never kissed the governor’s hands: mine is +therefore not so much as a permission poem, but a downright +interloper. Those gentlemen, who carry on their poetical +trade in a joint stock, would certainly do what they could to +sink and ruin an unlicensed adventurer, notwithstanding I +disturbed none of their factories, nor imported any goods they +have ever dealt in.” He had lived in the City till he +had learned its note.</p> +<p>That “Prince Arthur” found many readers is +certain; for in two years it had three editions, a very uncommon +instance of favourable reception, at a time when literary +curiosity was yet confined to particular classes of the +nation. Such success naturally raised animosity; and Dennis +attacked it by a formal criticism, more tedious and disgusting +than the work which he condemns. To this censure may be +opposed the approbation of Locke, and the admiration of Molyneux, +which are found in their printed “Letters.” +Molyneux is particularly delighted with the song of Mopas, which +is therefore subjoined to this narrative.</p> +<p>It is remarked by Pope, that “what raises the hero, +often sinks the man.” Of Blackmore is may be said +that, as the poet sinks, the man rises; the animadversions of +Dennis, insolent and contemptuous as they were, raised in him no +implacable resentment; he and his critic were afterwards friends; +and in one of his latter works he praises Dennis “as equal +to Boileau in poetry, and superior to him in critical +abilities.” He seems to have been more delighted with +praise than pained by censure, and instead of slackening, +quickened his career. Having in two years produced ten +books of “Prince Arthur,” in two years more (1697) he +sent into the world “King Arthur” in twelve. +The provocation was now doubled, and the resentment of wits and +critics may be supposed to have increased in proportion. He +found, however, advantages more than equivalent to all their +outrages. He was this year made one of the physicians in +ordinary to King William, and advanced by him to the honour of +knighthood, with the present of a gold chaise and medal. +The malignity of the wits attributed his knighthood to his new +poem, but King William was not very studious of poetry; and +Blackmore perhaps had other merit, for he says in his dedication +to “Alfred,” that “he had a greater part in the +succession of the house of Hanover than ever he had +boasted.”</p> +<p>What Blackmore could contribute to the Succession, or what he +imagined himself to have contributed, cannot now be known. +That he had been of considerable use, I doubt not but he +believed, for I hold him to have been very honest; but he might +easily make a false estimate of his own importance. Those +whom their virtue restrains from deceiving others, are often +disposed by their vanity to deceive themselves. Whether he +promoted the Succession or not, he at least approved it, and +adhered invariably to his principles and party through his whole +life.</p> +<p>His ardour of poetry still continued; and not long after +(1700) he published a “Paraphrase on the Book of Job, and +other parts of the Scripture.” This performance +Dryden, who pursued him with great malignity, lived long enough +to ridicule in a Prologue.</p> +<p>The wits easily confederated against him, as Dryden, whose +favour they almost all courted, was his professed +adversary. He had, besides, given them reason for +resentment, as, in his preface to “Prince Arthur,” he +had said of the dramatic writers almost all that was alleged +afterwards by Collier; but Blackmore’s censure was cold and +general, Collier’s was personal and ardent; Blackmore +taught his reader to dislike what Collier incited him to +abhor.</p> +<p>In his preface to “King Arthur” he endeavoured to +gain at least one friend, and propitiated Congreve by higher +praise of his “Mourning Bride” than it has obtained +from any other critic.</p> +<p>The same year he published a “Satire on Wit,” a +proclamation of defiance which united the poets almost all +against him, and which brought upon him lampoons and ridicule +from every side. This he doubtless foresaw, and evidently +despised; nor should his dignity of mind be without its praise, +had he not paid the homage to greatness which he denied to +genius, and degraded himself by conferring that authority over +the national taste, which he takes from the poets, upon men of +high rank and wide influence, but of less wit and not greater +virtue.</p> +<p>Here is again discovered the inhabitant of Cheapside, whose +head cannot keep his poetry unmingled with trade. To hinder +that intellectual bankruptcy which he affects to fear he will +erect a “Bank for Wit.” In this poem he justly +censured Dryden’s impurities, but praised his powers, +though in a subsequent edition he retained the satire, and +omitted the praise. What was his reason, I know not; Dryden +was then no longer in his way. His head still teemed with +heroic poetry; and (1705) he published “Eliza,” in +ten books. I am afraid that the world was now weary of +contending about Blackmore’s heroes, for I do not remember +that by any author, serious or comical, I have found +“Eliza” either praised or blamed.</p> +<p>She “dropped,” as it seems, “dead-born from +the press.” It is never mentioned, and was never seen +by me till I borrowed it for the present occasion. Jacob +says “it is corrected and revised from another +impression,” but the labour of revision was thrown +away.</p> +<p>From this time he turned some of his thoughts to the +celebration of living characters, and wrote a poem on the Kit-Cat +Club, and “Advice to the Poets how to celebrate the Duke of +Marlborough” but on occasion of another year of success, +thinking himself qualified to give more instruction, he again +wrote a poem of “Advice to a Weaver of +Tapestry.” Steele was then publishing the +<i>Tatler</i>, and, looking round him for something at which he +might laugh, unluckily alighted on Sir Richard’s work, and +treated it with such contempt that, as Fenton observes, he put an +end to that species of writers that gave advice to painters.</p> +<p>Not long after (1712) he published “Creation,” a +philosophical poem, which has been, by my recommendation, +inserted in the late collection. Whoever judges of this by +any other of Blackmore’s performances will do it +injury. The praise given it by Addison (<i>Spectator</i>, +339) is too well known to be transcribed; but some notice is due +to the testimony of Dennis, who calls it a “philosophical +poem, which has equalled that of ‘Lucretius’ in the +beauty of its versification, and infinitely surpassed it in the +solidity and strength of its reasoning.”</p> +<p>Why an author surpasses himself it is natural to +inquire. I have heard from Mr. Draper, an eminent +bookseller, an account received by him from Ambrose Philips, +“That Blackmore, as he proceeded in this poem, laid his +manuscript from time to time before a club of wits with whom he +associated, and that every man contributed, as he could, either +improvement or correction; so that,” said Philips, +“there are perhaps nowhere in the book thirty lines +together that now stand as they were originally +written.”</p> +<p>The relation of Philips, I suppose, was true; but when all +reasonable, all credible allowance is made for this friendly +revision, the author will still retain an ample dividend of +praise; for to him must always be assigned the plan of the work, +the distribution of its parts, the choice of topics, the train of +argument, and, what is yet more, the general predominance of +philosophical judgment and poetical spirit. Correction +seldom effects more than the suppression of faults: a happy line, +or a single elegance, may perhaps be added; but of a large work, +the general character must always remain. The original +constitution can be very little helped by local remedies; +inherent and radical dulness will never be much invigorated by +intrinsic animation. This poem, if he had written nothing +else, would have transmitted him to posterity among the first +favourites of the English muse; but to make verses was his +transcendent pleasure, and, as he was not deterred by censure, he +was not satiated with praise. He deviated, however, +sometimes into other tracks of literature, and condescended to +entertain his readers with plain prose. When the +<i>Spectator</i> stopped, he considered the polite world as +destitute of entertainment, and in concert with Mr. Hughes, who +wrote every third paper, published three times a week the +“Lay Monastery,” founded on the supposition that some +literary men, whose characters are described, had retired to a +house in the country to enjoy philosophical leisure, and resolved +to instruct the public by communicating their disquisitions and +amusements. Whether any real persons were concealed under +fictitious names is not known. The hero of the club is one +Mr. Johnson, such a constellation of excellence, that his +character shall not be suppressed, though there is no great +genius in the design nor skill in the delineation.</p> +<p>“The first I shall name is Mr. Johnson, a gentleman that +owes to nature excellent faculties and an elevated genius, and to +industry and application many acquired accomplishments. His +taste is distinguishing, just, and delicate; his judgment clear, +and his reason strong, accompanied with an imagination full of +spirit, of great compass, and stored with refined ideas. He +is a critic of the first rank and, what is his peculiar ornament, +he is delivered from the ostentation, malevolence, and +supercilious temper, that so often blemish men of that +character. His remarks result from the nature and reason of +things, and are formed by a judgment free and unbiassed by the +authority of those who have lazily followed each other in the +same beaten track of thinking, and are arrived only at the +reputation of acute grammarians and commentators; men who have +been copying one another many hundred years without any +improvement, or, if they have ventured farther, have only applied +in a mechanical manner the rules of ancient critics to modern +writings, and with great labour discovered nothing but their own +want of judgment and capacity. As Mr. Johnson penetrates to +the bottom of his subject, by which means his observations are +solid and natural, as well as delicate, so his design is always +to bring to light something useful and ornamental; whence his +character is the reverse to theirs, who have eminent abilities in +insignificant knowledge, and a great felicity in finding out +trifles. He is no less industrious to search out the merit +of an author, than sagacious in discerning his errors and +defects, and takes more pleasure in commending the beauties than +exposing the blemishes of a laudable writing. Like Horace, +in a long work he can bear some deformities, and justly lay them +on the imperfection of human nature, which is incapable of +faultless productions. When an excellent drama appears in +public, and by its intrinsic worth attracts a general applause, +he is not stung with envy and spleen; nor does he express a +savage nature in fastening upon the celebrated author, dwelling +upon his imaginary defects, and passing over his conspicuous +excellences. He treats all writers upon the same impartial +foot, and is not, like the little critics, taken up entirely in +finding out only the beauties of the ancient and nothing but the +errors of the modern writers. Never did any one express +more kindness and good-nature to young and unfinished authors, he +promotes their interests, protects their reputation, extenuates +their faults, and sets off their virtues, and by his candour +guards them from the severity of his judgment. He is not +like those dry critics who are morose because they cannot write +themselves, but is himself master of a good vein in poetry; and +though he does not often employ it, yet he has sometimes +entertained his friends with his unpublished +performances.”</p> +<p>The rest of the lay monks seem to be but feeble mortals an +comparison with the gigantic Johnson, who yet, with all his +abilities and the help of the fraternity, could drive the +publication but to forty papers, which were afterwards collected +into a volume, and called in the title “A Sequel to the +<i>Spectators</i>.”</p> +<p>Some years afterwards (1716 and 1717) he published two volumes +of essays in prose, which can be commended only as they are +written for the highest and noblest purpose—the promotion +of religion. Blackmore’s prose is not the prose of a +poet, for it is languid, sluggish, and lifeless; his diction is +neither daring nor exact, his flow neither rapid nor easy, and +his periods neither smooth nest strong. His account of +<i>wit</i> will show with how little clearness he is content to +think, and how little his thoughts are recommended by his +language.</p> +<p>“As to its efficient cause, <i>wit</i> owes its +production to an extraordinary and peculiar temperament in the +constitution of the possessor of it, in which is found a +concurrence of regular and exalted ferments, and an affluence of +animal spirits, refined and rectified to a great degree of +purity; whence, being endowed with vivacity, brightness, and +celerity, as well in their reflections as direct motions, they +become proper instruments for the sprightly operations of the +mind, by which means the imagination can with great facility +range the wide field of Nature, contemplate an infinite variety +of objects, and, by observing the similitude and disagreement of +their several qualities, single out and abstract, and then suit +and unite, those ideas which will best serve its purpose. +Hence beautiful allusions, surprising metaphors, and admirable +sentiments, are always ready at hand; and while the fancy is full +of images, collected from innumerable objects, and their +different qualities, relations, and habitudes, it can at pleasure +dress a common notion in a strange but becoming garb, by which, +as before observed, the same thought will appear a new one, to +the great delight and wonder of the hearer. What we call +<i>genius</i> results from this particular happy complexion in +the first formation of the person that enjoys it, and is +Nature’s gift, but diversified by various specific +characters and limitations, as its active fire is blended and +allayed by different proportions of phlegm, or reduced and +regulated by the contrast of opposite ferments. Therefore, +as there happens in the composition of facetious genius a greater +or less, though still an inferior, degree of judgment and +prudence, one man of wit will be varied and distinguished from +another.”</p> +<p>In these essays he took little care to propitiate the wits, +for he scorns to avert their malice at the expense of virtue or +of truth.</p> +<p>“Several, in their books, have many sarcastical and +spiteful strokes at religion in general; while others make +themselves pleasant with the principles of the Christian. +Of the last kind this age has seen a most audacious example in +the book entitled ‘A Tale of a Tub.’ Had this +writing been published in a pagan or popish nation, who are +justly impatient of all indignity offered to the established +religion of their country, no doubt but the author would have +received the punishment he deserved. But the fate of this +impious buffoon is very different, for in a Protestant kingdom, +zealous of their civil and religious immunities, he has not only +escaped affronts and the effects of public resentment, but has +been caressed and patronised by persons of great figure, and of +all denominations. Violent party-men, who differed in all +things besides, agreed in their turn to show particular respect +and friendship to this insolent derider of the worship of his +country, till at last the reputed writer is not only gone off +with impunity, but triumphs in his dignity and preferment. +I do not know that any inquiry or search was ever made after this +writing, or that any reward was ever offered for the discovery of +the author, or that the infamous book was ever condemned to be +burnt in public. Whether this proceeds from the excessive +esteem and love that men in power, during the late reign, had for +wit, or their defect of zeal and concern for the Christian +religion will be determined best by those who are best acquainted +with their character.”</p> +<p>In another place he speaks with becoming abhorrence of a +<i>godless author</i> who has burlesqued a Psalm. This +author was supposed to be Pope, who published a reward for any +one that would produce the coiner of the accusation, but never +denied it, and was afterwards the perpetual and incessant enemy +of Blackmore.</p> +<p>One of his essays is upon the spleen, which is treated by him +so much to his own satisfaction, that he has published the same +thoughts in the same words; first, in the “Lay +Monastery,” then in the “Essay,” and then in +the “Preface to a Medical Treatise on the +Spleen.” One passage, which I have found already +twice, I will here exhibit, because I think it better imagined +and better expressed than could be expected from the common tenor +of his prose:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“—As the several combinations of +splenetic madness and folly produce an infinite variety of +irregular under-standing, so the amicable accommodation and +alliance between several virtues and vices produce an equal +diversity in the dispositions and manners of mankind; whence it +comes to pass, that as many monstrous and absurd productions are +found in the moral as in the intellectual world. How +surprising is it to observe among the least culpable men, some +whose minds are attracted by heaven and earth with a seeming +equal force; some who are proud of humility; others who are +censorious and uncharitable, yet self-denying and devout; some +who join contempt of the world with sordid avarice; and others, +who preserve a great degree of piety with ill-nature and +ungoverned passions. Nor are instances of this inconsistent +mixture less frequent among bad men, where we often with +admiration see persons at once generous and unjust, impious +lovers of their country, and flagitious heroes, good-natured +sharpers, immoral men of honour, and libertines who will sooner +die than change their religion; and though it is true that +repugnant coalitions of so high a degree are found but in a part +of mankind, yet none of the whole mass, either good or bad, are +entirely exempted from some absurd mixture.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He about this time (August 22, 1716) became one of the elects +of the College of Physicians, and was soon after (October 1) +chosen Censor. He seems to have arrived late, whatever was +the reason, at his medical honours.</p> +<p>Having succeeded so well in his book on Creation, by which he +established the great principle of all religion, he thought his +undertaking imperfect, unless he likewise enforced the truth of +Revelation, and for that purpose added another poem on +“Redemption.” He had likewise written before +his “Creation” three books on the Nature of Man.</p> +<p>The lovers of musical devotion have always wished for a more +happy metrical version than they have yet obtained of the Book of +Psalms. This wish the piety of Blackmore led him to +gratify, and he produced (1721) “A New Version of the +Psalms of David fitted to the Tunes used in Churches,” +which being recommended by the archbishops and many bishops, +obtained a license for its admission into public worship; but no +admission has it yet obtained, nor has it any right to come where +Brady and Tate have got possession. Blackmore’s name +must be added to those of many others who, by the same attempt, +have obtained only the praise of meaning well.</p> +<p>He was not yet deterred from heroic poetry. There was +another monarch of this island (for he did not fetch his heroes +from foreign countries) whom he considered as worthy the epic +muse, and he dignified “Alfred” (1723) with twelve +books. But the opinion of the nation was now settled; a +hero introduced by Blackmore was not likely to find either +respect or kindness; “Alfred” took his place by +“Eliza” in silence and darkness. Benevolence +was ashamed to favour, and malice was weary of insulting. +Of his four epic poems, the first had such reputation and +popularity as enraged the critics; the second was at least known +enough to be ridiculed; the two last had neither friends nor +enemies.</p> +<p>Contempt is a kind of gangrene, which, if it seizes one part +of a character, corrupts all the rest by degrees. Blackmore +being despised as a poet, was in time neglected as a physician; +his practice, which was once invidiously great, forsook him in +the latter part of his life, but being by nature, or by +principle, averse from idleness, he employed his unwelcome +leisure in writing books on physic, and teaching others to cure +those whom he could himself cure no longer. I know not +whether I can enumerate all the treatises by which he has +endeavoured to diffuse the art of healing, for there is scarcely +any distemper of dreadful name which he has not taught the reader +how to oppose. He has written on the small-pox, with a +vehement invective against inoculation; on consumption, the +spleen, the gout, the rheumatism, the king’s evil, the +dropsy, the jaundice, the stone, the diabetes, and the +plague. Of those books, if I had read them, it could nor be +expected that I should be able to give a critical account. +I have been told that there is something in them of vexation and +discontent, discovered by a perpetual attempt to degrade physic +from its sublimity, and to represent it as attainable without +much previous or concomitant learning. By the transient +glances which I have thrown upon them I have observed an affected +contempt of the ancients, and a supercilious derision of +transmitted knowledge. Of this indecent arrogance the +following quotation from his preface to the “Treatise on +the Small-pox” will afford a specimen, in which, when the +reader finds what I fear is true, that, when he was censuring +Hippocrates, he did not know the difference between +<i>aphorism</i> and <i>apophthegm</i>, he will not pay much +regard to his determinations concerning ancient learning.</p> +<blockquote><p>“As for this book of aphorisms, it is like +my Lord Bacon’s of the same title, a book of jests, or a +grave collection of trite and trifling observations; of which, +though many are true and certain, yet they signify nothing, and +may afford diversion, but no instruction, most of them being much +inferior to the sayings of the wise men of Greece, which yet are +so low and mean, that we are entertained every day with more +valuable sentiments at the table conversation of ingenious and +learned men.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I am unwilling, however, to leave him in total disgrace, and +will therefore quote from another preface a passage less +reprehensible.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Some gentlemen have been disingenuous and +unjust to me, by wresting and forcing my meaning, in the preface +to another book, as if I condemned and exposed all learning, +though they knew I declared that I greatly honoured and esteemed +all men of superior literature and erudition, and that I only +undervalued false or superficial learning, that signifies nothing +for the service of mankind; and that as to physic, I expressly +affirmed that learning must be joined with native genius to make +a physician of the first rank; but if those talents are +separated, I asserted, and do still insist, that a man of native +sagacity and diligence will prove a more able and useful +practiser than a heavy notional scholar, encumbered with a heap +of confused ideas.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He was not only a poet and a physician, but produced likewise +a work of a different kind, “A True and Impartial History +of the Conspiracy against King William of Glorious Memory in the +Year 1695.” This I have never seen, but suppose it is +at least compiled with integrity. He engaged likewise in +theological controversy, and wrote two books against the Arians: +“Just Prejudices against the Arian Hypothesis,” and +“Modern Arians Unmasked.” Another of his works +is “Natural Theology; or, Moral Duties considered apart +from Positive; with some Observations on the Desirableness and +Necessity of a Supernatural Revelation.” This was the +last book that he published. He left behind him “The +Accomplished Preacher; or, an Essay upon Divine Eloquence,” +which was printed after his death by Mr. White of Nayland, in +Essex, the minister who attended his death-bed, and testified the +fervent piety of his last hours. He died on the 8th of +October, 1729.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>Blackmore, by the unremitted enmity of the wits, whom he +provoked more by his virtue than his dulness, has been exposed to +worse treatment than he deserved. His name was so long used +to point every epigram upon dull writers, that it became at last +a byword of contempt but it deserves observation, that malignity +takes hold only of his writings, and that his life passed without +reproach, even when his boldness of reprehension naturally turned +upon him many eyes desirous to espy faults which many tongues +would have made haste to publish. But those who could not +blame, could, at least, forbear to praise, and therefore of his +private life and domestic character there are no memorials.</p> +<p>As an author, he may justly claim the honours of +magnanimity. The incessant attacks of his enemies, whether +serious or merry, are never discovered to have disturbed his +quiet, or to have lessened his confidence in himself: they +neither awed him to silence nor to caution: they neither provoked +him to petulance, nor depressed him to complaint. While the +distributors of literary fame were endeavouring to depreciate and +degrade him, he either despised or defied them, wrote on as he +had written before, and never turned aside to quiet them by +civility, or repress them by confutation. He depended with +great security on his own powers, and perhaps was for that reason +less diligent in perusing books. His literature was, I +think, but small. What he knew of antiquity, I suspect him +to have gathered from modern compilers; but, though he could not +boast of much critical knowledge, his mind was stored with +general principles, and he left minute researches to those whom +he considered as little minds. With this disposition he +wrote most of his poems. Having formed a magnificent +design, he was careless of particular and subordinate elegances; +he studied no niceties of versification; he waited for no +felicities of fancy, but caught his first thoughts in the first +words in which they were presented; nor does it appear that he +saw beyond his own performances, or had ever elevated his was to +that ideal perfection which every genius born to excel is +condemned always to pursue, and never overtake. In the +first suggestions of his imagination he acquiesced; he thought +them good, and did not seek for better. His works may be +read a long time without the occurrence of a single line that +stands prominent from the rest. The poem on +“Creation” has, however, the appearance of more +circumspection; it wants neither harmony of numbers, accuracy of +thought, nor elegance of diction. It has either been +written with great care, or, what cannot be imagined of so long a +work, with such felicity as made care less necessary. Its +two constituent parts are ratiocination and description. To +reason in verse is allowed to be difficult; but Blackmore not +only reasons in verse, but very often reasons poetically; and +finds the art of uniting ornament with strength and ease with +closeness. This is a skill which Pope might have +condescended to learn from him, when he needed it so much in his +“Moral Essays.”</p> +<p>In his descriptions both of life and nature, the poet and the +philosopher happily co-operate; truth is recommended by elegance, +and elegance sustained by truth. In the structure and order +of the poem, not only the greater parts are properly consecutive, +but the didactic and illustrative paragraphs are so happily +mingled, that labour is relieved by pleasure, and the attention +is led on through a long succession of varied excellence to the +original position, the fundamental principle of wisdom and of +virtue.</p> +<p>As the heroic poems of Blackmore are now little read, it is +thought proper to insert, as a specimen from “Prince +Arthur,” the song of Mopas mentioned by +Molyneux:—</p> +<p class="poetry"> “But that which Arthur +with most pleasure heard<br /> +Were noble strains, by Mopas sung the bard,<br /> +Who to his harp in lofty verse began,<br /> +And through the secret maze of Nature ran.<br /> +He the Great Spirit sung, that all things filled,<br /> +That the tumultuous waves of Chaos stilled;<br /> +Whose nod disposed the jarring seeds to peace,<br /> +And made the wars of hostile Atoms cease.<br /> +All Beings, we in fruitful Nature find,<br /> +Proceeded from the Great Eternal mind:<br /> +Streams of his unexhausted spring of power,<br /> +And, cherished with his influence, endure.<br /> +He spread the pure cerulean fields on high,<br /> +And arched the chambers of the vaulted sky,<br /> +Which he, to suit their glory with their height,<br /> +Adorned with globes, that reel, as drunk with light.<br /> +His hand directed all the tuneful spheres,<br /> +He turned their orbs, and polished all the stars.<br /> +He filled the Sun’s vast lamp with golden light:<br /> +And bid the silver Moon adorn the night.<br /> +He spread the airy Ocean without shores,<br /> +Where birds are wafted with their feathered oars.<br /> +Then sung the bard how the light vapours rise<br /> +From the warm earth, and cloud the smiling skies;<br /> +He sung how some, chilled in their airy flight,<br /> +Fall scattered down in pearly dew by night;<br /> +How some, raised higher, sit in secret steams<br /> +On the reflected points of bounding beams,<br /> +Till, chilled with cold, they shade th’ ethereal plain,<br +/> +Then on the thirsty earth descend in rain;<br /> +How some, whose parts a slight contexture show,<br /> +Sink hovering through the air in fleecy snow;<br /> +How part is spun in silken threads, and clings<br /> +Entangled in the grass is gluey strings;<br /> +How others stamp to stones, with rushing sound<br /> +Fall from their crystal quarries to the ground;<br /> +How some are laid in trains, that kindled fly,<br /> +In harmless fires by night, about the sky;<br /> +How some in winds blow with impetuous force,<br /> +And carry ruin where they bend their course,<br /> +While some conspire to form a gentle breeze,<br /> +To fan the air, and play among the trees;<br /> +How some, enraged, grow turbulent and loud,<br /> +Pent in the bowels of a frowning cloud,<br /> +That cracks, as if the axis of the world<br /> +Was broke, and Heaven’s bright towers were downwards +hurled.<br /> +He sung how earth’s wide ball, at Jove’s command,<br +/> +Did in the midst on airy columns stand;<br /> +And how the soul of plants, in prison held,<br /> +And bound with sluggish fetters, lies concealed,<br /> +Till with the spring’s warm beams, almost released<br /> +From the dull weight, with which it lay opprest,<br /> +Its vigour spreads, and makes the teeming earth<br /> +Heave up, and labour with the sprouting birth:<br /> +The active spirit freedom seeks in vain,<br /> +It only works and twists a stronger chain;<br /> +Urging its prison’s sides to break a way,<br /> +It makes that wider, where ’tis forced to stay:<br /> +Till, having formed its living house, it rears<br /> +Its head, and in a tender plant appears.<br /> +Hence springs the oak, the beauty of the grove,<br /> +Whose stately trunk fierce storms can scarcely move.<br /> +Hence grows the cedar, hence the swelling vine<br /> +Does round the elm its purple clusters twine.<br /> +Hence painted flowers the smiling gardens bless,<br /> +Both with their fragrant scent and gaudy dress.<br /> +Hence the white lily in full beauty grows,<br /> +Hence the blue violet and blushing rose.<br /> +He sung how sunbeams brood upon the earth,<br /> +And in the glebe hatch such a numerous birth;<br /> +Which way the genial warmth in Summer storms<br /> +Turns putrid vapours to a bed of worms;<br /> +How rain, transformed by this prolific power,<br /> +Falls from the clouds an animated shower.<br /> +He sung the embryo’s growth within the womb,<br /> +And how the parts their various shapes assume.<br /> +With what rare art the wondrous structure’s wrought,<br /> +From one crude mass to such perfection brought;<br /> +That no part useless, none misplaced we see,<br /> +None are forgot, and more would monstrous be.”</p> +<h2>POPE.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Alexander Pope</span> was born in London, +May 22, 1688, of parents whose rank or station was never +ascertained: we are informed that they were of “gentle +blood;” that his father was of a family of which the Earl +of Downe was the head, and that his mother was the daughter of +William Turner, Esquire, of York, who had likewise three sons, +one of whom had the honour of being killed, and the other of +dying, in the service of Charles the First; the third was made a +general officer in Spain, from whom the sister inherited what +sequestrations and forfeitures had left in the family. +This, and this only, is told by Pope, who is more willing, as I +have heard observed, to show what his father was not, than what +he was. It is allowed that he grew rich by trade; but +whether in a shop or on the Exchange was never discovered till +Mr. Tyers told, on the authority of Mrs. Racket, that he was a +linendraper in the Strand. Both parents were Papists.</p> +<p>Pope was from his birth of a constitution tender and delicate, +but is said to have shown remarkable gentleness and sweetness of +disposition. The weakness of his body continued through his +life, but the mildness of his mind perhaps ended with his +childhood. His voice when he was young was so pleasing, +that he was called in fondness “The Little +Nightingale.”</p> +<p>Being not sent early to school, he was taught to read by an +aunt; and, when he was seven or eight years old, became a lover +of books. He first learned to write by imitating printed +books, a species of penmanship in which he retained great +excellence through his whole life, though his ordinary hand was +not elegant. When he was about eight he was placed in +Hampshire, under Taverner, a Romish priest, who, by a method very +rarely practised, taught him the Greek and Latin rudiments +together. He was now first regularly initiated in poetry by +the perusal of “Ogilby’s Homer” and +“Sandys’ Ovid.” Ogilby’s assistance +he never repaid with any praise; but of Sandys he declared, in +his notes to the “Iliad,” that English poetry owed +much of its beauty to his translations. Sandys very rarely +attempted original composition.</p> +<p>From the care of Taverner, under whom his proficiency was +considerable, he was removed to a school at Twyford, near +Winchester, and again to another school about Hyde Park Corner, +from which he used sometimes to stroll to the play-hones, and was +so delighted with theatrical exhibitions, that he formed a kind +of play from “Ogilby’s Iliad,” with some verses +of his own intermixed, which he persuaded his schoolfellows to +act, with the addition of his master’s gardener, who +personated Ajax.</p> +<p>At the two last schools he used to represent himself as having +lost part of what Taverner had taught him, and on his master at +Twyford he had already exercised his poetry in a lampoon. +Yet under those masters he translated more than a fourth part of +the “Metamorphoses.” If he kept the same +proportion in his other exercises, it cannot be thought that his +loss was great. He tells of himself, in his poems, that +“he lisped in numbers;” and used to say that he could +not remember the time when he began to make verses. In the +style of fiction, it might have been said of him, as of Pindar, +that when he lay in his cradle “the bees swarmed about his +mouth.”</p> +<p>About the time of the Revolution his father, who was +undoubtedly disappointed by the sudden blast of Popish +prosperity, quitted his trade, and retired to Binfield, in +Windsor Forest, with about twenty thousand pounds, for which, +being conscientiously determined not to entrust it to the +Government, he found no better use than that of locking it up in +a chest, and taking from it what his expenses required; and his +life was long enough to consume a great part of it before his son +came to the inheritance.</p> +<p>To Binfield Pope was called by his father when he was about +twelve years old, and there he had for a few months the +assistance of one Deane, another priest, of whom he learned only +to construe a little of “Tully’s +Offices.” How Mr. Deane could spend with a boy who +had translated so much of “Ovid” some months over a +small part of “Tully’s Offices,” it is now vain +to inquire. Of a youth so successfully employed, and so +conspicuously improved, a minute account must be naturally +desired; but curiosity must be contented with confused, +imperfect, and sometimes improbable intelligence. Pope, +finding little advantage from external help, resolved +thenceforward to direct himself, and at twelve formed a plan of +study, which he completed with little other incitement than the +desire of excellence. His primary and principal purpose was +to be a poet, with which his father accidentally concurred by +proposing subjects and obliging him to correct his performances +by many revisals, after which the old gentleman, when he was +satisfied, would say, “These are good rhymes.” +In his perusal of the English poets he soon distinguished the +versification of Dryden, which he considered as the model to be +studied, and was impressed with such veneration for his +instructor, that he persuaded some friends to take him to the +coffee-house which Dryden frequented, and pleased himself with +having seen him.</p> +<p>Dryden died May 1, 1701, some days before Pope was twelve; so +early must he therefore have felt the power of harmony, and the +zeal of genius. Who does not wish that Dryden could have +known the value of the homage that was paid him, and foreseen the +greatness of his young admirer?</p> +<p>The earliest of Pope’s productions is his “Ode on +Solitude,” written before he was twelve, in which there is +nothing more than other forward boys have attained, and which is +not equal to Cowley’s performance at the same age. +His time was now wholly spent in reading and writing. As he +read the classics he amused himself with translating them, and at +fourteen made a version of the first book of the +“Thebais,” which, with some revision, he afterwards +published. He must have been at this time, if he had no +help, a considerable proficient in the Latin tongue.</p> +<p>By Dryden’s fables, which had then been not long +published, and were much in the hands of poetical readers, he was +tempted to try his own skill in giving Chaucer a more fashionable +appearance, and put “January and May” and the +“Prologue of the Wife of Bath” into modern +English. He translated likewise the Epistle of +“Sappho to Phaon” from Ovid, to complete the version, +which was before imperfect, and wrote some other small pieces, +which he afterwards printed. He sometimes imitated the +English poets, and professed to have written at fourteen his poem +upon “Silence,” after Rochester’s +“Nothing.” He had now formed his versification, +and the smoothness of his numbers surpassed his original; but +this is a small part of his praise; he discovers such +acquaintance both with human life and public affairs as is not +easily conceived to have been attainable by a boy of fourteen in +Windsor Forest.</p> +<p>Next year he was desirous of opening to himself new sources of +knowledge, by making himself acquainted with modern languages, +and removed for a time to London, that he might study French and +Italian, which, as he desired nothing more than to read them, +were by diligent application soon despatched. Of Italian +learning he does not appear to have ever made much use in his +subsequent studies. He then returned to Binfield, and +delighted himself with his own poetry. He tried all styles, +and many subjects. He wrote a comedy, a tragedy, an epic +poem, with panegyrics on all the princes of Europe; and, as he +confesses, “thought himself the greatest genius that ever +was.” Self-confidence is the first requisite to great +undertakings. He, indeed, who forms his opinion of himself +in solitude, without knowing the powers of other men, is very +liable to error; but it was the felicity of Pope to rate himself +at his real value. Most of his puerile productions were, by +his maturer judgment, afterwards destroyed. +“Alcander,” the epic poem, was burnt by the +persuasion of Atterbury. The tragedy was founded on the +legend of St. Genevieve. Of the comedy there is no +account. Concerning his studies, it is related that he +translated “Tully on Old Age,” and that, besides his +books of poetry and criticisms, he read “Temple’s +Essays” and “Locke on Human +Understanding.” His reading, though his favourite +authors are not known, appears to have been sufficiently +extensive and multifarious, for his early pieces show with +sufficient evidence his knowledge of books. He that is +pleased with himself easily imagines that he shall please +others. Sir William Trumbull, who had been Ambassador at +Constantinople, and Secretary of State, when he retired from +business, fixed his residence in the neighbourhood of +Binfield. Pope, not yet sixteen, was introduced to the +statesman of sixty, and so distinguished himself that their +interviews ended in friendship and correspondence. Pope +was, through his whole life, ambitious of splendid acquaintance; +and he seems to have wanted neither diligence nor success in +attracting the notice of the great, for, from his first entrance +into the world, and his entrance was very early, he was admitted +to familiarity with those whose rank or station made them most +conspicuous.</p> +<p>From the age of sixteen the life of Pope, as an author, may be +properly computed. He now wrote his pastorals, which were +shown to the poets and critics of that time. As they well +deserved, they were read with admiration, and many praises were +bestowed upon them and upon the preface, which is both elegant +and learned in a high degree; they were, however, not published +till five years afterwards.</p> +<p>Cowley, Milton, and Pope are distinguished among the English +poets by the early exertion of their powers, but the works of +Cowley alone were published in his childhood, and, therefore, of +him only can it be certain that his puerile performances received +no improvement from his maturer studies.</p> +<p>At this time began his acquaintance with Wycherley, a man who +seems to have had among his contemporaries his full share of +reputation, to have been esteemed without virtue, and caressed +without good humour. Pope was proud of his notice. +Wycherley wrote verses in his praise, which he was charged by +Dennis with writing to himself, and they agreed for a while to +flatter one another. It is pleasant to remark how soon Pope +learned the cant of an author, and began to treat critics with +contempt, though he had yet suffered nothing from them. But +the fondness of Wycherley was too violent to last. His +esteem of Pope was such that he submitted some poems to his +revision, and when Pope, perhaps proud of such confidence, was +sufficiently bold in his criticisms, and liberal in his +alterations, the old scribbler was angry to see his pages +defaced, and felt more pain from the detection than content from +the amendment of his faults. They parted, but Pope always +considered him with kindness, and visited him a little time +before he died. Another of his early correspondents was Mr. +Cromwell, of whom I have learned nothing particular, but that he +used to ride a-hunting in a tie-wig. He was fond, and +perhaps vain, of amusing himself with poetry and criticism, and +sometimes sent his performances to Pope, who did not forbear such +remarks as were now and then unwelcome. Pope, in his turn, +put the juvenile version of “Statius” into his hands +for correction. Their correspondence afforded the public +its first knowledge of Pope’s epistolary powers, for his +letters were given by Cromwell to one Mrs. Thomas, and she many +years afterwards sold them to Curll, who inserted them in a +volume of his “Miscellanies.”</p> +<p>Walsh, a name yet preserved among the minor poets, was one of +his first encouragers. His regard was gained by the +pastorals, and from him Pope received the counsel from which he +seems to have regulated his studies. Walsh advised him to +correctness, which, as he told him, the English poets had +hitherto neglected, and which, therefore, was left to him as a +basis of fame; and, being delighted with rural poems, recommended +to him to write a pastoral comedy, like those which are read so +eagerly in Italy, a design which Pope probably did not approve, +as he did not follow it.</p> +<p>Pope had now declared himself a poet, and, thinking himself +entitled to poetical conversation, began at seventeen to frequent +Will’s, a coffee-house on the north side of Russell Street, +in Covent Garden, where the wits of that time used to assemble, +and where Dryden had, when he lived, been accustomed to +preside. During this period of his life he was +indefatigably diligent and insatiably curious, wanting health for +violent and money for expensive pleasures, and having excited in +himself very strong desires of intellectual eminence, he spent +much of his time over his books; but he read only to store his +mind with facts and images, seizing all that his authors +presented with undistinguishing voracity, and with an appetite +for knowledge too eager to be nice. In a mind like his, +however, all the faculties were at once involuntarily +improving. Judgment is forced upon us by experience. +He that reads many books must compare one opinion or one style +with another; and, when he compares, must necessarily +distinguish, reject, and prefer. But the account given by +himself of his studies was, that from fourteen to twenty he read +only for amusement, from twenty to twenty-seven for improvement +and instruction; that in the first part of his time he desired +only to know, and in the second he endeavoured to judge.</p> +<p>The Pastorals, which had been for some time handed about among +poets and critics, were at last printed (1709) in Tonson’s +“Miscellany,” in a volume which began with the +Pastorals of Philips, and ended with those of Pope. The +same year was written the “Essay on Criticism,” a +work which displays such extent of comprehension, such nicety of +distinction, such acquaintance with mankind, and such knowledge +both of ancient and modern learning, as are not often attained by +the maturest age and longest experience. It was published +about two years afterwards, and, being praised by Addison in the +<i>Spectator</i>, with sufficient liberality, met with so much +favour as enraged Dennis, “who,” he says, +“found himself attacked, without any manner of provocation +on his side, and attacked in his person instead of his writings, +by one who was wholly a stranger to him, at a time when all the +world knew he was persecuted by fortune; and not only saw that +this was attempted in a clandestine manner, with the utmost +falsehood and calumny, but found that all this was done by a +little, affected hypocrite, who had nothing in his mouth at the +same time but truth, candour, friendship, good-nature, humanity, +and magnanimity.” How the attack was clandestine is +not easily perceived, nor how his person is depreciated; but he +seems to have known something of Pope’s character, in whom +may be discovered an appetite to talk too frequently of his own +virtues. The pamphlet is such as rage might be expected to +dictate. He supposes himself to be asked two questions; +whether the essay will succeed, and who or what is the +author.</p> +<p>Its success he admits to be secured by the false opinions then +prevalent; the author he concludes to be “young and +raw.”</p> +<blockquote><p>“First, because he discovers a sufficiency +beyond his little ability, and hath rashly undertaken a task +infinitely above his force. Secondly, while this little +author struts and affects the dictatorian air, he plainly shows +that at the same time he is under the rod: and, while he pretends +to give laws to others, is a pedantic slave to authority and +opinion. Thirdly, he hath, like schoolboys, borrowed both +from living and dead. Fourthly, he knows not his own mind, +and frequently contradicts himself. Fifthly, he is almost +perpetually in the wrong.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>All these positions he attempts to prove by quotations and +remarks; but his desire to do mischief is greater than his +power. He has, however, justly criticised some passages in +these lines:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“There are whom Heaven has blessed with +store of wit,<br /> +Yet want as much again to manage it:<br /> +For wit and judgment ever are at strife—”</p> +<p>It is apparent that wit has two meanings, and that what is +wanted, though called wit, is truly judgment. So far Dennis +is undoubtedly right: but not content with argument, he will have +a little mirth, and triumphs over the first couplet in terms too +elegant to be forgotten. “By the way, what rare +numbers are here! Would not one swear that this youngster +had espoused some antiquated muse, who had sued out a divorce on +account of impotence, from some superannuated sinner; and, having +been p—d by her former spouse, has got the gout in her +decrepit age, which makes her hobble so damnably?” +This was the man who would reform a nation sinking into +barbarity.</p> +<p>In another place Pope himself allowed that Dennis had detected +one of those blunders which are called “bulls.” +The first edition had this line:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“What is this wit—<br /> +Where wanted scorned; and envied where acquired?”</p> +<p>“How,” says the critic, “can wit be scorned +where it is not? Is not this a figure frequently employed +in Hibernian land! The person that wants this wit may +indeed be scorned, but the scorn shows the honour which the +contemner has for wit.” Of this remark Pope made the +proper use, by correcting the passage.</p> +<p>I have preserved, I think, all that is reasonable in +Dennis’s criticism; it remains that justice be done to his +delicacy. “For his acquaintance,” says Dennis, +“he names Mr. Walsh, who had by no means the qualification +which this author reckons absolutely necessary to a critic, it +being very certain that he was, like this essayer a very +indifferent poet; he loved to be well dressed; and I remember a +little young gentleman whom Mr. Walsh used to take into his +company as a double foil to his person and capacity. +Inquire between Sunning Hill and Oakingham, for a young, short, +equal, gentleman, the very bow of the God of Love, and tell me +whether he be a proper author to make personal reflections? +He may extol the ancients, but he has reason to thank the gods +that he was born a modern; for had he been born of Grecian +parents, and his father consequently had by law had the absolute +disposal of him, his life had been no longer than that of one of +his poems, the life of half a day. Let the person of a +gentleman of his parts be never so contemptible, his inward man +is ten times more ridiculous; it being impossible that his +outward form, though it be that of downright monkey, should +differ so much from human shape as his unthinking, immaterial +part does from human understanding.” Thus began the +hostility between Pope and Dennis, which, though it was suspended +for a short time, never was appeased. Pope seems, at first, +to have attacked him wantonly; but though he always professed to +despise him, he discovers, by mentioning him very often, that he +felt his force or his venom.</p> +<p>Of this essay, Pope declared that he did not expect the sale +to be quick, because “not one gentleman in sixty, even of +liberal education, could understand it.” The +gentleman, and the education of that time, seem to have been of a +lower character than they are of this. He mentioned a +thousand copies as a numerous impression.</p> +<p>Dennis was not his only censurer; the zealous Papists thought +the monks treated with too much contempt, and Erasmus too +studiously praised; but to these objections he had not much +regard.</p> +<p>The “Essay,” has been translated into French by +Hamilton, author of the “Comte de Grammont,” whose +version was never printed, by Robotham, secretary to the king for +Hanover, and by Resnel; and commented by Dr. Warburton, who has +discovered in it such order and connection as was not perceived +by Addison, nor, as it is said, intended by the author.</p> +<p>Almost every poem, consisting of precepts, is so far arbitrary +and immethodical, that many of the paragraphs may change places +with no apparent inconvenience; for of two or more positions, +depending upon some remote and general principle, there is seldom +any cogent reason why one should precede the other. But for +the order in which they stand, whatever it be, a little ingenuity +may easily give a reason. “It is possible,” +says Hooker, “that, by long circumduction, from any one +truth all truth may be inferred.” Of all homogeneous +truths, at least of all truths respecting the same general end, +in whatever series they may be produced, a concatenation by +intermediate ideas may be formed, such as, when it is once shown, +shall appear natural; but if this order be reversed, another mode +of connection equally spacious may be found or made. +Aristotle is praised for naming fortitude first of the cardinal +virtues, as that without which no other virtue can steadily be +practised; but he might, with equal propriety, have placed +prudence and justice before it; since without prudence fortitude +is mad; without justice, it is mischievous. As the end of +method is perspicuity, that series is sufficiently regular that +avoids obscurity; and where there is no obscurity, it will not be +difficult to discover method.</p> +<p>In the <i>Spectator</i> was published the +“Messiah,” which he first submitted to the perusal of +Steele, and corrected in compliance with his criticisms. It +is reasonable to infer from his “Letters” that the +verses on the “Unfortunate Lady” were written about +the time when his “Essay” was published. The +lady’s name and adventures I have sought with fruitless +inquiry. I can therefore tell no more than I have learned +from Mr. Ruffhead, who writes with the confidence of one who +could trust his information. She was a woman of eminent +rank and large fortune, the ward of an uncle, who, having given +her a proper education, expected, like other guardians, that she +should make at least an equal match; and such he proposed to her, +but found it rejected in favour of a young gentleman of inferior +condition. Having discovered the correspondence between the +two lovers, and finding the young lady determined to abide by her +own choice, he supposed that separation might do what can rarely +be done by arguments, and sent her into a foreign country, where +she was obliged to converse only with those from whom her uncle +had nothing to fear. Her lover took care to repeat his +vows; but his letters were intercepted and carried to her +guardian, who directed her to be watched with still greater +vigilance, till of this restraint she grow so impatient that she +bribed a woman servant to procure her a sword, which she directed +to her heart.</p> +<p>From this account, given with evident intention to raise the +lady’s character, it does not appear that she had any claim +to praise nor much to compassion. She seems to have been +impatient, violent, and ungovernable. Her uncle’s +power could not have lasted long; the hour of liberty and choice +would have come in time. But her desires were too hot for +delay, and she liked self-murder better than suspense. Nor +is it discovered that the uncle, whoever he was, is with much +justice delivered to posterity as “a false +guardian.” He seems to have done only that for which +a guardian is appointed; he endeavoured to direct his niece till +she should be able to direct herself. Poetry has not often +been worse employed than in dignifying the amorous fiery of a +raving girl.</p> +<p>Not long after he wrote the “Rape of the Lock,” +the most airy, the most ingenious, and the most delightful off +all his compositions, occasioned by a frolic of gallantry, rather +too familiar, in which Lord Petre cut off a lock of Mrs. Arabella +Fermor’s hair. This, whether stealth or violence, was +so much resented that the commerce of the two families, before +very friendly, was interrupted. Mr. Caryl, a gentleman who, +being secretary to King James’s queen, had followed his +mistress into France, and who, being the author of <i>Sir Solomon +Single</i>, a comedy, and some translations, was entitled to the +notice of a wit, solicited Pope to endeavour a reconciliation by +a ludicrous poem which might bring both the parties to a better +temper. In compliance with Caryl’s request, though +his name was for a long time marked only by the first and last +letter, “C—l,” a poem of two cantos, was +written (1711), as is said, in a fortnight, and sent to the +offended lady, who liked it well enough to show it; and, with the +usual process of literary transactions, the author, dreading a +surreptitious edition, was forced to publish it.</p> +<p>The event is said to have been such as was desired, the +pacification and diversion of all to whom it related, except Sir +George Brown, who complained with some bitterness that, in the +character of Sir Plume, he was made to talk nonsense. +Whether all this be true I have some doubt; for at Paris, a few +years ago, a niece of Mrs. Fermor, who presided in an English +convent, mentioned Pope’s work with very little gratitude, +rather as an insult than an honour; and she may be supposed to +have inherited the opinion of her family. At its first +appearance at was termed by Addison “merum +sal.” Pope, however, saw that it was capable of +improvement; and, having luckily contrived to borrow his +machinery from the Rosicrucians, imparted the scheme with which +his head was teeming to Addison, who told him that his work, as +it stood, was “a delicious little thing,” and gave +him no encouragement to retouch it.</p> +<p>This has been too hastily considered as an instance of +Addison’s jealousy, for, as he could not guess the conduct +of the new design, or the possibilities of pleasure comprised in +a fiction of which there had been no examples, he might very +reasonably and kindly persuade the author to acquiesce in his own +prosperity, and forbear an attempt which he considered as an +unnecessary hazard. Addison’s counsel was happily +rejected. Pope foresaw the future efflorescence of imagery +then budding in his mind, and resolved to spare no art or +industry of cultivation. The soft luxuriance of his fancy +was already shooting, and all the gay varieties of diction were +ready at his hand to colour and embellish it. His attempt +was justified by its success. The “Rape of the +Lock” stands forward, in the classes of literature, as the +most exquisite example of ludicrous poetry. Berkeley +congratulated him upon the display of powers more truly poetical +than he had shown before with elegance of description and +justness of precepts he had now exhibited boundless fertility of +invention. He always considered the intermixture of the +machinery with the action as his most successful exertion of +poetical art. He, indeed, could never afterwards produce +anything of such unexampled excellence. Those performances, +which strike with wonder, are combinations of skilful genius with +happy casualty; and it is not likely that any felicity, like the +discovery of a new race of preternatural agents, should happen +twice to the same man. Of this poem the author was, I +think, allowed to enjoy the praise for a long time without +disturbance. Many years afterwards Dennis published some +remarks upon it with very little force and with no effect; for +the opinion of the public was already settled, and it was no +longer at the mercy of criticism.</p> +<p>About this time he published the “Temple of Fame,” +which, as he tells Steele in their correspondence, he had written +two years before—that is, when he was only twenty-two years +old, an early time of life for so much learning and so much +observation as that work exhibits. On this poem Dennis +afterwards published some remarks, of which the most reasonable +is that some of the lines represent motion as exhibited by +sculpture.</p> +<p>Of the Epistle from “Eloisa to Abelard,” I do not +know the date. His first inclination to attempt a +composition of that tender kind arose, as Mr. Savage told me, +from his perusal of Prior’s “Nut-brown +Maid.” How much he has surpassed Prior’s work +it is not necessary to mention, when perhaps it may be said, with +justice, that he has excelled every composition of the same +kind. The mixture of religious hope and resignation gives +an elevation and dignity to disappointed love, which images +merely natural cannot bestow. The gloom of a convent +strikes the imagination with far greater force than the solitude +of a grove. This piece was, however, not much his favourite +in his later years, though I never heard upon what principle he +slighted it.</p> +<p>In the next year (1713) he published “Windsor +Forest,” of which part was, as he relates, written at +sixteen, about the same time as his Pastorals, and the latter +part was added afterwards. Where the addition begins we are +not told. The lines relating to the peace confess their own +date. It is dedicated to Lord Lansdowne, who was then in +high reputation and influence among the Tories; and it is said +that the conclusion of the poem gave great pain to Addison, both +as a poet and a politician. Reports like this are often +spread with boldness very disproportionate to their +evidence. Why should Addison receive any particular +disturbance from the last lines of “Windsor +Forest”? If contrariety of opinion could poison a +politician, he could not live a day; and, as a poet, he must have +felt Pope’s force of genius much more from many other parts +of his works. The pain that Addison might feel it is not +likely that he would confess; and it is certain that he so well +suppressed his discontent that Pope now thought himself his +favourite, for, having been consulted in the revisal of +“Cato” he introduced it by a prologue; and, when +Dennis published his remarks, undertook, not indeed to vindicate, +but to revenge his friend, by a “Narrative of the Frenzy of +John Dennis.”</p> +<p>There is reason to believe that Addison gave no encouragement +to this disingenuous hostility, for, says Pope, in a letter to +him, “indeed your opinion, that ’tis entirely to be +neglected, would be my own in my own case; but I felt more warmth +here than I did when I first saw his book against myself (though, +indeed, in two minutes it made me heartily merry).” +Addison was not a man on whom such cant of sensibility could make +much impression. He left the pamphlet to itself, having +disowned it to Dennis, and perhaps did not think Pope to have +deserved much by his officiousness.</p> +<p>This year was printed in the <i>Guardian</i> the ironical +comparison between the pastorals of Philips and Pope, a +composition of artifice, criticism, and literature, to which +nothing equal will easily be found. The superiority of Pope +is so ingeniously dissembled, and the feeble lines of Philips so +skilfully preferred, that Steele, being deceived, was unwilling +to print the paper, lest Pope should be offended. Addison +immediately saw the writer’s design, and, as it seems, had +malice enough to conceal his discovery, and to permit a +publication which, by making his friend Philips ridiculous, made +him for ever an enemy to Pope.</p> +<p>It appears that about this time Pope had a strong inclination +to unite the art of painting with that of poetry, and put himself +under the tuition of Jervas. He was near-sighted, and +therefore not formed by nature for a painter; he tried, however, +how far he could advance, and sometimes persuaded his friends to +sit. A picture of Betterton, supposed to be drawn by him, +was in the possession of Lord Mansfield. If this was taken +from the life, he must have begun to paint earlier, for Betterton +was now dead. Pope’s ambition of this new art +produced some encomiastic verses to Jervas, which certainly show +his power as a poet; but I have been told that they betray his +ignorance of painting. He appears to have regarded +Betterton with kindness and esteem, and after his death +published, under his name, a version into modern English of +Chaucer’s Prologues and one of his Tales, which, as was +related by Mr. Harte, were believed to have been the performance +of Pope himself by Fenton, who made him a gay offer of five +pounds if he would show them in the hand of Betterton.</p> +<p>The next year (1713) produced a bolder attempt, by which +profit was sought as well as praise. The poems which he had +hitherto written, however they might have diffused his name, had +made very little addition to his fortune. The allowance +which his father made him, though, proportioned to what he had, +it might be liberal, could not be large; his religion hindered +him from the occupation of any civil employment; and he +complained that he wanted even money to buy books. He +therefore resolved to try how far the favour of the public +extended by soliciting a subscription to a version of the +“Iliad,” with large notes. To print by +subscription was, for some time, a practice peculiar to the +English. The first considerable work for which this +expedient was employed is said to have been Dryden’s +“Virgil,” and it had been tried again with great +success when the <i>Tatlers</i> were collected into volumes.</p> +<p>There was reason to believe that Pope’s attempt would be +successful. He was in the full bloom of reputation and was +personally known to almost all whom dignity of employment or +splendour of reputation had made eminent; he conversed +indifferently with both parties, and never disturbed the public +with his political opinions; and it might be naturally expected, +as each faction then boasted its literary zeal, that the great +men, who on other occasions practised all the violence of +opposition, would emulate each other in their encouragement of a +poet who delighted all, and by whom none had been offended. +With these hopes, he offered an English “Iliad” to +subscribers, in six volumes in quarto, for six guineas, a sum +according to the value of money at that time by no means +inconsiderable, and greater than I believe to have been ever +asked before. His proposal, however, was very favourably +received, and the patrons of literature were busy to recommend +his undertaking and promote his interest. Lord Oxford, +indeed, lamented that such a genius should be wasted upon a work +not original, but proposed no means by which he might live +without it. Addison recommended caution and moderation, and +advised him not to be content with the praise of half the nation +when he might be universally favoured.</p> +<p>The greatness of the design, the popularity of the author, and +the attention of the literary world, naturally raised such +expectations of the future sale, that the booksellers made their +offers with great eagerness; but the highest bidder was Bernard +Lintot, who became proprietor on condition of supplying, at his +own expense, all the copies which were to be delivered to +subscribers, or presented to friends, and paying two hundred +pounds for every volume.</p> +<p>Of the quartos it was, I believe, stipulated that none should +be printed but for the author, that the subscription might not be +depreciated; but Lintot impressed the same pages upon a small +folio, and paper perhaps a little thinner, and sold exactly at +half the price, for half a guinea each volume, books so little +inferior to the quartos that, by fraud of trade, those folios +being afterwards shortened by cutting away the top and bottom, +were sold as copies printed for the subscribers.</p> +<p>Lintot printed two hundred and fifty on royal paper in folio +for two guineas a volume; of the small folio, having printed +seventeen hundred and fifty copies of the first volume, he +reduced the number in the other volumes to a thousand. It +is unpleasant to relate that the bookseller, after all his hopes +and all his liberality, was, by a very unjust and illegal action, +defrauded of his profit. An edition of the English +“Iliad” was printed in Holland in duodecimo, and +imported clandestinely for the gratification of those who were +impatient to read what they could not yet afford to buy. +This fraud could only be counteracted by an edition equally cheap +and more commodious; and Lintot was compelled to contract his +folio at once into a duodecimo, and lose the advantage of an +intermediate gradation. The notes which in the Dutch copies +were placed at the end of each book as they had been in the large +volumes, were now subjoined to the text in the same page, and are +therefore more easily consulted. Of this edition two +thousand five hundred were first printed, and five thousand a few +weeks afterwards; but indeed great numbers were necessary to +produce considerable profit.</p> +<p>Pope, having now emitted his proposals, and engaged not only +his own reputation but in some degree that of his friends who +patronised his subscription, began to be frightened at his own +undertaking, and finding himself at first embarrassed with +difficulties which retarded and oppressed him, he was for a time +timorous and uneasy, had his nights disturbed by dreams of long +journeys through unknown ways, and wished, as he said, +“that somebody would hang him.” This misery, +however, was not of long continuance; he grew by degrees more +acquainted with Homer’s images and expressions, and +practice increased his facility of versification. In a +short time he represents himself as despatching regularly fifty +verses a day, which would show him by an easy computation, the +termination of his labour. His own diffidence was not his +only vexation. He that asks a subscription soon finds that +he has enemies. All who do not encourage him defame +him. He that wants money would rather be thought angry than +poor; and he that wishes to save his money conceals his avarice +by his malice. Addison had hinted his suspicion that Pope +was too much a Tory; and some of the Tories suspected his +principles because he had contributed to the <i>Guardian</i>, +which was carried on by Steele.</p> +<p>To those who censured his politics were added enemies more +dangerous, who called in question his knowledge of Greek, and his +qualifications for a translator of “Homer.” To +these he made no public opposition, but in one of his letters +escapes from them as well as he can. At an age like his, +for he was not more than twenty-five, with an irregular education +and a course of life of which much seems to have passed in +conversation, it is not very likely that he overflowed with +Greek. But when he felt himself deficient he sought +assistance, and what man of learning would refuse to help +him? Minute inquiries into the force of words are less +necessary in translating Homer than other poets, because his +positions are general, and his representations natural, with very +little dependence on local or temporary customs, on those +changeable scenes of artificial life, which, by mingling original +with accidental notions and crowding the mind with images which +time effaces, produces ambiguity in dictation and obscurity in +books. To this open display of unadulterated nature it must +be ascribed that Homer has fewer passages of doubtful meaning +than any other poet either in the learned or in modern +languages. I have read of a man who, being by his ignorance +of Greek compelled to gratify his curiosity with the Latin +printed on the opposite page, declared that from the rude +simplicity of the lines literally rendered he formed nobler ideas +of the Homeric majesty than from the laboured elegance of +polished versions. Those literal translations were always +at hand, and from them he could easily obtain his author’s +sense with sufficient certainty and among the readers of Homer +the number is very small of those who find much in the Greek more +than in the Latin, except the music of the numbers.</p> +<p>If more help was wanting he had the poetical translation of +Eobanus Hessus, an unwearied writer of Latin verses; he had the +French Homers of La Valterie and Dacier, and the English of +Chapman, Hobbes, and Ogilby. With Chapman, whose work, +though now totally neglected, seems to have been popular almost +to the end of the last century, he had very frequent +consultations, and perhaps never translated any passage till he +had read his version, which he indeed has been sometimes +suspected of using instead of the original. Notes were +likewise to be provided, for the six volumes would have been very +little more than six pamphlets without them. What the mere +perusal of the text could suggest Pope wanted no assistance to +collect or methodise; but more was necessary. Many pages +were to be filled, and learning must supply materials to wit and +judgment. Something might be gathered from Dacier, but no +man loves to be indebted to his contemporaries, and Dacier was +accessible to common readers. Eustathius was therefore +necessarily consulted. To read Eustathius, of whose work +there was then no Latin version, I suspect Pope if he had been +willing not to have been able. Some other was therefore to +be found who had leisure as well as abilities, and he was +doubtless most readily employed who would do much work for little +money.</p> +<p>The history of the notes has never been traced. Broome, +an his preface to his poems, declares himself the commentator +“in part upon the ‘Iliad,’” and it +appears from Fenton’s letter, preserved in the Museum, that +Broome was at first engaged in consulting Eustathius; but that +after a time, whatever was the reason, he desisted. Another +man of Cambridge was then employed, who soon grew weary of the +work, and a third, that was recommended by Thirlby, is now +discovered to have been Jortin, a man since well known to the +learned world, who complained that Pope, having accepted and +approved his performance, never testified any curiosity to see +him, and who professed to have forgotten the terms on which he +worked. The terms which Fenton uses are very mercantile: +“I think at first sight that his performance is very +commendable, and have sent word for him to finish the seventeenth +book, and to send it with his demands for his trouble. I +have here enclosed the specimen; if the rest come before the +return, I will keep them till I receive your order.”</p> +<p>Broome then offered his service a second time, which was +probably accepted, as they had afterwards a closer +correspondence. Parnell contributed the “Life of +Homer,” which Pope found so harsh, that he took great pains +in correcting it; and by his own diligence, with such help as +kindness or money could procure him, in somewhat more than five +years he completed his version of the “Iliad,” with +the notes. He began it in 1712, his twenty-fifth year, and +concluded it in 1718, his thirtieth year. When we find him +translating fifty lines a day, it is natural to suppose that he +would have brought his work to a more speedy conclusion. +The “Iliad,” containing less than sixteen thousand +verses, might have been despatched in less than three hundred and +twenty days by fifty verses in a day. The notes, compiled +with the assistance of his mercenaries, could not be supposed to +require more time than the text. According to this +calculation, the progress of Pope may seem to have been slow; but +the distance is commonly very great between actual performances +and speculative possibility. It is natural to suppose, that +as much as has been done to-day may be done to-morrow; but on the +morrow some difficulty emerges, or some external impediment +obstructs.</p> +<p>Indolence, interruption, business, and pleasure, all take +their turns of retardation; and every long work is lengthened by +a thousand causes that can, and ten thousand that cannot, be +recounted. Perhaps no extensive and multifarious +performance was ever effected within the term originally fixed in +the undertaker’s mind. He that runs against time has +an antagonist not subject to casualties.</p> +<p>The encouragement given to this translation, though report +seems to have overrated it, was such as the world has not often +seen. The subscribers were five hundred and +seventy-five. The copies, for which subscriptions were +given, were six hundred and fifty-four; and only six hundred and +sixty were printed. For these copies Pope had nothing to +pay. He therefore received, including the two hundred +pounds a volume, five thousand three hundred and twenty pounds, +four shillings, without deduction, as the books were supplied by +Lintot.</p> +<p>By the success of his subscription Pope was relieved from +those pecuniary distresses with which, notwithstanding his +popularity, he had hitherto struggled. Lord Oxford had +often lamented his disqualification for public employment, but +never proposed a pension. While the translation of +“Homer” was in its progress, Mr. Craggs, then +Secretary of State, offered to procure him a pension, which, at +least during his ministry, might be enjoyed with secrecy. +This was not accepted by Pope, who told him, however, that, if he +should be pressed with want of money, he would send to him for +occasional supplies. Craggs was not long in power, and was +never solicited for money by Pope, who disdained to beg what he +did not want.</p> +<p>With the product of this subscription, which he had too much +discretion to squander, he secured his future life from want, by +considerable annuities. The estate of the Duke of +Buckingham was found to have been charged with five hundred +pounds a year, payable to Pope, which doubtless his translation +enabled him to purchase.</p> +<p>It cannot be unwelcome to literary curiosity, that I deduce +thus minutely the history of the English +“Iliad.” It is certainly the noblest version of +poetry which the world has ever seen, and its publication must +therefore be considered as one of the great events in the annals +of learning. To those who have skill to estimate the +excellence and difficulty of this great work, it must be very +desirable to know how it was performed, and by what gradations it +advanced to correctness. Of such an intellectual process +the knowledge has very rarely been attainable; but happily there +remains the original copy of the “Iliad,” which, +being obtained by Bolingbroke as a curiosity, descended from him +to Mallet, and is now, by the solicitation of the late Dr. Maty, +reposited in the Museum. Between this manuscript, which is +written upon accidental fragments of paper, and the printed +edition, there must have been an intermediate copy, that was +perhaps destroyed as it returned from the press.</p> +<p>From the first copy I have procured a few transcripts, and +shall exhibit first the printed lines; then, in a small print, +those of the manuscripts, with all their variations. Those +words in the small print, which are given in italics, are +cancelled in the copy, and the words placed under them adopted in +their stead:</p> +<p>The beginning of the first book stands thus:—</p> +<p class="poetry"> The wrath of Peleus’ +son, the direful spring<br /> +Of all the Grecian woes, O Goddess, sing,<br /> +That wrath which hurled to Pluto’s gloomy reign<br /> +The souls of mighty chiefs untimely slain.</p> +<p class="poetry"> The stern Pelides’ +<i>rage</i>, O Goddess, sing,<br /> + + +wrath<br /> + Of all the woes <i>of Greece</i> too fatal +spring,<br /> + + +Grecian<br /> + That screwed with warriors dead the Phrygian +plain,<br /> + + +heroes<br /> + And <i>peopled the dark with heroes</i> slain:<br /> + filled the shady hell with chiefs +untimely</p> +<p class="poetry">Whose limbs, unburied on the naked shore,<br /> +Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore,<br /> +Since great Achilles and Atrides strove;<br /> +Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Whose limbs, unburied on the +hostile shore,<br /> + Devouring dogs and greedy vultures tore,<br /> + Since first <i>Atrides</i> and <i>Achilles</i> +strove;<br /> + Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of +Jove.</p> +<p class="poetry">Declare, O Muse, in what ill-fated hour<br /> +Sprung the fierce strife from what offended Power?<br /> +Latona’s son a dire contagion spread,<br /> +And heaped the camp with mountains of the dead;<br /> +The King of Men his reverend priest defied,<br /> +And for the King’s offence the people died.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Declare, O Goddess, what +offended Power<br /> + Enflamed their <i>rage</i> in that <i>ill-omened</i> +hour;<br /> + + +anger fatal, hapless<br /> + Phœbus himself the <i>dire</i> debate +procured,<br /> + + +fierce<br /> + To avenge the wrongs his injured priest endured;<br +/> + For this the god a dire infection spread,<br /> + And heaped the camp with millions of the dead:<br /> + The King of men the sacred sire defied,<br /> + And for the King’s offence the people +died.</p> +<p class="poetry">For Chryses sought with costly gifts to gain<br +/> +His captive daughter from the Victor’s chain;<br /> +Suppliant the venerable father stands,<br /> +Apollo’s awful ensigns grace his hands,<br /> +By these he begs, and, lowly bending down,<br /> +Extends the sceptre and the laurel crown.</p> +<p class="poetry"> For Chryses sought by +<i>presents to regain</i><br /> + + +costly gifts to gain<br /> + His captive daughter from the Victor’s +chain;<br /> + Suppliant the venerable father stands,<br /> + Apollo’s awful ensigns graced his hands.<br /> + By these he begs, and, lowly bending down<br /> + <i>The golden sceptre</i> and the laurel crown,<br +/> + Presents the sceptre<br /> + <i>For these as ensigns of his god he bare</i>,<br +/> + <i>The god who sends his golden shaft afar</i>;<br +/> + Then low on earth the venerable man,<br /> + Suppliant before the brother kings began.</p> +<p class="poetry">He sued to all, but chief implored for +grace,<br /> +The brother kings of Atreus’ royal race;<br /> +Ye kings and warriors, may your vows be crowned,<br /> +And Troy’s proud walls lie level with the ground;<br /> +May Jove restore you, when your toils are o’er,<br /> +Safe to the pleasures of your native shore.</p> +<p class="poetry"> To all he sued, but chief +implored for grace<br /> + The brother kings of Atreus’ royal race.<br /> + Ye <i>sons of Atreus</i>, may your vows be +crowned,<br /> + kings and +warriors<br /> + <i>Your labours</i>, <i>by the gods be all your +labours crowned</i>;<br /> + <i>So may the gods your arms with conquest +bless</i>,<br /> + <i>And</i> Troy’s proud walls <i>lie</i> level +with the ground;<br /> + Till laid<br /> + <i>And crown your labours with desired +success</i>;<br /> + May Jove restore you when your toils are +o’er<br /> + Safe to the pleasures of your native shore.</p> +<p class="poetry">But, oh! relieve a wretched parent’s +pain,<br /> +And give Chryses to these arms again;<br /> +If mercy fail, yet let my present move,<br /> +And dread avenging Phœbus, son of Jove.</p> +<p class="poetry"> But, oh! relieve a hapless +parent’s pain,<br /> + And give my daughter to these arms again;<br /> + <i>Receive my gifts</i>, if mercy fails, yet let my +present move,<br /> + And fear <i>the god who deals his darts +around</i>,<br /> + + +avenging Phœbus, son of Jove.</p> +<p class="poetry">The Greeks, in shouts, their joint assent +declare,<br /> +The priest to reverence, and release the fair:<br /> +Not so Atrides; he, with kingly pride,<br /> +Repulsed the sacred sire, and thus replied.</p> +<p class="poetry"> He said, the Greeks their +joint assent declare,<br /> + <i>The father said</i>, <i>the generous Greeks +relent</i>,<br /> + To accept the ransom, and restore the fair:<br /> + <i>Revere the priest</i>, <i>and speak their joint +assent</i>;<br /> + Not so <i>the tyrant</i>; he, with kingly pride,<br +/> + + +Atrides,<br /> + Repulsed the sacred sire, and thus replied<br /> + + +[Not so the tyrant. <span class="smcap">Dryden</span>.]</p> +<p>Of these lines, and of the whole first book, I am told that +there was yet a former copy, more varied, and more deformed with +interlineations.</p> +<p>The beginning of the second book varies very little from the +printed page, and is therefore set down without any +parallel. The few slight differences do not require to be +elaborately displayed.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Now pleasing sleep had sealed +each mortal eye:<br /> +Stretched in the tents the Grecian leaders lie;<br /> +The Immortals slumbered on their thrones above,<br /> +All but the ever-wakeful eye of Jove.<br /> +To honour Thetis’ son he bends his care,<br /> +And plunge the Greeks in all the woes of war.<br /> +Then bids an empty phantom rise to sight,<br /> +And thus <i>commands</i> the vision of the night: directs<br /> +Fly hence, delusive dream, and, light as air,<br /> +To Agamemnon’s royal tent repair;<br /> +Bid him in arms draw forth the embattled train,<br /> +March all his legions to the dusty plain.<br /> +<i>Now tell the King</i> ’tis given him to destroy<br /> +Declare even now<br /> +The lofty <i>walls</i> of wide-extended Troy; towers<br /> +For now no more the gods with fate contend;<br /> +At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.<br /> +Destruction <i>hovers</i> o’er yon devoted wall, hangs<br +/> +And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.</p> +<p>Invocation to the catalogue of ships.</p> +<p class="poetry">Say, virgins, seated round the throne +divine,<br /> +All-knowing goddesses! immortal nine!<br /> +Since earth’s wide regions, heaven’s unmeasured +height,<br /> +And hell’s abyss, hide nothing from your sight<br /> +(We, wretched mortals! lost in doubts below,<br /> +But guess by rumour, and but boast we know),<br /> +Oh! say what heroes, fired by thirst of fame,<br /> +Or urged by wrongs, to Troy’s destruction came!<br /> +To count them all demands a thousand tongues,<br /> +A throat of brass and adamantine lungs.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Now virgin goddesses, +immortal nine!<br /> + That round Olympus’ heavenly summit shine,<br +/> + Who see through heaven and earth, and hell +profound,<br /> + And all things know, and all things can resound!<br +/> + Relate what armies sought the Trojan land,<br /> + What nations followed, and what chiefs command;<br +/> + (For doubtful fame distracts mankind below,<br /> + And nothing can we tell, and nothing know)<br /> + Without your aid, to count the unnumbered train,<br +/> +A thousand mouths, a thousand tongues, were vain.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">Book V. <i>v.</i> 1.</p> +<p class="poetry"> But Pallas now Tydides’ +soul inspires,<br /> +Fills with her force, and warms with all her fires:<br /> +Above the Greeks his deathless fame to raise,<br /> +And crown her hero with distinguished praise,<br /> +High on his helm celestial lightnings play,<br /> +His beamy shield emits a living ray;<br /> +The unwearied blaze incessant streams supplies,<br /> +Like the red star that fires the autumnal skies.<br /> + But Pallas now Tydides’ soul inspires,<br /> +Fills with her <i>rage</i>, and warms with all her fires;<br /> + + +force<br /> +O’er all the Greeks decrees his fame to raise,<br /> +Above the Greeks <i>her warrior’s</i> fame to raise,<br /> + + +his deathless<br /> +And crown her hero with <i>immortal</i> praise: distinguished<br +/> +<i>Bright from</i> his beamy <i>crest the</i> lightnings play,<br +/> + High +on helm<br /> +From his broad buckler flashed the living ray;<br /> +High on his helm celestial lightnings play,<br /> +His beamy shield emits a living ray;<br /> +The goddess with her breath the flame supplies,<br /> +Bright as the star whose fires in autumn rise;<br /> +Her breath divine thick streaming flames supplies,<br /> +Bright as the star that fires the autumnal skies:<br /> +The unwearied blaze incessant streams supplies,<br /> +Like the red star that fires the autumnal skies.</p> +<p class="poetry">When fresh he rears his radiant orb to +sight,<br /> +And bathed in ocean shoots a keener light,<br /> +Such glories Pallas on the chief bestowed,<br /> +Such from his arms the fierce effulgence flowed;<br /> +Onward she drives him, furious to engage,<br /> +Where the fight burns, and where the thickest rage.</p> +<p class="poetry"> When fresh he rears his +radiant orb to sight,<br /> + And gilds old ocean with a blaze of light,<br /> + Bright as the star that fires the autumnal skies,<br +/> + Fresh from the deep, and gilds the seas and +skies:<br /> + Such glories Pallas on her chief bestowed,<br /> + Such sparkling rays from his bright armour +flowed,<br /> + Such sparkling rays from his bright armour +flowed,<br /> + Onward she drives him <i>headlong</i> to engage,<br +/> + + +furious<br /> + Where the <i>war bleeds</i>, and where the +<i>fiercest</i> rage.<br /> + + +fight burns +thickest</p> +<p class="poetry">The sons of Dares first the combat sought,<br +/> +A wealthy priest, but rich without a fault;<br /> +In Vulcan’s fane the father’s days were led,<br /> +The sons to toils of glorious battle bred;</p> +<p class="poetry"> There lived a +Trojan—Dares was his name,<br /> + The priest of Vulcan, rich, yet void of blame;<br /> + The sons of Dares first the combat sought,<br /> + A wealthy priest, but rich without a fault.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Conclusion of</i> Book VIII. +<i>v.</i> 687.</p> +<p class="poetry">As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,<br +/> +O’er heaven’s clear azure spreads her sacred +light,<br /> +When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,<br /> +And not a cloud o’ercasts the solemn scene;<br /> +Around her throne the vivid planets roll,<br /> +And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole:<br /> +O’er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,<br /> +And tip with silver every mountain’s head:<br /> +Then shine the vales—the rocks in prospect rise,<br /> +A flood of glory bursts from all the skies;<br /> +The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight,<br /> +Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.<br /> +So many flames before proud Ilion blaze,<br /> +And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays;<br /> +The long reflections of the distant fires<br /> +Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires.<br /> +A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild,<br /> +And shoot a shady lustre o’er the field;<br /> +Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend,<br /> +Whose umbered arms by fits thick flashes send;<br /> +Loud neigh the coursers o’er their heaps of corn,<br /> +And ardent warriors wait the rising morn.</p> +<p class="poetry"> As when in stillness of the +silent night,<br /> + As when the moon in all her lustre bright,<br /> + As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,<br /> + O’er Heaven’s <i>clear</i> azure +<i>sheds</i> her <i>silver</i> light;<br /> + + +pure spreads +sacred<br /> + As still in air the trembling lustre stood,<br /> + And o’er its golden border shoots a flood;<br +/> + When <i>no loose gale</i> disturbs the deep +serene,<br /> + + +not a breath<br /> + And <i>no dim</i> cloud o’ercasts the solemn +scene;<br /> + + +not a<br /> + Around her silver throne the planets glow,<br /> + And stars unnumbered <i>trembling beams +bestow</i>;<br /> + Around her throne the vivid planets roll,<br /> + And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole:<br /> + Clear gleams of light <i>o’er the dark trees +are seen</i>,<br /> + + +o’er the dark trees a yellow sheds<br /> + O’er the dark trees a yellower <i>green</i> +they shed,<br /> + + +gleam<br /> + + +verdure<br /> + And tip with silver <i>all the mountain heads</i><br +/> + + +forest<br /> + And tip with silver every mountain’s head.<br +/> + The valleys open, and the forests rise,<br /> + The vales appear, the rocks in prospect rise,<br /> + Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,<br +/> + All nature stands revealed before our eyes;<br /> + A flood of glory bursts from all the skies.<br /> + The conscious shepherd, joyful at the sight,<br /> + Eyes the blue vault, and numbers every light.<br /> + The conscious swains <i>rejoicing at the +sight</i>,<br /> + + +shepherds gazing with delight<br /> + Eye the blue vault, and bless the <i>vivid</i> +light.<br /> + + +glorious<br /> + + +useful<br /> + So many flames before <i>the navy</i> blaze,<br /> + + +proud Ilion<br /> + And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays,<br +/> + Wide o’er the fields to Troy extend the +gleams,<br /> + And tip the distant spires with fainter beams;<br /> + The long reflections of the distant fires<br /> + Gild the high walls, and tremble on the spires;<br +/> + Gleam on the walls, and <i>tremble on the</i> +spires;<br /> + A thousand fires at distant stations bright,<br /> + Gild the dark prospect, and dispel the night.</p> +<p>Of these specimens every man who has cultivated poetry, or who +delights to trace the mind from the rudeness of its first +conceptions to the elegance of its last, will naturally desire a +great number; but most other readers are already tired, and I am +not writing only to poets and philosophers.</p> +<p>The “Iliad” was published volume by volume, as the +translation proceeded. The four first books appeared in +1713. The expectation of this work was undoubtedly high, +and every man who had connected his name with criticism or poetry +was desirous of such intelligence as might enable him to talk +upon the popular topic. Halifax, who, by having been first +a poet, and then a patron of poetry, had acquired the right of +being a judge, was willing to hear some books while they were yet +unpublished. Of this rehearsal Pope afterwards gave the +following account:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“The famous Lord Halifax was rather a +pretender to taste than really possessed of it. When I had +finished the two or three first books of my translation of the +‘Iliad,’ that lord desired to have the pleasure of +hearing them read at his house. Addison, Congreve, and +Garth were there at the reading. In four or five places +Lord Halifax stopped me very civilly, and with a speech each time +of much the same kind, ‘I beg your pardon, Mr. Pope, but +there is something in that passage that does not please me. +Be so good as to mark the place, and consider it a little at your +leisure. I am sure you can give it a little +turn.’ I returned from Lord Halifax’s with Dr. +Garth in his chariot, and as we were going along was saying to +the Doctor that my lord had laid me under a great deal of +difficulty by such loose and general observations; that I had +been thinking over the passages almost ever since, and could not +guess at what it was that offended his lordship in either of +them. Garth laughed heartily at my embarrassment: said I +had not been long enough acquainted with Lord Halifax to know his +way yet; that I need not puzzle myself about looking those places +over and over when I got home. ‘All you need +do,’ says he, ‘is to leave them just as they are, +call on Lord Halifax two or three months hence, thank him for his +kind observations on those passages, and then read them to him as +altered. I have known him much longer than you have, and +will be answerable for the event.’ I followed his +advice, waited on Lord Halifax some time after; said I hoped he +would find his objections to those passages removed; read them to +him exactly as they were at first; and his lordship was extremely +pleased with them, and cried out, ‘Ay, now they are +perfectly right; nothing can be better.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It is seldom that the great or the wise suspect that they are +despised or cheated. Halifax, thinking this a lucky +opportunity of securing immortality, made some advances of favour +and some overtures of advantage to Pope, which he seems to have +received with sullen coldness. All our knowledge of this +transaction is derived from a single letter (December 1, 1714), +in which Pope says, “I am obliged to you, both for the +favours you have done me and those you intend me. I +distrust neither your will nor your memory when it is to do good; +and if I ever become troublesome or solicitous, it must not be +out of expectation, but out of gratitude. Your lordship may +cause me to live agreeably in the town, or contentedly in the +country, which is really all the difference I set between an easy +fortune and a small one. It is indeed a high strain of +generosity in you to think of making me easy all my life, only +because I have been so happy as to divert you some few hours; +but, if I may have leave to add it is because you think me no +enemy to my native country, there will appear a better reason; +for I must of consequence be very much (as I sincerely am) yours, +&c.”</p> +<p>These voluntary offers, and this faint acceptance, ended +without effect. The patron was not accustomed to such +frigid gratitude; and the poet fed his own pride with the dignity +of independence. They probably were suspicious of each +other. Pope would not dedicate till he saw at what rate his +praise was valued; he would be “troublesome out of +gratitude, not expectation.” Halifax thought himself +entitled to confidence, and would give nothing unless he knew +what he should receive. Their commerce had its beginning in +hope of praise on one side and of money on the other, and ended +because Pope was less eager of money than Halifax of +praise. It is not likely that Halifax had any personal +benevolence to Pope; it is evident that Pope looked on Halifax +with scorn and hatred.</p> +<p>The reputation of this great work failed of gaining him a +patron but it deprived him of a friend. Addison and he were +now at the head of poetry and criticism, and both in such a state +of elevation that, like the two rivals in the Roman State, one +could no longer bear an equal, nor the other a superior. Of +the gradual abatement of kindness between friends, the beginning +is often scarcely discernible to themselves, and the process is +continued by petty provocations, and incivilities sometimes +peevishly returned, and sometimes contemptuously neglected, which +would escape all attention but that of pride, and drop from any +memory but that of resentment. That the quarrel of these +two wits should be minutely deduced is not to be expected from a +writer to whom, as Homer says, “nothing but rumour has +reached, and who has no personal knowledge.”</p> +<p>Pope doubtless approached Addison, when the reputation of +their wit first brought them together, with the respect due to a +man whose abilities were acknowledged, and who, having attained +that eminence to which he was himself aspiring, had in his hands +the distribution of literary fame. He paid court with +sufficient diligence by his prologue to “Cato,” by +his abuse of Dennis, and with praise yet more direct, by his poem +on the “Dialogues on Medals,” of which the immediate +publication was then intended. In all this there was no +hypocrisy for he confessed that he found in Addison something +more pleasing than in any other man.</p> +<p>It may be supposed that, as Pope saw himself favoured by the +world, and more frequently compared his own powers with those of +others, his confidence increased, and his submission lessened; +and that Addison felt no delight from the advances of a young +wit, who might soon contend with him for the highest place. +Every great man, of whatever kind be his greatness, has among his +friends those who officiously or insidiously quicken his +attention to offences, heighten his disgust, and stimulate his +resentment. Of such adherents Addison doubtless had many; +and Pope was now too high to be without them. From the +emission and reception of the proposals for the +“Iliad,” the kindness of Addison seems to have +abated. Jervas the painter once pleased himself (August 20, +1714) with imagining that he had re-established their friendship, +and wrote to Pope that Addison once suspected him of too close a +confederacy with Swift, but was now satisfied with his +conduct. To this Pope answered, a week after, that his +engagements to Swift were such as his services in regard to the +subscription demanded, and that the Tories never put him under +the necessity of asking leave to be grateful. +“But,” says he, “as Mr. Addison must be the +judge in what regards himself, and seems to have no very just one +in regard to me, so I must own to you I expect nothing but +civility from him.” In the same letter he mentions +Philips, as having been busy to kindle animosity between them; +but in a letter to Addison he expresses some consciousness of +behaviour, inattentively deficient in respect.</p> +<p>Of Swift’s industry in promoting the subscription there +remains the testimony of Kennet, no friend to either him or +Pope.</p> +<blockquote><p>“November 2, 1713, Dr. Swift came into the +coffee-house, and had a bow from everybody but me, who, I +confess, could not but despise him. When I came to the +antechamber to wait, before prayers, Dr. Swift was the principal +man of talk and business, and acted as master of requests. +Then he instructed a young nobleman that the <i>best poet in +England</i> was Mr. Pope (a papist), who had begun a translation +of ‘Homer’ into English verse, for which <i>he must +have them all subscribe</i>: for, says he, the author <i>shall +not</i> begin to print till <i>I have</i> a thousand guineas for +him.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>About this time it is likely that Steele, who was, with all +his political fury, good-natured and officious, procured an +interview between these angry rivals, which ended in aggravated +malevolence. On this occasion, if the reports be true, Pope +made his complaint with frankness and spirit, as a man +undeservedly neglected or opposed; and Addison affected a +contemptuous unconcern, and in a calm, even voice reproached Pope +with his vanity, and, telling him of the improvements which his +early works had received from his own remarks and those of +Steele, said that he, being now engaged in public business, had +no longer any care for his poetical reputation, nor had any other +desire with regard to Pope than that he should not, by too much +arrogance, alienate the public.</p> +<p>To this Pope is said to have replied with great keenness and +severity, upbraiding Addison with perpetual dependence, and with +the abuse of those qualifications which he had obtained at the +public cost, and charging him with mean endeavours to obstruct +the progress of rising merit. The contest rose so high that +they parted at last without any interchange of civility.</p> +<p>The first volume of “Homer” was (1715) in time +published; and a rival version of the first “Iliad,” +for rivals the time of their appearance inevitably made them, was +immediately printed, with the name of Tickell. It was soon +perceived that, among the followers of Addison, Tickell had the +preference, and the critics and poets divided into +factions. “I,” says Pope, “have the town, +that is, the mob, on my side; but it is not uncommon for the +smaller party to supply by industry what it wants in +numbers. I appeal to the people as my rightful judges, and, +while they are not inclined to condemn me, shall not fear the +high-flyers at Button’s.” This opposition he +immediately imputed to Addison, and complained of it in terms +sufficiently resentful to Craggs, their common friend.</p> +<p>When Addison’s opinion was asked, he declared the +versions to be both good, but Tickell’s the best that had +ever been written; and sometimes said that they were both good, +but that Tickell had more of “Homer.”</p> +<p>Pope was now sufficiently irritated; his reputation and his +interest were at hazard. He once intended to print together +the four versions of Dryden, Maynwaring, Pope, and Tickell, that +they might be readily compared and fairly estimated. This +design seems to have been defeated by the refusal off Tonson, who +was the proprietor of the other three versions.</p> +<p>Pope intended, at another time, a rigorous criticism of +Tickell’s translation, and had marked a copy, which I have +seen, in all places that appeared defective. But while he +was thus meditating defence or revenge, his adversary sunk before +him without a blow; the voice of the public was not long divided, +and the preference universally given to Pope’s +performance. He was convinced, by adding one circumstance +to another, that the other translation was the work of Addison +himself; but, if he knew it in Addison’s lifetime, it does +not appear that he told it. He left his illustrious +antagonist to lie punished by what has been considered as the +most painful of all reflections—the remembrance of a crime +perpetrated in vain. The other circumstances of their +quarrel were thus related by Pope:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Philips seemed to have been encouraged to +abuse me in coffee-houses and conversations, and Gildon wrote a +thing about Wycherley, in which he had abused both me and my +relations very grossly. Lord Warwick himself told me one +day that it was in vain for me to endeavour to be well with Mr. +Addison; that his jealous temper would never admit of a settled +friendship between us; and, to convince me of what he had said, +assured me that Addison had encouraged Gildon to publish those +scandals, and had given him ten guineas after they were +published. The next day, while I was heated with what I had +heard, I wrote a letter to Mr. Addison, to let him know that I +was not unacquainted with this behaviour of his; that if I was to +speak severely of him in return for it, it should not be in such +a dirty way; that I should rather tell him himself fairly of his +faults, and allow his good qualities; and that it should be +something in the following manner. I then adjoined the +first sketch of what has since been called my satire on +Addison. Mr Addison used me very civilly ever +after.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The verses on Addison, when they were sent to Atterbury, were +considered by him as the most excellent of Pope’s +performances; and the writer was advised, since he knew where his +strength lay, not to suffer it to remain unemployed. This +year (1715), being by the subscription enabled to live more by +choice, having persuaded his father to sell their estate at +Binfield, he purchased, I think only for his life, that house at +Twickenham to which his residence afterwards procured so much +celebration, and removed thither with his father and +mother. Here he planted the vines and the quincunx which +his verses mention; and being under the necessity of making a +subterraneous passage to a garden on the other side of the road, +he adorned it with fossil bodies, and dignified it with the title +of a grotto; a place of silence and retreat, from which he +endeavoured to persuade his friends and himself that cares and +passions could be excluded.</p> +<p>A grotto is not often the wish or pleasure of all Englishmen, +who has more frequent need to solicit than exclude the sun; but +Pope’s excavation was requisite as an entrance to his +garden; and, as some men try to be proud of their defects, he +extracted an ornament from an inconvenience, and vanity produced +a grotto where necessity enforced a passage. It may be +frequently remarked of the studious and speculative, that they +are proud of trifles, and that their amusements seem frivolous +and childish. Whether it be that men, conscious of great +reputation, think themselves above the reach of censure, and safe +in the admission of negligent indulgences, or that mankind expect +from elevated genius a uniformity of greatness, and watch its +degradation with malicious wonder, like him who, having followed +with his eye an eagle into the clouds, should lament that she +ever descended to a perch.</p> +<p>While the volumes of his “Homer” were annually +published, he collected his former works (1717) into one quarto +volume, to which he prefixed a preface, written with great +sprightliness and elegance, which was afterwards reprinted, with +some passages subjoined that he at first omitted. Other +marginal additions of the same kind he made in the later editions +of his poems. Waller remarks, that poets lose half their +praise, because the reader knows not what they have +blotted. Pope’s voracity of fame taught him the art +of obtaining the accumulated honour both of what he had +published, and of what he had suppressed. In this year his +father died suddenly, in his seventy-fifth year, having passed +twenty-nine years in privacy. He is not known but by the +character which his son has given him. If the money with +which he retired was all gotten by himself, he had traded very +successfully in times when sudden riches were rarely +attainable.</p> +<p>The publication of the “Iliad” was at last +completed in 1720. The splendour and success of this work +raised Pope many enemies that endeavoured to depreciate his +abilities. Burnet, who was afterwards a judge of no mean +reputation, censured him in a piece called +“Homerides” before it was published. Ducket +likewise endeavoured to make him ridiculous. Dennis was the +perpetual persecutor of all his studies. But whoever his +critics were, their writings are lost, and the names, which are +preserved are preserved in the “Dunciad.”</p> +<p>In this disastrous year (1720) of national infatuation, when +more riches than Peru can boast were expected from the South Sea, +when the contagion of avarice tainted every mind, and even poets +panted after wealth, Pope was seized with the universal passion, +and ventured some of his money. The stock rose in its +price, and for a while he thought himself the lord of +thousands. But this dream of happiness did not last long, +and he seems to have waked soon enough to get clear with the loss +of what he once thought himself to have won, and perhaps not +wholly of that.</p> +<p>Next year he published some select poems of his friend Dr. +Parnell, with a very elegant dedication to the Earl of Oxford, +who, after all his struggles and dangers, then lived in +retirement, still under the frown of a victorious faction, who +could take no pleasure in hearing his praise. He gave the +same year (1721) an edition of Shakespeare. His name was +now of so much authority that Tonson thought himself entitled, by +annexing it, to demand a subscription of six guineas for +Shakespeare’s plays in six quarto volumes. Nor did +his expectation much deceive him, for, of seven hundred and fifty +which he printed, he dispersed a great number at the price +proposed. The reputation of that edition indeed, sunk, +afterwards so low, that one hundred and forty copies were sold at +sixteen shillings each. On this undertaking, to which Pope +was induced by a reward of two hundred and seventeen pounds +twelve shillings, he seems never to have reflected afterwards +without vexation; for Theobald a man of heavy diligence, with +very slender powers, first, in a book called “Shakespeare +Restored,” and then in a formal edition, detected his +deficiencies with all the insolence of victory; and as he was now +high enough to be feared and hated, Theobald had from others all +the help that could be supplied, by the desire of humbling a +haughty character. From this time Pope became an enemy to +editors, collators, commentators, and verbal critics, and hoped +to persuade the world that he miscarried in this undertaking only +by having a mind too great for such minute employment.</p> +<p>Pope in his edition undoubtedly did many things wrong, and +left many things undone; but let him not be defrauded of his due +praise. He was the first that knew, at least the first that +told, by what helps the text might be improved. If he +inspected the early editions negligently, he taught others to be +more accurate. In his preface he expanded with great skill +and elegance the character which had been given of Shakespeare by +Dryden; and he drew the public attention upon his works, which, +though often mentioned, had been little read. Soon after +the appearance of the “Iliad,” resolving not to let +the general kindness cool, he published proposals for a +translation of the “Odyssey,” in five volumes, for +five guineas. He was willing, however, now to have +associates in his labour, being either weary with toiling upon +another’s thoughts, or having heard, as Ruffhead relates, +that Fenton and Broome had already begun the work, and liking +better to have them confederates than rivals. In the +patent, instead of saying that he had “translated” +the “Odyssey,” as he had said of the +“Iliad,” he says that he had “undertaken” +a translation: and in the proposals, the subscription is said to +be not solely for his own use, but for that of “two of his +friends who have assisted him in his work.”</p> +<p>In 1723, while he was engaged in this new version, he appeared +before the Lords at the memorable trial of Bishop Atterbury, with +whom he had lived in great familiarity, and frequent +correspondence. Atterbury had honestly recommended to him +the study of the Popish controversy, in hope of his conversion; +to which Pope answered in a manner that cannot much recommend his +principles or his judgment. In questions and projects of +learning they agree better. He was called at the trial to +give an account of Atterbury’s domestic life and private +employment, that it might appear how little time he had left for +plots. Pope had but few words to utter, and in those few he +made several blunders.</p> +<p>His letters to Atterbury express the utmost esteem, +tenderness, and gratitude. “Perhaps,” says he, +“it is not only in this world that I may have cause to +remember the Bishop of Rochester.” At their last +interview in the Tower, Atterbury presented him with a Bible.</p> +<p>Of the “Odyssey” Pope translated only twelve +books. The rest were the work of Broome and Fenton: the +notes were written wholly by Broome, who was not over liberally +rewarded. The public was carefully kept ignorant of the +several shares; and an account was subjoined at the conclusion +which is now known not to be true. The first copy of +Pope’s books, with those of Fenton, are to be seen in the +Museum. The parts of Pope are less interlined than the +“Iliad,” and the latter books of the +“Iliad” less than the former. He grew dexterous +by practice, and every sheet enabled him to write the next with +more facility. The books of Fenton have very few +alterations by the hand of Pope. Those of Broome have not +been found, but Pope complained, as it is reported, that he had +much trouble in correcting them. His contract with Lintot +was the same as for the “Iliad,” except that only one +hundred pounds were to be paid him for each volume. The +number of subscribers were five hundred and seventy-four, and of +copies eight hundred and nineteen, so that his profit, when he +had paid his assistants, was still very considerable. The +work was finished in 1723; and from that time he resolved to make +no more translations. The sale did not answer +Lintot’s expectation, and he then pretended to discover +something of a fraud in Pope, and commenced or threatened a suit +in Chancery.</p> +<p>On the English “Odyssey” a criticism was published +by Spence, at that time Prelector of Poetry at Oxford, a man +whose learning was not very great, and whose mind was not very +powerful. His criticism, however, was commonly just; what +he thought he thought rightly, and his remarks were recommended +by his coolness and candour. In him Pope had the first +experience of a critic without malevolence, who thought it as +much his duty to display beauties as expose faults, who censured +with respect, and praised with alacrity. With this +criticism Pope was so little offended, that he sought the +acquaintance of the writer, who lived with him from that time in +great familiarity, attended him in his last hours, and compiled +memorials of his conversation. The regard of Pope +recommended him to the great and powerful, and he obtained very +valuable preferments in the Church. Not long after Pope was +returning home from a visit in a friend’s coach, which, in +passing a bridge, was overturned into the water; the +window’s were closed, and, being unable to force them open, +he was in danger of immediate death, when the postillion snatched +him out by breaking the glass, of which the fragments cut two of +his fingers in such a manner that he lost their use.</p> +<p>Voltaire, who was then in England, sent him a letter of +consolation. He had been entertained by Pope at his table, +where he talked with so much grossness that Mrs. Pope was driven +from the room. Pope discovered, by a trick, that he was a +spy for the Court, and never considered him as a man worthy of +confidence. He soon afterwards (1727) joined with Swift, +who was then in England, to publish three volumes of +“Miscellanies,” in which, amongst other things, he +inserted the “Memoirs of a Parish Clerk,” in ridicule +of Burnet’s importance in his own history, and a +“Debate upon Black and White Horses,” written in all +the formalities of a legal process by the assistance, as is said, +of Mr. Fortescue, afterwards Master of the Rolls. Before +these “Miscellanies” is a preface signed by Swift and +Pope, but apparently written by Pope, in which he makes a +ridiculous and romantic complaint of the robberies committed upon +authors by the clandestine seizure and sale of their +papers. He tells in tragic strains how “the cabinets +of the sick and the closets of the dead have been broken open and +ransacked,” as if those violences were often committed for +papers of uncertain and accidental value which are rarely +provoked by real treasures—as if epigrams and essays were +in danger where gold and diamonds are safe. A cat hunted +for his musk is, according to Pope’s account, but the +emblem of a wit winded by booksellers. His complaint, +however, received some attestation, for the same year the letters +written by him to Mr. Cromwell in his youth were sold by Mrs. +Thomas to Curll, who printed them.</p> +<p>In these “Miscellanies” was first published the +“Art of Sinking in Poetry,” which, by such a train of +consequences as usually passes in literary quarrels, gave in a +short time, according to Pope’s account, occasion to the +“Dunciad.”</p> +<p>In the following year (1728) he began to put Atterbury’s +advice in practice, and showed his satirical powers by publishing +the “Dunciad,” one of his greatest and most elaborate +performances, in which he endeavoured to sink into contempt all +the writers by whom he had been attacked, and some others whom he +thought unable to defend themselves. At the head of the +“Dunces” he placed poor Theobald, whom he accused of +ingratitude, but whose real crime was supposed to be that of +having revised Shakespeare more happily than himself. This +satire had the effect which he intended, by blasting the +characters which it touched. Ralph, who, unnecessarily +interposing in the quarrel, got a place in a subsequent edition, +complained that for a time he was in danger of starving, as the +booksellers had no longer any confidence in his capacity. +The prevalence of this poem was gradual and slow: the plan, if +not wholly new, was little understood by common readers. +Many of the allusions required illustration; the names were often +expressed only by the initial and final letters, and if they had +been printed at length were such as few had known or +recollected. The subject itself had nothing generally +interesting, for whom did it concern to know that one or another +scribbler was a dunce? If, therefore, it had been possible +for those who were attacked to conceal their pain and their +resentment, the “Dunciad” might have made its way +very slowly in the world. This, however, was not to be +expected: every man is of importance to himself, and therefore, +in his own opinion, to others; and, supposing the world already +acquainted with all his pleasures and his pains, is perhaps the +first to publish injuries or misfortunes, which had never been +known unless related by himself, and at which those that hear +them will only laugh, for no man sympathises with the sorrows of +vanity.</p> +<p>The history of the “Dunciad” is very minutely +related by Pope himself in a dedication which he wrote to Lord +Middlesex in the name of Savage.</p> +<blockquote><p>“I will relate the war of the +‘Dunces’ (for so it has been commonly called), which +began in the year 1727, and ended in 1730</p> +<p>“When Dr. Swift and Mr. Pope thought it proper, for +reasons specified in the preface to their +‘Miscellanies,’ to publish such little pieces of +theirs as had occasionally got abroad, there was added to them +the ‘Treatise of the Bathos, or the Art of Sinking in +Poetry.’ It happened that in one chapter of this +piece the several species of bad poets were ranged in classes, to +which were prefixed almost all the letters of the alphabet (the +greatest part of them at random); but such was the number of +poets eminent in that art, that some one or other took every +letter to himself. All fell into so violent a fury, that, +for half a year or more, the common newspapers (in most of which +they had some property, as being hired writers) were filled with +the most abusive falsehoods and scurrilities they could possibly +devise, a liberty no way to be wondered at in those people, and +in those papers, that, for many years during the uncontrolled +license of the Press, had aspersed almost all the great +characters of the age; and this with impunity, their own persons +and names being utterly secret and obscure. This gave Mr. +Pope the thought that he had now some opportunity of doing good +by detecting and dragging into light these common enemies of +mankind, since, to invalidate this universal slander, it sufficed +to show what contemptible men were the authors of it. He +was not without hopes that, by manifesting the dulness of those +who had only malice to recommend them, either the booksellers +would not find their account in employing them, or the men +themselves, when discovered, want courage to proceed in so +unlawful an occupation. This it was that gave birth to the +‘Dunciad,’ and he thought it a happiness that, by the +late flood of slander on himself, he had acquired such a peculiar +right over their names as was necessary to this design.</p> +<p>“On the 12th of March, 1729, at St. James’s, that +poem was presented to the king and queen (who had before been +pleased to read it) by the Right Honourable Sir Robert Walpole, +and some days after the whole impression was taken and dispersed +by several noblemen and persons of the first distinction.</p> +<p>“It is certainly a true observation that no people are +so impatient of censure as those who are the greatest slanderers, +which was wonderfully exemplified on this occasion. On the +day the book was first vended a crowd of authors besieged the +shop; entreaties, advices, threats of law and battery—nay, +cries of treason—were all employed to hinder the coming out +of the ‘Dunciad.’ On the other side, the +booksellers and hawkers made as great efforts to procure +it. What could a few poor authors do against so great a +majority as the public? There was no stopping a torrent +with a finger, so out it came.</p> +<p>“Many ludicrous circumstances attended it. The +‘Dunces’ (for by this name they were called) held +weekly clubs, to consult of hostilities against the author. +One wrote a letter to a great minister, assuring him Mr. Pope was +the greatest enemy the Government had, and another bought his +image in clay to execute him in effigy, with which sad sort of +satisfaction the gentlemen were a little comforted. Some +false editions of the book, having an owl in their frontispiece, +the true one, to distinguish it, fixed in his stead an ass laden +with authors. Then another surreptitious one being printed +with the same ass, the new edition in octavo returned for +distinction to the owl again. Hence arose a great contest +of booksellers against booksellers, and advertisements against +advertisements, some recommending the edition of the owl, and +others the edition of the ass, by which names they came to be +distinguished, to the great honour also of the gentlemen of the +‘Dunciad.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Pope appears by this narrative to have contemplated his +victory over the “Dunces” with great exultation; and +such was his delight in the tumult which he had raised, that for +a while his natural sensibility was suspended, and he read +reproaches and invectives without emotion, considering them only +as the necessary effects of that pain which he rejoiced in having +given. It cannot, however, be concealed that, by his own +confession, he was the aggressor, for nobody believes that the +letters in the “Bathos” were placed at random; and at +may be discovered that, when he thinks himself concealed, he +indulges the common vanity of common men, and triumphs in those +distinctions which he affected to despise. He is proud that +his book was presented to the king and queen by the Right +Honourable Sir Robert Walpole; he is proud that they had read it +before; he is proud that the edition was taken off by the +nobility and persons of the first distinction. The edition +of which he speaks was, I believe, that which, by telling in the +text the names, and in the notes the characters, of those whom he +had satirised, was made intelligible and diverting. The +critics had now declared their approbation of the plan, and the +common reader began to like it without fear. Those who were +strangers to petty literature, and therefore unable to decipher +initials and blanks, had now names and persons brought within +their view, and delighted in the visible effects of those shafts +of malice which they had hitherto contemplated as shot into the +air.</p> +<p>Dennis, upon the fresh provocation now given him, renewed the +enmity which had for a time been appeased by mutual civilities, +and published remarks, which he had till then suppressed, upon +the “Rape of the Lock.” Many more grumbled in +secret, or vented their resentment in the newspapers by epigrams +or invectives. Ducket, indeed, being mentioned as loving +Burnet with “pious passion,” pretended that his moral +character was injured, and for some time declared his resolution +to take vengeance with a cudgel. But Pope appeased him, by +changing “pious passion” to “cordial +friendship,” and by a note, in which he vehemently +disclaims the malignity of the meaning imputed to the first +expression. Aaron Hill, who was represented as diving for +the prize, expostulated with Pope in a manner so much superior to +all mean solicitation, that Pope was reduced to sneak and +shuffle, sometimes to deny, and sometimes to apologies; he first +endeavours to wound, and is then afraid to own that he meant a +blow.</p> +<p>The “Dunciad,” in the complete edition, is +addressed to Dr. Swift. Of the notes, part were written by +Dr. Arbuthnot, and an apologetical letter was prefixed, signed by +Cleland, but supposed to have been written by Pope.</p> +<p>After this general war upon dulness, he seems to have indulged +himself a while in tranquillity, but his subsequent productions +prove that he was not idle. He published (1731) a poem on +“Taste,” in which he very particularly and severely +criticises the house, the furniture, the gardens, and the +entertainments of Timon, a man of great wealth and little +taste. By Timon he was universally supposed, and by the +Earl of Burlington, to whom the poem is addressed, was privately +said, to mean the Duke of Chandos, a man perhaps too much +delighted with pomp and show, but of a temper kind and +beneficent, and who had consequently the voice of the public in +his favour. A violent outcry was, therefore, raised against +the ingratitude and treachery of Pope, who was said to have been +indebted to the patronage of Chandos for a present of a thousand +pounds, and who gained the opportunity of insulting him by the +kindness of his invitation. The receipt of the thousand +pounds Pope publicly denied; but from the reproach which the +attack on a character so amiable brought upon him, he tried all +means of escaping. The name of Cleland was again employed +in an apology, by which no man was satisfied, and he was at last +reduced to shelter his temerity behind dissimulation, and +endeavour to make that disbelieved which he never had confidence +openly to deny. He wrote an exculpatory letter to the duke, +which was answered with great magnanimity, as by a man who +accepted his excuse without believing his professions. He +said that to have ridiculed his taste, or his buildings, had been +an indifferent action in another man, but that in Pope, after the +reciprocal kindness that had been exchanged between them, it had +been less easily excused.</p> +<p>Pope, in one of his letters, complaining of the treatment +which his poem had found, “owns that such critics can +intimidate him, nay almost persuade him, to write no more, which +is a compliment this age deserves.” The man who +threatens the world is always ridiculous, for the world can +easily go on without him, and in a short time will cease to miss +him. I have heard of an idiot, who used to revenge his +vexatious by lying all night upon the bridge. “There +is nothing,” says Juvenal, “that a man will not +believe in his own favour.” Pope had been flattered +till he thought himself one of the moving powers in the system of +life. When he talked of laying down his pen, those who sat +round him entreated and implored; and self-love did not suffer +him to suspect that they went away and laughed.</p> +<p>The following year deprived him of Gay, a man whom he had +known early, and whom he seemed to love with more tenderness than +any other of his literary friends. Pope was now forty-four +years old, an age at which the mind begins less easily to admit +new confidence, and the will to grow less flexible, and when, +therefore, the departure of an old friend is very acutely +felt. In the next year (1733) he lost his mother, not by an +unexpected death, for she had lasted to the age of +ninety-three. But she did not die unlamented. The +filial piety of Pope was in the highest degree amiable and +exemplary. His parents had the happiness of living till he +was at the summit of poetical reputation, till he was at ease in +his fortune, and without a rival in his fame, and found no +diminution of his respect or tenderness. Whatever was his +pride, to them he was obedient; and whatever was his +irritability, to them he was gentle. Life has, among its +soothing and quiet comforts, few things better to give than such +a son.</p> +<p>One of the passages of Pope’s life, which seems to +deserve some inquiry, was a publication of “Letters” +between him and many of his friends, which, falling into the +hands of Curll, a rapacious bookseller, of no good fame, were by +him printed and sold. This volume containing some letters +from noblemen, Pope incited a prosecution against him in the +House of Lords for breach of privilege, and attended himself to +stimulate the resentment of his friends. Curll appeared at +the bar, and, knowing himself in no great danger, spoke of Pope +with very little reverence. “He has,” said +Curll, “a knack at versifying, but in prose I think myself +a match for him.” When the orders of the House were +examined, none of them appeared to have been infringed. +Curll went away triumphant, and Pope was left to seek some other +remedy.</p> +<p>Curll’s account was, that one evening a man in a +clergyman’s gown, but with a lawyer’s band, brought +and offered for sale a number of printed volumes, which he found +to be Pope’s epistolary correspondence; that he asked no +name, and was told none, but gave the price demanded, and thought +himself authorised to use his purchase to his own +advantage. That Curll gave a true account of the +transaction it is reasonable to believe, because no falsehood was +ever detected; and when, some years afterwards, I mentioned it to +Lintot, the son of Bernard, he declared his opinion to be, that +Pope knew better than anybody else how Curll obtained the copies, +because another parcel was at the same time sent to himself, for +which no price had ever been demanded, as he made known his +resolution not to pay a porter, and consequently not to deal with +a nameless agent. Such care had been taken to make them +public, that they were sent at once to two booksellers; to Curll, +who was likely to seize them as a prey, and to Lintot, who might +he expected to give Pope information of the seeming injury. +Lintot, I believe, did nothing, and Curll did what was +expected. That to make them public was the only purpose may +be reasonably supposed, because the numbers offered to sale by +the private messengers showed that the hope of gain could not +have been the motive of the impression. It seems that Pope, +being desirous of printing his “Letters,” and not +knowing how to do, without imputation of vanity, what has in this +country been done very rarely, contrived an appearance of +compulsion, that, when he could complain that his +“Letters” were surreptitiously published, he might +decently and defensively publish them himself.</p> +<p>Pope’s private correspondence, thus promulgated, filled +the nation with the praises of his candour, tenderness, and +benevolence, the purity of his purposes, and the fidelity of his +friendship. There were some letters which a very good or a +wise man would wish suppressed; but, as they had been already +exposed, it was impracticable now to retract them. From the +perusal of those letters, Mr. Allen first conceived the desire of +knowing him; and with so much zeal did he cultivate the +friendship which he had newly formed, that, when Pope told his +purpose of vindicating his own property by a genuine edition, he +offered to pay the cost. This, however, Pope did not +accept; but in time solicited a subscription for a quarto volume, +which appeared (1737), I believe, with sufficient profit. +In the preface he tells that his letters were reposited in a +friend’s library, said to be the Earl of Oxford’s, +and that the copy thence stolen was sent to the press. The +story was doubtless received with different degrees of +credit. It may be suspected that the preface to the +“Miscellanies” was written to prepare the public for +such an incident; and, to strengthen this opinion, James +Worsdale, a painter, who was employed in clandestine +negotiations, but whose voracity was very doubtful, declared that +he was the messenger who carried, by Pope’s direction, the +books to Curll. When they were thus published and avowed, +as they had relation to recent facts, and persons either then +living or not yet forgotten, they may be supposed to have found +readers; but, as the facts were minute, and the characters being +either private or literary, were little known, or little +regarded, they awaked no popular kindness or resentment. +The book never became much the subject of conversation. +Some read it as a contemporary history, and some perhaps as a +model of epistolary language; but those who read it did not talk +of it. Not much therefore was added by it to fame or envy, +nor do I remember that it produced either public praise or public +censure. It had, however, in some degree, the +recommendation of novelty. Our language had few letters, +except those of statesmen. Howel, indeed, about a century +ago, published his “Letters,” which are commended by +Morhoff, and which alone, of his hundred volumes, continue his +memory. Loveday’s “Letters” were printed +only once; those of Herbert and Suckling are hardly known. +Mrs. Phillips’s (Orinda’s) are equally +neglected. And those of Walsh seem written as exercises, +and were never sent to any living mistress or friend. +Pope’s epistolary excellence had an open field; he had no +English rival, living or dead.</p> +<p>Pope is seen in this collection as connected with the other +contemporary wits, and certainly suffers no disgrace in the +comparison; but it must be remembered that he had the power of +favouring himself. He might have originally had publication +in his mind, and have written with care, or have afterwards +selected those which he had most happily conceived or most +diligently laboured; and I know not whether there does not appear +something more studied and artificial in his productions than the +rest, except one long letter by Bolingbroke, composed with all +the skill and industry of a professed author. It is indeed +not easy to distinguish affectation from habit; he that has once +studiously formed a style, rarely writes afterwards with complete +ease. Pope may be said to write always with his reputation +in his head; Swift, perhaps, like a man that remembered he was +writing to Pope; but Arbuthnot, like one who lets thoughts drop +from his pen as they rise into his mind. Before these +“Letters” appeared he published the first part of +what he persuaded himself to think a system of Ethics, under the +title of an “Essay on Man,” which, if his letter to +Swift (of September 14, 1723), be rightly explained by the +commentator, had been eight years under his consideration, and of +which he seems to have desired the success with great +solicitude. He had now many open, and doubtless many +secret, enemies. The “Dunces” were yet smarting +from the war, and the superiority which he publicly arrogated +disposed the world to wish his humiliation. All this he +knew, and against all this he provided. His own name, and +that of his friend to whom the work is inscribed, were in the +first editions carefully suppressed; and the poem being of a new +kind was ascribed to one or another as favour determined or +conjecture wandered. It was given, says Warburton, to every +man except him only who could write it. Those who like only +when they like the author, and who are under the dominion of a +name, condemned it, and those admired it who are willing to +scatter praise at random, which, while it is unappropriated, +excites no envy. Those friends of Pope that were trusted +with the secret went about lavishing honours on the new-born +poet, and hinting that Pope was never so much in danger from any +former rival. To those authors whom he had personally +offended, and to those whose opinion the world considered as +decisive, and whom he suspected of envy or malevolence, he sent +his Essay as a present before publication, that they might defeat +their own enemity by praises which they could not afterwards +decently retract. With these precautions, in 1733, was +published the first part of the “Essay on Man.” +There had been for some time a report that Pope was busy upon a +“System of Morality,” but this design was not +discovered in the new poem, which had a form and a title with +which its readers were unacquainted. Its reception was not +uniform. Some thought it a very imperfect piece, though not +without good lines. While the author was unknown, some, as +will always happen, favoured him as an adventurer, and some +censured him as an intruder, but all thought him above +neglect. The sale increased, and editions were +multiplied. The subsequent editions of the first epistle +exhibited two memorable corrections. At first, the poet and +his friend</p> +<p class="poetry">“Expatiate freely o’er this scene +of man,<br /> +A mighty maze <i>of walks without a plan</i>;”</p> +<p>for which he wrote afterwards,</p> +<p class="poetry">“A mighty maze, <i>but not without a +plan</i>;”</p> +<p>for if there was no plan it was in vain to describe or to +trace the maze.</p> +<p>The other alteration was of these lines:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“And spike of pride, <i>and in thy +reason’s spite</i>,<br /> +One truth is clear, whatever is, is right:”</p> +<p>but having afterwards discovered, or been shown, that the +“truth” which subsisted “in spite of +reason” could not be very “clear,” he +substituted</p> +<p class="poetry">“And spite of pride <i>in erring +reason’s spite</i>.”</p> +<p>To such oversights will the most vigorous mind be liable when +it is employed at once upon argument and poetry.</p> +<p>The second and third epistles were published, and Pope was, I +believe, more and more suspected of writing them. At last, +in 1734, he avowed the fourth, and claimed the honour of a moral +poet. In the conclusion it is sufficiently acknowledged +that the doctrine of the “Essay on Man” was received +from Bolingbroke, who is said to have ridiculed Pope, among those +who enjoyed his confidence, as having adopted and advanced +principles of which he did not perceive the consequence, and as +blindly propagating opinions contrary to his own. That +those communications had been consolidated into a scheme +regularly drawn, and delivered to Pope, from whom it returned +only transformed from prose to verse, has been reported, but +hardly can be true. The essay plainly appears the fabric of +a poet; what Bolingbroke supplied could be only the first +principles, the order, illustration, and embellishments, must all +be Pope’s. These principles it is not my business to +clear from obscurity, dogmatism, or falsehood, but they were not +immediately examined. Philosophy and poetry have not often +the same readers; and the essay abounded in splendid +amplifications and sparkling sentences, which were read and +admired with no great attention to their ultimate purpose. +Its flowers caught the eye, which did not see what the gay +foliage concealed, and for a time flourished in the sunshine of +universal approbation. So little was any evil tendency +discovered, that, as innocence is unsuspicious, many read it for +a manual of piety. Its reputation soon invited a +translator. It was first turned into French prose, and +afterwards by Resnel into verse. Both translations fell +into the hands of Crousaz, who first, when he had the version in +prose, wrote a general censure, and afterwards reprinted +Resnel’s version, with particular remarks upon every +paragraph.</p> +<p>Crousaz was a professor of Switzerland, eminent for his +treatise of logic, and his “Examen de Pyrrhonisme,” +and, however little known or regarded here, was no mean +antagonist. His mind was one of those in which philosophy +and piety are happily united. He was accustomed to argument +and disquisition, and perhaps was grown too desirous of detecting +faults, but his intentions were always right, his opinions were +solid, and his religion pure. His incessant vigilance for +the promotion of piety disposed him to look with distrust upon +all metaphysical systems of theology, and all schemes of virtue +and happiness purely rational; and therefore it was not long +before he was persuaded that the positions of Pope, as they +terminated for the most part in natural religion, were intended +to draw mankind away from revelation, and to represent the whole +course of things as a necessary concatenation of indissoluble +fatality, and it is undeniable that in many passages a religious +eye may easily discover expressions not very favourable to morals +or to liberty.</p> +<p>About this time Warburton began to make his appearance in the +first ranks of learning. He was a man of vigorous +faculties, a mind fervid and vehement, supplied by incessant and +unlimited inquiry, with wonderful extent and variety of +knowledge, which yet had not oppressed his imagination nor +clouded his perspicacity. To every work he brought a memory +full fraught, together with a fancy fertile of original +combinations and at once exerted the powers of the scholar, the +reasoner, and the wit. But his knowledge was too +multifarious to be always exact, and his pursuits were too eager +to be always cautions. His abilities gave him a haughty +confidence, which he disdained to conceal or mollify, and his +impatience of opposition disposed him to treat his adversaries +with such contemptuous superiority as made his readers commonly +his enemies, and excited against the advocate the wishes of some +who favoured the cause. He seems to have adopted the Roman +Emperor’s determination, <i>oderint dum metuant</i>; he +used no allurements of gentle language, but wished to compel +rather than persuade. His style is copious without +selection, and forcible without neatness. He took the words +that presented themselves. His diction is coarse and +impure, and his sentences are unmeasured. He had in the +early part of his life pleased himself with the notice of +inferior wits, and corresponded with the enemies of Pope. A +letter was produced, when he had perhaps himself forgotten it, in +which he tells Concanen, “Dryden, I observe, borrows for +want of leisure, and Pope for want of genius, Milton out of +pride, and Addison out of modesty.” And when Theobald +published Shakespeare, in opposition to Pope, the best notes were +supplied by Warburton. But the time was now come when +Warburton was to change his opinion, and Pope was to find a +defender in him who had contributed so much to the exaltation of +his rival.</p> +<p>The arrogance of Warburton excited against him every artifice +of offence, and therefore it may be supposed that his union with +Pope was censured as hypocritical inconstancy, but surely to +think differently at different times of poetical merit may be +easily allowed. Such opinions are often admitted, and +dismissed without nice examination. Who is there that has +not found reason for changing his mind about questions of greater +importance?</p> +<p>Warburton, whatever was his motive, undertook, without +solicitation, to rescue Pope from the talons of Crousaz, by +freeing him from the imputation of favouring fatality or +rejecting revelation; and from month to month continued a +vindication of the “Essay on Man,” in the literary +journal of that time called the “Republic of +Letters.”</p> +<p>Pope, who probably began to doubt the tendency of his own +work, was glad that the positions, of which he perceived himself +not to know the full meaning, could by any mode of interpretation +be made to mean well. How much he was pleased with his +gratuitous defender the following letter evidently +shows:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“April 11, +1739.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">Sir</span>,—I have just +received from Mr. R. two more of your letters. It is in the +greatest hurry imaginable that I write this; but I cannot help +thanking you in particular for your third letter, which is so +extremely clear, short, and full, that I think Mr. Crousaz ought +never to have another answer, and deserved not so good an +one. I can only say, you do him too much honour, and me too +much right, so odd as the expression seems; for you have made my +system as clear as I ought to have done, and could not. It +is indeed the same system as mine, but illustrated with a ray of +your own, as they say our natural body is the same still when it +is glorified. I am sure I like it better than I did before, +and so will every man else. I know I meant just what you +explain; but I did not explain my own meaning so well as +you. You understand me as well as I do myself; but you +express me better than I could express myself. Pray accept +the sincerest acknowledgments. I cannot but wish these +letters were put together in one book, and intend (with your +leave) to procure a translation of part at least, or of all of +them, into French; but I shall not proceed a step without your +consent and opinion,” &c.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>By this fond and eager acceptance of an exculpatory comment +Pope testified that, whatever might be the seeming or real import +of the principles which he had received from Bolingbroke, he had +not intentionally attacked religion; and Bolingbroke, if he meant +to make him, without his own consent, an instrument of mischief, +found him now engaged, with his eyes open, on the side of +truth. It is known that Bolingbroke concealed from Pope his +real opinions. He once discovered them to Mr. Hooke, who +related them again to Pope, and was told by him that he must have +mistaken the meaning of what he heard: and Bolingbroke, when +Pope’s uneasiness incited him to desire an explanation, +declared that Hooke had misunderstood him.</p> +<p>Bolingbroke hated Warburton, who had drawn his pupil from him; +and a little before Pope’s death they had a dispute, from +which they parted with mutual aversion. From this time Pope +lived in the closest intimacy with his commentator, and amply +rewarded his kindness and his zeal, for he introduced him to Mr. +Murray, by whose interest he became preacher at Lincoln’s +Inn, and to Mr. Allen, who gave him his niece and his estate, and +by consequence a bishopric. When he died, he left him the +property of his works, a legacy which may be reasonably estimated +at four thousand pounds.</p> +<p>Pope’s fondness for the “Essay on Man” +appeared by his desire of its propagation. Dobson, who had +gained reputation by his version of Prior’s +“Solomon,” was employed by him to translate it into +Latin verse, and was for that purpose some time at Twickenham; +but he left his work, whatever was the reason, unfinished; and, +by Benson’s invitation, undertook the longer task of +“Paradise Lost.” Pope then desired his friend +to find a scholar who should turn his essay into Latin prose; but +no such performance has ever appeared.</p> +<p>Pope lived at this time <i>among the great</i>, with that +reception and respect to which his works entitled him, and which +he had not impaired by any private misconduct or factious +partiality. Though Bolingbroke was his friend, Walpole was +not his enemy, but treated him with so much consideration as, at +his request, to solicit and obtain from the French Minister an +abbey for Mr. Southcot, whom he considered himself as obliged to +reward, by his exertion of his interest, for the benefit which he +had received from his attendance in a long illness. It was +said, that when the Court was at Richmond, Queen Caroline had +declared her intention to visit him. This may have been +only a careless effusion, thought on no more. The report of +such notice, however, was soon in many mouths; and, if I do not +forget or misapprehend Savage’s account, Pope, pretending +to decline what was not yet offered, left his house for a time, +not, I suppose, for any other reason than lest he should be +thought to stay at home in expectation of an honour which would +not be conferred. He was therefore angry at Swift, who +represents him as “refusing the visits of a queen,” +because he knew that what had never been offered had never been +refused.</p> +<p>Beside the general system of morality, supposed to be +contained in the “Essay on Man,” it was his intention +to write distinct poems upon the different duties or conditions +of life, one of which is the “Epistle to Lord +Bathurst” (1733) on the “Use of Riches,” a +piece on which he declared great labour to have been +bestowed. Into this poem some hints are historically +thrown, and some known characters are introduced, with others of +which it is difficult to say how far they are real or fictitious: +but the praise of Kryle, the Man of Ross, deserves particular +examination, who, after a long and pompous enumeration of his +public works and private charities, is said to have diffused all +those blessings from five hundred a year. Wonders are +willingly told and willingly heard. The truth is, that +Kyrle was a man of known integrity and active benevolence, by +whose solicitation the wealthy were persuaded to pay +contributions to his charitable schemes. This influence he +obtained by an example of liberality exerted to the utmost extent +of his power, and was thus enabled to give more than he +had. This account Mr. Victor received from the minister of +the place, and I have preserved it, that the praise of a good +man, being made more credible, may be more solid. +Narrations of romantic and impracticable virtue will be read with +wonder, but that which is unattainable is recommended in vain; +that good may be endeavoured it must be shown to be +possible. This is the only piece in which the author has +given a hint of his religion, by ridiculing the ceremony of +burning the Pope, and by mentioning with some indignation the +inscription on the Monument.</p> +<p>When this poem was first published, the dialogue having no +letters of direction was perplexed and obscure. Pope seems +to have written with no very distinct idea, for he calls that an +“Epistle to Bathurst,” in which Bathurst is +introduced as speaking. He afterwards (1734) inscribed to +Lord Cobham his “Characters of Men,” written with +close attention to the operations of the mind and modifications +of life. In this poem he has endeavoured to establish and +exemplify his favourite theory of the <i>ruling passion</i>, by +which he means an original direction of desire to some particular +object, an innate affection which gives all action a determinate +and invariable tendency, and operates upon the whole system of +life, either openly, cut more secretly by the intervention of +some accidental or subordinate propension. Of any passion, +thus innate and irresistible, the existence may reasonably be +doubted. Human characters are by no means constant; men +change by change of place, of fortune, of acquaintance. He +who is at one time a lover of pleasure, is at another a lover of +money. Those, indeed, who attain any excellence commonly +spend life in one pursuit, for excellence is not often gained +upon easier terms. But to the particular species of +excellence men are directed, not by an ascendant planet or +predominating humour, but by the first book which they read, some +early conversation which they heard, or some accident which +excited ardour and emulation. It must at least be allowed +that this ruling passion, antecedent to reason and observation, +must have an object independent on human contrivance, for there +can be no natural desire of artificial good. No man, +therefore, can be born, in the strict acceptation, a lover of +money, for he may be born where money does not exist; nor can he +be born in a moral sense a lover of his country, for society +politically regulated is a state contradistinguished from a state +of nature, and any attention to that coalition of interests which +makes the happiness of a country is possible only to those whom +inquiry and reflection have enabled to comprehend it. This +doctrine is in itself pernicious as well as false; its tendency +is to produce the belief of a kind of moral predestination or +over-ruling principle which cannot be resisted. He that +admits it is prepared to comply with every desire that caprice or +opportunity shall excite, and to flatter himself that he submits +only to the lawful dominion of nature in obeying the resistless +authority of his ruling passion.</p> +<p>Pope has formed his theory with so little skill that in the +examples by which he illustrates and confirms it he has +confounded passions, appetites, and habits. To the +“Characters of Men” he added soon after, in an +epistle supposed to have been addressed to Martha Blount, but +which the last edition has taken from her, the “Characters +of Women.” This poem, which was laboured with great +diligence and in the author’s opinion with great success, +was neglected at its first publication, as the commentator +supposes, because the public was informed by an advertisement +that it contained no character drawn from the life, an assertion +which Pope probably did not expect nor wished to have been +believed, and which he soon gave his readers sufficient reason to +distrust, by telling them in a note that the work was imperfect +because part of his subject was vice too high to be yet +exposed. The time, however, soon came in which it was safe +to display the Duchess of Marlborough under the name of Atossa, +and her character was inserted with no great honour to the +writer’s gratitude.</p> +<p>He published from time to time (between 1730 and 1740) +imitations of different poems of Horace, generally with his name, +and once, as was suspected, without it. What he was upon +moral principles ashamed to own he ought to have +suppressed. Of these pieces it is useless to settle the +dates, as they had seldom much relation to the times, and perhaps +had been long in his hands. This mode of imitation, in +which the ancients are familiarised by adapting their sentiments +to modern topics, by making Horace say of Shakespeare what he +originally said of Ennius, and accommodating his satires on +Pantolabus and Nomentanus to the flatterers and prodigals of our +own time, was first practised in the reign of Charles the Second, +by Oldham and Rochester, at least I remember no instances more +ancient. It is a kind of middle composition between +translation and original design, which pleases when the thoughts +are unexpectedly applicable, and the parallels lucky. It +seems to have been Pope’s favourite amusement, for he has +carried it farther than any former poet. He published +likewise a revival, in smoother numbers, of Dr. Donne’s +“Satires,” which was recommended to him by the Duke +of Shrewsbury and the Earl of Oxford. They made no great +impression on the public. Pope seems to have known their +imbecility and therefore suppressed them while he was yet +contending to rise in reputation, but ventured them when he +thought their deficiencies more likely to be imputed to Donne +than to himself.</p> +<p>The “Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot,” which seems to be +derived in its first design from Boileau’s Address +<i>à son Esprit</i>, was published in January, 1735, about +a month before the death of him to whom it is inscribed. It +is to be regretted that either honour or pleasure should have +been missed by Arbuthnot, a man estimable for his learning, +amiable for his life, and venerable for his piety. +Arbuthnot was a man of great comprehension, skilful in his +profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with ancient +literature, and able to animate his mass of knowledge by a bright +and active imagination; a scholar with great brilliance of wit, a +wit who, in the crowd of life, retained and discovered a noble +ardour of religious zeal. In this poem Pope seems to reckon +with the public. He vindicates himself from censures, and +with dignity rather than arrogance enforces his own claims to +kindness and respect. Into this poem are interwoven several +paragraphs which had been before printed, as a fragment, and +among them the satirical lines upon Addison, of which the last +couplet has been twice corrected. It was at +first—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Who would not smile if such a man there +be?<br /> +Who would not laugh if Addison were he?”</p> +<p>Then—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Who would not grieve if such a man there +be?<br /> +Who would not laugh if Addison were he?”</p> +<p>At last it is—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Who but must laugh if such a man there +he?<br /> +Who would not weep if Atticus were he?”</p> +<p>He was at this time at open war with Lord Hervey, who had +distinguished himself as a steady adherent to the ministry, and +being offended with a contemptuous answer to one of his +pamphlets, had summoned Pulteney to a duel. Whether he or +Pope made the first attack perhaps cannot now be easily +known. He had written an invective against Pope, whom he +calls, “Hard as thy heart, and as thy birth obscure;” +and hints that his father was a hatter. To this Pope wrote +a reply in verse and prose. The verses are in this poem, +and the prose, though it was never sent, is printed among his +letters; but to a cool reader of the present time exhibits +nothing but tedious malignity.</p> +<p>His last “Satires” of the general kind, were two +Dialogues, named, from the year in which they were published, +“Seventeen hundred and thirty-eight.” In these +poems many are praised and many reproached. Pope was then +entangled in the opposition, a follower of the Prince of Wales, +who dined at his house, and the friend of many who obstructed and +censured the conduct of the ministers. His political +partiality was too plainly shown; he forgot the prudence with +which he passed, in his earlier years, uninjured and unoffending, +through much more violent conflicts of faction. In the +first Dialogue, having an opportunity of praising Allen of Bath, +he asked his leave to mention him as a man not illustrious by any +merit of his ancestors, and called him in his verses +“low-born Allen.” Men are seldom satisfied with +praise introduced or followed by any mention of defect. +Allen seems not to have taken any pleasure in his epithet, which +was afterwards softened into “humble Allen.” In +the second Dialogue he took some liberty with one of the Foxes +among others; which Fox in a reply to Lyttelton, took an +opportunity of repaying, by reproaching him with the friendship +of a lampooner, who scattered his ink without fear or decency, +and against whom he hoped the resentment of the Legislature would +quickly be discharged.</p> +<p>About this time Paul Whitehead, a small poet, was summoned +before the Lords for a poem called “Manners,” +together with Dodsley, his publisher. Whitehead, who hung +loose upon society, skulked and escaped, but Dodsley’s shop +and family made his appearance necessary. He was, however, +soon dismissed, and the whole process was probably intended +rather to intimidate Pope than to punish Whitehead.</p> +<p>Pope never afterwards attempted to join the patriot with the +poet, nor drew his pen upon statesmen. That he desisted +from his attempts of reformation is imputed by his commentator to +his despair of prevailing over the corruption of the time. +He was not likely to have been ever of opinion that the dread of +his satire would countervail the love of power or of money; he +pleased himself with being important and formidable, and +gratified sometimes his pride, and sometimes his resentment, till +at last he began to think he should be more safe if he were less +busy.</p> +<p>The “Memoirs of Scriblerus,” published about this +time, extend only to the first book of a work projected in +concert by Pope, Swift, and Arbuthnot, who used to meet on the +time of Queen Anne, and denominated themselves the +“Scriblerus Club.” Their purpose was to censure +the abuses of learning by a fictitious life of an infatuated +scholar. They were dispersed; the design was never +completed, and Warburton laments its miscarriage as an event very +disastrous to polite letters. If the whole may be estimated +by this specimen, which seems to be the production of Arbuthnot, +with a few touches perhaps by Pope, the want of more will not be +much lamented; for the follies which the writer ridicules are so +little practised that they are not known; nor can the satire be +understood but by the learned. He raises phantoms of +absurdity, and then drives them away. He cures diseases +that were never felt. For this reason this joint production +of three great writers has never obtained any notice from +mankind. It has been little read, or when read has been +forgotten, as no man could be wiser, better, or merrier, by +remembering it. The design cannot boast of much +originality; for, besides its general resemblance to “Don +Quixote,” there will be found in it particular imitations +of the “History of Mr. Ouffle.”</p> +<p>Swift carried so much of it into Ireland as supplied him with +hints for his “Travels;” and with those the world +might have been contented, though the rest had been +suppressed.</p> +<p>Pope had sought for images and sentiments in a region not +known to have been explored by many other of the English +writers. He had consulted the modern writers of Latin +poetry, a class of authors whom Boileau endeavoured to bring into +contempt, and who are too generally neglected. Pope, +however, was not ashamed of their acquaintance, nor ungrateful +for the advantages which he might have derived from it. A +small selection from the Italians, who wrote in Latin, had been +published at London, about the latter end of the last century, by +a man who concealed his name, but whom his preface shows to have +been qualified for his undertaking. This collection Pope +amplified by more than half, and (1740) published it in two +volumes, but injuriously omitted his predecessor’s +preface. To these books, which had nothing but the mere +text, no regard was paid; the authors were still neglected, and +the editor was neither praised nor censured. He did not +sink into idleness; he had planned a work, which he considered as +subsequent to his “Essay on Man,” of which he has +given this account to Dr. Swift:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“March 25, +1736.</p> +<p>“If ever I write any more Epistles in verse, one of them +shall be addressed to you. I have long concerted it and +begun it; but I would make what bears your name as finished as my +last work ought to be, that is to say, more finished than any of +the rest. The subject is large, and will divide into four +Epistles, which naturally follow the ‘Essay on Man,’ +viz: 1. Of the Extent and Limits of Human Reason and +Science. 2. A view of the useful and therefore attainable, +and of the unuseful and therefore unattainable Arts. 3. Of +the Nature, Ends, Application, and Use, of different +Capacities. 4. Of the Use of Learning, of the Science, of +the World, and of Wit. It will conclude with a satire +against the misapplication of all these, exemplified by Pictures, +Characters, and Examples.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>This work in its full extent—being now afflicted with an +asthma, and finding the powers of life gradually +declining—he had no longer courage to undertake; but, from +the materials which he had provided, he added, at +Warburton’s request, another book to the +“Dunciad,” of which the design is to ridicule such +studies as are either hopeless or useless, as either pursue what +is unattainable, or what, if it be attained, is of no use. +When this book was printed (1742) the laurel had been for some +time upon the head of Cibber, a man whom it cannot be supposed +that Pope could regard with much kindness or esteem, though in +one of the imitations of Horace he has liberally enough praised +the “Careless Husband.” In the +“Dunciad,” among other worthless scribblers, he had +mentioned Cibber, who, in his “Apology,” complains of +the great Poet’s unkindness as more injurious, +“because,” says he, “I never have offended +him.”</p> +<p>It might have been expected that Pope should have been in some +degree mollified by this submissive gentleness, but no such +consequence appeared. Though he condescended to commend +Cibber once, he mentioned him afterwards contemptuously in one of +his satires, and again in his “Epistle to Arbuthnot,” +and in the fourth book of the “Dunciad” attacked him +with acrimony, to which the provocation is not easily +discoverable. Perhaps he imagined that, in ridiculing the +Laureate, he satirised those by whom the laurel had been given, +and gratified that ambitious petulance with which he affected to +insult the great. The severity of this satire left Cibber +no longer any patience. He had confidence enough in his own +powers to believe that he could disturb the quiet of his +adversary, and doubtless did not want instigators, who, without +any care about the victory, desired to amuse themselves by +looking on the contest. He therefore gave the town a +pamphlet, in which he declares his resolution from that time +never to bear another blow without returning it, and to tire out +his adversary by perseverance if he cannot conquer him by +strength.</p> +<p>The incessant and unappeasable malignity of Pope he imputes to +a very distant cause. After the <i>Three Hours After +Marriage</i> had been driven off the stage, by the offence which +the mummy and crocodile gave the audience, while the exploded +scene was yet fresh in memory, it happened that Cibber played +Bayes in the <i>Rehearsal</i>; and, as it had been usual to +enliven the part by the mention of any recent theatrical +transactions, he said, that he once thought to have introduced +his lovers disguised in a mummy and a crocodile. +“This,” says he, “was received with loud claps, +which indicated contempt for the play.” Pope, who was +behind the scenes, meeting him as he left the stage, attacked +him, as he says, with all the virulence of a “wit out of +his senses;” to which he replied, “that he would take +no other notice of what was said by so particular a man, than to +declare, that as often as he played that part he would repeat the +same provocation.” He shows his opinion to be that +Pope was one of the authors of the play which he so zealously +defended, and adds an idle story of Pope’s behaviour at a +tavern.</p> +<p>The pamphlet was written with little power of thought or +language, and, if suffered to remain without notice, would have +been very soon forgotten. Pope had now been enough +acquainted with human life to know, if his passion had not been +too powerful for his understanding, that, from a contention like +his with Cibber, the world seeks nothing but diversion, which is +given at the expense of the higher character. When Cibber +lampooned Pope, curiosity was excited. What Pope would say +of Cibber nobody inquired, but in hope that Pope’s asperity +might betray his pain and lessen his dignity. He should +therefore have suffered the pamphlet to flutter and die, without +confessing that it stung him. The dishonour of being shown +as Cibber’s antagonist could never be compensated by the +victory. Cibber had nothing to lose. When Pope had +exhausted all his malignity upon him, he would rise in the esteem +both of his friends and his enemies. Silence only could +have made him despicable; the blow which did not appear to be +felt would have been struck in vain. But Pope’s +irascibility prevailed, and he resolved to tell the whole English +world that he was at war with Cibber; and, to show that he +thought him to common adversary, he prepared no common +vengeance. He published a new edition of the +“Dunciad,” in which he degraded Theobald from his +painful pre-eminence, and enthroned Cibber in his stead. +Unhappily the two heroes were of opposite characters, and Pope +was unwilling to lose what he had already written. He has +therefore depraved his poem by giving to Cibber the old books, +the old pedantry, and the sluggish pertinacity of Theobald.</p> +<p>Pope was ignorant enough of his own interest to make another +change, and introduced Osborne contending for a prize among the +booksellers. Osborne was a man entirely destitute of shame, +without sense of any disgrace but that of poverty. He told +me, when he was doing that which raised Pope’s resentment, +that he should be put into the “Dunciad;” but he had +the fate of Cassandra. I gave no credit to his prediction, +till in time I saw it accomplished. The shafts of satire +were directed equally in vain against Cibber and Osborne; being +repelled by the impenetrable impudence of one, and deadened by +the impassive dulness of the other. Pope confessed his own +pain by his anger; but he gave no pain to those who had provoked +him. He was able to hurt none but himself; by transferring +the same ridicule from one to another, he reduced himself to the +insignificance of his own magpie, who from his cage calls cuckold +at a venture.</p> +<p>Cibber, according to his engagement, repaid the +“Dunciad” with another pamphlet, which, Pope said, +“would be as good as a dose of hartshorn to him;” but +his tongue and his heart were at variance. I have heard Mr. +Richardson relate that he attended his father the painter on a +visit, when one of Cibber’s pamphlets came into the hands +of Pope, who said, “These things are my +diversion.” They sat by him while he perused it, and +saw his features writhing with anguish: and young Richardson said +to his father, when they returned, that he hoped to be preserved +from such diversion as had been that day the lot of Pope. +From this time, finding his diseases more oppressive, and his +vital powers gradually declining, he no longer strained his +faculties with any original composition, nor proposed any other +employment for his remaining life than the revisal and correction +of his former works, in which he received advice and assistance +from Warburton, whom he appears to have trusted and honoured in +the highest degree. He laid aside his Epic Poem, perhaps +without much loss to mankind; for his hero was Brutus the Trojan, +who, according to a ridiculous fiction, established a colony in +Britain. The subject, therefore, was of the fabulous age; +the actors were a race upon whom imagination has been exhausted, +and attention wearied, and to whom the mind will not easily be +recalled, when it is invited in blank verse, which Pope had +adopted with great imprudence, and, I think, without due +consideration of the nature of our language. The sketch is, +at least in part, preserved by Ruffhead, by which it appears that +Pope was thoughtless enough to model the names of his heroes with +terminations not consistent with the time or country in which he +places them. He lingered through the next year, but +perceived himself, as he expresses it, “going down the +hill.” He had for at least five years been afflicted +with an asthma, and other disorders, which his physicians were +unable to relieve. Towards the end of his life he consulted +Dr. Thomson, a man who had, by large promises, and free censures +of the common practice of physic, forced himself up into sudden +reputation. Thomson declared his distemper to be a dropsy, +and evacuated part of the water by tincture of jalap, but +confessed that his belly did not subside. Thomson had many +enemies, and Pope was persuaded to dismiss him.</p> +<p>While he was yet capable of amusement and conversation, as he +was one day sitting in the air with Lord Bolingbroke and Lord +Marchmont, he saw his favourite Martha Blount at the bottom of +the terrace, and asked Lord Bolingbroke to go and hand her +up. Bolingbroke, not liking his errand, crossed his legs +and sat still; but Lord Marchmont, who was younger and less +captious, waited on the lady, who, when he came to her, asked, +“What, is he not dead yet?” She is said to have +neglected him with shameful unkindness, in the latter time of his +decay; yet, of the little which he had to leave she had a very +great part. Their acquaintance began early; the life of +each was pictured on the other’s mind; their conversation +therefore was endearing, for when they met, there was an +immediate coalition of congenial notions. Perhaps he +considered her unwillingness to approach the chamber of sickness +as female weakness, or human frailty; perhaps he was conscious to +himself of peevishness and impatience, or, though he was offended +by her inattention, might yet consider her merit as overbalancing +her fault; and if he had suffered his heart to be alienated from +her, he could have found nothing that might fill her place; he +could have only shrunk within himself. It was too late to +transfer his confidence or fondness.</p> +<p>In May, 1744, his death was approaching. On the 6th he +was all day delirious, which he mentioned for days afterwards as +a sufficient humiliation of the vanity of man; he afterwards +complained of seeing things as through a curtain, and in false +colours, and one day, its the presence of Dodsley, asked what arm +it was that came from the wall. He said that his greatest +inconvenience was inability to think. Bolingbroke sometimes +wept over him in this state of helpless decay; and being told by +Spence, that Pope, at the intermission of his deliriousness, was +always saying something kind either of his present or absent +friends, and that his humanity seemed to have survived his +understanding, answered, “It has so.” And +added, “I never in my life knew a man that had so tender a +heart for his particular friends, or more general friendship for +mankind.” At another time he said, “I have +known Pope these thirty years, and value myself more in his +friendship than—” His grief then suppressed his +voice.</p> +<p>Pope expressed undoubting confidence of a future state. +Being asked by his friend Mr. Hooke, a papist, whether he would +not die like his father and mother, and whether a priest should +not be called, he answered, “I do not think it essential, +but it will be very right; and I thank you for putting me in mind +of it.” In the morning, after the priest had given +him the last sacraments, he said “There is nothing that is +meritorious but virtue and friendship; and indeed friendship +itself is only a part of virtue.” He died in the +evening of the 30th day of May 1744, so placidly, that the +attendants did not discern the exact time of his +expiration. He was buried at Twickenham, near his father +and mother, where a monument has been erected to him by his +commentator, the Bishop of Gloucester.</p> +<p>He left the care of his papers to his executors; first to Lord +Bolingbroke, and, if he should not be living, to the Earl of +Marchmont, undoubtedly expecting them to be proud of the trust, +and eager to extend his fame. But let no man dream of +influence beyond his life. After a decent time Dodsley, the +bookseller, went to solicit preference as the publisher, and was +told that the parcel had not been yet inspected; and, whatever +was the reason, the world has been disappointed of what was +“reserved for the next age.” He lost, indeed, +the favour of Bolingbroke by a kind of posthumous offence. +The political pamphlet called “The Patriot King” had +been put into his hands that he might procure the impression of a +very few copies, to be distributed, according to the +author’s direction, among his friends, and Pope assured him +that no more had been printed than were allowed; but, soon after +his death, the printer brought and resigned a complete edition of +fifteen hundred copies, which Pope had ordered him to print and +retain in secret. He kept, as was observed, his engagement +to Pope better than Pope had kept it to his friend; and nothing +was known of the transaction till, upon the death of his +employer, he thought himself obliged to deliver the books to the +right owner, who, with great indignation, made a fire in his +yard, and delivered the whole impression to the flames.</p> +<p>Hitherto nothing had been done which was not naturally +dictated by resentment of violated faith; resentment more +acrimonious, as the violator had been more loved or more +trusted. But here the anger might have stopped; the injury +was private, and there was little danger from the example. +Bolingbroke, however, was not yet satisfied. His thirst of +vengeance excited him to blast the memory of the man over whom he +had wept in his last struggles; and he employed Mallet, another +friend of Pope, to tell the tale to the public, with all its +aggravations. Warburton, whose heart was warm with his +legacy and tender by the recent separation, thought it proper for +him to interpose, and undertook, not indeed to vindicate the +action, for breach of trust has always something criminal, but to +extenuate it by an apology. Having advanced what cannot be +denied, that moral obliquity is made more or less excusable by +the motives that produce it, he inquires what evil purpose could +have induced Pope to break his promise. He could not +delight his vanity by usurping the work, which, though not sold +in shops, had been shown to a number more than sufficient to +preserve the author’s claim; he could not gratify his +avarice, for he could not sell his plunder till Bolingbroke was +dead; and even then, if the copy was left to another, his fraud +would be defeated, and if left to himself would be useless.</p> +<p>Warburton therefore supposes, with great appearance of reason, +that the irregularity of his conduct proceeded wholly from his +zeal for Bolingbroke, who might perhaps have destroyed the +pamphlet, which Pope thought it his duty to preserve, even +without its author’s approbation. To this apology an +answer was written in “A letter to the most impudent man +living.” He brought some reproach upon his own memory +by the petulant and contemptuous mention made in his will of Mr. +Allen and an affected repayment of his benefactions. Mrs. +Blount, as the known friend and favourite of Pope, had been +invited to the house of Allen, where she comported herself with +such indecent arrogance that she parted from Mrs. Allen in a +state of irreconcilable dislike, and the door was for ever barred +against her. This exclusion she resented with so much +bitterness as to refuse any legacy from Pope unless he left the +world with a disavowal of obligation to Allen. Having been +long under her dominion, now tottering in the decline of life, +and unable to resist the violence of her temper, or perhaps, with +the prejudice of a lover, persuaded that she had suffered +improper treatment, he complied with her demand, and polluted his +will with female resentment. Allen accepted the legacy, +which he gave to the hospital at Bath, observing that Pope was +always a bad accountant, and that if to £150 he had put a +cipher more he had come nearer to the truth.</p> +<p>The person of Pope is well known not to have been formed by +the nicest model. He has, in his account of the +“Little Club,” compared himself to a spider, and by +another is described as protuberant behind and before. He +is said to have been beautiful in his infancy, but he was of a +constitution originally feeble and weak; and, as bodies of a +tender frame are easily distorted, his deformity was probably in +part the effect of his application. His stature was so low, +that to bring him to a level with common tables, it was necessary +to raise his seat. But his face was not displeasing, and +his eyes were animated and vivid. By natural deformity, or +accidental distortion, his vital functions were so much +disordered, that his life was “a long disease.” +His most frequent assailant was the headache, which he used to +relieve by inhaling the steam of coffee, which he very frequently +required.</p> +<p>Most of what can be told concerning his petty peculiarities +was communicated by a female domestic of the Earl of Oxford, who +knew him perhaps after the middle of life. He was then so +weak as to stand in perpetual need of female attendance; +extremely sensible of cold, so that he wore a kind of fur +doublet, under a shirt of a very coarse warm linen with fine +sleeves. When he rose, he was invested in bodice made of +stiff canvas, being scarcely able to hold himself erect till they +were laced, and he then put on a flannel waistcoat. One +side was contracted. His legs were so slender, that he +enlarged their bulk with three pairs of stockings, which were +drawn on and off by the maid, for he was not able to dress or +undress himself, and neither went to bed nor rose without +help. His weakness made it very difficult for him to be +clean. His hair had fallen almost all away, and he used to +dine sometimes with Lord Oxford, privately, in a velvet +cap. His dress of ceremony was black, with a tie-wig, and a +little sword. The indulgence and accommodation which his +sickness required, had taught him all the unpleasing and unsocial +qualities of a valetudinary man. He expected that +everything should give way to his ease or humour, as a child, +whose parents will not hear her cry, has an unresisted dominion +in the nursery.</p> +<blockquote><p>“C’est que l’enfant toujours est +homme,<br /> +C’est que l’homme est toujours enfant.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>When he wanted to sleep he “nodded in company,” +and once slumbered at his own table while the Prince of Wales was +talking of poetry.</p> +<p>The reputation which his friendship gave procured him many +invitations, but he was a very troublesome inmate. He +brought no servant, and had so many wants, that a numerous +attendance was scarcely able to supply them. Wherever he +was, he left no room for another, because he exacted the +attention, and employed the activity of the whole family. +His errands were so frequent and frivolous, that the footmen in +time avoided and neglected him, and the Earl of Oxford discharged +some of his servants for their resolute refusal of his +messages. The maids, when they had neglected their +business, alleged that they had been employed by Mr. Pope. +One of his constant demands was of coffee in the night, and to +the woman that waited on him in his chamber he was very +burthensome. But he was careful to recompense her want of +sleep, and Lord Oxford’s servant declared, that in the +house where her business was to answer his call, she would not +ask for wages. He had another fault, easily incident to +those who, suffering much pain, think themselves entitled to what +pleasures they can snatch. He was too indulgent to his +appetite: he loved meat highly seasoned and of strong taste; and, +at the intervals of the table, amused himself with biscuits and +dry conserves. If he sat down to a variety of dishes, he +would oppress his stomach with repletion; and though he seemed +angry when a dram was offered him, did not forbear to drink +it. His friends, who knew the avenues to his heart, +pampered him with presents of luxury, which he did not suffer to +stand neglected. The death of great men is not always +proportioned to the lustre of their lives. Hannibal, says +Juvenal, did not perish by the javelin or the sword, the +slaughters of Cannæ were revenged by a ring. The +death of Pope was imputed by some of his friends to a silver +saucepan, in which it was his delight to eat potted +lampreys. That he loved too well to eat is certain; but +that his sensuality shortened his life will not be hastily +concluded, when it is remembered that a conformation so irregular +lasted six-and-fifty years, notwithstanding such pertinacious +diligence of study and meditation. In all his intercourse +with mankind he had great delight in artifice, and endeavoured to +attain all his purposes by indirect and unsuspected +methods. “He hardly drank tea without a +stratagem.” If at the house of friends he wanted any +accommodation, he was not willing to ask for it in plain terms, +but would mention it remotely as something convenient; though +when it was procured, he soon made it appear for whose sake it +had been recommended. Thus he teased Lord Orrery till he +obtained a screen. He practised his arts on such small +occasions, that Lady Bolingbroke used to say, in a French phrase, +that “he played the politician about cabbages and +turnips.” His unjustifiable impression of the +“Patriot King,” as it can be attributed to no +particular motive, must have proceeded from his general habit of +secrecy and cunning; he caught an opportunity of a sly trick, and +pleased himself with the thought of outwitting Bolingbroke. +In familiar or convivial conversation, it does not appear that he +excelled. He may be said to have resembled Dryden, as being +not one that was distinguished by vivacity in company. It +is remarkable that, so near his time, so much should be known of +what he has written, and so little of what he has said: +traditional memory retains no sallies of raillery, nor sentences +of observation: nothing either pointed or solid, either wise or +merry. One apophthegm only stands upon record. When +an objection, raised against his inscription for Shakespeare, was +defended by the authority of Patrick, he replied, <i>horresco +referens</i>, that he “would allow the publisher of a +dictionary to know the meaning of a single word, but not of two +words put together.”</p> +<p>He was fretful and easily displeased, and allowed himself to +be capriciously resentful. He would sometimes leave Lord +Oxford silently, no one could tell why, and was to be courted +back by more letters and messages than the footmen were willing +to carry. The table was indeed infested by Lady Mary +Wortley, who was the friend of Lady Oxford, and who, knowing his +peevishness, could by no entreaties be restrained from +contradicting him, till their disputes were sharpened to such +asperity, that one or the other quitted the house. He +sometimes condescended to be jocular with servants or inferiors; +but by no merriment, either of others or his own, was he ever +seen excited to laughter.</p> +<p>Of his domestic character, frugality was a part eminently +remarkable. Having determined not to be dependent, he +determined not to be in want, and therefore wisely and +magnanimously rejected all temptations to expense unsuitable to +his fortune. This general care must be universally +approved; but it sometimes appeared in petty artifices of +parsimony, such as the practice of writing his compositions on +the back of letters, as may be seen in the remaining copy of the +“Iliad,” by which perhaps in five years five +shillings were saved; or in a niggardly reception of his friends, +and scantiness of entertainment, as, when he had two guests in +his house, he would set at supper a single pint upon the table; +and having himself taken two small glasses, would retire, and +say, “Gentlemen. I leave you to your +wine.” Yet he tells his friends that “he has a +heart for all, a house for all, and whatever they may think, a +fortune for all.” He sometimes, however, made a +splendid dinner, and is said to have wanted no part of the skill +or elegance which such performances require. That this +magnificence should be often displayed, that obstinate prudence +with which he conducted his affairs would not permit; for his +revenue, certain and casual, amounted only to about eight hundred +pounds a year, of which, however, he declares himself able to +assign one hundred to charity. Of this fortune, which, as +it arose from public approbation, was very honourably obtained, +his imagination seems to have been too full: it would be hard to +find a man so well entitled to notice by his wit, that ever +delighted so much in talking of his money. In his Letters +and in his poems, his garden and his grotto, his quincunx and his +vines, or some hints of his opulence, are always to be +found. The great topic of his ridicule is poverty; the +crimes with which he reproaches his antagonists are their debts, +their habitation in the Mint, and their want of a dinner. +He seems to be of an opinion not very uncommon in the world, that +to want money is to want everything. Next to the pleasure +of contemplating his possessions, seems to be that of enumerating +the men of high rank with whom he was acquainted, and whose +notice he loudly proclaims not to have been obtained by any +practices of meanness or servility; a boast which was never +denied to be true, and to which very few poets have ever +aspired. Pope never set genius to sale; he never flattered +those whom he did not love, nor praised those whom he did not +esteem. Savage, however, remarked that he began a little to +relax his dignity when he wrote a distich for “his +Highness’s dog.”</p> +<p>His admiration of the great seems to have increased in the +advance of life. He passed over peers and statesmen to +inscribe his “Iliad” to Congreve, with a magnanimity +of which the praise had been complete, had his friend’s +virtue been equal to his wit. Why he was chosen for so +great an honour, it is not now possible to know; there is no +trace in literary history of any particular intimacy between +them. The name of Congreve appears in the Letters among +those of his other friends, but without any observable +distinction or consequence. To his latter works, however, +he took care to annex names dignified with titles, but was not +very happy in his choice; for, except Lord Bathurst, none of his +noble friends were such as that a good man would wish to have his +intimacy with them known to posterity; he can derive little +honour from the notice of Cobham, Burlington, or Bolingbroke.</p> +<p>Of his social qualities, if an estimate be made from his +Letters, an opinion too favourable cannot easily be formed; they +exhibit a perpetual and unclouded effulgence of general +benevolence, and particular fondness. There is nothing but +liberality, gratitude, constancy, and tenderness. It has +been so long said as to be commonly believed, that the true +characters of men may be found in their letters, and that he who +writes to his friend lays his heart open before him. But +the truth is that such were the simple friendships of the Golden +Age, and are now the friendships only of children. Very few +can boast of hearts which they dare lay open to themselves, and +of which, by whatever accident exposed, they do not shun a +distinct and continued view; and, certainly, who we hide from +ourselves we do not show to our friend. There is, indeed, +no transaction which offers strange temptations to fallacy and +sophistication than epistolary intercourse. In the +eagerness of conversation the first emotions of the mind often +burst out before they are considered; in the tumult of business, +interest and passion have their genuine effect; but a friendly +letter is a calm and deliberate performance in the cool of +leisure, in the stillness of solitude, and surely no man sits +down to depreciate by design his own character.</p> +<p>Friendship has no tendency to secure veracity; for by whom can +a man so much wish to be thought better than he is, as by him +whose kindness he desires to gain or keep? Even in writing +to the world there is less constraint; the author is not +confronted with his reader, and takes his chance of approbation +among the different dispositions of mankind; but a letter is +addressed to a single mind, of which the prejudices and +partialities are known; and must therefore please, if not by +favouring them, by forbearing to oppose them. To charge +those favourable representations, which men give of their own +minds, with the guilt of hypocritical falsehood, would show more +severity than knowledge. The writer commonly believes +himself. Almost every man’s thoughts, while they are +general, are right; and most hearts are pure while temptation is +away. It is easy to awaken generous sentiments in privacy; +to despise death when there is no danger; to glow with +benevolence when there is nothing to be given. While such +ideas are formed they are felt; and self-love does not suspect +the gleam of virtue to be the meteor of fancy.</p> +<p>If the Letters of Pope are considered merely as compositions, +they seem to be premeditated and artificial. It is one +thing to write because there is something which the mind wishes +to discharge, and another to solicit the imagination because +ceremony or vanity requires something to be written. Pope +confesses his early Letters to be vitiated with <i>affectation +and ambition</i>: to know whether he disentangled himself from +these perverters of epistolary integrity, his book and his life +must be set in comparison. One of his favourite topics is +contempt of his own poetry. For this, if it had been real, +he would deserve no commendation; and in this he was certainly +not sincere, for his high value of himself was sufficiently +observed; and of what could he be proud but of his poetry? +He writes, he says, when “he has just nothing else to +do;” yet Swift complains that he was never at leisure for +conversation, because he “had always some poetical scheme +in his head.” It was punctually required that his +writing-box should be set upon his bed before he rose; and Lord +Oxford’s domestic related that, in the dreadful winter of +Forty, she was called from her bed by him four times in one +night, to supply him with paper, lest he should lose a +thought. He pretends insensibility to censure and +criticism, though it was observed by all who knew him that every +pamphlet disturbed his quiet, and that his extreme irritability +laid him open to perpetual vexation; but he wished to despise his +critics, and therefore hoped that he did despise them. As +he happened to live in two reigns when the court paid little +attention to poetry, he nursed in his mind a foolish disesteem of +kings, and proclaims that “he never sees +courts.” Yet a little regard shown him by the Prince +of Wales melted his obduracy; and he had not much to say when he +was asked by his Royal Highness, “How he could love a +prince while he disliked kings?”</p> +<p>He very frequently professes contempt of the world, and +represents himself as looking on mankind, sometimes with gay +indifference, as on emmets of a hillock, below his serious +attention; and sometimes with gloomy indignation, as on monsters +more worthy of hatred than pity. These were dispositions +apparently counterfeited. How could he despise those whom +he lived by pleasing, and on whose approbation his esteem of +himself was superstructed? Why should he hate those to +whose favour he owed his honour and his ease? Of things +that terminate in human life, the world is the proper judge: to +despise its sentence, if it were possible, is not just; and if it +were just, is not possible. Pope was far enough from this +unreasonable temper; he was sufficiently <i>a fool to fame</i>, +and his fault was that he pretended to neglect it. His +levity and his sullenness were only in his letters; he passed +through common life, sometimes vexed, and sometimes pleased, with +the natural emotions of common men. His scorn of the great +is repeated too often to be real; no man thinks much of that +which he despises; and as falsehood is always in danger of +inconsistency, he makes it his boast at another time that he +lives among them. It is evident that his own importance +swells often in his mind. He is afraid of writing, lest the +clerks of the post-office should know his secrets; he has many +enemies; he considers himself as surrounded by universal +jealousy: “After many deaths, and many dispersions, two or +three of us,” says he, “may still be brought +together, not to plot, but to divert ourselves, and the world +too, if it pleases;” and they can live together, and +“show what friends wits may be, in spite of all the fools +in the world.” All this while it was likely that the +clerks did not know his hand; he certainly had no more enemies +than a public character like his inevitably excites; and with +what degree of friendship the wits might live, very few were so +much fools as ever to inquire. Some part of this pretended +discontent he learned from Swift, and expresses it, I think, most +frequently in his correspondence with him. Swift’s +resentment was unreasonable, but it was sincere; Pope’s was +the mere mimicry of his friend, a fictitious part which he began +to play before it became him. When he was only twenty-five +years old, he related that “a glut of study and retirement +had thrown him on the world,” and that there was danger +lest “a glut of the world should throw him back upon study +and retirement.” To this Swift answered with great +propriety, that Pope had not yet acted or suffered enough in the +world to have become weary of it. And, indeed, it must have +been some very powerful reason that can drive back to solitude +him who has once enjoyed the pleasures of society.</p> +<p>In the Letters both of Swift and Pope there appears such +narrowness of mind as makes them insensible of any excellence +that has not some affinity with their own, and confines their +esteem and approbation to so small a number, that whoever should +form his opinion of their age from their representation, would +suppose them to have lived amidst ignorance and barbarity, unable +to find among their contemporaries either virtue or intelligence, +and persecuted by those that could not understand them.</p> +<p>When Pope murmurs at the world, when he professes contempt of +fame, when he speaks of riches and poverty, of success and +disappointment, with negligent indifference, he certainly does +not express his habitual and settled resentments, but either +wilfully disguises his own character, or, what is more likely, +invests himself with temporary qualities, and sallies out in the +colours of the present moment. His hopes and fears, his +joys and sorrows, acted strongly upon his mind, and if he +differed from others it was not by carelessness; he was irritable +and resentful; his malignity to Philips, whom he had first made +ridiculous and then hated for being angry continued too +long. Of his vain desire to make Bentley contemptible I +never heard any adequate reason. He was sometimes wanton in +his attacks, and before Chandos, Lady Wortley, and Hill, was mean +in his retreat. The virtues which seem to have had most of +his affection were liberality and fidelity of friendship, in +which it does not appear that he was other than he describes +himself. His fortune did not suffer his character to be +splendid and conspicuous, but he assisted Dodsley with a hundred +pounds that he might open a shop, and of the subscription of +forty pounds a year that he raised for Savage twenty were paid by +himself. He was accused of loving money, but his love was +eagerness to gain, not solicitude to keep it. In the duties +of friendship he was zealous and constant; his early maturity of +mind commonly united him with men older than himself, and +therefore, without attaining any considerable length of life, he +saw many companions of his youth sink into the grave; but it does +not appear that he lost a single friend by coldness or by injury; +those who loved him once continued their kindness. His +ungrateful mention of Allen in his will was the effect of his +adherence to one whom he had known much longer, and whom he +naturally loved with greater fondness. His violation of the +trust reposed in him by Bolingbroke could have no motive +inconsistent with the warmest affection; he either thought the +action so near to indifferent that he forgot it, or so laudable +that he expected his friend to approve it. It was reported +with such confidence as almost to enforce belief, that in the +papers entrusted to his executors was found a defamatory Life of +Swift, which he had prepared as an instrument of vengeance, to be +used if any provocation should be ever given. About this I +inquired of the Earl of Marchmont, who assured me that no such +piece was among his remains.</p> +<p>The religion in which he lived and died was that of the Church +of Rome, to which, in his correspondence with Racine, he +professes himself a sincere adherent. That he was not +scrupulously pious in some part of his life is known by many idle +and indecent applications of sentences taken from the Scriptures, +a mode of merriment which a good man dreads for its profaneness, +and a witty man disdains for its easiness and vulgarity. +But to whatever levities he has been betrayed, it does not appear +that his principles were ever corrupted, or that he ever lost his +belief of revelation. The positions which he transmitted +from Bolingbroke he seems not to have understood, and was pleased +with an interpretation that made them orthodox.</p> +<p>A man of such exalted superiority and so little moderation +would naturally have all his delinquencies observed and +aggravated; those who could not deny that he was excellent would +rejoice to find that he was not perfect. Perhaps it may be +imputed to the unwillingness with which the same man is allowed +to possess many advantages, that his learning has been +depreciated. He certainly was in his early life a man of +great literary curiosity, and when he wrote his “Essay on +Criticism,” had, for his age, a very wide acquaintance with +books. When he entered into the living world it seems to +have happened to him, as to many others, that he was less +attentive to dead masters; he studied in the academy of +Paracelsus, and made the universe his favourite volume. He +gathered his notions fresh from reality, not from the copies of +authors, but the originals of Nature. Yet there is no +reason to believe that literature ever lost his esteem; he always +professed to love reading, and Dobson, who spent some time at his +house translating his “Essay on Man,” when I asked +him what learning he found him to possess, answered, “More +than I expected.” His frequent references to history, +his allusions to various kinds of knowledge, and his images +selected from art and nature, with his observations on the +operations of the mind and the modes of life, show an +intelligence perpetually on the wing, excursive, vigorous, and +diligent, eager to pursue knowledge, and attentive to retain +it. From this curiosity arose the desire of travelling, to +which he alludes in his verses to Jervas, and which, though he +never found an opportunity to gratify it, did not leave him till +his life declined.</p> +<p>Of his intellectual character, the constituent and fundamental +principle was good sense, a prompt and intuitive perception of +consonance and propriety. He saw immediately of his own +conceptions what was to be chosen and what to be rejected, and, +in the works of others, what was to be shunned and what was to be +copied. But good sense alone is a sedate and quiescent +quality, which manages its possessions well, but does not +increase them; it collects few materials for its own operations, +and preserves safety, but never gains supremacy. Pope had +likewise genius; a mind active, ambitious, and adventurous, +always investigating, always aspiring; in its widest searches +still longing to go forward, in its highest flights still wishing +to be higher, always imagining some thing greater than it knows, +always endeavouring more than it can do. To assist these +powers he is said to have had great strength and exactness of +memory. That which he had heard or read was not easily +lost, and he had before him not only what his own meditations +suggested, but what he had found in other writers that might be +accommodated to his present purpose. These benefits of +Nature he improved by incessant and unwearied diligence; he had +recourse to every source of intelligence, and lost no opportunity +of information; he consulted the living as well as the dead; he +read his compositions to his friends, and was never content with +mediocrity when excellence could be attained. He considered +poetry as the business of his life, and however he might seem to +lament his occupation he followed it with constancy; to make +verses was his first labour, and to mend them was his last. +From his attention to poetry he was never diverted. If +conversation offered anything that could be improved, he +committed it to paper; if a thought, or perhaps an expression, +more happy than was common, rose to his mind, he was careful to +write it; an independent distich was preserved for an opportunity +of insertion, and some little fragments have been found +containing lines, or parts of lines, to be wrought upon at some +other time. He was one of those few whose labour is their +pleasure; he was never elevated to negligence nor wearied to +impatience; he never passed a fault unamended by indifference, +nor quitted it by despair. He laboured his works first to +gain reputation, and afterwards to keep it.</p> +<p>Of composition there are different methods. Some employ +at once memory and invention, and, with little intermediate use +of the pen, form and polish large masses by continued meditation, +and write their productions only when, in their own opinion, they +have completed them. It is related of Virgil that his +custom was to pour out a great number of verses in the morning, +and pass the day in retrenching exuberances and correcting +inaccuracies. The method of Pope, as may be collected from +his translation, was to write his first thoughts in his first +words, and gradually to amplify, decorate, rectify, and refine +them. With such faculties and such dispositions he excelled +every other writer in poetical prudence; he wrote in such a +manner as might expose him to few hazards. He used almost +always the same fabric of verse, and, indeed, by those few essays +which he made of any other, he did not enlarge his +reputation. Of this uniformity the certain consequence was +readiness and dexterity. By perpetual practice language +had, in his mind, a systematical arrangement; having always the +same use for words, he had words so selected and combined as to +be ready at his call. This increase of facility he +confessed himself to have perceived in the progress of his +translation. But what was yet of more importance, his +effusions were always voluntary, and his subjects chosen by +himself. His independence secured him from drudging at a +task, and labouring upon a barren topic; he never exchanged +praise for money, nor opened a shop of condolence or +congratulation. His poems, therefore, were scarcely ever +temporary. He suffered coronations and royal marriages to +pass without a song, and derived no opportunities from recent +events, nor any popularity from the accidental disposition of his +readers. He was never reduced to the necessity of +soliciting the sun to shine upon a birthday, of calling the +graces and virtues to a wedding, or of saying what multitudes +have said before him. When he could produce nothing new he +was at liberty to be silent.</p> +<p>His publications were for the same reason never hasty. +He is said to have sent nothing to the press till it had lain two +years under his inspection: it is at least certain that he +ventured nothing without nice examination. He suffered the +tumult of imagination to subside, and the novelties of invention +to grow familiar. He knew that the mind is always enamoured +of its own productions, and did not trust his first +fondness. He consulted his friends, and listened with great +willingness to criticism; and, what was of more importance, he +consulted himself, and let nothing pass against his own +judgment. He professed to have learned his poetry from +Dryden, whom, whenever an opportunity was presented, he praised +through his whole life with unvaried liberality; and perhaps his +character may receive some illustration if he be compared with +his master.</p> +<p>Integrity of understanding and nicety of discernment were not +allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope. The +rectitude of Dryden’s mind was sufficiently shown by the +dismission of his poetical prejudices, and the rejection of +unnatural thoughts and rugged numbers. But Dryden never +desired to apply all the judgment that he had. He wrote, +and professed to write, merely for the people; and when he +pleased others, he contented himself. He spent no time in +struggles to rouse latent powers; he never attempted to make that +better which was already good, nor often to mend what he must +have known to be faulty. He wrote, as he tells us, with +very little consideration; when occasion or necessity called upon +him, he poured out what the present moment happened to supply, +and, when once it had passed the press, ejected it from his mind; +for, when he had no pecuniary interest, he had no further +solicitude.</p> +<p>Pope was not content to satisfy; he desired to excel, and +therefore always endeavoured to do his best; he did not court the +candour, but dared the judgment of his reader, and, expecting no +indulgence from others, he showed none to himself. He +examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, +and retouched every part with indefatigable diligence, till he +had left nothing to be forgiven. For this reason he kept +his pieces very long in his hands, while he considered and +reconsidered them. The only poems which can be supposed to +have been written with such regard to the times as might hasten +their publication, were the two satires of +“Thirty-eight;” of which Dodsley told me that they +were brought to him by the author, that they might be fairly +copied. “Almost every line,” he said, +“was then written twice over; I gave him a clean +transcript, which he sent some time afterwards to me for the +press, with almost every line written twice over a second +time.” His declaration, that his care for his works +ceased at their publication, was not strictly true. His +parental attention never abandoned them; what he found amiss in +the first edition, he silently corrected in those that +followed. He appears to have revised the +“Iliad,” and freed it from some of its imperfections; +and the “Essay on Criticism” received many +improvements after its first appearance. It will seldom be +found that he altered without adding clearness, elegance, or +vigour. Pope had perhaps the judgment of Dryden; but Dryden +certainly wanted the diligence of Pope.</p> +<p>In acquired knowledge, the superiority must be allowed to +Dryden, whose education was more scholastic, and who before he +became an author had been allowed more time for study, with +better means of information. His mind has a larger range, +and he collects his images and illustrations from a more +extensive circumference of science. Dryden knew more of man +in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The +notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, and +those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in +the knowledge of Dryden, and more certainty in that of +Pope. Poetry was not the sole praise of either; for both +excelled likewise in prose; but Pope did not borrow his prose +from his predecessor. The style of Dryden is capricious and +varied; that of Pope is cautious and uniform. Dryden +observes the motions of his own mind; Pope constrains his mind to +his own rules of composition. Dryden is sometimes vehement +and rapid; Pope is always smooth, uniform, and gentle. +Dryden’s page is a natural field, rising into inequalities, +and diversified by the varied exuberance of abundant vegetation; +Pope’s is a velvet lawn, shaven by the scythe, and levelled +by the roller.</p> +<p>Of genius, that power which constitutes a poet; that quality +without which judgment is cold, and knowledge is inert; that +energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates; the +superiority must, with some hesitation, be allowed to +Dryden. It is not to be inferred that of this poetical +vigour Pope had only a little, because Dryden had more; for every +other writer since Milton must give place to Pope; and even of +Dryden it must be said that, if he has brighter paragraphs, he +has not better poems. Dryden’s performances were +always hasty, either excited by some external occasion, or +extorted by domestic necessity; he composed without +consideration, and published without correction. What his +mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, was all +that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory caution +of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply his +images, and to accumulate all that study might produce or chance +might supply. If the flights of Dryden therefore are +higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of +Dryden’s fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope’s the +heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses +expectation, and Pope never falls below it. Dryden is read +with frequent astonishment, and Pope with perpetual +delight. This parallel will, I hope, when it is well +considered, be found just; and if the reader should suspect me, +as I suspect myself, of some partial fondness for the memory of +Dryden, let him not too hastily condemn me; for meditation and +inquiry may, perhaps, show him the reasonableness of my +determination.</p> +<p>The Works of Pope are now to be distinctly examined, not so +much with attention to slight faults or petty beauties, as to the +general character and effect of each performance.</p> +<p>It seems natural for a young poet to initiate himself by +pastorals, which, not professing to imitate real life, require no +experience; and, exhibiting only the simple operation of +unmingled passions, admit no subtle reasoning or deep +inquiry. Pope’s pastorals are not, however, composed +but with close thought; they have reference to the times of the +day, the seasons of the year, and the periods of human +life. The last, that which turns the attention upon age and +death, was the author’s favourite. To tell of +disappointment and misery, to thicken the darkness of futurity +and perplex the labyrinth of uncertainty, has been always a +delicious employment of the poets. His preference was +probably just. I wish, however, that his fondness had not +overlooked a line in which the Zephyrs are made to lament in +silence. To charge these pastorals with wane of invention, +is to require what was never intended. The imitations are +so ambitiously frequent, that the writer evidently means rather +to show his literature than his wit. It is surely +sufficient for an author of sixteen, not only to be able to copy +the poems of antiquity with judicious selection, but to have +obtained sufficient power of language, and skill in metre, to +exhibit a series of versification which had in English poetry no +precedent, nor has since had an imitation.</p> +<p>The design of “Windsor Forest” is evidently +derived from “Cooper’s Hill,” with some +attention to Waller’s poem on “The Park;” but +Pope cannot be denied to excel his masters in variety and +elegance, and the art of interchanging description, narrative, +and morality. The objection made by Dennis is the want of +plan, of a regular subordination of parts terminating in the +principal and original design. There is this want in most +descriptive poems, because as the scenes, which they must exhibit +successively, are all subsisting at the same time, the order in +which they are shown must by necessity be arbitrary, and more is +not to be expected from the last part than from the first. +The attention, therefore, which cannot be detained by suspense, +must be excited by diversity, such as this poem offers to its +reader. But the desire of diversity may be too much +indulged; the parts of “Windsor Forest” which deserve +least praise are those which were added to enliven the stillness +of the scene—the appearance of Father Thames, and the +transformation of Lodona. Addison had in his +“Campaign” derided the rivers that “rise from +their oozy beds” to tell stories of heroes; and it is +therefore strange that Pope should adopt a fiction not only +unnatural, but lately censured. The story of Lodona is told +with sweetness; but a new metamorphosis is a ready and puerile +expedient; nothing is easier than to tell how a flower was once a +blooming virgin, or a rock an obdurate tyrant.</p> +<p>The “Temple of Fame” has, as Steele warmly +declared, a “thousand beauties.” Every part is +splendid; there is great luxuriance of ornaments; the original +vision of Chaucer was never denied to be much improved; the +allegory is very skilfully continued, the imagery is properly +selected, and learnedly displayed; yet, with all this +comprehension of excellence, as its scene is laid in remote ages, +and its sentiments, if the concluding paragraph be excepted, have +little relation to general manners or common life, it never +obtained much notice, but is turned silently over, and seldom +quoted or mentioned with either praise or blame.</p> +<p>That the “Messiah” excels the “Pollio” +is no great praise, if it be considered from what original the +improvements are derived.</p> +<p>The “Verses on the Unfortunate Lady” have drawn +much attention by the illaudable singularity of treating suicide +with respect; and they must be allowed to be written in some +parts with vigorous animation, and in others with gentle +tenderness; nor has Pope produced any poem in which the sense +predominates more over the diction. But the tale is not +skilfully told; it is not easy to discover the character of +either the lady or her guardian. History relates that she +was about to disparage herself by a marriage with an inferior; +Pope praises her for the dignity of ambition, and yet condemns +the uncle to detestation for his pride; the ambitious love of a +niece may be opposed by the interest, malice, or envy of an +uncle, but never by his pride. On such an occasion a poet +may be allowed to be obscure, but inconsistency never can be +right.</p> +<p>The “Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day” was +undertaken at the desire of Steele: in this the author is +generally confessed to have miscarried, yet he has miscarried +only as compared with Dryden; for he has far outgone other +competitors. Dryden’s plan is better chosen; history +will always take stronger hold of the attention than fable: the +passions excited by Dryden are the pleasures and pains of real +life, the scene of Pope is laid in imaginary existence; Pope is +read with calm acquiescence, Dryden with turbulent delight; Pope +hangs upon the ear, and Dryden finds the passes of the +mind. Both the odes want the essential constituent of +metrical compositions, the stated recurrence of settled +numbers. It may be alleged that Pindar is said by Horace to +have written <i>numeris lege solutis</i>; but as no such lax +performances have been transmitted to us, the meaning of that +expression cannot be fixed; and perhaps the like return might +properly be made to a modern Pindarist as Mr. Cobb received from +Bentley, who, when he found his criticisms upon a Greek exercise, +which Cobb had presented, refuted one after another by +Pindar’s authority, cried out at last, “Pindar was a +bold fellow, but thou art an impudent one.”</p> +<p>If Pope’s ode be particularly inspected, it will be +found that the first stanza consists of sounds well chosen +indeed, but only sounds. The second consists of +hyperbolical commonplaces, easily to be found, and perhaps +without much difficulty to be as well expressed. In the +third, however, there are numbers, images, harmony, and rigour, +not unworthy the antagonist of Dryden. Had all been like +this—but every part cannot be the best. The next +stanzas place and detain us in the dark and dismal regions of +mythology, where neither hope nor fear, neither joy nor sorrow +can be found: the poet, however, faithfully attends us; we have +all that can be performed by elegance of diction or sweetness of +versification; but what can form avail without better +matter? The last stanza recurs again to commonplaces. +The conclusion is too evidently modelled by that of Dryden; and +it may be remarked that both end with the same fault; the +comparison of each is literal on one side and metaphorical on the +other. Poets do not always express their own thoughts: +Pope, with all this labour in the praise of music, was ignorant +of its principles and insensible of its effects.</p> +<p>One of his greatest, though of his earliest works, is the +“Essay on Criticism,” which, if he had written +nothing else, would have placed him among the first critics and +the first poets, as it exhibits every mode of excellence that can +embellish or dignify didactic composition, selection of matter, +novelty of arrangement, justness of precept, splendour of +illustration, and propriety of digression. I know not +whether it be pleasing to consider that he produced this piece at +twenty, and never afterwards excelled it: he that delights +himself with observing that such powers may be soon attained, +cannot but grieve to think that life was ever after at a +stand.</p> +<p>To mention the particular beauties of the essay would be +unprofitably tedious: but I cannot forbear to observe that the +comparison of a student’s progress in the sciences with the +journey of a traveller in the Alps is perhaps the best that +English poetry can show. A simile, to be perfect, must both +illustrate and ennoble the subject; must show it to the +understanding in a clearer view, and display it to the fancy with +greater dignity; but either of these qualities may be sufficient +to recommend it. In didactic poetry, of which the great +purpose is instruction, a simile may be praised which +illustrates, though it does not ennoble; in heroics, that may be +admitted which ennobles, though it does not illustrate. +That it may be complete, it is required to exhibit, independently +of its references, a pleasing image; for a simile is said to be a +short episode. To this antiquity was so attentive, that +circumstances were sometimes added, which, having no parallels, +served only to fill the imagination, and produced what Perrault +ludicrously called “comparisons with a long +tail.” In their similes the greatest writers have +sometimes failed; the ship-race, compared with the chariot-race, +is neither illustrated nor aggrandised; land and water make all +the difference: when Apollo, running after Daphne, is likened to +a greyhound chasing a hare, there is nothing gained; the ideas of +pursuit and flight are too plain to be made plainer; and a god +and the daughter of a god are not represented much to their +advantage by a hare and dog. The simile of the Alps has no +useless parts, yet affords a striking picture by itself; it makes +the foregoing position better understood, and enables it to take +faster hold on the attention; it assists the apprehension and +elevates the fancy. Let me likewise dwell a little on the +celebrated paragraph in which it is directed that “the +sound should seem an echo to the sense;” a precept which +Pope is allowed to have observed beyond any other English +poet.</p> +<p>This notion of representative metre, and the desire of +discovering frequent adaptations of the sound to the sense, have +produced, in my opinion, many wild conceits and imaginary +beauties. All that can furnish this representation are the +sounds of the words considered singly and the time in which they +are pronounced. Every language has some words framed to +exhibit the noises which they express, as <i>thump</i>, +<i>rattle</i>, <i>growl</i>, <i>hiss</i>. These, however, +are but few, and the poet cannot make them more, nor can they be +of any use but when sound is to be mentioned. The time of +pronunciation was in the dactylic measures of the learned +languages capable of considerable variety; but that variety could +be accommodated only to motion or duration, and different degrees +of motion were perhaps expressed by verses rapid or slow, without +much attention of the writer, when the image had full possession +of his fancy: but our language having little flexibility, our +verses can differ very little in their cadence. The fancied +resemblances, I fear, arise sometimes merely from the ambiguity +of words; there is supposed to be some relation between a +<i>soft</i> line and <i>soft</i> couch, or between <i>heard</i> +syllables and <i>hard</i> fortune. Motion, however, may be +in some sort exemplified; and yet it may be suspected that in +such resemblances the mind often governs the ear, and the sounds +are estimated by their meaning. One of their most +successful attempts has been to describe the labour of +Sisyphus:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“With many a weary step, and many a +groan,<br /> +Up a high hill he heaves a huge round stone;<br /> +The huge round stone, resulting with a bound,<br /> +Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along the ground.”</p> +<p>Who does not perceive the stone to move slowly upward, and +roll violently back? But set the same numbers to another +sense:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“While many a merry tale, and many a +song,<br /> +Cheered the rough road, we wished the rough road long.<br /> +The rough road, then, returning in a round,<br /> +Mocked our impatient steps, for all was fairy ground.”</p> +<p>We have now surely lost much of the delay and much of the +rapidity. But, to show how little the greatest master of +numbers can fix the principles of representative harmony, it will +be sufficient to remark that the poet who tells us +that—</p> +<p class="poetry">“When Ajax strives some rock’s vast +weight to throw,<br /> +The line too labours, and the words move slow:<br /> +Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain,<br /> +Flies o’er th’ unbending corn, and skims along the +main;”</p> +<p>when he had enjoyed for about thirty years the praise of +Camilla’s lightness of foot, he tried another experiment +upon <i>sound</i> and <i>time</i>, and produced this memorable +triplet:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Waller was smooth; but Dryden taught to +join<br /> +The varying verse, the full resounding line,<br /> +The long majestic march, and energy divine.”</p> +<p>Here are the swiftness of the rapid race, and the march of +slow-paced majesty, exhibited by the same poet in the same +sequence of syllables, except that the exact prosodist will find +the line of <i>swiftness</i> by one time longer than that of +<i>tardiness</i>. Beauties of this kind are commonly +fancied, and, when real, are technical and nugatory, not to be +rejected and not to be solicited.</p> +<p>To the praises which have been accumulated on the “Rape +of the Look” by readers of every class, from the critic to +the waiting-maid, it is difficult to make any addition. Of +that which is universally allowed to be the most attractive of +all ludicrous compositions, let it rather be now inquired from +what sources the power of pleasing is derived.</p> +<p>Dr. Warburton, who excelled in critical perspicacity, has +remarked that the preternatural agents are very happily adapted +to the purposes of the poem. The heathen deities can no +longer gain attention; we should have turned away from a contest +between Venus and Diana. The employment of allegorical +persons always excites conviction of its own absurdity; they may +produce effects, but cannot conduct actions; when the phantom is +put in motion it dissolves; thus <i>Discord</i> may raise a +mutiny, but <i>Discord</i> cannot conduct a march nor besiege a +town. Pope brought in view a new race of beings, with +powers and passions proportionate to their operation. The +Sylphs and Gnomes act at the toilet and the tea-table what more +terrific and more powerful phantoms perform on the stormy ocean +or the field of battle: they give their proper help and do their +proper mischief. Pope is said, by an objector, not to have +been the inventor of this petty notion, a charge which might with +more justice have been brought against the author of the +“Iliad,” who doubtless adopted the religious system +of his country; for what is there but the names of his agents +which Pope has not invented? Has he not assigned them +characters and operations never heard of before? Has he +not, at least, given them their first poetical existence? +If this is not sufficient to denominate his work original, +nothing original ever can be written.</p> +<p>In this work are exhibited in a very high degree the two most +engaging powers of an author. New things are made familiar, +and familiar things are made new. A race of aërial +people never heard of before is presented to us in a manner so +clear and easy that the reader seeks for no further information, +but immediately mingles with his new acquaintance, adopts their +interests, and attends their pursuits, loves a Sylph, and detests +a Gnome. That familiar things are made new every paragraph +will prove. The subject of the poem is an event below the +common incidents of common life; nothing real is introduced that +is not seen so often as to be no longer regarded; yet the whole +detail of a female day is here brought before us, invested with +so much art of decoration that, though nothing is disguised, +everything is striking, and we feel all the appetite of curiosity +for that from which we have a thousand times turned fastidiously +away.</p> +<p>The purpose of the poet is, as he tells us, to laugh at +“the little unguarded follies of the female +sex.” It is therefore without justice that Dennis +charges the “Rape of the Lock” with the want of a +moral, and for that reason sets it below the +“Lutrin,” which exposes the pride and discord of the +clergy. Perhaps neither Pope nor Boileau has made the world +much better than he found it; but if they had both succeeded, it +were easy to tell who would have deserved most from public +gratitude. The freaks, and humours, and spleen, and vanity +of women as they embroil families in discord, and fill houses +with disquiet, do more to obstruct the happiness of life in a +year than the ambition of the clergy in many centuries. It +has been well observed that the misery of man proceeds not from +any single crush of overwhelming evil, but from small vexatious +continually repeated. It is remarked by Dennis, likewise, +that the machinery is superfluous; that, by all the bustle of +preternatural operation, the main event is neither hastened nor +retarded. To this charge an efficacious answer is not +easily made. The Sylphs cannot be said to help or oppose; +and it must be allowed to imply some want of art that their power +has not been sufficiently intermingled with the action. +Other parts may likewise be charged with want of +connection—the game at <i>ombre</i> might be spared; but if +the lady had lost her hair while she was intent upon her cards it +might have been inferred that those who are too fond of play will +be in danger of neglecting more important interests. Those, +perhaps, are faults, but what are such faults to so much +excellence!</p> +<p>The Epistle of “Eloise to Abelard” is one of the +most happy productions of human wit; the subject is so +judiciously chosen that it would be difficult in turning over the +annals of the world to find another which so many circumstances +concur to recommend. We regularly interest ourselves most +in the fortune of those who most deserve our notice. +Abelard and Eloise were conspicuous in their days for eminence of +merit. The heart naturally loves truth. The +adventures and misfortunes of this illustrious pair are known +from undisputed history. Their fate does not leave the mind +in hopeless dejection, for they both found quiet and consolation +in retirement and piety. So new and so affecting is their +story that it supersedes invention, and imagination ranges at +full liberty without straggling into scenes of fable. The +story thus skilfully adopted has been diligently improved. +Pope has left nothing behind him which seems more the effect of +studious perseverance and laborious revisal. Here is +particularly observable the <i>curiosa felicitas</i>, a fruitful +soil and careful cultivation. Here is no crudeness of sense +nor asperity of language. The sources from which sentiments +which have so much vigour and efficacy have been drawn are shown +to be the mystic writers by the learned author of the +“Essays on the Life and Writings of Pope,” a book +which teaches how the brow of Criticism may be smoothed, and how +she may be enabled, with all her severity, to attract and to +delight.</p> +<p>The train of my disquisition has now conducted me to that +poetical wonder, the translation of the “Iliad,” a +performance which no age or nation can pretend to equal. To +the Greeks translation was almost unknown; it was totally unknown +to the inhabitants of Greece. They had no recourse to the +barbarians for poetical beauties, but sought for everything in +Homer, where, indeed, there is but little which they might not +find. The Italians have been very diligent translators, but +I can hear of no version, unless, perhaps, Anguillara’s +“Ovid” may be excepted, which is read with +eagerness. The “Iliad” of Salvini every reader +may discover to be punctiliously exact; but it seems to be the +work of a linguist skilfully pedantic; and his countrymen, the +proper judges of its power to please, reject it with +disgust. Their predecessors, the Romans, have left some +specimens of translation behind them, and that employment must +have had some credit in which Tully and Germanicus engaged; but +unless we suppose, what is perhaps true, that the plays of +Terence were versions of Menander, nothing translated seems ever +to have risen to high reputation. The French in the +meridian hour of their learning were very laudably industrious to +enrich their own language with the wisdom of the ancients; but +found themselves reduced by whatever necessity to turn the Greek +and Roman poetry into prose. Whoever could read an author +could translate him. From such rivals little can be +feared.</p> +<p>The chief help of Pope in this audacious undertaking was drawn +from the versions of Dryden. Virgil had borrowed much of +his imagery from Homer; and part of the debt was now paid by his +translator. Pope searched the pages of Dryden for happy +combinations of heroic diction, but it will not be denied that he +added much to what he found. He cultivated our language +with so much diligence and art, that he has left in his +“Homer” a treasure of poetical elegances to +posterity. His version may be said to have tuned the +English tongue; for since its appearance no writer, however +deficient in other powers, has wanted melody. Such a series +of lines, so elaborately corrected, and so sweetly modulated, +took possession of the public ear; the vulgar was enamoured of +the poem, and the learned wondered at the translation. But +in the most general applause discordant voices will always be +heard. It has been objected by some who wish to be numbered +among the sons of learning that Pope’s version of Homer is +not Homerical; that it exhibits no resemblance of the original +and characteristic manner of the Father of Poetry, as it wants +his artless grandeur, his unaffected majesty. This cannot +be totally denied; but it must be remembered that <i>necessitas +quod cogit defendit</i>; that may be lawfully done which cannot +be forborne. Time and place will always enforce +regard. In estimating this translation, consideration must +be had of the nature of our language, the form of our metre, and, +above all, of the change which two thousand years have made in +the modes of life and the habits of thought. Virgil wrote +in a language of the same general fabric with that of Homer, in +verses of the same measure, and in an age nearer to Homer’s +time by eighteen hundred years; yet he found even then the state +of the world so much altered, and the demand for elegance so much +increased, that mere nature would be endured no longer; and, +perhaps, in the multitude of borrowed passages, very few can be +shown which he has not embellished.</p> +<p>There is a time when nations, emerging from barbarity, and +falling into regular subordination, gain leisure to grow wise, +and feel the shame of ignorance and the craving pain of +unsatisfied curiosity. To this hunger of the mind plain +sense is grateful; that which fills the void removes uneasiness, +and to be free from pain for a while is pleasure; but repletion +generates fastidiousness; a saturated intellect soon becomes +luxurious, and knowledge finds no willing reception till it is +recommended by artificial diction. Thus it will be found, +in the progress of learning, that in all nations the first +writers are simple, and that every age improves in +elegance. One refinement always makes way for another; and +what was expedient to Virgil was necessary to Pope. I +suppose many readers of the English “Iliad,” when +they have been touched with some unexpected beauty of the lighter +kind, have tried to enjoy it in the original, where, alas! it was +not to be found. Homer doubtless owes to his translator +many Ovidian graces not exactly suitable to his character; but to +have added can be no great crime, if nothing be taken away. +Elegance is surely to be desired, if it be not gained at the +expense of dignity. A hero would wish to be loved, as well +as to be reverenced. To a thousand cavils one answer is +sufficient; the purpose of a writer is to be read, and the +criticism which would destroy the power of pleasing must be blown +aside. Pope wrote for his own age and his own nation: he +knew that it was necessary to colour the images and point the +sentiments of his author; he therefore made him graceful, but +lost him some of his sublimity. The copious notes with +which the version is accompanied, and by which it is recommended +to many readers, though they were undoubtedly written to swell +the volumes, ought not to pass without praise: commentaries which +attract the reader by the pleasure of perusal have not often +appeared; the notes of others are read to clear difficulties; +those of Pope to vary entertainment. It has, however, been +objected, with sufficient reason, that there is in the commentary +too much of unseasonable levity and affected gaiety; that too +many appeals are made to the ladies, and the ease which is so +carefully preserved is sometimes the ease of a trifler. +Every art has its terms, and every kind of instruction its proper +style; the gravity of common critics may be tedious, but is less +despicable than childish merriment.</p> +<p>Of the “Odyssey” nothing remains to be observed; +the same general praise may be given to both translations, and a +particular examination of either would require a large +volume. The notes were written by Broome, who endeavoured, +not unsuccessfully, to imitate his master.</p> +<p>Of the “Dunciad” the hint is confessedly taken +from Dryden’s “Mac Flecknoe;” but the plan is +so enlarged and diversified as justly to claim the praise of an +original, and affords the best specimen that has yet appeared of +personal satire ludicrously pompous. That the design was +moral, whatever the author might tell either his readers or +himself, I am not convinced. The first motive was the +desire of revenging the contempt with which Theobald had treated +his Shakspeare, and regaining the honour which he had lost, by +crushing his opponent. Theobald was not of bulk enough to +fill a poem, and therefore it was necessary to find other enemies +with other names, at whose expense he might divert the +public.</p> +<p>In this design there was petulance and malignity enough; but I +cannot think it very criminal. An author places himself +uncalled before the tribunal of criticism, and solicits fame at +the hazard of disgrace. Dulness or deformity are not +culpable in themselves, but may be very justly reproached when +they pretend to the honour of wit or the influence of +beauty. If bad writers were to pass without reprehension, +what should restrain them? <i>impune diem consumpserit ingens +Telephus</i>; and upon bad writers only will censure have much +effect. The satire which brought Theobald and Moore into +contempt dropped impotent from Bentley, like the javelin of +Priam. All truth is valuable, and satirical criticism may +be considered as useful when it rectifies error and improves +judgment; he that refines the public taste is a public +benefactor. The beauties of this poem are well known; its +chief fault is the grossness of its images. Pope and Swift +had an unnatural delight in ideas physically impure, such as +every other tongue utters with unwillingness, and of which every +ear shrinks from the mention. But even this fault, +offensive as it is, may be forgiven for the excellence of other +passages; such as the formation and dissolution of Moore, the +account of the Traveller, the misfortune of the Florist, and the +crowded thoughts and stately numbers which dignify the concluding +paragraph. The alterations which have been made in the +“Dunciad,” not always for the better, require that it +should be published, as in the present collection, with all its +variations.</p> +<p>The “Essay on Man” was a work of great labour and +long consideration, but certainly not the happiest of +Pope’s performances. The subject is perhaps not very +proper for poetry; and the poet was not sufficiently master of +his subject; metaphysical morality was to him a new study; he was +proud of his acquisitions, and, supposing himself master of great +secrets, was in haste to teach what he had not learned. +Thus he tells us, in the first Epistle, that from the nature of +the Supreme Being may be deduced an order of beings such as +mankind, because infinite excellence can do only what is +best. He finds out that these beings must be +“somewhere;” and that “all the question is, +whether man be in a wrong place.” Surely if, +according to the poet’s Leibnitzian reasoning, we may infer +that man ought to be, only because he is, we may allow that his +place is the right place, because he has it. Supreme Wisdom +is not less infallible in disposing than in creating. But +what is meant by <i>somewhere</i>, and <i>place</i>, and <i>wrong +piece</i>, it had been in vain to ask Pope, who probably had +never asked himself.</p> +<p>Having exalted himself into the chair of wisdom, he tells us +much that every man knows, and much that he does not know +himself; that we see but little, and that the order of the +universe is beyond our comprehension; an opinion not very +uncommon; and that there is a chain of subordinate beings +“from infinite to nothing,” of which himself and his +readers are equally ignorant. But he gives us one comfort, +which without his help he supposes unattainable, in the position +“that though we are fools, yet God is wise.”</p> +<p>This essay affords an egregious instance of the predominance +of genius, the dazzling splendour of imagery, and the seductive +powers of eloquence. Never was penury of knowledge and +vulgarity of sentiment so happily disguised. The reader +feels his mind full, though he learns nothing; and, when he meets +it in its new array, no longer knows the talk of his mother and +his nurse. When these wonder-working sounds sink into +sense, and the doctrine of the essay, disrobed of its ornaments, +is left to the powers of its naked excellence, what shall we +discover? That we are, in comparison with our Creator, very +weak and ignorant; that we do not uphold the chain of existence; +and that we could not make one another with more skill than we +are made. We may learn yet more that the arts of human life +were copied from the instinctive operations of other animals; +that if the world be made for man, it may be said that man was +made for geese. To these profound principles of natural +knowledge are added some moral instructions equally new; that +self-interest, well understood, will produce social concord; that +men are mutual gainers by mutual benefits; that evil is sometimes +balanced by good; that human advantages are unstable and +fallacious, of uncertain duration and doubtful effect; that our +true honour is not to have a great part, but to act it well; that +virtue only is our own; and that happiness is always in our +power. Surely a man of no very comprehensive search may +venture to say that he has heard all this before; but it was +never till now recommended by such a blaze of embellishments, or +such sweetness of melody. The vigorous contraction of some +thoughts, the luxuriant amplification of others, the incidental +illustrations, and sometimes the dignity, sometimes the softness +of the verses, enchain philosophy, suspend criticism, and oppress +judgment by overpowering pleasure. This is true of many +paragraphs; yet, if I had undertaken to exemplify Pope’s +felicity of composition before a rigid critic, I should not +select the “Essay on Man;” for it contains more lines +unsuccessfully laboured, more harshness of diction, and more +thoughts imperfectly expressed, more levity without elegance, and +more heaviness without strength, than will easily be found in all +his other works.</p> +<p>The “Characters of Men and Women” are the product +of diligent speculation upon human life; much labour has been +bestowed upon them, and Pope very seldom laboured in vain. +That his excellence may be properly estimated, I recommend a +comparison of his “Characters of Women” with +Boileau’s Satire; it will then be seen with how much more +perspicacity female nature is investigated, and female excellence +selected; and he surely is no mean writer to whom Boileau should +be found inferior. The “Characters of Men,” +however, are written with more, if not with deeper, thought, and +exhibit many passages exquisitely beautiful. The “Gem +and the Flower” will not easily be equalled. In the +women’s part are some defects; the character of Atossa is +not so neatly finished as that of Clodio, and some of the female +characters may be found, perhaps, more frequently among men; what +is said of Philomede was true of Prior.</p> +<p>In the Epistles to Lord Bathurst and Lord Burlington, Dr. +Warburton has endeavoured to find a train of thought which was +never in the writer’s head, and, to support his hypothesis, +has printed that first which was published last. In one the +most valuable passage is perhaps the Elegy on Good Sense, and the +other the end of the Duke of Buckingham.</p> +<p>The Epistle to Arbuthnot, now arbitrarily called the +“Prologue to the Satires,” is a performance +consisting, as it seems, of many fragments wrought into one +design, which, by this union of scattered beauties, contains more +striking paragraphs than could probably have been brought +together into an occasional work. As there is no stronger +motive to exertion than self-defence, no part has more elegance, +spirit, or dignity, than the poet’s vindication of his own +character. The meanest passage is the satire upon +Sporus.</p> +<p>Of the two poems which derived their names from the year, and +which are called the “Epilogue to the Satires,” it +was very justly remarked by Savage that the second was in the +whole more strongly conceived, and more equally supported, but +that it had no single passages equal to the contention in the +first for the dignity of Vice and the celebration of the triumph +of Corruption.</p> +<p>The “Imitations of Horace” seem to have been +written as relaxations of his genius. This employment +became his favourite by its facility; the plan was ready to his +hand, and nothing was required but to accommodate as he could the +sentiments of an old author to recent facts or familiar images; +but what is easy is seldom excellent. Such imitations +cannot give pleasure to common readers; the man of learning may +be sometimes surprised and delighted by an unexpected parallel, +but the comparison requires knowledge of the original, which will +likewise often detect strained applications. Between Roman +images and English manners there will be an irreconcilable +dissimilitude, and the works will be generally uncouth and +parti-coloured, neither original nor translated, neither ancient +nor modern.</p> +<p>Pope had, in proportions very nicely adjusted to each other, +all the qualities that constitute genius. He had +<i>intention</i>, by which new trains of events are formed and +new scenes of imagery displayed, as in the “Rape of the +Lock,” and by which extrinsic and adventitious +embellishments and illustrations are connected with a known +subject, as in the “Essay on Criticism.” He had +<i>imagination</i>, which strongly impresses on the +writer’s mind, and enables him to convey to the reader the +various forms of nature, incidents of life, and energies of +passion, as in his “Eloisa,” “Windsor +Forest,” and “Ethic Epistles.” He had +<i>judgment</i>, which selects from life or Nature what the +present purpose requires, and by separating the essence of things +from its concomitants, often makes the representation more +powerful than the reality; and he had colours of language always +before him, ready to decorate his matter with every grace of +elegant expression, as when he accommodates his diction to the +wonderful multiplicity of Homer’s sentiments and +descriptions.</p> +<p>Poetical expression includes sound as well as meaning. +“Music,” says Dryden, “is inarticulate +poetry;” among the excellences of Pope, therefore, must be +mentioned the melody of his metre. By perusing the works of +Dryden, he discovered the most perfect fabric of English verse, +and habituated himself to that only which he found the best; in +consequence of which restraint his poetry has been censured as +too uniformly musical, and as glutting the ear with unvaried +sweetness. I suspect this objection to be the cant of those +who judge by principles rather than perception, and who would +even themselves have less pleasure in his works if he had tried +to relieve attention by studied discords, or affected to break +his lines and vary his pauses. But though he was thus +careful of his versification, he did not oppress his powers with +superfluous rigour. He seems to have thought with Boileau +that the practice of writing might be refined till the difficulty +should overbalance the advantage. The construction of the +language is not always strictly grammatical; with those rhymes +which prescription had conjoined he contented himself, without +regard to Swift’s remonstrances, though there was no +striking consonance, nor was he very careful to vary his +terminations or to refuse admission, at a small distance, to the +same rhymes. To Swift’s edict for the exclusion of +alexandrines and triplets he paid little regard; he admitted +them, but, in the opinion of Fenton, too rarely; he uses them +more liberally in his translation than his poems. He has a +few double rhymes, and always, I think, unsuccessfully, except +once in the “Rape of the Lock.” Expletives he +very early ejected from his verses, but he now and then admits an +epithet rather commodious than important. Each of the six +first lines of the “Iliad” might lose two syllables +with very little diminution of the meaning, and sometimes, after +all his art and labour, one verse seems to be made for the sake +of another. In his latter productions the diction is +sometimes vitiated by French idioms, with which Bolingbroke had +perhaps infected him.</p> +<p>I have been told that the couplet by which he declared his own +ear to be most gratified was this:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Lo, where Mæotis sleeps, and +hardly flows<br /> +The freezing Tanais through a waste of snows.”</p> +<p>But the reason of this preference I cannot discover.</p> +<p>It is remarked by Watts that there is scarcely a happy +combination of words, or a phrase poetically elegant in the +English language, which Pope has not inserted into his version of +Homer. How he obtained possession of so many beauties of +speech it were desirable to know. That he gleaned from +authors, obscure as well as eminent, what he thought brilliant or +useful, and preserved it all in a regular collection, is not +unlikely. When, in his last years, Hall’s +“Satires” were shown him, he wished that he had seen +them sooner. New sentiments and new images others may +produce; but to attempt any further improvement of versification +will be dangerous. Art and diligence have now done their +best, and what shall be added will be the effort of tedious toil +and needless curiosity. After all this, it is surely +superfluous to answer the question that has once been asked, +Whether Pope was a poet, otherwise than by asking in return, If +Pope be not a poet, where is poetry to be found? To +circumscribe poetry by a definition will only show the narrowness +of the definer, though a definition which shall exclude Pope will +not easily be made. Let us look round upon the present time +and back upon the past; let us inquire to whom the voice of +mankind has decreed the wreath of poetry; let their productions +be examined, and their claims stated, and the pretensions of Pope +will be no more disputed. Had he given the world only his +version, the name of poet must have been allowed him: if the +writer of the “Iliad” were to class his successors he +would assign a very high place to his translator, without +requiring any other evidence of genius.</p> +<p>The following letter, of which the original is in the hands of +Lord Hardwicke, was communicated to me by the kindness of Mr. +Jodrell:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">“<i>To</i> <span +class="smcap">Mr. Bridges</span>, <i>at the Bishop of +London’s</i>, <i>at Fulham</i>.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">Sir</span>,—The favour of +your letter, with your remarks, can never be enough acknowledged, +and the speed with which you discharged so troublesome a task +doubles the obligation.</p> +<p>“I must own you have pleased me very much by the +commendations so ill bestowed upon me; but I assure you, much +more by the frankness of your censure, which I ought to take the +more kindly of the two, as it is more advantage to a scribbler to +be improved in his judgment than to be smoothed in his +vanity. The greater part of those deviations from the Greek +which you have observed I was led into by Chapman and Hobbes; who +are, it seems, as much celebrated for their knowledge of the +original as they are decried for the badness of their +translations. Chapman pretends to have restored the genuine +sense of the author from the mistakes of all former explainers in +several hundred places; and the Cambridge editors of the large +Homer, in Greek and Latin, attributed so much to Hobbes, that +they confess they have corrected the old Latin interpretation +very often by his version. For my part, I generally took +the author’s meaning to be as you have explained it; yet +their authority, joined to the knowledge of my own imperfectness +in the language, overruled me. However, sir, you may be +confident, I think you in the right, because you happen to be of +my opinion; for men (let them say what they will) never approve +any other’s sense but as it squares with their own. +But you have made me much more proud of and positive in my +judgment, since it is strengthened by yours. I think your +criticisms which regard the expression very just, and shall make +my profit of them; to give you some proof that I am in earnest, I +will alter three verses on your bare objection, though I have Mr. +Dryden’s example for each of them. And this, I hope, +you will account no small piece of obedience, from one who values +the authority of one true poet above that of twenty critics or +commentators. But, though I speak thus of commentators, I +will continue to read carefully all I can procure, to make up +that way for my own want of critical understanding in the +original beauties of Homer. Though the greatest of them are +certainly those of invention and design, which are not at all +confined to the language; for the distinguishing excellences of +Homer are (by the consent of the best critics of all nations), +first in the manners (which include all the speeches, as being no +other than the representations of each person’s manners by +his words): and then in that rapture and fire, which carries you +away with him, with that wonderful force, that no man who has a +true poetical spirit is master of himself while he reads +him. Homer makes you interested and concerned before you +are aware, all at once, where Virgil does it by soft +degrees. This, I believe, is what a translator of Homer +ought principally to imitate; and it is very hard for any +translator to come up to it, because the chief reason why all +translations fall short of their originals is, that the very +constraint they are obliged to renders them heavy and +dispirited.</p> +<p>“The great beauty of Homer’s language, as I take +it, consists in that noble simplicity which runs through all his +works (and yet his diction, contrary to what one would imagine +consistent with simplicity, is at the same time very +copious). I don’t know how I have run into this +pedantry in a letter, but I find I have said too much, as well as +spoken too inconsiderately; what farther thoughts I have upon +this subject I shall be glad to communicate to you (for my own +improvement) when we meet, which is a happiness I very earnestly +desire, as I do likewise some opportunity of proving how much I +think myself obliged to your friendship, and how truly I am, +sir,</p> +<p style="text-align: right">“Your most faithful humble +servant,</p> +<p style="text-align: right">“A. <span +class="smcap">Pope</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The criticism upon Pope’s Epitaphs, which was printed in +“The Universal Visitor,” is placed here, being too +minute and particular to be inserted in the Life.</p> +<p>Every art is best taught by example. Nothing contributes +more to the cultivation of propriety than remarks on the works of +those who have most excelled. I shall therefore endeavour +at this <i>visit</i> to entertain the young students in poetry +with an examination of Pope’s Epitaphs.</p> +<p>To define an epitaph is useless; every one knows that it is an +inscription on a tomb. An epitaph, therefore, implies no +particular character of writing, but may be composed in verse or +prose. It is, indeed, commonly panegyrical, because we are +seldom distinguished with a stone but by our friends; but it has +no rule to restrain or mollify it except this, that it ought not +to be longer than common beholders may be expected to have +leisure and patience to peruse.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">I.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On</i> <span +class="smcap">Charles</span> <i>Earl of</i> <span +class="smcap">Dorset</span>, <i>in the church of Wythyham in +Sussex</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Dorset, the grace of courts, +the Muse’s pride,<br /> +Patron of arts, and judge of nature, died.<br /> +The scourge of pride, though sanctified or great,<br /> +Of fops in learning, and of knaves in state;<br /> +Yet soft in nature, though severe his lay,<br /> +His anger moral, and his wisdom gay.<br /> +Blest satirist! who touched the means so true,<br /> +As showed Vice had his hate and pity too.<br /> +Blest courtier! who could king and country please,<br /> +Yet sacred kept his friendship and his ease.<br /> +Blest peer! his great forefathers’ every grace<br /> +Reflecting, and reflected on his race;<br /> +Where other Buckhursts, other Dorsets shine,<br /> +And patriots still, or pests, deck the line.</p> +<p>The first distich of this epitaph contains a kind of +information which few would want, that the man for whom the tomb +was erected <i>died</i>. There are indeed some qualities +worthy of the praise ascribed to the dead, but none that were +likely to exempt him from the lot of man, or incline us much to +wonder that he should die. What is meant by “judge of +nature” is not easy to say. Nature is not the object +of human judgment; for it is in vain to judge where we cannot +alter. If by nature is meant what is commonly called +<i>nature</i> by the critics, a just representation of things +really existing, and actions really performed, nature cannot be +properly opposed to <i>art</i>; nature being, in this sense, only +the best effect of <i>art</i>.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">The scourge of +pride—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Of this couplet the second line is not what is intended, an +illustration of the former. <i>Pride</i> in the +<i>Great</i>, is indeed well enough connected with knaves in +state, though <i>knaves</i> is a word rather too ludicrous and +light; but the mention of <i>sanctified</i> pride will not lead +the thoughts to <i>fops in learning</i>, but rather to some +species of tyranny or oppression, something more gloomy and more +formidable than foppery.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">Yet soft his +nature—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>This is a high compliment, but was not first bestowed on +Dorset by Pope. The next verse is extremely beautiful.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">Blest +satirist!—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In this distich is another line of which Pope was not the +author. I do not mean to blame these imitations with much +harshness; in long performances they are scarcely to be avoided, +and in shorter they may be indulged, because the train of the +composition may naturally involve them, or the scantiness of the +subject allow little choice. However, what is borrowed is +not to be enjoyed as our own, and it is the business of critical +justice to give every bird of the Muses his proper feather.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">Blest +courtier!—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Whether a courtier can properly be commended for keeping his +<i>ease sacred</i>, may perhaps be disputable. To please +king and country without sacrificing friendship to any change of +times was a very uncommon instance of prudence or felicity, and +deserved to be kept separate from so poor a commendation as care +of his ease. I wish our poets would attend a little more +accurately to the use of the word <i>sacred</i>, which surely +should never be applied in a serious composition, but where some +reference may be made to a higher Being, or where some duty is +exacted or implied. A man may keep his friendship sacred, +because promises of friendship are very awful ties; but methinks +he cannot, but in a burlesque sense, be said to keep his ease +<i>sacred</i>.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">Blest peer!—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The blessing ascribed to the <i>peer</i> has no connection +with his peerage; they might happen to any other man whose +posterity were likely to be regarded.</p> +<p>I know not whether this epitaph be worthy either of the writer +or the man entombed.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">II.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On Sir</i> <span +class="smcap">William Trumbull</span>, <i>one of the principal +Secretaries of State to King</i> <span +class="smcap">William</span> III., <i>who</i>, <i>having resigned +his place</i>, <i>died in his retirement at Easthamstead</i>, +<i>in Berkshire</i>, <i>1716</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry"> A pleasing form, a firm, yet +cautious mind,<br /> +Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resigned;<br /> +Honour unchanged, a principle profest.<br /> +Fixed to one side, but moderate to the rest;<br /> +An honest courtier, yet a patriot too,<br /> +Just to his prince, and to his country true;<br /> +Filled with the sense of age, the fire of youth,<br /> +A scorn of wrangling, yet a zeal for truth;<br /> +A generous faith, from superstition free;<br /> +A love to peace, and hate of tyranny;<br /> +Such this man was; who new from earth removed<br /> +At length enjoys that liberty he loved.</p> +<p>In this epitaph, as in many others, there appears at the first +view a fault which I think scarcely any beauty can +compensate. The name is omitted. The end of an +epitaph is to convey some account of the dead; and to what +purpose is anything told of him whose name is concealed? An +epitaph, and a history of a nameless hero, are equally absurd, +since the virtues and qualities so recounted in either are +scattered at the mercy of fortune to be appropriated by +guess. The name, it is true, may be read upon the stone; +but what obligation has it to the poet, whose verses wander over +the earth and leave their subject behind them, and who is forced, +like an unskilful painter, to make his purpose known by +adventitious help? This epitaph is wholly without +elevation, and contains nothing striking or particular; but the +poet is not to be blamed for the defect of his subject. He +said perhaps the best that could be said. There are, +however, some defects which were not made necessary by the +character in which he was employed. There is no opposition +between an <i>honest courtier</i> and a <i>patriot</i>; for an +<i>honest</i>, <i>courtier</i> cannot but be a +<i>patriot</i>. It was unsuitable to the nicety required in +short compositions to close his verse with the word <i>too</i>; +every rhyme should be a word of emphasis: nor can this rule be +safely neglected, except where the length of the poem makes +slight inaccuracies excusable, or allows room for beauties +sufficient to overpower the effects of petty faults.</p> +<p>At the beginning of the seventh line the word <i>filled</i> is +weak and prosaic, having no particular adaptation to any of the +words that follow it. The thought in the last line is +impertinent, having no connection with the foregoing character, +nor with the condition of the man described. Had the +epitaph been written on the poor conspirator who died lately in +prison, after a confinement of more than forty years, without any +crime proved against him, the sentiment had been just and +pathetical; but why should Trumbull be congratulated upon his +liberty who had never known restraint?</p> +<p style="text-align: center">III.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On the Hon.</i> <span +class="smcap">Simon Harcourt</span>, <i>only son of the Lord +Chancellor</i> <span class="smcap">Harcourt</span>, <i>at the +Church of Stanton-Harcourt in Oxfordshire</i>, <i>1720</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry"> To this sad shrine, +whoe’er thou art, draw near,<br /> +Here lies the friend most loved, the son most dear;<br /> +Who ne’er knew joy, but friendship might divide,<br /> +Or gave his father grief but when he died.<br /> + How vain is reason, eloquence how weak!<br /> +If Pope must tell what Harcourt cannot speak.<br /> +Oh let thy once-loved friend inscribe thy stone,<br /> +And with a father’s sorrows mix his own!</p> +<p>This epitaph is principally remarkable for the artful +introduction of the name, which is inserted with a peculiar +felicity, to which chance must concur with genius, which no man +can hope to attain twice, and which cannot be copied but with +servile imitation. I cannot but wish that, of this +inscription, the two last lines had been omitted, as they take +away from the energy what they do not add to the sense.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">IV.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On</i> <span class="smcap">James +Craggs</span>, <i>Esq.</i>, <i>in Westminster Abbey</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">JACOBVS CRAGS,<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">REGI MAGNAE BRITANNIAE A +SECRETIS</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">ET CONSILIIS SANCTIORIBVS,</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">PRINCIPIS PARITER AC POPVLI AMOR ET +DELICIAE:</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">VIXIT TITLIS ET INVIDIA MAJOR</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">ANNOS HEV PAVCOS, XXXV.</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">OB. FEB. XVI. MDCCXX.</span></p> +<p class="poetry"> Statesman, yet friend to +truth; of soul sincere,<br /> +In action faithful, and in honour clear!<br /> +Who broke no premise, served no private end,<br /> +Who gained no title, and who lost no friend;<br /> +Ennobled by himself, by all approved,<br /> +Praised, wept, and honoured by the Muse he loved.</p> +<p>The lines on Craggs were not originally intended for an +epitaph; and therefore some faults are to be imputed to the +violence with which they are torn from the poems that first +contained them. We may, however, observe some +defects. There is a redundancy of words in the first +couplet: it is superfluous to tell of him, who was +<i>sincere</i>, <i>true</i>, and <i>faithful</i>, that he was +<i>in honour clear</i>. There seems to be an opposition +intended in the fourth line, which is not very obvious: where is +the relation between the two positions, that he <i>gained no +title</i> and <i>lest no friend</i>?</p> +<p>It may be proper here to remark the absurdity of joining in +the same inscription Latin and English or verse and prose. +If either language be preferable to the other, let that only be +used; for no reason can be given why part of the information +should be given in one tongue, and part in another on a tomb, +more than in any other place, or any other occasion; and to tell +all that can be conveniently told in verse, and then to call in +the help of prose, has always the appearance of a very artless +expedient, or of an attempt unaccomplished. Such an epitaph +resembles the conversation of a foreigner, who tells part of his +meaning by words, and conveys part by signs.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">V.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Intended for Mr.</i> <span +class="smcap">Rowe</span>, <i>in Westminster Abbey</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Thy reliques, Rowe, to this +fair urn we trust,<br /> +And sacred, place by Dryden’s awful dust;<br /> +Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,<br /> +To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.<br /> +Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest!<br /> +Blest in thy genius, in thy love too blest;<br /> +One grateful women to thy fame supplies<br /> +What a whole thankless land to his denies.</p> +<p>Of this inscription the chief fault is that it belongs less to +Rowe, for whom it was written, than to Dryden, who was buried +near him; and indeed gives very little information concerning +either.</p> +<p>To wish <i>peace to thy shade</i> is too mythological to be +admitted into a Christian temple: the ancient worship has +infected almost all our other compositions, and might therefore +be contented to spare our epitaphs. Let fiction, at least, +cease with life, and let us be serious over the grave.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">VI.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On Mrs.</i> <span +class="smcap">Corbet</span>, <i>who died of a Cancer in her +Breast</i>.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Here rests a woman, good +without pretence,<br /> +Blest with plain reason, and with sober sense;<br /> +No conquest she, but o’er herself, desired;<br /> +No arts essayed, but not to be admired.<br /> +Passion and pride were to her soul unknown,<br /> +Convinced that Virtue only is our own.<br /> +So unaffected, so composed a mind,<br /> +So firm, yet soft, so strong, yet so refined,<br /> +Heaven, as its purest gold, by tortures tried;<br /> +The saint sustained it, but the woman died.</p> +<p>I have always considered this as the most valuable of all +Pope’s epitaphs; the subject of it is a character not +discriminated by any shining or eminent peculiarities; yet that +which really makes, though not the splendour, the felicity of +life, and that which every wise man will choose for his final and +lasting companion in the languor of age, in the quiet of privacy, +when he departs weary and disgusted from the ostentatious, the +volatile, and the vain. Of such a character, which the dull +overlook and the gay despise, it was fit that the value should be +made known and the dignity established. Domestic virtue, as +it is exerted without great occasions, or conspicuous +consequences, in an even unnoted tenor, required the genius of +Pope to display it in such a manner as might attract regard and +enforce reverence. Who can forbear to lament that this +amiable woman has no name in the verses? If the particular +lines of this inscription be examined, it will appear less faulty +than the rest. There is scarce one line taken from +commonplaces, unless it be that in which <i>only Virtue</i> is +said to be <i>our own</i>. I once heard a lady of great +beauty and excellence object to the fourth line that it contained +an unnatural and incredible panegyric. Of this let the +ladies judge.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">VII.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On the Monument of the Hon.</i> +<span class="smcap">Robert Digby</span>, <i>and of his Sister</i> +<span class="smcap">Mary</span>, <i>erected by their Father the +Lord</i> <span class="smcap">Digby</span> <i>in the church of +Sherborne in Dorsetshire</i>, 1727</p> +<p class="poetry"> Go! fair example of untainted +youth,<br /> +Of modest wisdom, and pacific truth:<br /> +Composed in sufferings, and in joy sedate,<br /> +Good without noise, without pretension great<br /> +Just of thy word, in every thought sincere,<br /> +Who knew no wish but what the world might hear:<br /> +Of softest manners, unaffected mind,<br /> +Lover of peace, and friend of human kind:<br /> +Go, live! for heaven’s eternal year is thine,<br /> +Go, and exalt thy mortal to divine.<br /> + And thou, blest maid! attendant on his doom.<br /> +Pensive hast followed to the silent tomb,<br /> +Steered the same course to the same quiet shore,<br /> +Not parted long, and now to part no more!<br /> +Go, then, where only bliss sincere is known!<br /> +Go, where to love and to enjoy are one!<br /> + Yet take these tears, Mortality’s relief,<br +/> +And, till we share your joys, forgive our grief:<br /> +These little rites a stone, a verse receive.<br /> +’Tis all a father, all a friend can give!</p> +<p>This epitaph contains of the brother only a general +indiscriminate character, and of the sister tells nothing but +that she died. The difficulty in writing epitaphs is to +give a particular and appropriate praise. This, however, is +not always to be performed, whatever be the diligence or ability +of the writer; for the greater part of mankind <i>have no +character at all</i>, have little that distinguishes them from +others, equally good or bad, and therefore nothing can be said of +them which may not be applied with equal propriety to a thousand +more. It is indeed no great panegyric that there is +enclosed 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 any other memorial. These +are however not the proper subjects of poetry; and whenever +friendship, or any other motive, obliges a poet to write on such +subjects, he must be forgiven if he sometimes wanders in +generalities, and utters the same praises over different +tombs.</p> +<p>The scantiness of human praises can scarcely be made more +apparent than by remarking how often Pope has, in the few +epitaphs which he composed, found it necessary to borrow from +himself. The fourteen epitaphs which he has written +comprise about a hundred and forty lines, in which there are more +repetitions than will easily be found in all the rest of his +works. In the eight lines which make the character of Digby +there is scarce 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 conclusion +is the same with that on Harcourt, but is here more elegant and +better connected.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">VIII.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On Sir</i> <span +class="smcap">Godfrey Kneller</span>, <i>in Westminster +Abbey</i>, 1723.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Kneller, by Heaven, and not a +master, taught,<br /> +Whose art was Nature, and whose pictures thought;<br /> +Now for two ages, having snatched from fate<br /> +Whate’er was beauteous, or whate’er was great,<br /> +Lies crowned with Princes, honours, Poets, lays,<br /> +Due to his merit, and brave thirst of praise.<br /> + Living, great Nature feared he might outvie<br /> +Her works; and dying, fears herself may die.</p> +<p>Of this epitaph the first couplet is good, the second not bad, +the third is deformed with a broken metaphor, the word crowned +not being applicable to the honours or the lays, and the fourth +is not only borrowed from the epitaph on Raphael, but of a very +harsh construction.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">IX.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On General</i> <span +class="smcap">Henry Withers</span>, <i>in Westminster Abbey</i>, +1729.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Here, Withers, rest! thou +bravest, gentlest mind,<br /> +Thy country’s friend, but more of human kind.<br /> +O born to arms! O worth in youth approved!<br /> +O soft humanity in age beloved!<br /> +For thee the hardy veteran drops a tear,<br /> +And the gay courtier feels the sigh sincere<br /> + Withers, adieu! yet not will thee remove<br /> +Thy martial spirit, or thy social love!<br /> +Amidst corruption, luxury, and rage,<br /> +Still leave some ancient virtues to our age:<br /> +Nor let us say (those English glories gone)<br /> +The last true Briton lies beneath this stone.</p> +<p>The epitaph on Withers affords another instance of +commonplaces, though somewhat diversified by mingled qualities, +and the peculiarity of a profession. The second couplet is +abrupt, general, and unpleasing; exclamation seldom succeeds in +our language; and, I think, it may be observed that the particle +O! used at the beginning of a sentence, always offends. The +third couplet is more happy; the value expressed for him, by +different sorts of men, raises him to esteem; there is yet +something of the common cant of superficial satirists, who +suppose that the insincerity of a courtier destroys all his +sensations, and that he is equally a dissembler to the living and +the dead. At the third couplet I should wish the epitaph to +close, but that I should be unwilling to lose the two next lines, +which yet are dearly bought if they cannot be retained without +the four that follow them.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">X.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On Mr.</i> <span +class="smcap">Elijah Fenton</span>, <i>at Easthamstead in +Berkshire</i>, 1730.</p> +<p class="poetry"> This modest stone, what few +vain marbles can,<br /> +May truly say, Here lies an honest man:<br /> +A poet, blest beyond the poet’s fate,<br /> +Whom Heaven kept sacred from the Proud and Great:<br /> +Foe to loud praise, and friend to learned ease,<br /> +Content with science in the vale of peace.<br /> +Calmly he looked on either life, and here<br /> +Saw nothing to regret or there to fear;<br /> +From Nature’s temperate feast rose satisfied,<br /> +Thanked Heaven that he lived, and that he died.</p> +<p>The first couplet of this epitaph is borrowed from +Crashaw. The four next lines contain a species of praise +peculiar, original, and just. Here, therefore, the +inscription should have ended, the latter part containing nothing +but what is common to every man who is wise and good. The +character of Fenton was so amiable, that I cannot forbear to wish +for some poet or biographer to display it more fully for the +advantage of posterity. If he did not stand in the first +rank of genius, he may claim a place in the second; and, whatever +criticism may object to his writings, censure could find very +little to blame in his life.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">XI.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On Mr.</i> <span +class="smcap">Gay</span>, <i>in Westminster Abbey</i>, 1732.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Of manners gentle, of +affections mild;<br /> +In wit, a muse; simplicity, a child:<br /> +With native humour tempering virtuous rage,<br /> +Formed to delight at once and lash the age:<br /> +Above temptation, in a low estate,<br /> +And uncorrupted, ev’n among the Great:<br /> +A safe companion and an easy friend,<br /> +Unbiased through life, lamented in thy end,<br /> +These are thy honours! not that here thy bust<br /> +Is mixed with heroes, or with kings thy dust;<br /> +But that the worthy and the Good shall say,<br /> +Striking their pensive bosoms—Here lies <span +class="smcap">Gay</span>.</p> +<p>As Gay was the favourite of our author this epitaph was +probably written with an uncommon degree of attention, yet it is +not more successfully executed than the rest, for it will not +always happen that the success of a poet is proportionate to his +labour. The same observation may be extended to all works +of imagination, which are often influenced by causes wholly out +of the performer’s power, by hints of which he perceives +not the origin, by sudden elevations of mind which he cannot +produce in himself, and which sometimes rise when he expects them +least. The two parts of the first line are only echoes of +each other; <i>gentle manners</i> and <i>mild affections</i>, if +they mean anything, must mean the same.</p> +<p>That Gay was a <i>man in wit</i> is a very frigid +commendation; to have the wit of a man is not much for a +poet. The <i>wit of man</i> and the <i>simplicity of a +child</i> make a poor and vulgar contrast, and raise no ideas of +excellence, either intellectual or moral.</p> +<p>In the next couplet <i>rage</i> is less properly introduced +after the mention of <i>mildness</i> and <i>gentleness</i>, which +are made the constituents of his character; for a man so +<i>mild</i> and <i>gentle</i> to <i>temper</i> his <i>rage</i> +was not difficult. The next line is inharmonious in its +sound, and mean in its conception; the opposition is obvious, and +the word <i>lash</i> used absolutely, and without any +modification, is gross and improper. To be <i>above +temptation</i> in poverty and <i>free from corruption among the +Great</i> is indeed such a peculiarity as deserved notice. +But to be a <i>safe companion</i> is a praise merely negative, +arising not from possession of virtue but the absence of vice, +and that one of the most odious.</p> +<p>As little can be added to his character by asserting that he +was <i>lamented in his end</i>. Every man that dies is, at +least by the writer of his epitaph, supposed to be lamented, and +therefore this general lamentation does no honour to Gay.</p> +<p>The first eight lines have no grammar; the adjectives are +without any substantive, and the epithets without a +subject. The thought in the last line, that Gay is buried +in the bosoms of the <i>worthy</i> and <i>good</i>, who are +distinguished only to lengthen the line, is so dark that few +understand it, and so harsh, when it is explained, that still +fewer approve.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">XII.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Intended for Sir</i> <span +class="smcap">Isaac Newton</span>, <i>in Westminster +Abbey</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center" class="poetry"><span +class="smcap">Isaacus Newtonius</span>:<br /> +Quem Immortalem<br /> +Testantur, <i>Tempus</i>, <i>Natura</i>, <i>Cœlum</i>:<br +/> +Mortalem hoc marmor fatetur.<br /> +Nature, and Nature’s laws, lay hid in night:<br /> +God said, <i>Let Newton be</i>! And all was light.</p> +<p>On this epitaph, short as it is, the faults seem not to be +very few. Why part should be Latin and part English it is +not easy to discover. In the Latin the opposition of +<i>Immortalis</i> and <i>Mortalis</i> is a mere sound, or a mere +quibble; he is not <i>immortal</i> in any sense contrary to that +in which he is <i>mortal</i>. In the verses the thought is +obvious, and the words <i>night</i> and <i>light</i> are too +nearly allied.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">XIII.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>On</i> <span +class="smcap">Edmund</span> <i>Duke of</i> <span +class="smcap">Buckingham</span>, <i>who died in the 19th Year of +his Age</i>, 1735.</p> +<p class="poetry"> If modest youth, with cool +reflection crowned,<br /> +And every opening virtue blooming round,<br /> +Could save a parent’s justest pride from fate,<br /> +Or add one patriot to a sinking state;<br /> +This weeping marble had not asked thy tear,<br /> +Or sadly told how many hopes lie here!<br /> +The living virtue now had shone approved,<br /> +The senate heard him, and his country loved.<br /> +Yet softer honours, and less noisy fame,<br /> +Attend the shade of gentle Buckingham:<br /> +In whom a race, for courage famed and art,<br /> +Ends in the milder merit of the heart;<br /> +And, chiefs or sages long to Britain given,<br /> +Pays the last tribute of a saint to heaven.</p> +<p>This epitaph Mr. Warburton prefers to the rest, but I know not +for what reason. To <i>crown</i> with <i>reflection</i> is +surely a mode of speech approaching to nonsense. <i>Opening +virtues blooming round</i> is something like tautology; the six +following lines are poor and prosaic. <i>Art</i> is in +another couplet used for <i>arts</i>, that a rhyme may be had to +<i>heart</i>. The six last lines are the best, but not +excellent.</p> +<p>The rest of his sepulchral performances hardly deserve the +notice of criticism. The contemptible dialogue between He +and She should have been suppressed for the author’s +sake.</p> +<p>In his last epitaph on himself, in which he attempts to be +jocular upon one of the few things that make wise men serious, he +confounds the living man with the dead:</p> +<p class="poetry">“Under this stone, or under this sill,<br +/> +Or under this turf, &c.”</p> +<p>When a man is once buried, the question, under what he is +buried, is easily decided. He forgot that though he wrote +the epitaph in a state of uncertainty, yet it could not be laid +over him till his grave was made. Such is the folly of wit +when it is ill employed.</p> +<p>The world has but little new, even this wretchedness seems to +have been borrowed from the following tuneless lines:—</p> +<p class="poetry">“Ludovici Areosti humantur ossa<br /> +Sub hoc marmore, vel sub hac humo, seu<br /> +Sub quicquid voluit benignus hæres<br /> +Siv hærede benignior comes, seu<br /> +Opportunius incidens Viator:<br /> +Nam scire haud potuit futura, sed nec<br /> +Tanti erat vacuum sibi cadaver<br /> +Ut utnam cuperet parere vivens,<br /> +Vivens ista tamen sibi paravit.<br /> +Quæ inscribi voluit suo sepulchro<br /> +Olim siquod haberetis sepulchrum.”</p> +<p>Surely Ariosto did not venture to expect that his trifle would +have ever had such an illustrious imitator.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIVES OF THE ENGLISH POETS: +PRIOR, CONGREVE, BLACKMORE AND POPE***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 5101-h.htm or 5101-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/5/1/0/5101 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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