[TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Greek words in this text have beentransliterated and placed between +marks+. A complete list of changesfollows the text. ]

English Men of Letters

EDITED BY JOHN MORLEY

POPE

ALEXANDER POPE

BY

LESLIE STEPHEN

London:MACMILLAN AND CO. 1880. 

_The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved. _

FIFTH THOUSAND. 

PREFATORY NOTE. 

The life and writings of Pope have been discussed in a literature morevoluminous than that which exists in the case of almost any otherEnglish man of letters. No biographer, however, has produced adefinitive or exhaustive work. It seems therefore desirable to indicatethe main authorities upon which such a biographer would have to rely, and which have been consulted for the purpose of the followingnecessarily brief and imperfect sketch. 

The first life of Pope was a catchpenny book, by William Ayre, publishedin 1745, and remarkable chiefly as giving the first version of somedemonstrably erroneous statements, unfortunately adopted by laterwriters. In 1751, Warburton, as Pope's literary executor, published theauthoritative edition of the poet's works, with notes containing somebiographical matter. In 1769 appeared a life by Owen Ruffhead, who wroteunder Warburton's inspiration. This is a dull and meagre performance, and much of it is devoted to an attack--partly written by Warburtonhimself--upon the criticisms advanced in the first volume of JosephWarton's Essay on Pope. Warton's first volume was published in 1756; andit seems that the dread of Warburton's wrath counted for something inthe delay of the second volume, which did not appear till 1782. TheEssay contains a good many anecdotes of interest. Warton's edition ofPope--the notes in which are chiefly drawn from the Essay--was publishedin 1797. The Life by Johnson appeared in 1781; it is admirable in manyways; but Johnson had taken the least possible trouble in ascertainingfacts. Both Warton and Johnson had before them the manuscriptcollections of Joseph Spence, who had known Pope personally during thelast twenty years of his life, and wanted nothing but literary abilityto have become an efficient Boswell. Spence's anecdotes, which were notpublished till 1820, give the best obtainable information upon manypoints, especially in regard to Pope's childhood. This ends the list ofbiographers who were in any sense contemporary with Pope. Theirstatements must be checked and supplemented by the poet's own letters, and innumerable references to him in the literature of the time. In 1806appeared the edition of Pope by Bowles, with a life prefixed. Bowlesexpressed an unfavourable opinion of many points in Pope's character, and some remarks by Campbell, in his specimens of English poets, led toa controversy (1819-1826) in which Bowles defended his views againstCampbell, Byron, Roscoe, and others, and which incidentally cleared upsome disputed questions. Roscoe, the author of the Life of Leo X. , published his edition of Pope in 1824. A life is contained in the firstvolume, but it is a feeble performance; and the notes, many of themdirected against Bowles, are of little value. A more complete biographywas published by R. Carruthers (with an edition of the works), in 1854. The second, and much improved, edition appeared in 1857, and is stillthe most convenient life of Pope, though Mr. Carruthers was not fullyacquainted with the last results of some recent investigations, whichhave thrown a new light upon the poet's career. 

The writer who took the lead in these inquiries was the late Mr. Dilke. Mr. Dilke published the results of his investigations (which were partlyguided by the discovery of a previously unpublished correspondencebetween Pope and his friend Caryll), in the _Athenĉum_ and _Notes andQueries_, at various intervals, from 1854 to 1860. His contributions tothe subject have been collated in the first volume of the _Papers of aCritic_, edited by his grandson, the present Sir Charles W. Dilke, in1875. Meanwhile Mr. Croker had been making an extensive collection ofmaterials for an exhaustive edition of Pope's works, in which he was tobe assisted by Mr. Peter Cunningham. After Croker's death thesematerials were submitted by Mr. Murray to Mr. Whitwell Elwin, whose ownresearches have greatly extended our knowledge, and who had also theadvantage of Mr. Dilke's advice. Mr. Elwin began, in 1871, thepublication of the long-promised edition. It was to have occupied tenvolumes--five of poems and five of correspondence, the latter of whichwas to include a very large proportion of previously unpublished matter. Unfortunately for all students of English literature, only two volumesof poetry and three of correspondence have appeared. The notes andprefaces, however, contain a vast amount of information, which clears upmany previously disputed points in the poet's career; and it is to behoped that the materials collected for the remaining volumes will not beultimately lost. It is easy to dispute some of Mr. Elwin's criticalopinions, but it would be impossible to speak too highly of the value ofhis investigations of facts. Without a study of his work, no adequateknowledge of Pope is attainable. 

The ideal biographer of Pope, if he ever appears, must be endowed withthe qualities of an acute critic and a patient antiquarian; and it wouldtake years of labour to work out all the minute problems connected withthe subject. All that I can profess to have done is to have given ashort summary of the obvious facts, and of the main conclusionsestablished by the evidence given at length in the writings of Mr. Dilkeand Mr. Elwin. I have added such criticisms as seemed desirable in awork of this kind, and I must beg pardon by anticipation if I havefallen into inaccuracies in relating a story so full of pitfalls for theunwary. 

L. S. 

CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER I. PAGE

 EARLY YEARS 1

CHAPTER II. 

 FIRST PERIOD OF POPE'S LITERARY CAREER 21

CHAPTER III. 

 POPE'S HOMER 61

CHAPTER IV. 

 POPE AT TWICKENHAM 81

CHAPTER V. 

 THE WAR WITH THE DUNCES 111

CHAPTER VI. 

 CORRESPONDENCE 137

CHAPTER VII. 

 THE ESSAY ON MAN 159

CHAPTER VIII. 

 EPISTLES AND SATIRES 181

CHAPTER IX. 

 THE END 206

POPE. 

CHAPTER I. 

EARLY YEARS. 

The father of Alexander Pope was a London merchant, a devout Catholic, and not improbably a convert to Catholicism. His mother was one ofseventeen children of William Turner, of York; one of her sisters wasthe wife of Cooper, the well-known portrait-painter. Mrs. Cooper was thepoet's godmother; she died when he was five years old, leaving to hersister, Mrs. Pope, a "grinding-stone and muller, " and their mother's"picture in limning;" and to her nephew, the little Alexander, all her"books, pictures, and medals set in gold or otherwise. "

In after-life the poet made some progress in acquiring the art ofpainting; and the bequest suggests the possibility that the precociouschild had already given some indications of artistic taste. Affectionateeyes were certainly on the watch for any symptoms of developing talent. Pope was born on May 21st, 1688--the _annus mirabilis_ which introduceda new political era in England, and was fatal to the hopes of ardentCatholics. About the same time, partly, perhaps, in consequence of thecatastrophe, Pope's father retired from business, and settled atBinfield--a village two miles from Wokingham and nine from Windsor. Itis near Bracknell, one of Shelley's brief perching places, and in such aregion as poets might love, if poetic praises of rustic seclusion are tobe taken seriously. To the east were the "forests and green retreats" ofWindsor, and the wild heaths of Bagshot, Chobham and Aldershot stretchedfor miles to the South. Some twelve miles off in that direction, one mayremark, lay Moor Park, where the sturdy pedestrian, Swift, was livingwith Sir W. Temple during great part of Pope's childhood; but it doesnot appear that his walks ever took him to Pope's neighbourhood, nor didhe see, till some years later, the lad with whom he was to form one ofthe most famous of literary friendships. The little household waspresumably a very quiet one, and remained fixed at Binfield fortwenty-seven years, till the son had grown to manhood and celebrity. From the earliest period he seems to have been a domestic idol. He wasnot an only child, for he had a half-sister by his father's side, whomust have been considerably older than himself, as her mother died nineyears before the poet's birth. But he was the only child of his mother, and his parents concentrated upon him an affection which he returnedwith touching ardour and persistence. They were both forty-six in theyear of his birth. He inherited headaches from his mother, and a crookedfigure from his father. A nurse who shared their care, lived with himfor many years, and was buried by him, with an affectionate epitaph, in1725. The family tradition represents him as a sweet-tempered child, andsays that he was called the "little nightingale, " from the beauty of hisvoice. As the sickly, solitary, and precocious infant of elderlyparents, we may guess that he was not a little spoilt, if only in thetechnical sense. 

The religion of the family made their seclusion from the world the morerigid, and by consequence must have strengthened their mutualadhesiveness. Catholics were then harassed by a legislation which wouldbe condemned by any modern standard as intolerably tyrannical. Whateverapology may be urged for the legislators on the score of contemporaryprejudices or special circumstances, their best excuse is that theirlaws were rather intended to satisfy constituents, and to supply apotential means of defence, than to be carried into actual execution. Itdoes not appear that the Popes had to fear any active molestation in thequiet observance of their religious duties. Yet a Catholic was not onlya member of a hated minority, regarded by the rest of his countrymen asrepresenting the evil principle in politics and religion, but wasrigorously excluded from a public career, and from every position ofhonour or authority. In times of excitement the severer laws might beput in force. The public exercise of the Catholic religion wasforbidden, and to be a Catholic was to be predisposed to the variousJacobite intrigues which still had many chances in their favour. Whenthe pretender was expected in 1744, a proclamation, to which Popethought it decent to pay obedience, forbade the appearance of Catholicswithin ten miles of London; and in 1730 we find him making interest onbehalf of a nephew, who had been prevented from becoming an attorneybecause the judges were rigidly enforcing the oaths of supremacy andallegiance. 

Catholics had to pay double taxes and were prohibited from acquiringreal property. The elder Pope, according to a certainly inaccuratestory, had a conscientious objection to investing his money in the fundsof a Protestant government, and, therefore, having converted his capitalinto coin, put it in a strong-box, and took it out as he wanted it. Theold merchant was not quite so helpless, for we know that he hadinvestments in the French _rentes_, besides other sources of income; butthe story probably reflects the fact that his religiousdisqualifications hampered even his financial position. 

Pope's character was affected in many ways by the fact of his belongingto a sect thus harassed and restrained. Persecution, like bodilyinfirmity, has an ambiguous influence. If it sometimes generates in itsvictims a heroic hatred of oppression, it sometimes predisposes them tothe use of the weapons of intrigue and falsehood, by which the weakevade the tyranny of the strong. If under that discipline Pope learnt tolove toleration, he was not untouched by the more demoralizinginfluences of a life passed in an atmosphere of incessant plotting andevasion. A more direct consequence was his exclusion from the ordinaryschools. The spirit of the rickety lad might have been broken by therough training of Eton or Westminster in those days; as, on the otherhand, he might have profited by acquiring a livelier perception of themeaning of that virtue of fair-play, the appreciation of which is heldto be a set-off against the brutalizing influences of our system ofpublic education. As it was, Pope was condemned to a desultoryeducation. He picked up some rudiments of learning from the familypriest; he was sent to a school at Twyford, where he is said to have gotinto trouble for writing a lampoon upon his master; he went for a shorttime to another in London, where he gave a more creditable if lesscharacteristic proof of his poetical precocity. Like other lads ofgenius, he put together a kind of play--a combination, it seems, of thespeeches in Ogilby's Iliad--and got it acted by his schoolfellows. Thesebrief snatches of schooling, however, counted for little. Pope settledat home at the early age of twelve, and plunged into the delights ofmiscellaneous reading with the ardour of precocious talent. He read soeagerly that his feeble constitution threatened to break down, and whenabout seventeen, he despaired of recovery, and wrote a farewell to hisfriends. One of them, an Abbé Southcote, applied for advice to thecelebrated Dr. Radcliffe, who judiciously prescribed idleness andexercise. Pope soon recovered, and, it is pleasant to add, showed hisgratitude long afterwards by obtaining for Southcote, through Sir RobertWalpole, a desirable piece of French preferment. Self-guided studieshave their advantages, as Pope himself observed, but they do not lead ayouth through the dry places of literature, or stimulate him to severeintellectual training. Pope seems to have made some hasty raids intophilosophy and theology; he dipped into Locke, and found him "insipid;"he went through a collection of the controversial literature of thereign of James II. , which seems to have constituted the paternallibrary, and was alternately Protestant and Catholic, according to thelast book which he had read. But it was upon poetry and pure literaturethat he flung himself with a genuine appetite. He learnt languages toget at the story, unless a translation offered an easier path, andfollowed wherever fancy led "like a boy gathering flowers in the fieldsand woods. "

It is needless to say that he never became a scholar in the strict senseof the term. Voltaire declared that he could hardly read or speak aword of French; and his knowledge of Greek would have satisfied Bentleyas little as his French satisfied Voltaire. Yet he must have been fairlyconversant with the best known French literature of the time, and hecould probably stumble through Homer with the help of a crib and a guessat the general meaning. He says himself that at this early period, hewent through all the best critics; all the French, English and Latinpoems of any name; "Homer and some of the greater Greek poets in theoriginal, " and Tasso and Ariosto in translations. 

Pope at any rate acquired a wide knowledge of English poetry. Waller, Spenser, and Dryden were, he says, his great favourites in the ordernamed, till he was twelve. Like so many other poets, he took infinitedelight in the _Faery Queen_; but Dryden, the great poetical luminary ofhis own day, naturally exercised a predominant influence upon his mind. He declared that he had learnt versification wholly from Dryden's works, and always mentioned his name with reverence. Many scattered remarksreported by Spence, and the still more conclusive evidence of frequentappropriation, show him to have been familiar with the poetry of thepreceding century, and with much that had gone out of fashion in histime, to a degree in which he was probably excelled by none of hissuccessors, with the exception of Gray. Like Gray he contemplated at onetime the history of English poetry which was in some sense executed byWarton. It is characteristic, too, that he early showed a criticalspirit. From a boy, he says, he could distinguish between sweetness andsoftness of numbers, Dryden exemplifying softness and Waller sweetness;and the remark, whatever its value, shows that he had been analysinghis impressions and reflecting upon the technical secrets of his art. 

Such study naturally suggests the trembling aspiration, "I, too, am apoet. " Pope adopts with apparent sincerity the Ovidian phrase, As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came. 

His father corrected his early performances and when not satisfied, senthim back with the phrase, "These are not good rhymes. " He translated anypassages that struck him in his reading, excited by the examples ofOgilby's Homer and Sandys' Ovid. His boyish ambition prompted him beforehe was fifteen to attempt an epic poem; the subject was Alcander, Princeof Rhodes, driven from his home by Deucalion, father of Minos; and thework was modestly intended to emulate in different passages the beautiesof Milton, Cowley, Spenser, Statius, Homer, Virgil, Ovid, and Claudian. Four books of this poem survived for a long time, for Pope had a morethan parental fondness for all the children of his brain, and always hadan eye to possible reproduction. Scraps from this early epic were workedinto the Essay on Criticism and the Dunciad. This couplet, for example, from the last work comes straight, we are told, from Alcander, --

 As man's Mĉanders to the vital spring Roll all their tides, then back their circles bring. 

Another couplet, preserved by Spence, will give a sufficient taste ofits quality:--

 Shields, helms, and swords all jangle as they hang, And sound formidinous with angry clang. 

After this we shall hardly censure Atterbury for approving (perhapssuggesting) its destruction in later years. Pope long meditated anotherepic, relating the foundation of the English government by Brutus ofTroy, with a superabundant display of didactic morality and religion. Happily this dreary conception, though it occupied much thought, nevercame to the birth. 

The time soon came when these tentative flights were to be superseded bymore serious efforts. Pope's ambition was directed into the same channelby his innate propensities and by the accidents of his position. No manever displayed a more exclusive devotion to literature, or was moretremblingly sensitive to the charm of literary glory. His zeal was neverdistracted by any rival emotion. Almost from his cradle to his grave hiseye was fixed unremittingly upon the sole purpose of his life. The wholeenergies of his mind were absorbed in the struggle to place his name ashigh as possible in that temple of fame, which he painted after Chaucerin one of his early poems. External conditions pointed to letters as thesole path to eminence, but it was precisely the path for which he hadadmirable qualifications. The sickly son of the Popish tradesman was cutoff from the bar, the senate, and the church. Physically contemptible, politically ostracized, and in a humble social position, he could yetwin this dazzling prize and force his way with his pen to the highestpinnacle of contemporary fame. Without adventitious favour and in spiteof many bitter antipathies, he was to become the acknowledged head ofEnglish literature, and the welcome companion of all the most eminentmen of his time. Though he could not foresee his career from the start, he worked as vigorously as if the goal had already been in sight; andeach successive victory in the field of letters was realized the morekeenly from his sense of the disadvantages in face of which it had beenwon. In tracing his rapid ascent, we shall certainly find reason todoubt his proud assertion, --

 That, if he pleased, he pleased by manly ways, but it is impossible for any lover of literature to grudge admiration tothis singular triumph of pure intellect over external disadvantages, andthe still more depressing influences of incessant physical suffering. 

Pope had indeed certain special advantages which he was not slow inturning to account. In one respect even his religion helped him toemerge into fame. There was naturally a certain free-masonry amongst theCatholics allied by fellow-feeling under the general antipathy. Therelations between Pope and his co-religionists exercised a materialinfluence upon his later life. Within a few miles of Binfield lived theBlounts of Mapledurham, a fine old Elizabethan mansion on the banks ofthe Thames, near Reading, which had been held by a royalist Blount inthe civil war against a parliamentary assault. It was a more interestingcircumstance to Pope that Mr. Lister Blount, the then representative ofthe family, had two fair daughters, Teresa and Martha, of about thepoet's age. Another of Pope's Catholic acquaintances was John Caryll, ofWest Grinstead in Sussex, nephew of a Caryll who had been therepresentative of James II. At the Court of Rome, and who, following hismaster into exile, received the honours of a titular peerage and heldoffice in the melancholy court of the Pretender. In such circles Popemight have been expected to imbibe a Jacobite and Catholic horror ofWhigs and freethinkers. In fact, however, he belonged from his youth tothe followers of Gallio, and seems to have paid to religious duties justas much attention as would satisfy his parents. His mind was reallygiven to literature; and he found his earliest patron in his immediateneighbourhood. This was Sir W. Trumbull, who had retired to his nativevillage of Easthampstead in 1697, after being ambassador at the Porteunder James II. , and Secretary of State under William III. Sir Williammade acquaintance with the Popes, praised the father's artichokes, andwas delighted with the precocious son. The old diplomatist and the youngpoet soon became fast friends, took constant rides together, and talkedover classic and modern poetry. Pope made Trumbull acquainted withMilton's juvenile poems, and Trumbull encouraged Pope to follow inMilton's steps. He gave, it seems, the first suggestion to Pope that heshould translate Homer; and he exhorted his young friend to preserve hishealth by flying from tavern company--_tanquam ex incendio_. Anotherearly patron was William Walsh, a Worcestershire country gentleman offortune and fashion, who condescended to dabble in poetry after themanner of Waller, and to write remonstrances upon Celia's cruelty, verses to his mistress against marriage, epigrams, and pastoraleclogues. He was better known, however, as a critic, and had beendeclared by Dryden to be, without flattery, the best in the nation. Popereceived from him one piece of advice which has become famous. We hadhad great poets--so said the "knowing Walsh, " as Pope calls him--"butnever one great poet that was correct;" and he accordingly recommendedPope to make correctness his great aim. The advice doubtless impressedthe young man as the echo of his own convictions. Walsh died (1708), before the effect of his suggestion had become fully perceptible. 

The acquaintance with Walsh was due to Wycherley, who had submittedPope's Pastorals to his recognized critical authority. Pope'sintercourse with Wycherley and another early friend, Henry Cromwell, hada more important bearing upon his early career. He kept up acorrespondence with each of these friends, whilst he was still passingthrough his probationary period; and the letters published longafterwards under singular circumstances to be hereafter related, givethe fullest revelation of his character and position at this time. BothWycherley and Cromwell were known to the Englefields of Whiteknights, near Reading, a Catholic family, in which Pope first made theacquaintance of Martha Blount, whose mother was a daughter of the oldMr. Englefield of the day. It was possibly, therefore, through thisconnexion that Pope owed his first introduction to the literary circlesof London. Pope, already thirsting for literary fame, was delighted toform a connexion which must have been far from satisfactory to hisindulgent parents, if they understood the character of his newassociates. 

Henry Cromwell, a remote cousin of the Protector, is known to other thanminute investigators of contemporary literature by nothing except hisfriendship with Pope. He was nearly thirty years older than Pope, andthough heir to an estate in the country, was at this time a gay, thoughrather elderly, man about town. Vague intimations are preserved of hispersonal appearance. Gay calls him "honest hatless Cromwell with redbreeches;" and Johnson could learn about him the single fact that heused to ride a-hunting in a tie-wig. The interpretation of these outwardsigns may not be very obvious to modern readers; but it is plain fromother indications that he was one of the frequenters of coffee-houses, aimed at being something of a rake and a wit, was on speaking terms withDryden, and familiar with the smaller celebrities of literature, aregular attendant at theatres, a friend of actresses, and able topresent himself in fashionable circles and devote complimentary versesto the reigning beauties at the Bath. When he studied the _Spectator_ hemight recognize some of his features reflected in the portrait of WillHoneycomb. Pope was proud enough for the moment at being taken by thehand by this elderly buck, though, as Pope himself rose in the literaryscale and could estimate literary reputations more accurately, hebecame, it would seem, a little ashamed of his early enthusiasm, and, atany rate, the friendship dropped. The letters which passed between thepair during four or five years down to the end of 1711, show Pope in hisearliest manhood. They are characteristic of that period of developmentin which a youth of literary genius takes literary fame in the mostdesperately serious sense. Pope is evidently putting his best footforward, and never for a moment forgets that he is a young authorwriting to a recognized critic--except, indeed, when he takes the airsof an experienced rake. We might speak of the absurd affectationdisplayed in the letters, were it not that such affectation is the mostgenuine nature in a clever boy. Unluckily it became so ingrained in Popeas to survive his youthful follies. Pope complacently indulges inelaborate paradoxes and epigrams of the conventional epistolary style;he is painfully anxious to be alternately sparkling and playful; hishead must be full of literature; he indulges in an elaborate criticismof Statius, and points out what a sudden fall that author makes at oneplace from extravagant bombast; he communicates the latest efforts ofhis muse, and tries, one regrets to say, to get more credit forprecocity and originality than fairly belongs to him; he accidentallyalludes to his dog that he may bring in a translation from the Odyssey, quote Plutarch, and introduce an anecdote which he has heard fromTrumbull about Charles I. ; he elaborately discusses Cromwell's classicaltranslations, adduces authorities, ventures to censure Mr. Rowe'samplifications of Lucan, and, in this respect, thinks that Breboeuf, the famous French translator, is equally a sinner, and writes a longletter as to the proper use of the cĉsura and the hiatus in Englishverse. There are signs that the mutual criticisms became a little tryingto the tempers of the correspondents. Pope seems to be inclined toridicule Cromwell's pedantry, and when he affects satisfaction atlearning that Cromwell has detected him in appropriating a rondeau fromVoiture, we feel that the tension is becoming serious. Probably he foundout that Cromwell was not only a bit of a prig, but a person not likelyto reflect much glory upon his friends, and the correspondence came toan end, when Pope found a better market for his wares. 

Pope speaks more than once in these letters of his country retirement, where he could enjoy the company of the muses, but where, on the otherhand, he was forced to be grave and godly, instead of drunk andscandalous as he could be in town. The jolly hunting and drinkingsquires round Binfield thought him, he says, a well-disposed person, butunluckily disqualified for their rough modes of enjoyment by his sicklyhealth. With them he has not been able to make one Latin quotation, buthas learnt a song of Tom Durfey's, the sole representative ofliterature, it appears, at the "toping-tables" of these thick-wittedfox-hunters. Pope naturally longed for the more refined or at leastmore fashionable indulgences of London life. Beside the literaryaffectation, he sometimes adopts the more offensiveaffectation--unfortunately not peculiar to any period--of the youth whowishes to pass himself off as deep in the knowledge of the world. Pope, as may be here said once for all, could be at times grossly indecent;and in these letters there are passages offensive upon this score, though the offence is far graver when the same tendency appears, as itsometimes does, in his letters to women. There is no proof that Pope wasever licentious in practice. He was probably more temperate than most ofhis companions, and could be accused of fewer lapses from strictmorality than, for example, the excellent but thoughtless Steele. Forthis there was the very good reason that his "little, tender, crazycarcass, " as Wycherley calls it, was utterly unfit for such excesses ashis companions could practice with comparative impunity. He was boundunder heavy penalties to be through life a valetudinarian, and suchdoses of wine as the respectable Addison used regularly to absorb, wouldhave brought speedy punishment. Pope's loose talk probably meant littleenough in the way of actual vice, though, as I have already said, Trumbull saw reasons for friendly warning. But some of his writings arestained by pruriency and downright obscenity; whilst the same fault maybe connected with a painful absence of that chivalrous feeling towardswomen which redeems Steele's errors of conduct in our estimate of hischaracter. Pope always takes a low, sometimes a brutal view of therelation between the sexes. 

Enough, however, has been said upon this point. If Pope erred, he wascertainly unfortunate in the objects of his youthful hero-worship. Cromwell seems to have been but a pedantic hanger-on of literarycircles. His other great friend, Wycherley, had stronger claims uponhis respect, but certainly was not likely to raise his standard ofdelicacy. Wycherley was a relic of a past literary epoch. He was nearlyfifty years older than Pope. His last play, the _Plain Dealer_, had beenproduced in 1677, eleven years before Pope's birth. The _Plain Dealer_and the _Country Wife_, his chief performances, are conspicuous amongstthe comedies of the Restoration dramatists for sheer brutality. DuringPope's boyhood he was an elderly rake about town, having squandered hisintellectual as well as his pecuniary resources, but still scribblingbad verses and maxims on the model of Rochefoucauld. Pope had a veryexcusable, perhaps we may say creditable, enthusiasm for theacknowledged representatives of literary glory. Before he was twelveyears old he had persuaded some one to take him to Will's, that he mighthave a sight of the venerable Dryden; and in the first publishedletter[1] to Wycherley he refers to this brief glimpse, and warmlythanks Wycherley for some conversation about the elder poet. And thus, when he came to know Wycherley, he was enraptured with the honour. Hefollowed the great man about, as he tells us, like a dog; and, doubtless, received with profound respect the anecdotes of literary lifewhich fell from the old gentleman's lips. Soon a correspondence began, in which Pope adopts a less jaunty air than that of his letters toCromwell, but which is conducted on both sides in the labouredcomplimentary style which was not unnatural in the days when Congreve'scomedy was taken to represent the conversation of fashionable life. Presently, however, the letters began to turn upon an obviouslydangerous topic. Pope was only seventeen when it occurred to his friendto turn him to account as a literary assistant. The lad had alreadyshown considerable powers of versification, and was soon employing themin the revision of some of the numerous compositions which amusedWycherley's leisure. It would have required, one might have thought, less than Wycherley's experience to foresee the natural end of such analliance. Pope, in fact, set to work with great vigour in his favouriteoccupation of correcting. He hacked and hewed right and left; omitted, compressed, rearranged, and occasionally inserted additions of his owndevising. Wycherley's memory had been enfeebled by illness, and nowplayed him strange tricks. He was in the habit of reading himself tosleep with Montaigne, Rochefoucauld, and Racine. Next morning he would, with entire unconsciousness, write down as his own the thoughts of hisauthor, or repeat almost word for word some previous composition of hisown. To remove such repetitions thoroughly would require a very freeapplication of the knife, and Pope would not be slow to discover that hewas wasting talents fit for original work in botching and tinkering amass of rubbish. 

Any man of ripe years would have predicted the obvious consequences;and, according to the ordinary story, those consequences followed. Popebecame more plain-speaking, and at last almost insulting in hislanguage. Wycherley ended by demanding the return of his manuscripts, ina letter showing his annoyance under a veil of civility; and Pope sentthem back with a smart reply, recommending Wycherley to adopt a previoussuggestion and turn his poetry into maxims after the manner ofRochefoucauld. The "old scribbler, " says Johnson, "was angry to see hispages defaced, and felt more pain from the criticism than content fromthe amendment of his faults. " The story is told at length, and with hisusual brilliance, by Macaulay, and has hitherto passed muster with allPope's biographers; and, indeed, it is so natural a story, and is so farconfirmed by other statements of Pope, that it seems a pity to spoil it. And yet it must be at least modified, for we have already reached one ofthose perplexities which force a biographer of Pope to be constantlylooking to his footsteps. So numerous are the contradictions whichsurround almost every incident of the poet's career, that one isconstantly in danger of stumbling into some pitfall, or bound to crossit in gingerly fashion on the stepping-stone of a cautious "perhaps. "The letters which are the authority for this story have undergone amanipulation from Pope himself, under circumstances to be hereafternoticed; and recent researches have shown that a very false colouringhas been put upon this as upon other passages. The nature of thisstrange perversion is a curious illustration of Pope's absorbing vanity. 

Pope, in fact, was evidently ashamed of the attitude which he had notunnaturally adopted to his correspondent. The first man of letters ofhis day could not bear to reveal the full degree in which he had fawnedupon the decayed dramatist, whose inferiority to himself was now plainlyrecognized. He altered the whole tone of the correspondence by omission, and still worse by addition. He did not publish a letter in whichWycherley gently remonstrates with his young admirer for excessiveadulation; he omitted from his own letters the phrase which had provokedthe remonstrance; and, with more daring falsification, he manufacturedan imaginary letter to Wycherley out of a letter really addressed tohis friend Caryll. In this letter Pope had himself addressed to Caryll aremonstrance similar to that which he had received from Wycherley. Whenpublished as a letter to Wycherley, it gives the impression that Pope, at the age of seventeen, was already rejecting excessive complimentsaddressed to him by his experienced friend. By these audaciousperversions of the truth, Pope is enabled to heighten his youthfulindependence, and to represent himself as already exhibiting a gracefulsuperiority to the reception or the offering of incense; whilst he thusprecisely inverts the relation which really existed between himself andhis correspondent. 

The letters, again, when read with a due attention to dates, shows thatWycherley's proneness to take offence has at least been exaggerated. Pope's services to Wycherley were rendered on two separate occasions. The first set of poems were corrected during 1706 and 1707, andWycherley, in speaking of this revision, far from showing symptoms ofannoyance, speaks with gratitude of Pope's kindness, and returns theexpressions of goodwill which accompanied his criticisms. Both theseexpressions, and Wycherley's acknowledgment of them, were omitted inPope's publication. More than two years elapsed, when (in April, 1710)Wycherley submitted a new set of manuscripts to Pope's unflinchingseverity; and it is from the letters which passed in regard to this lastbatch that the general impression as to the nature of the quarrel hasbeen derived. But these letters, again, have been mutilated, and somutilated as to increase the apparent tartness of the mutual retorts;and it must therefore remain doubtful how far the coolness which ensuedwas really due to the cause assigned. Pope, writing at the time toCromwell, expresses his vexation at the difference, and professeshimself unable to account for it, though he thinks that his correctionsmay have been the cause of the rupture. An alternative rumour, [2] itseems, accused Pope of having written some satirical verses upon hisfriend. To discover the rights and wrongs of the quarrel is nowimpossible, though, unfortunately, one thing is clear, namely, that Popewas guilty of grossly sacrificing truth in the interests of his ownvanity. We may, indeed, assume, without much risk of error, that Popehad become too conscious of his own importance to find pleasure or pridein doctoring another man's verses. It must remain uncertain how far heshowed this resentment to Wycherley openly, or gratified it by somecovert means; and how far, again, he succeeded in calming Wycherley'ssusceptibility by his compliments, or aroused his wrath by more or lesscontemptuous treatment of his verses. 

A year after the quarrel, Cromwell reported that Wycherley had againbeen speaking in friendly terms of Pope, and Pope expressed his pleasurewith eagerness. He must, he said, be more agreeable to himself whenagreeable to Wycherley, as the earth was brighter when the sun was lessovercast. Wycherley, it may be remarked, took Pope's advice by turningsome of his verses into prose maxims; and they seem to have been at lastupon more or less friendly terms. The final scene of Wycherley'squestionable career, some four years later, is given by Pope in a letterto his friend, Edward Blount. The old man, he says, joined thesacraments of marriage and extreme unction. By one he supposed himselfto gain some advantage of his soul; by the other, he had the pleasureof saddling his hated heir and nephew with the jointure of his widow. When dying, he begged his wife to grant him a last request, and, uponher consent, explained it to be that she would never again marry an oldman. Sickness, says Pope in comment, often destroys wit and wisdom, buthas seldom the power to remove humour. Wycherley's joke, replies acritic, is contemptible; and yet one feels that the death scene, withthis strange mixture of cynicism, spite, and superstition, half redeemedby imperturbable good temper, would not be unworthy of a place inWycherley's own school of comedy. One could wish that Pope had shown alittle more perception of the tragic side of such a conclusion. 

Pope was still almost a boy when he broke with Wycherley; but he wasalready beginning to attract attention, and within a surprisingly shorttime he was becoming known as one of the first writers of the day. Imust now turn to the poems by which this reputation was gained, and theincidents connected with their publication. In Pope's life, almost morethan in that of any other poet, the history of the author is the historyof the man. 

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The letter is, unluckily, of doubtful authenticity; but itrepresents Pope's probable sentiments. 

[2] See Elwin's Pope, Vol. I. , cxxxv. 

CHAPTER II. 

FIRST PERIOD OF POPE'S LITERARY CAREER. 

Pope's rupture with Wycherley took place in the summer of 1710, whenPope, therefore, was just twenty-two. He was at this time only known asthe contributor of some small poems to a Miscellany. Three yearsafterwards (1713) he was receiving such patronage in his greatundertaking, the translation of Homer, as to prove conclusively that hewas regarded by the leaders of literature as a poet of very highpromise; and two years later (1715) the appearance of the first volumeof his translation entitled him to rank as the first poet of the day. Sorapid a rise to fame has had few parallels, and was certainly notapproached until Byron woke and found himself famous at twenty-four. Pope was eager for the praise of remarkable precocity, and was weak andinsincere enough to alter the dates of some of his writings in order tostrengthen his claim. Yet, even when we accept the corrected accounts ofrecent enquirers, there is no doubt that he gave proofs at a very earlyage of an extraordinary command of the resources of his art. It is stillmore evident that his merits were promptly and frankly recognized by hiscontemporaries. Great men and distinguished authors held out friendlyhands to him; and he never had to undergo, even for a brief period, thedreary ordeal of neglect through which men of loftier but less populargenius, have been so often compelled to pass. And yet it unfortunatelyhappened that, even in this early time, when success followed success, and the young man's irritable nerves might well have been soothed by thegeneral chorus of admiration he excited and returned bitter antipathies, some of which lasted through his life. 

Pope's works belong to three distinct periods. The translation of Homerwas the great work of the middle period of his life. In his later yearshe wrote the moral and satirical poems by which he is now best known. The earlier period, with which I have now to deal, was one ofexperimental excursions into various fields of poetry, with varyingsuccess and rather uncertain aim. Pope had already, as we have seen, gone through the process of "filling his basket. " He had written theepic poem which happily found its way into the flames. He had translatedmany passages that struck his fancy in the classics, especiallyconsiderable fragments of Ovid and Statius. Following Dryden, he hadturned some of Chaucer into modern English; and, adopting a fashionwhich had not as yet quite died of inanition, he had composed certainpastorals in the manner of Theocritus and Virgil. These earlyproductions had been written under the eye of Trumbull; they had beenhanded about in manuscript; Wycherley, as already noticed, had shownthem to Walsh, himself an offender of the same class. Granville, afterwards Lord Lansdowne, another small poet, read them, and professedto see in Pope another Virgil; whilst Congreve, Garth, Somers, Halifax, and other men of weight, condescended to read, admire, and criticize. Old Tonson, who had published for Dryden, wrote a polite note to Pope, then only seventeen, saying that he had seen one of the Pastorals inthe hands of Congreve and Walsh, "which was extremely fine, " andrequesting the honour of printing it. Three years afterwards itaccordingly appeared in Tonson's Miscellany, a kind of annual, of whichthe first numbers had been edited by Dryden. Such miscellanies more orless discharged the function of a modern magazine. The plan, said Popeto Wycherley, is very useful to the poets, "who, like other thieves, escape by getting into a crowd. " The volume contained contributions fromBuckingham, Garth, and Howe; it closed with Pope's Pastorals, and openedwith another set of pastorals by Ambrose Philips--a combination which, as we shall see, led to one of Pope's first quarrels. 

The Pastorals have been seriously criticized; but they are, in truth, mere school-boy exercises; they represent nothing more than so manyexperiments in versification. The pastoral form had doubtless been usedin earlier hands to embody true poetic feeling; but in Pope's time ithad become hopelessly threadbare. The fine gentlemen in wigs and lacedcoats amused themselves by writing about nymphs and "conscious swains, "by way of asserting their claims to elegance of taste. Pope, as a boy, took the matter seriously, and always retained a natural fondness for ajuvenile performance upon which he had expended great labour, and whichwas the chief proof of his extreme precocity. He invites attention tohis own merits, and claims especially the virtue of propriety. He doesnot, he tells us, like some other people, make his roses and daffodilsbloom in the same season, and cause his nightingales to sing inNovember; and he takes particular credit for having remembered thatthere were no wolves in England, and having accordingly excised apassage in which Alexis prophesied that those animals would grow milderas they listened to the strains of his favourite nymph. When a man hasgot so far as to bring to England all the pagan deities, and rivalshepherds contending for bowls and lambs in alternate strophes, theseniceties seem a little out of place. After swallowing such a camel of ananachronism as is contained in the following lines, it is ridiculous topride oneself upon straining at a gnat:--

Inspire me, says Strephon, Inspire me, Phoebus, in my Delia's praise With Waller's strains or Granville's moving lays. A milkwhite bull shall at your altars stand, That threats a fight, and spurns the rising sand. 

Granville would certainly not have felt more surprised at meeting awolf, than at seeing a milk-white bull sacrificed to Phoebus on thebanks of the Thames. It would be a more serious complaint that Pope, whocan thus admit anachronisms as daring as any of those which provokedJohnson in Lycidas, shows none of that exquisite feeling for ruralscenery which is one of the superlative charms of Milton's early poems. Though country-bred, he talks about country sights and sounds as if hehad been brought up at Christ's Hospital, and read of them only inVirgil. But, in truth, it is absurd to dwell upon such points. The solepoint worth notice in the Pastorals is the general sweetness of theversification. Many corrections show how carefully Pope had elaboratedthese early lines, and by what patient toil he was acquiring thepeculiar qualities of style in which he was to become pre-eminent. Wemay agree with Johnson that Pope performing upon a pastoral pipe israther a ludicrous person, but for mere practice even nonsense verseshave been found useful. 

The young gentleman was soon to give a far more characteristic specimenof his peculiar powers. Poets, according to the ordinary rule, shouldbegin by exuberant fancy, and learn to prune and refine as the reasoningfaculties develop. But Pope was from the first a conscious anddeliberate artist. He had read the fashionable critics of his time, andhad accepted their canons as an embodiment of irrefragable reason. Hishead was full of maxims, some of which strike us as palpable truisms, and others as typical specimens of wooden pedantry. Dryden had set theexample of looking upon the French critics as authoritative lawgivers inpoetry. Boileau's art of poetry was carefully studied, as bits of itwere judiciously appropriated by Pope. Another authority was the greatBossu, who wrote in 1675 a treatise on epic poetry; and the modernreader may best judge of the doctrines characteristic of the school, bythe naive pedantry with which Addison, the typical man of taste of histime, invokes the authority of Bossu and Aristotle, in his exposition ofParadise Lost. [3] English writers were treading in the steps of Boileauand Horace. Roscommon selected for a poem the lively topic of"translated verse, " and Sheffield had written with Dryden an essay uponsatire, and afterwards a more elaborate essay upon poetry. To thesemasterpieces, said Addison, another masterpiece was now added by Pope'sEssay upon Criticism. Not only did Addison applaud, but later criticshave spoken of their wonder at the penetration, learning, and tasteexhibited by so young a man. The essay was carefully finished. Writtenapparently in 1709, it was published in 1711. This was as short a time, said Pope to Spence, as he ever let anything of his lie by him; he nodoubt employed it, according to his custom, in correcting and revising, and he had prepared himself by carefully digesting the whole in prose. It is, however, written without any elaborate logical plan, though it isquite sufficiently coherent for its purpose. The maxims on which Popechiefly dwells are, for the most part, the obvious rules which have beenthe common property of all generations of critics. One would scarcelyask for originality in such a case, any more than one would desire awriter on ethics to invent new laws of morality. "We require neitherPope nor Aristotle to tell us that critics should not be pert norprejudiced; that fancy should be regulated by judgment; that apparentfacility comes by long training; that the sound should have someconformity to the meaning; that genius is often envied; and that dulnessis frequently beyond the reach of reproof. "We might even guess, withoutthe authority of Pope, backed by Bacon, that there are some beautieswhich cannot be taught by method, but must be reached "by a kind offelicity. " It is not the less interesting to notice Pope's skill inpolishing these rather rusty sayings into the appearance of novelty. Ina familiar line Pope gives us the view which he would himself apply insuch cases. 

 True wit is nature to advantage dress'd, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd. 

The only fair question, in short, is whether Pope has managed to give alasting form to some of the floating commonplaces which have more orless suggested themselves to every writer. If we apply this test, wemust admit that if the essay upon criticism does not show deep thought, it shows singular skill in putting old truths. Pope undeniably succeededin hitting off many phrases of marked felicity. He already showed thepower, in which he was probably unequalled, of coining aphorisms out ofcommonplace. Few people read the essay now, but everybody is aware that"fools rush in where angels fear to tread, " and has heard the warning--

 A little learning is a dangerous thing, Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring--

maxims which may not commend themselves as strictly accurate to ascientific reasoner, but which have as much truth as one can demand froman epigram. And besides many sayings which share in some degree theirmerit, there are occasional passages which rise, at least, to the heightof graceful rhetoric if they are scarcely to be called poetical. Onesimile was long famous, and was called by Johnson the best in thelanguage. It is that in which the sanguine youth, overwhelmed by agrowing perception of the boundlessness of possible attainments, iscompared to the traveller crossing the mountains, and seeing--

 Hills peep o'er hills and Alps on Alps arise. 

The poor simile is pretty well forgotten, but is really a good specimenof Pope's brilliant declamation. 

The essay, however, is not uniformly polished. Between the happierpassages we have to cross stretches of flat prose twisted into rhyme;Pope seems to have intentionally pitched his style at a prosaic level asfitter for didactic purposes; but besides this we here and there comeupon phrases which are not only elliptical and slovenly, but defy allgrammatical construction. This was a blemish to which Pope was alwaysstrangely liable. It was perhaps due in part to over-correction, whenthe context was forgotten and the subject had lost its freshness. Critics, again, have remarked upon the poverty of the rhymes, andobserved that he makes ten rhymes to "wit" and twelve to "sense. " Thefrequent recurrence of the words is the more awkward because they arecuriously ambiguous. "Wit" was beginning to receive its modern meaning;but Pope uses it vaguely as sometimes equivalent to intelligence ingeneral, sometimes to the poetic faculty, and sometimes to the erraticfancy, which the true poet restrains by sense. Pope would have beenstill more puzzled if asked to define precisely what he meant by theantithesis between nature and art. They are somehow opposed, yet artturns out to be only "nature methodized. " We have indeed a clue for ourguidance; to study nature, we are told, is the same thing as to studyHomer, and Homer should be read day and night, with Virgil for a commentand Aristotle for an expositor. Nature, good sense, Homer, Virgil, andthe Stagyrite all, it seems, come to much the same thing. 

It would be very easy to pick holes in this very loose theory. But it isbetter to try to understand the point of view indicated; for, in truth, Pope is really stating the assumptions which guided his whole career. Noone will accept his position at the present time; but any one who isincapable of, at least, a provisional sympathy, may as well throw Popeaside at once, and with Pope most contemporary literature. 

The dominant figure in Pope's day was the Wit. The wit--takenpersonally--was the man who represented what we now describe by cultureor the spirit of the age. Bright clear common sense was for once havingits own way, and tyrannizing over the faculties from which it too oftensuffers violence. The favoured faculty never doubted its ownqualification for supremacy in every department. In metaphysics it wastriumphing with Hobbes and Locke over the remnants of scholasticism;under Tillotson, it was expelling mystery from religion; and in art itwas declaring war against the extravagant, the romantic, the mystic, andthe Gothic, --a word then used as a simple term of abuse. Wit and senseare but different avatars of the same spirit; wit was the form in whichit showed itself in coffee-houses, and sense that in which it appearedin the pulpit or parliament. When Walsh told Pope to be correct, he wasvirtually advising him to carry the same spirit into poetry. Theclassicism of the time was the natural corollary; for the classicalmodels were the historical symbols of the movement which Poperepresented. He states his view very tersely in the essay. Classicalculture had been overwhelmed by the barbarians, and the monks "finishedwhat the Goths began. " Letters revived when the study of classicalmodels again gave an impulse and supplied a guidance. 

 At length Erasmus, that great injured name, The glory of the priesthood and their shame, Stemm'd the wild torrent of a barbarous age, And drove these holy Vandals off the stage. 

The classicalism of Pope's time was no doubt very different from that ofthe period of Erasmus; but in his view it differed only because thecontemporaries of Dryden had more thoroughly dispersed the mists of thebarbarism which still obscured the Shakspearean age, and from which evenMilton or Cowley had not completely escaped. Dryden and Boileau and theFrench critics, with their interpreters Roscommon, Sheffield, and Walsh, who found rules in Aristotle, and drew their precedents from Homer, were at last stating the pure canons of unadulterated sense. To thisschool, wit and sense, and nature, and the classics, all meant prettymuch the same. That was pronounced to be unnatural which was too silly, or too far-fetched, or too exalted, to approve itself to the good senseof a wit; and the very incarnation and eternal type of good sense andnature was to be found in the classics. The test of thorough polish andrefinement was the power of ornamenting a speech with an appropriatephrase from Horace or Virgil, or prefixing a Greek motto to an essay inthe _Spectator_. If it was necessary to give to any utterance an air ofphilosophical authority, a reference to Longinus or Aristotle was thenatural device. Perhaps the acquaintance with classics might not be veryprofound; but the classics supplied at least a convenient symbol for thespirit which had triumphed against Gothic barbarism and scholasticpedantry. 

Even the priggish wits of that day were capable of being bored bydidactic poetry, and especially by such didactic poetry as resolveditself too easily into a string of maxims, not more poetical insubstance than the immortal "'Tis a sin to steal a pin. " Theessay--published anonymously--did not make any rapid success till Popesent round copies to well-known critics. Addison's praise and Dennis'sabuse helped, as we shall presently see, to give it notoriety. Pope, however, returned from criticism to poetry, and his next performance wasin some degree a fresh, but far less puerile, performance upon thepastoral pipe. [4] Nothing could be more natural than for the young poetto take for a text the forest in which he lived. Dull as the nativesmight be, their dwelling-place was historical, and there was anexcellent precedent for such a performance. Pope, as we have seen, wasfamiliar with Milton's juvenile poems; but such works as the Allegro andPenseroso were too full of the genuine country spirit to suit hisprobable audience. Wycherley, whom he frequently invited to come toBinfield, would undoubtedly have found Milton a bore. But Sir JohnDenham, a thoroughly masculine, if not, as Pope calls him, a majesticpoet, was a guide whom the Wycherleys would respect. His _Cooper's Hill_(in 1642) was the first example of what Johnson calls localpoetry--poetry, that is, devoted to the celebration of a particularplace; and, moreover, it was one of the early models of the rhythm whichbecame triumphant in the hands of Dryden. One couplet is stillfamiliar:--

 Though deep, yet clear; though gentle, yet not dull; Strong without rage; without o'erflowing, full. 

The poem has some vigorous descriptive touches, but is in the main aforcible expression of the moral and political reflections which wouldbe approved by the admirers of good sense in poetry. 

Pope's _Windsor Forest_, which appeared in the beginning of 1713, isclosely and avowedly modelled upon this original. There is still aconsiderable infusion of the puerile classicism of the Pastorals, whichcontrasts awkwardly with Denham's strength, and a silly episode aboutthe nymph Lodona changed into the river Loddon by Diana, to save herfrom the pursuit of Pan. But the style is animated, and thedescriptions, though seldom original, show Pope's frequent felicity oflanguage. Wordsworth, indeed, was pleased to say that Pope had hereintroduced almost the only "new images of internal nature" to be foundbetween Milton and Thomson. Probably the good Wordsworth was wishing todo a little bit of excessive candour. Pope will not introduce hisscenery without a turn suited to the taste of the town:--

 Here waving groves a chequer'd scene display, And part admit and part exclude the day; As some coy nymph her lover's fond address, Nor quite indulges nor can quite repress. 

He has some well turned lines upon the sports of the forest, though theyare clearly not the lines of a sportsman. They betray something of thesensitive lad's shrinking from the rough squires whose only literatureconsisted of Durfey's songs, and who would have heartily laughed at hissympathy for a dying pheasant. I may observe in passing that Pope alwaysshowed the true poet's tenderness for the lower animals, and disgust atbloodshed. He loved his dog, and said that he would have inscribed overhis grave, "O rare Bounce, " but for the appearance of ridiculing "rareBen Jonson. " He spoke with horror of a contemporary dissector of livedogs, and the pleasantest of his papers in the _Guardian_ is a warmremonstrance against cruelty to animals. He "dares not" attack hunting, he says--and, indeed, such an attack requires some courage even at thepresent day--but he evidently has no sympathy with huntsmen, and has toborrow his description from Statius, which was hardly the way to get thetrue local colour. _Windsor Forest_, however, like _Cooper's Hill_, speedily diverges into historical and political reflections. Thebarbarity of the old forest laws, the poets Denham and Cowley andSurrey, who had sung on the banks of the Thames, and the heroes whomade Windsor illustrious, suggest obvious thoughts, put into versesoften brilliant, though sometimes affected, varied by a compliment toTrumbull and an excessive eulogy of Granville, to whom the poem isinscribed. The whole is skilfully adapted to the time by a brillianteulogy upon the peace which was concluded just as the poem waspublished. The Whig poet Tickell, soon to be Pope's rival, wascelebrating the same "lofty theme" on his "artless reed, " andintroducing a pretty little compliment to Pope. To readers who have lostthe taste for poetry of this class one poem may seem about as good asthe other; but Pope's superiority is plain enough to a reader who willcondescend to distinguish. His verses are an excellent specimen of hisdeclamatory style--polished, epigrammatic, and well expressed; and, though keeping far below the regions of true poetry, preserving justthat level which would commend them to the literary statesmen and thepoliticians at Will's and Button's. Perhaps some advocate of Free Trademight try upon a modern audience the lines in which Pope expresses hisaspiration in a footnote that London may one day become a "FREE PORT. "There is at least not one antiquated or obscure phrase in the whole. Here are half-a-dozen lines:--

 The time shall come, when, free as seas and wind, Unbounded Thames shall flow for all mankind, Whole nations enter with each swelling tide, And seas but join the regions they divide; Earth's distant ends our glory shall behold, And the new world launch forth to seek the old. 

In the next few years Pope found other themes for the display of hisdeclamatory powers. Of the _Temple of Fame_ (1715), a frigid imitationof Chaucer, I need only say that it is one of Pope's least successfulperformances; but I must notice more fully two rhetorical poems whichappeared in 1717. These were the _Elegy to the Memory of an UnfortunateLady_ and the _Eloisa to Abelard_. Both poems, and especially the last, have received the warmest praises from Pope's critics, and even fromcritics who were most opposed to his school. They are, in fact, hischief performances of the sentimental kind. Written in his youth, andyet when his powers of versification had reached their fullest maturity, they represent an element generally absent from his poetry. Pope was atthe period in which, if ever, a poet should sing of love, and in whichwe expect the richest glow and fervour of youthful imagination. Pope wasneither a Burns, nor a Byron, nor a Keats; but here, if anywhere, weshould find those qualities in which he has most affinity to the poetsof passion or of sensuous emotion, not soured by experience or purifiedby reflection. The motives of the two poems were skilfully chosen. Pope--as has already appeared to some extent--was rarely original in hisdesigns; he liked to have the outlines at last drawn for him, to befilled with his own colouring. The _Eloisa to Abelard_ was founded upona translation from the French, published in 1714 by Hughes (author ofthe _Siege of Damascus_), which is itself a manipulated translation fromthe famous Latin originals. Pope, it appears, kept very closely to thewords of the English translation, and in some places has done littlemore than versify the prose, though, of course, it is compressed, rearranged, and modified. The _Unfortunate Lady_ has been the cause of agood deal of controversy. Pope's elegy implies, vaguely enough, that shehad been cruelly treated by her guardians, and had committed suicide insome foreign country. The verses, as commentators decided, showed suchgenuine feeling, that the story narrated in them must have beenauthentic, and one of his own correspondents (Caryll) begged him for anexplanation of the facts. Pope gave no answer, but left a posthumousnote to an edition of his letters calculated, perhaps intended, tomystify future inquirers. The lady, a Mrs. Weston, to whom the notepointed, did not die till 1724, and could therefore not have committedsuicide in 1717. The mystification was childish enough, though if Popehad committed no worse crime of the kind, one would not consider him tobe a very grievous offender. The inquiries of Mr. Dilke, who cleared upthis puzzle, show that there were in fact two ladies, Mrs. Weston and aMrs. Cope, known to Pope about this time, both of whom suffered undersome domestic persecution. Pope seems to have taken up their cause withenergy, and sent money to Mrs. Cope when, at a later period, she wasdying abroad in great distress. His zeal seems to have been sincere andgenerous, and it is possible enough that the elegy was a reflection ofhis feelings, though it suggested an imaginary state of facts. If thisbe so, the reference to the lady in his posthumous note contained somerelation to the truth, though if taken too literally it would bemisleading. 

The poems themselves are, beyond all doubt, impressive compositions. They are vivid and admirably worked. "Here, " says Johnson of the _Eloisato Abelard_, the most important of the two, "is particularly observablethe _curiosa felicitas_, a fruitful soil and careful cultivation. Hereis no crudeness of sense, nor asperity of language. " So far there can beno dispute. The style has the highest degree of technical perfection, and it is generally added that the poems are as pathetic as they areexquisitely written. Bowles, no hearty lover of Pope, declared theEloisa to be "infinitely superior to everything of the kind, ancient ormodern. " The tears shed, says Hazlitt of the same poem, "are dropsgushing from the heart; the words are burning sighs breathed from thesoul of love. " And De Quincey ends an eloquent criticism by declaringthat the "lyrical tumult of the changes, the hope, the tears, therapture, the penitence, the despair, place the reader in tumultuoussympathy with the poor distracted nun. " The pathos of the _UnfortunateLady_ has been almost equally praised, and I may quote from it a famouspassage which Mackintosh repeated with emotion to repel a charge ofcoldness brought against Pope:--

 By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed, By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed, By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn'd, By strangers honour'd and by strangers mourn'd! What though no friends in sable weeds appear, Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year, And bear about the mockery of woe To midnight dances and the public show? What though no weeping loves thy ashes grace, Nor polish'd marble emulate thy face? What though no sacred earth allow thee room, Nor hallow'd dirge be mutter'd o'er thy tomb? Yet shall thy grave with rising flowers be dress'd, And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast; There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow, There the first roses of the year shall blow; While angels with their silver wings o'ershade The ground, now sacred by thy reliques made. 

The more elaborate poetry of the _Eloisa_ is equally polishedthroughout, and too much praise cannot easily be bestowed upon the skillwith which the romantic scenery of the convent is indicated in thebackground, and the force with which Pope has given the revulsions offeeling of his unfortunate heroine from earthly to heavenly love, andfrom keen remorse to renewed gusts of overpowering passion. All this maybe said, and without opposing high critical authority. And yet, I mustalso say, whether with or without authority, that I, at least, can readthe poems without the least "disposition to cry, " and that a singlepathetic touch of Cowper or Wordsworth strikes incomparably deeper. Andif I seek for a reason, it seems to be simply that Pope never crossesthe undefinable, but yet ineffaceable, line which separates true poetryfrom rhetoric. The Eloisa ends rather flatly by one of Pope'scharacteristic aphorisms. "He best can paint them (the woes, that is, ofEloisa) who shall feel them most;" and it is characteristic, by the way, that even in these his most impassioned verses, the lines which oneremembers are of the same epigrammatic stamp, e. G. :

 A heap of dust alone remains of thee, 'Tis all thou art and all the proud shall be!

 I mourn the lover, not lament the fault. 

 How happy is the blameless vestal's lot, The world forgetting, by the world forgot. 

The worker in moral aphorisms cannot forget himself even in the fullswing of his fervid declamation. I have no doubt that Pope so farexemplified his own doctrine that he truly felt whilst he was writing. His feelings make him eloquent, but they do not enable him to "snatch agrace beyond the reach of art, " to blind us for a moment to the presenceof the consummate workman, judiciously blending his colours, heighteninghis effects, and skilfully managing his transitions or consciouslyintroducing an abrupt outburst of a new mood. The smoothness of theverses imposes monotony even upon the varying passions which aresupposed to struggle in Eloisa's breast. It is not merely our knowledgethat Pope is speaking dramatically which prevents us from receiving thesame kind of impressions as we receive from poetry--such, for example, as some of Cowper's minor pieces--into which we know that a man isreally putting his whole heart. The comparison would not be fair, for insuch cases we are moved by knowledge of external facts as well as by thepoetic power. But it is simply that Pope always resembles an oratorwhose gestures are studied, and who thinks while he is speaking of thefall of his robes and the attitude of his hands. He is throughoutacademical; and though knowing with admirable nicety how grief should berepresented, and what have been the expedients of his best predecessors, he misses the one essential touch of spontaneous impulse. 

One other blemish is perhaps more fatal to the popularity of the Eloisa. There is a taint of something unwholesome and effeminate. Pope, it istrue, is only following the language of the original in the mostoffensive passages; but we see too plainly that he has dwelt too fondlyupon those passages, and worked them up with especial care. We need notbe prudish in our judgment of impassioned poetry; but when the passionhas this false ring, the ethical coincides with the ĉsthetic objection. 

I have mentioned these poems here, because they seem to be thedevelopment of the rhetorical vein which appeared in the earlier work. But I have passed over another work which has sometimes been regarded ashis masterpiece. A Lord Petre had offended a Miss Fermor by stealing alock of her hair. She thought that he showed more gallantry thancourtesy, and some unpleasant feeling resulted between the families. Pope's friend, Caryll, thought that it might be appeased if the youngpoet would turn the whole affair into friendly ridicule. Nobody, itmight well be supposed, had a more dexterous touch; and a brillianttrifle from his hands, just fitted for the atmosphere of drawing-rooms, would be a convenient peace-offering, and was the very thing in which hemight be expected to succeed. Pope accordingly set to work at a daintylittle mock-heroic, in which he describes, in playful mockery of theconventional style, the fatal coffee-drinking at Hampton, in which thetoo daring peer appropriated the lock. The poem received the praisewhich it well deserved; for certainly the young poet had executed histask to a nicety. No more brilliant, sparkling, vivacious trifle, is tobe found in our literature than the _Rape of the Lock_, even in thisearly form. Pope received permission from the lady to publish it inLintot's Miscellany in 1712, and a wider circle admired it, though itseems that the lady and her family began to think that young Mr. Popewas making rather too free with her name. Pope meanwhile, animated byhis success, hit upon a singularly happy conception, by which he thoughtthat the poem might be rendered more important. The solid critics ofthose days were much occupied with the machinery of epic poems; themachinery being composed of the gods and goddesses who, from the days ofHomer, had attended to the fortunes of heroes. He had hit upon a curiousFrench book, the _Comte de Gabalis_, which professes to reveal themysteries of the Rosicrucians, and it occurred to him that the elementalsylphs and gnomes would serve his purpose admirably. He spoke of his newdevice to Addison, who administered--and there is not the slightestreason for doubting his perfect sincerity and good meaning--a littledose of cold water. The poem, as it stood, was a "delicious littlething"--_merum sal_--and it would be a pity to alter it. Pope, however, adhered to his plan, made a splendid success, and thought that Addisonmust have been prompted by some mean motive. The _Rape of the Lock_appeared in its new form, with sylphs and gnomes, and an ingeniousaccount of a game at cards and other improvements, in 1714. Popedeclared, and critics have agreed, that he never showed more skill thanin the remodelling of this poem; and it has ever since held a kind ofrecognised supremacy amongst the productions of the drawing-room muse. 

The reader must remember that the so-called heroic style of Pope'speriod is now hopelessly effete. No human being would care aboutmachinery and the rules of Bossu, or read without utter weariness themechanical imitations of Homer and Virgil which were occasionallyattempted by the Blackmores and other less ponderous versifiers. Theshadow grows dim with the substance. The burlesque loses its point whenwe care nothing for the original; and, so far, Pope's bit offiligree-work, as Hazlitt calls it, has become tarnished. The verymention of beaux and belles suggests the kind of feeling with which wedisinter fragments of old-world finery from the depths of an ancientcabinet, and even the wit is apt to sound wearisome. And further, itmust be allowed to some hostile critics that Pope has a worse defect. The poem is, in effect, a satire upon feminine frivolity. It continuesthe strain of mockery against hoops and patches and their wearers, whichsupplied Addison and his colleagues with the materials of so many_Spectators_. I think that even in Addison there is something whichrather jars upon us. His persiflage is full of humour and kindliness, but underlying it there is a tone of superiority to women which issometimes offensive. It is taken for granted that a woman is a fool, orat least should be flattered if any man condescends to talk sense toher. With Pope this tone becomes harsher, and the merciless satiristbegins to show himself. In truth, Pope can be inimitably pungent, but hecan never be simply playful. Addison was too condescending with hispretty pupils; but under Pope's courtesy there lurks contempt, and hissmile has a disagreeable likeness to a sneer. If Addison's mannersometimes suggests the blandness of a don who classes women with theinferior beings unworthy of the Latin grammar, Pope suggests thebrilliant wit whose contempt has a keener edge from his resentmentagainst fine ladies blinded to his genius by his personal deformity. 

Even in his dedication, Pope, with unconscious impertinence, insults hisheroine for her presumable ignorance of his critical jargon. His smartepigrams want but a slight change of tone to become satire. It is thesame writer who begins an essay on women's characters by telling a womanthat her sex is a compound of

 Matter too soft a lasting mask to bear; And best distinguished by black, brown, or fair, and communicates to her the pleasant truth that

 Every woman is at heart a rake. 

Women, in short, are all frivolous beings, whose one genuine interest isin love-making. The same sentiment is really implied in the more playfullines in the _Rape of the Lock_. The sylphs are warned by omens thatsome misfortune impends; but they don't know what. 

 Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law, Or some frail china jar receive a flaw; Or stain her honour or her new brocade, Forget her prayers or miss a masquerade; Or lose her heart or necklace at a ball, Or whether heaven has doom'd that Shock must fall. 

We can understand that Miss Fermor would feel such raillery to beequivocal. It may be added, that an equal want of delicacy is implied inthe mock-heroic battle at the end, where the ladies are gifted with anexcess of screaming power:--

 'Restore the lock!' she cries, and all around 'Restore the lock, ' the vaulted roofs rebound-- Not fierce Othello in so loud a strain Roar'd for the handkerchief that caused his pain. 

These faults, though far from trifling, are yet felt only as blemishesin the admirable beauty and brilliance of the poem. The successivescenes are given with so firm and clear a touch--there is such a senseof form, the language is such a dexterous elevation of the ordinarysocial twaddle into the mock-heroic, that it is impossible not torecognize a consummate artistic power. The dazzling display of true witand fancy blinds us for the time to the want of that real tenderness andhumour, which would have softened some harsh passages, and given a moreenduring charm to the poetry. It has, in short, the merit that belongsto any work of art which expresses in the most finished form thesentiment characteristic of a given social phase; one deficient in manyof the most ennobling influences, but yet one in which the arts ofconverse represent a very high development of shrewd sense refined intovivid wit. And we may, I think, admit that there is some foundation forthe genealogy that traces Pope's Ariel back to his more elevatedancestor in the _Tempest_. The later Ariel, indeed, is regarded as thesoul of a coquette, and is almost an allegory of the spirit of poeticfancy in slavery to polished society. 

 Gums and pomatums shall his flight restrain While clogg'd he beats his silken wings in vain. 

Pope's Ariel is a parody of the ethereal being into whom Shakspeare hadrefined the ancient fairy; but it is a parody which still preserves asense of the delicate and graceful. The ancient race which appeared forthe last time in this travesty of the fashion of Queen Anne, stillshowed some touch of its ancient beauty. Since that time no fairy hasappeared without being hopelessly childish or affected. 

Let us now turn from the poems to the author's personal career duringthe same period. In the remarkable autobiographic poem called the_Epistle to Arbuthnot_, Pope speaks of his early patrons and friends, and adds--

 Soft were my numbers; who could take offence When pure description held the place of sense? Like gentle Fanny's was my flow'ry theme, A painted mistress or a purling stream. Yet then did Gildon draw his venal quill-- I wish'd the man a dinner, and sat still. Yet then did Dennis rave in furious fret; I never answer'd, --I was not in debt. 

Pope's view of his own career suggests the curious problem: how it cameto pass that so harmless a man should be the butt of so manyhostilities? How could any man be angry with a writer of gentlepastorals and versified love-letters? The answer of Pope was, that thiswas the normal state of things. "The life of a wit, " he says, in thepreface to his works, "is a warfare upon earth;" and the warfare resultsfrom the hatred of men of genius natural to the dull. Had any one elsemade such a statement, Pope would have seen its resemblance to thecomplaint of the one reasonable juryman overpowered by eleven obstinatefellows. But we may admit that an intensely sensitive nature is a badqualification for a public career. A man who ventures into the throng ofcompetitors without a skin will be tortured by every touch, and sufferthe more if he turns to retaliate. 

Pope's first literary performances had not been so harmless as hesuggests. Amongst the minor men of letters of the day was the surly JohnDennis. He was some thirty years Pope's senior; a writer of drearytragedies which had gained a certain success by their Whiggishtendencies, and of ponderous disquisitions upon critical questions, notmuch cruder in substance though heavier in form than many utterances ofAddison or Steele. He could, however, snarl out some shrewd things whenprovoked, and was known to the most famous wits of the day. He hadcorresponded with Dryden, Congreve, and Wycherley, and published some oftheir letters. Pope, it seems, had been introduced to him by Cromwell, but they had met only two or three times. When Pope had become ashamedof following Wycherley about like a dog, he would soon find out that aDennis did not deserve the homage of a rising genius. Possibly Dennishad said something of Pope's Pastorals, and Pope had probably been awitness, perhaps more than a mere witness, to some passage of arms inwhich Dennis lost his temper. In mere youthful impertinence heintroduced an offensive touch in the _Essay upon Criticism_. It would bewell, he said, if critics could advise authors freely, --

 But Appius reddens at each word you speak, And stares, tremendous, with a threatening eye, Like some fierce tyrant in old tapestry. 

The name Appius referred to Dennis's tragedy of _Appius and Virginia_, apiece now recollected solely by the fact that poor Dennis had inventedsome new thunder for the performance; and by his piteous complaintagainst the actors for afterwards "stealing his thunder, " had started aproverbial expression. Pope's reference stung Dennis to the quick. Hereplied by a savage pamphlet, pulling Pope's essay to pieces, andhitting some real blots, but diverging into the coarsest personal abuse. Not content with saying in his preface that he was attacked with theutmost falsehood and calumny by a little affected hypocrite, who hadnothing in his mouth but truth, candour, and good-nature, he reviledPope for his personal defects; insinuated that he was a hunch-backedtoad; declared that he was the very shape of the bow of the god of love;that he might be thankful that he was born a modern, for had he beenborn of Greek parents his life would have been no longer than that ofone of his poems, namely, half a day; and that his outward form, howeverlike a monkey's, could not deviate more from the average of humanitythan his mind. These amenities gave Pope his first taste of good savageslashing abuse. The revenge was out of all proportion to the offence. Pope, at first, seemed to take the assault judiciously. He kept silence, and simply marked some of the faults exposed by Dennis for alteration. But the wound rankled, and when an opportunity presently offered itself, Pope struck savagely at his enemy. To show how this came to pass, I mustrise from poor old Dennis to a more exalted literary sphere. 

The literary world, in which Dryden had recently been, and Pope was soonto be, the most conspicuous figure, was for the present under the milddictatorship of Addison. We know Addison as one of the most kindly anddelicate of humourists, and we can perceive the gentleness which madehim one of the most charming of companions in a small society. His senseof the ludicrous saved him from the disagreeable ostentation of powerswhich were never applied to express bitterness of feeling or to edgeangry satire. The reserve of his sensitive nature made access difficult, but he was so transparently modest and unassuming that his shyness wasnot, as is too often the case, mistaken for pride. It is easy tounderstand the posthumous affection which Macaulay has so eloquentlyexpressed, and the contemporary popularity which, according to Swift, would have made people unwilling to refuse him had he asked to be king. And yet I think that one cannot read Addison's praises without a certainrecalcitration, like that which one feels in the case of the model boywho wins all the prizes, including that for good conduct. It is hard tofeel very enthusiastic about a virtue whose dictates coincide soprecisely with the demands of decorum, and which leads by so easy a pathto reputation and success. Popularity is more often significant of thetact which makes a man avoid giving offence, than of the warm impulsesof a generous nature. A good man who mixes with the world ought to behated, if not to hate. But whatever we may say against his excessivegoodness, Addison deserved and received universal esteem, which in somecases became enthusiastic. Foremost amongst his admirers was thewarm-hearted, reckless, impetuous Steele, the typical Irishman; andamongst other members of his little senate--as Pope called it--wereAmbrose Philips and Tickell, young men of letters and sound Whigpolitics, and more or less competitors of Pope in literature. When Popewas first becoming known in London the Whigs were out of power; Addisonand his friends were generally to be found at Button's Coffee-house inthe afternoon, and were represented to the society of the time by the_Spectator_, which began in March, 1711, and appeared daily to the endof 1712. Naturally, the young Pope would be anxious to approach thisfamous clique, though his connexions lay in the first instance amongstthe Jacobite and Catholic families. Steele, too, would be glad towelcome so promising a contributor to the _Spectator_ and its successorthe _Guardian_. 

Pope, we may therefore believe, was heartily delighted when, some monthsafter Dennis's attack, a notice of his _Essay upon Criticism_ appearedin the _Spectator_, December 20, 1711. The reviewer censured someattacks upon contemporaries--a reference obviously to the lines uponDennis--which the author had admitted into his "very fine poem;" butthere were compliments enough to overbalance this slight reproof. Popewrote a letter of acknowledgment to Steele, overflowing with thesincerest gratitude of a young poet on his first recognition by a highauthority. Steele, in reply, disclaimed the article, and promised tointroduce Pope to its real author, the great Addison himself. It doesnot seem that the acquaintance thus opened with the Addisonians ripenedvery rapidly, or led to any considerable results. Pope, indeed, is saidto have written some _Spectators_. He certainly sent to Steele his_Messiah_, a sacred eclogue in imitation of Virgil's _Pollio_. Itappeared on May 14th, 1712, and is one of Pope's dexterous pieces ofworkmanship, in which phrases from Isaiah are so strung together as toform a good imitation of the famous poem, which was once supposed toentitle Virgil to some place among the inspired heralds of Christianity. Pope sent another letter or two to Steele, which look very much likeintended contributions to the _Spectator_, and a short letter aboutHadrian's verses to his soul, which appeared in November, 1712. When, in1713, the _Guardian_ succeeded the _Spectator_, Pope was one of Steele'scontributors, and a paper by him upon dedications appeared as the fourthnumber. He soon gave a more remarkable proof of his friendly relationswith Addison. 

It is probable that no first performance of a play upon the Englishstage ever excited so much interest as that of Addison's _Cato_. It wasnot only the work of the first man of letters of the day, but it had, orwas taken to have, a certain political significance. "The time wascome, " says Johnson, "when those who affected to think liberty in dangeraffected likewise to think that a stage-play might preserve it. "Addison, after exhibiting more than the usual display of reluctance, prepared his play for representation, and it was undoubtedly taken to bein some sense a Whig manifesto. It was therefore remarkable that heshould have applied to Pope for a prologue, though Pope's connexionswere entirely of the anti-Whiggish kind, and a passage in _WindsorForest_, his last new poem (it appeared in March 1713), indicated prettyplainly a refusal to accept the Whig shibboleths. In the _Forest_ he wasenthusiastic for the peace, and sneered at the Revolution. Popeafterwards declared that Addison had disavowed all party intentions atthe time, and he accused him of insincerity for afterwards taking credit(in a poetical dedication of _Cato_) for the services rendered by hisplay to the cause of liberty. Pope's assertion is worthless in any casewhere he could exalt his own character for consistency at another man'sexpense, but it is true that both parties were inclined to equivocate. It is, indeed, difficult to understand how, if any "stage-play couldpreserve liberty, " such a play as _Cato_ should do the work. Thepolished declamation is made up of the platitudes common to Whigs andTories; and Bolingbroke gave the one to his own party when he presentedfifty guineas to _Cato_'s representative for defending the cause ofliberty so well against a perpetual dictator. The Whigs, said Pope, design a second present when they can contrive as good a saying. Bolingbroke was, of course, aiming at Marlborough, and hisinterpretation was intrinsically as plausible as any that could havebeen devised by his antagonists. Each side could adopt _Cato_ as easilyas rival sects can quote the Bible; and it seems possible that Addisonmay have suggested to Pope that nothing in _Cato_ could really offendhis principles. Addison, as Pope also tells us, thought the prologueambiguous, and altered "Britons, _arise_!" to "Britons, _attend_!" lestthe phrase should be thought to hint at a new revolution. Addisonadvised Pope about this time not to be content with the applause of"half the nation, " and perhaps regarded him as one who, by the fact ofhis external position with regard to parties, would be a moreappropriate sponsor for the play. 

Whatever the intrinsic significance of _Cato_, circumstances gave it apolitical colour; and Pope, in a lively description of the firsttriumphant night to his friend Caryll, says, that as author of thesuccessful and very spirited prologue, he was clapped into a Whig, sorely against his will, at every two lines. Shortly before he hadspoken in the warmest terms to the same correspondent of the admirablemoral tendency of the work; and perhaps he had not realized the fullparty significance till he became conscious of the impression producedupon the audience. Not long afterwards (letter of June 12, 1713), wefind him complaining that his connexion with Steele and the _Guardian_was giving offence to some honest Jacobites. Had they known the natureof the connexion, they need hardly have grudged Steele his contributor. His next proceedings possibly suggested the piece of advice whichAddison gave to Lady M. W. Montagu: "Leave Pope as soon as you can; hewill certainly play you some devilish trick else. "

His first trick was calculated to vex an editor's soul. Ambrose Philips, as I have said, had published certain pastorals in the same volume withPope's. Philips, though he seems to have been less rewarded than most ofhis companions, was certainly accepted as an attached member ofAddison's "little senate;" and that body was not more free than othermutual admiration societies from the desire to impose its own prejudicesupon the public. When Philips's _Distressed Mother_, a close imitationof Racine's _Andromaque_, was preparing for the stage, the Spectator wastaken by Will Honeycomb to a rehearsal (_Spectator_, January 31, 1712), and Sir Roger de Coverley himself attended one of the performances(_Ib. _, March 25) and was profoundly affected by its pathos. The lastpaper was of course by Addison, and is a real triumph of art as a mostdelicate application of humour to the slightly unworthy purpose ofpuffing a friend and disciple. Addison had again praised Philips'sPastorals in the _Spectator_ (October 30, 1712), and amongst the earlynumbers of the _Guardian_ were a short series of papers upon pastoralpoetry, in which the fortunate Ambrose was again held up as a model, whilst no notice was taken of Pope's rival performance. Pope, one maybelieve, had a contempt for Philips, whose pastoral inanities, whetherbetter or worse than his own, had not the excuse of being youthfulproductions. Philips has bequeathed to our language the phrase"Namby-pamby, " imposed upon him by Henry Carey (author of _Sally in ourAlley_, and the clever farce _Chrononhotonthologos_), and years afterthis he wrote a poem to Miss Pulteney in the nursery, beginning, --

 "Dimply damsel, sweetly smiling, "

which may sufficiently interpret the meaning of his nickname. Pope'sirritable vanity was vexed at the liberal praises bestowed on such arival, and he revenged himself by an artifice more ingenious thanscrupulous. He sent an anonymous article to Steele for the _Guardian_. It is a professed continuation of the previous papers on pastorals, andis ostensibly intended to remove the appearance of partiality arisingfrom the omission of Pope's name. In the first paragraphs the design issufficiently concealed to mislead an unwary reader into the belief thatPhilips is preferred to Pope; but the irony soon becomes transparent, and Philips's antiquated affectation is contrasted with the polish ofPope, who is said even to "deviate into downright poetry. " Steele, it issaid, was so far mystified as to ask Pope's permission to publish thecriticism. Pope generously permitted, and accordingly Steele printedwhat he must soon have discovered to be a shrewd attack upon his oldfriend and ally. Some writers have found a difficulty in understandinghow Steele could have so blundered. One might, perhaps, whisper inconfidence to the discreet, that even editors are mortal, and thatSteele was conceivably capable of the enormity of reading paperscarelessly. Philips was furious, and hung up a birch in Button'sCoffee-house, declaring that he would apply it to his tormentor shouldhe ever show his nose in the room. As Philips was celebrated for skillwith the sword, the mode of vengeance was certainly unmanly, and stungthe soul of his adversary, always morbidly sensitive to all attacks, andespecially to attacks upon his person. The hatred thus kindled was neverquenched, and breathes in some of Pope's bitterest lines. 

If not a "devilish trick, " this little performance was enough to makePope's relations to the Addison set decidedly unpleasant. Addison issaid (but the story is very improbable) to have enjoyed the joke. If so, a vexatious incident must have changed his view of Pope's pleasantries, though Pope professedly appeared as his defender. Poor oldThersites-Dennis published, during the summer, a very bitter attack uponAddison's _Cato_. He said afterwards--though, considering the relationsof the men, some misunderstanding is probable--that Pope had indirectlyinstigated this attack through the bookseller, Lintot. If so, Pope musthave deliberately contrived the trap for the unlucky Dennis; and, at anyrate, he fell upon Dennis as soon as the trap was sprung. Though Denniswas a hot-headed Whig, he had quarrelled with Addison and Steele, andwas probably jealous, as the author of tragedies intended, like _Cato_, to propagate Whig principles, perhaps to turn Whig prejudices toaccount. He writes with the bitterness of a disappointed and unluckyman, but he makes some very fair points against his enemy. Pope'sretaliation took the form of an anonymous "Narrative of the Frenzy ofJohn Dennis. "[5] It is written in that style of coarse personal satireof which Swift was a master, but for which Pope was very ill fitted. Allhis neatness of style seems to desert him when he tries this tone, andnothing is left but a brutal explosion of contemptuous hatred. Dennis isdescribed in his garret, pouring forth insane ravings prompted by hisdisgust at the success of _Cato_; but not a word is said in reply toDennis' criticisms. It was plain enough that the author, whoever hemight be, was more anxious to satisfy a grudge against Dennis than todefend Dennis's victim. It is not much of a compliment to Addison to saythat he had enough good feeling to scorn such a mode of retaliation, andperspicuity enough to see that it would be little to his credit. Accordingly, in his majestic way, he caused Steele to write a note toLintot (August 4, 1713), disavowing all complicity, and saying that ifeven he noticed Mr. Dennis's criticisms, it should be in such a way asto give Mr. Dennis no cause of complaint. He added that he had refusedto see the pamphlet when it was offered for his inspection, and hadexpressed his disapproval of such a mode of attack. Nothing could bemore becoming; and it does not appear that Addison knew, when writingthis note, that Pope was the author of the anonymous assault. If, as thebiographers say, Addison's action was not kindly to Pope, it was barejustice to poor Dennis. Pope undoubtedly must have been bitterly vexedat the implied rebuff, and not the less because it was perfectly just. He seems always to have regarded men of Dennis's type as outside thepale of humanity. Their abuse stung him as keenly as if they had beenentitled to speak with authority, and yet he retorted it as though theywere not entitled to common decency. He would, to all appearance, haveregarded an appeal for mercy to a Grub-street author much as DandieDinmont regarded Brown's tenderness to a "brock"--as a proof ofincredible imbecility, or, rather, of want of proper antipathy tovermin. Dennis, like Philips, was inscribed on the long list of hishatreds; and was pursued almost to the end of his unfortunate life. Pope, it is true, took great credit to himself for helping his miserableenemy when dying in distress, and wrote a prologue to a play acted forhis benefit. Yet even this prologue is a sneer, and one is glad to thinkthat Dennis was past understanding it. We hardly know whether to pity orto condemn the unfortunate poet, whose unworthy hatreds made him sufferfar worse torments than those which he could inflict upon their objects. 

By this time we may suppose that Pope must have been regarded withanything but favour in the Addison circle; and, in fact, he was passinginto the opposite camp, and forming a friendship with Swift and Swift'spatrons. No open rupture followed with Addison for the present; but aquarrel was approaching which is, perhaps, the most celebrated in ourliterary history. Unfortunately, the more closely we look, the moredifficult it becomes to give any definite account of it. The statementsupon which accounts have been based have been chiefly those of Popehimself; and these involve inconsistencies and demonstrably inaccuratestatements. Pope was anxious in later life to show that he had enjoyedthe friendship of a man so generally beloved, and was equally anxious toshow that he had behaved generously and been treated with injustice and, indeed, with downright treachery. And yet, after reading the variousstatements made by the original authorities, one begins to doubt whetherthere was any real quarrel at all; or rather, if one may say so, whetherit was not a quarrel upon one side. 

It is, indeed, plain that a coolness had sprung up between Pope andAddison. Considering Pope's offences against the senate, his ridiculeof Philips, his imposition of that ridicule upon Steele, and hisindefensible use of Addison's fame as a stalking-horse in the attackupon Dennis, it is not surprising that he should have been kept at arm'slength. If the rod suspended by Philips at Button's be authentic (asseems probable), the talk about Pope, in the shadow of such an ornament, is easily imaginable. Some attempts seem to have been made at areconciliation. Jervas, Pope's teacher in painting--a bad artist, but akindly man--tells Pope on August 20, 1714, of a conversation withAddison. It would have been worth while, he says, for Pope to have beenhidden behind a wainscot or a half-length picture to have heard it. Addison expressed a wish for friendly relations, was glad that Pope hadnot been "carried too far among the enemy" by Swift, and hoped to be ofuse to him at Court--for Queen Anne died on August 1st; the wheel hadturned; and the Whigs were once more the distributors of patronage. Pope's answer to Jervas is in the dignified tone; he attributesAddison's coolness to the ill offices of Philips, and is ready to be onfriendly terms whenever Addison recognizes his true character andindependence of party. Another letter follows, as addressed by Pope toAddison himself; but here alas! if not in the preceding letters, we areupon doubtful ground. In fact, it is impossible to doubt that the letterhas been manipulated after Pope's fashion, if not actually fabricated. It is so dignified as to be insulting. It is like a box on the earadministered by a pedagogue to a repentant but not quite pardoned pupil. Pope has heard (from Jervas, it is implied) of Addison's profession; heis glad to hope that the effect of some "late malevolences" isdisappearing; he will not believe (that is, he is strongly inclined tobelieve) that the author of _Cato_ could mean one thing and sayanother; he will show Addison his first two books of Homer as a proof ofthis confidence, and hopes that it will not be abused; he challengesAddison to point out the ill nature in the _Essay upon Criticism_; andwinds up by making an utterly irrelevant charge (as a proof, he says, ofhis own sincerity) of plagiarism against one of Addison's _Spectators_. Had such a letter been actually sent as it now stands, Addison's goodnature could scarcely have held out. As it is, we can only assume thatduring 1714 Pope was on such terms with the clique at Button's, that aquarrel would be a natural result. According to the ordinary account theoccasion presented itself in the next year. 

A translation of the first Iliad by Tickell appeared (in June, 1715)simultaneously with Pope's first volume. Pope had no right to complain. No man could be supposed to have a monopoly in the translation of Homer. Tickell had the same right to try his hand as Pope; and Pope fullyunderstood this himself. He described to Spence a conversation in whichAddison told him of Tickell's intended work. Pope replied that Tickellwas perfectly justified. Addison having looked over Tickell'stranslation of the first book, said that he would prefer not to seePope's, as it might suggest double dealing; but consented to read Pope'ssecond book, and praised it warmly. In all this, by Pope's own showing, Addison seems to have been scrupulously fair; and if he and the littlesenate preferred Tickell's work on its first appearance, they had a fullright to their opinion, and Pope triumphed easily enough to pardon them. "He was meditating a criticism upon Tickell, " says Johnson, "when hisadversary sank before him without a blow. " Pope's performance wasuniversally preferred, and even Tickell himself yielded by anticipation. He said, in a short preface, that he had abandoned a plan of translatingthe whole Iliad on finding that a much abler hand had undertaken thework, and that he only published this specimen to bespeak favour for atranslation of the Odyssey. It was, say Pope's apologists, an awkwardcircumstance that Tickell should publish at the same time as Pope, andthat is about all that they can say. It was, we may reply inStephenson's phrase, very awkward--for Tickell. In all this, in fact, itseems impossible for any reasonable man to discover anything of whichPope had the slightest ground of complaint; but his amazingly irritablenature was not to be calmed by reason. The bare fact that a translationof Homer appeared contemporaneously with his own, and that it came fromone of Addison's court, made him furious. He brooded over it, suspectedsome dark conspiracy against his fame, and gradually mistook his morbidfancies for solid inference. He thought that Tickell had been put up byAddison as his rival, and gradually worked himself into the furtherbelief that Addison himself had actually written the translation whichpassed under Tickell's name. It does not appear, so far as I know, whenor how this suspicion became current. Some time after Addison's death, in 1719, a quarrel took place between Tickell, his literary executor, and Steele. Tickell seemed to insinuate that Steele had not sufficientlyacknowledged his obligations to Addison, and Steele, in an angry retort, called Tickell the "reputed translator" of the first Iliad, andchallenged him to translate another book successfully. The innuendoshows that Steele, who certainly had some means of knowing, was willingto suppose that Tickell had been helped by Addison. The manuscript ofTickell's work, which has been preserved, is said to prove this to be anerror, and in any case there is no real ground for supposing thatAddison did anything more than he admittedly told Pope, that is, readTickell's manuscript and suggest corrections. 

To argue seriously about other so-called proofs, would be waste of time. They prove nothing except Pope's extreme anxiety to justify his wildhypothesis of a dark conspiracy. Pope was jealous, spiteful, andcredulous. He was driven to fury by Tickell's publication, which had theappearance of a competition. But angry as he was, he could find no realcause of complaint, except by imagining a fictitious conspiracy; andthis complaint was never publicly uttered till long after Addison'sdeath. Addison knew, no doubt, of Pope's wrath, but probably caredlittle for it, except to keep himself clear of so dangerous a companion. He seems to have remained on terms of civility with his antagonist, andno one would have been more surprised than he to hear of the quarrel, upon which so much controversy has been expended. 

The whole affair, so far as Addison's character is concerned, thusappears to be a gigantic mare's nest. There is no proof, or even theslightest presumption, that Addison or Addison's friends ever injuredPope, though it is clear that they did not love him. It would have beenmarvellous if they had. Pope's suspicions are a proof that in this casehe was almost subject to the illusion characteristic of actual insanity. The belief that a man is persecuted by hidden conspirators is one of thecommon symptoms in such cases; and Pope would seem to have been almostin the initial stage of mental disease. His madness, indeed, was notsuch as would lead us to call him morally irresponsible, nor was it thekind of madness which is to be found in a good many people who welldeserve criminal prosecution; but it was a state of mind so morbid as tojustify some compassion for the unhappy offender. 

One result besides the illustration of Pope's character remains to benoticed. According to Pope's assertion it was a communication from LordWarwick which led him to write his celebrated copy of verses uponAddison. Warwick (afterwards Addison's stepson) accused Addison ofpaying Gildon for a gross libel upon Pope. Pope wrote to Addison, hesays, the next day. He said in this letter that he knew of Addison'sbehaviour--and that, unwilling to take a revenge of the same kind, hewould rather tell Addison fairly of his faults in plain words. If he hadto take such a step, it would be in some such way as followed, and hesubjoined the first sketch of the famous lines. Addison, says Pope, usedhim very civilly ever afterwards. Indeed, if the account be true, Addison showed his Christian spirit by paying a compliment in one of his_Freeholders_ (May 17th, 1716) to Pope's Homer. 

Macaulay, taking the story for granted, praises Addison's magnanimity, which, I must confess, I should be hardly Christian enough to admire. Itwas however asserted at the time that Pope had not written the verseswhich have made the quarrel memorable till after Addison's death. Theywere not published till 1723, and are not mentioned by any independentauthority till 1722, though Pope afterwards appealed to Burlington as awitness to their earlier composition. The fact seems to be confirmed bythe evidence of Lady M. W. Montagu, but it does not follow that Addisonever saw the verses. He knew that Pope disliked him; but he probably didnot suspect the extent of the hostility. Pope himself appears not tohave devised the worst part of the story--that of Addison having usedTickell's name--till some years later. Addison was sufficientlymagnanimous in praising his spiteful little antagonist as it was; helittle knew how deeply that antagonist would seek to injure hisreputation. 

And here, before passing to the work which afforded the main pretext ofthe quarrel, it may be well to quote once more the celebrated satire. Itmay be remarked that its excellence is due in part to the fact that, foronce, Pope does not lose his temper. His attack is qualified and reallysharpened by an admission of Addison's excellence. It is therefore areal masterpiece of satire, not a simple lampoon. That it is anexaggeration is undeniable, and yet its very keenness gives apresumption that it is not altogether without foundation. 

 Peace to all such! but were there one whose fires True genius kindles and fair fame inspires; Blest with each talent and each art to please, And born to write, converse, and live with ease; Should such a man, too fond to rule alone, Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne: View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes, And hate for arts that caused himself to rise; Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault and hesitate dislike; Alike reserved to praise or to commend, A timorous foe and a suspicious friend; Dreading ev'n fools, by flatterers besieged, And so obliging that he ne'er obliged; Like Cato, give his little senate laws, And sit attentive to his own applause: While wits and templars every sentence raise, And wonder with a foolish face of praise; Who would not laugh if such a man there be? Who would not weep, if Atticus were he?

FOOTNOTES:

[3] Any poet who followed Bossu's rules, said Voltaire, might be certainthat no one would read him; happily it was impossible to follow them. 

[4] There is the usual contradiction as to the date of composition of_Windsor Forest_. Part seems to have been written early (Pope says1704), and part certainly not before 1712. 

[5] Mr. Dilke, it is perhaps right to say, has given some reasons fordoubting Pope's authorship of this squib; but the authenticity seems tobe established, and Mr. Dilke himself hesitates. 

CHAPTER III. 

POPE'S HOMER. 

Pope's uneasy relations with the wits at Button's were no obstacle tohis success elsewhere. Swift, now at the height of his power, waspleased by his _Windsor Forest_, recommended it to Stella, and soon madethe author's acquaintance. The first letter in their long correspondenceis a laboured but fairly successful piece of pleasantry from Pope, uponSwift's having offered twenty guineas to the young Papist to change hisreligion. It is dated December 8, 1713. In the preceding month BishopKennet saw Swift in all his glory, and wrote an often quoted descriptionof the scene. Swift was bustling about in the royal antechamber, swelling with conscious importance, distributing advice, promisingpatronage, whispering to ministers, and filling the whole room with hispresence. He finally "instructed a young nobleman that the best poet inEngland was Mr. Pope, a Papist, who had begun a translation of Homerinto English verse, for which he must have them all subscribe; 'for, 'says he, 'the author shall not begin to print till I have a thousandguineas for him!'" Swift introduced Pope to some of the leaders of theministry, and he was soon acquainted with Oxford, Bolingbroke, Atterbury, and many other men of high position. Pope was not disinclinedto pride himself upon his familiarity with the great, though boastingat the same time of his independence. In truth, the morbid vanity whichwas his cardinal weakness seems to have partaken sufficiently of thenature of genuine self-respect to preserve him from any unworthyconcessions. If he flattered, it was as one who expected to be repaid inkind; and though his position was calculated to turn the head of a youthof five-and-twenty, he took his place as a right without humiliating hisown dignity. Whether from principle or prudence, he judiciously kepthimself free from identification with either party, and both sides tooka pride in supporting the great literary undertaking which he had nowannounced. 

When Pope first circulated his proposals for translating Homer, Oxfordand Bolingbroke were fellow-ministers, and Swift was their mosteffective organ in the press. At the time at which his first volumeappeared, Bolingbroke was in exile, Oxford under impeachment, and Swifthad retired, savagely and sullenly, to his deanery. Yet, through all theintervening political tempest, the subscription list grew andflourished. The pecuniary result was splendid. No author had ever madeanything approaching the sum which Pope received, and very few authors, even in the present age of gold, would despise such payment. The detailsof the magnificent bargain have been handed down, and give the pecuniarymeasure of Pope's reputation. 

The Iliad was to be published in six volumes. For each volume Lintot wasto pay 200_l. _; and, besides this, he was to supply Pope gratuitouslywith the copies for his subscribers. The subscribers paid a guinea avolume, and as 575 subscribers took 654 copies, Pope received altogether5320_l. _ 4_s. _ at the regular price, whilst some royal and distinguishedsubscribers paid larger sums. By the publication of the Odyssey Popeseems to have made about 3500_l. _ more, [6] after paying his assistants. The result was, therefore, a total profit at least approaching 9000_l. _The last volume of the Odyssey did not appear till 1726, and thepayments were thus spread over eleven years. Pope, however, saved enoughto be more than comfortable. In the South Sea excitement he ventured tospeculate, but though for a time he fancied himself to have made a largesum, he seems to have retired rather a loser than a gainer. But he couldsay with perfect truth that, "thanks to Homer, " he "could live andthrive, indebted to no prince or peer alive. " The money success is, however, of less interest to us than the literary. Pope put his bestwork into the translation of the Iliad. His responsibility, he said, weighed upon him terribly on starting. He used to dream of being on along journey, uncertain which way to go, and doubting whether he wouldever get to the end. Gradually he fell into the habit of translatingthirty or forty verses before getting up, and then "piddling with it"for the rest of the morning; and the regular performance of his taskmade it tolerable. He used, he said at another time, to take advantageof the "first heat, " then correct by the original and othertranslations; and finally to "give it a reading for the versificationonly. " The statement must be partly modified by the suggestion that thetranslations were probably consulted before the original. Pope'signorance of Greek--an awkward qualification for a translator ofHomer--is undeniable. Gilbert Wakefield, who was, I believe, a fairscholar and certainly a great admirer of Pope, declares his convictionto be, after a more careful examination of the Homer than any one is nowlikely to give, that Pope "collected the general purport of everypassage from some of his predecessors--Dryden" (who only translated thefirst Iliad), "Dacier, Chapman, or Ogilby. " He thinks that Pope wouldhave been puzzled to catch at once the meaning even of the Latintranslation, and points out proofs of his ignorance of both languagesand of "ignominious and puerile mistakes. "

It is hard to understand at the present day the audacity which couldlead a man so ill qualified in point of classical acquirements toundertake such a task. And yet Pope undoubtedly achieved, in some truesense, an astonishing success. He succeeded commercially; for Lintot, after supplying the subscription copies gratuitously, and so losing thecream of the probable purchasers, made a fortune by the remaining sale. He succeeded in the judgment both of the critics and of the public ofthe next generation. Johnson calls the Homer "the noblest version ofpoetry the world has ever seen. " Gray declared that no other translationwould ever equal it, and Gibbon that it had every merit except that offaithfulness to the original. This merit of fidelity, indeed, wasscarcely claimed by any one. Bentley's phrase--"a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer"--expresses the uniform view taken fromthe first by all who could read both. Its fame, however, survived intothe present century. Byron speaks--and speaks, I think, with genuinefeeling--of the rapture with which he first read Pope as a boy, and saysthat no one will ever lay him down except for the original. Indeed, thetestimonies of opponents are as significant as those of admirers. Johnson remarks that the Homer "may be said to have tuned the Englishtongue, " and that no writer since its appearance has wanted melody. Coleridge virtually admits the fact, though drawing a differentconclusion, when he says that the translation of Homer has been one ofthe main sources of that "pseudo-poetic diction" which he and Wordsworthwere struggling to put out of credit. Cowper, the earliestrepresentative of the same movement, tried to supplant Pope's Homer byhis own, and his attempt proved at least the position held in generalestimation by his rival. If, in fact, Pope's Homer was a recognizedmodel for near a century, we may dislike the style, but we must admitthe power implied in a performance which thus became the acceptedstandard of style for the best part of a century. How, then, should weestimate the merits of this remarkable work? I give my own opinion uponthe subject with diffidence, for it has been discussed by eminentlyqualified critics. The conditions of a satisfactory translation of Homerhave been amply canvassed, and many experiments have been made byaccomplished poets who have what Pope certainly had not--a closeacquaintance with the original, and a fine appreciation of itssuperlative beauties. From the point of view now generally adopted, thetask even of criticism requires this double qualification. Not only canno man translate Homer, but no man can even criticize a translation ofHomer without being at once a poet and a fine classical scholar. So faras this is true, I can only apologize for speaking at all, and should becontent to refer my readers to such able guides as Mr. Matthew Arnoldand the late Professor Conington. And yet I think that something remainsto be said which has a bearing upon Pope, however little it may concernHomer. 

We--if "we" means modern writers of some classical culture--can claim toappreciate Homer far better than the contemporaries of Pope. But ourappreciation involves a clear recognition of the vast differencebetween ourselves and the ancient Greeks. We see the Homeric poems intheir true perspective through the dim vista of shadowy centuries. Weregard them as the growth of a long past stage in the historicalevolution; implying a different social order--a different ideal oflife--an archaic conception of the world and its forces, only to bereconstructed for the imagination by help of long training and seriousstudy. The multiplicity of the laws imposed upon the translator is theconsequence of this perception. They amount to saying that a man mustmanage to project himself into a distant period, and saturate his mindwith the corresponding modes of life. If the feat is possible at all, itrequires a great and conscious effort, and the attainment of a state ofmind which can only be preserved by constant attention. The translatorhas to wear a mask which is always in danger of being rudely shattered. Such an intellectual feat is likely to produce what, in the most obvioussense, one would call highly artificial work. Modern classicism must befine-spun, and smell rather of the hothouse than the open air. Undoubtedly some exquisite literary achievements have been accomplishedin this spirit; but they are, after all, calculated for the small circleof cultivated minds, and many of their merits can be appreciated only byprofessors qualified by special training. Most frequently we can hopefor pretty playthings, or, at best, for skilful restorations which showlearning and taste far more distinctly than a glowing imagination. Buteven if an original poet can breathe some spirit into classical poems, the poor translator, with the dread of philologists and antiquarians inthe back-ground, is so fettered that free movement becomes almostimpossible. No one, I should venture to prophesy, will really succeed insuch work unless he frankly accepts the impossibility of reproducingthe original, and aims only at an equivalent for some of its aspects. The perception of this change will enable us to realize Pope's mode ofapproaching the problem. The condemnatory epithet most frequentlyapplied to him is "artificial;" and yet, as I have just said, a moderntranslator is surely more artificial, so far as he is attempting a moreradical transformation of his own thoughts into the forms of a pastepoch. But we can easily see in what sense Pope's work fairly deservesthe name. The poets of an older period frankly adopted the classicalmythology without any apparent sense of incongruity. They mix heathendeities with Christian saints, and the ancient heroes adopt the mannersof chivalrous romance without the slightest difficulty. The freedom wasstill granted to the writers of the renaissance. Milton makes Phoebusand St. Peter discourse in successive stanzas, as if they belonged tothe same pantheon. For poetical purposes the old gods are simplycanonized as Christian saints, as, in a more theological frame of mind, they are regarded as devils. In the reign of common sense this was nolonger possible. The incongruity was recognized and condemned. The godswere vanishing under the clearer light, as modern thought began moreconsciously to assert its independence. Yet the unreality of the oldmythology is not felt to be any objection to their use as conventionalsymbols. Homer's gods, says Pope in his preface, are still the gods ofpoetry. Their vitality was nearly extinct; but they were regarded asconvenient personifications of abstract qualities, machines for epicpoetry, or figures to be used in allegory. In the absence of a truehistorical perception, the same view was attributed to Homer. Homer, asPope admits, did not invent the gods; but he was the "first who broughtthem into a system of machinery for poetry, " and showed his fertileimagination by clothing the properties of the elements, and the virtuesand vices in forms and persons. And thus Pope does not feel that he isdiverging from the spirit of the old mythology when he regards the gods, not as the spontaneous growth of the primitive imagination, but asdeliberate contrivances intended to convey moral truth in allegoricalfables, and probably devised by sages for the good of the vulgar. 

The old gods, then, were made into stiff mechanical figures, as drearyas Justice with her scales, or Fame blowing a trumpet on a monument. They belonged to that family of dismal personifications which it wascustomary to mark with the help of capital letters. Certainly they are adismal and frigid set of beings, though they still lead a shiveringexistence on the tops of public monuments, and hold an occasional wreathover the head of a British grenadier. To identify the Homeric gods withthese wearisome constructions was to have a more seriousdisqualification for fully entering into Homer's spirit than even animperfect acquaintance with Greek, and Pope is greatly exercised in hismind by their eating and drinking and fighting, and uncompromisinganthropomorphism. He apologizes for his author, and tries to excuse himfor unwilling compliance with popular prejudices. The Homeric theologyhe urges was still substantially sound, and Homer had always a distinctmoral and political purpose. The Iliad, for example, was meant to showthe wickedness of quarrelling, and the evil results of an insatiablethirst for glory, though shallow persons have thought that Homer onlythought to please. 

The artificial diction about which so much has been said is the naturalvehicle of this treatment. The set of phrases and the peculiar mouldinto which his sentences were cast, was already the accepted type forpoetry which aimed at dignity. He was following Dryden as his ownperformance became the law for the next generation. The style in which awoman is called a nymph--and women generally are "the fair"--in whichshepherds are conscious swains, and a poet invokes the muses and strikesa lyre, and breathes on a reed, and a nightingale singing becomesPhilomel "pouring her throat, " represents a fashion as worn out as hoopsand wigs. By the time of Wordsworth it was a mere survival--a dead formremaining after its true function had entirely vanished. The proposal toreturn to the language of common life was the natural revolt of one whodesired poetry to be above all things the genuine expression of realemotion. Yet it is, I think, impossible to maintain that the diction ofpoetry should be simply that of common life. 

The true principle would rather seem to be that any style becomes badwhen it dies; when it is used merely as a tradition, and not as the bestmode of producing the desired impression; and when, therefore, itrepresents a rule imposed from without, and is not an expression of thespontaneous working of minds in which the corresponding impulse isthoroughly incarnated. In such a case, no doubt, the diction becomes aburden, and a man is apt to fancy himself a poet because he is the slaveof the external form instead of using it as the most familiarinstrument. By Wordsworth's time the Pope style was thus effete; whatought to be the dress of thought had become the rigid armour into whichthought was forcibly compressed, and a revolt was inevitable. We mayagree, too, that his peculiar style was in a sense artificial, even inthe days of Pope. It had come into existence during the reign of theRestoration wits, under the influence of foreign models, not as thespontaneous outgrowth of a gradual development, and had thereforesomething mechanical and conscious, even when it flourished mostvigorously. It came in with the periwigs, to which it is so oftencompared, and, like the artificial headgear, was an attempt to give adignified or full-dress appearance to the average prosaic human being. Having this innate weakness of pomposity and exaggeration, it naturallyexpired, and became altogether ridiculous, with the generation to whichit belonged. As the wit or man of the world had at bottom a veryinadequate conception of epic poetry, he became inevitably strained andcontorted when he tried to give himself the airs of a poet. 

After making all such deductions, it would still seem that the bare factthat he was working in a generally accepted style gave Pope a verydefinite advantage. He spoke more or less in a falsetto, but he could atonce strike a key intelligible to his audience. An earlier poet wouldsimply annex Homer's gods and fix them with a mediĉval framework. A moremodern poet tries to find some style which will correspond to theHomeric as closely as possible, and feels that he is making anexperiment beset with all manner of difficulties. Pope needed no more tobother himself about such matters than about grammatical or philologicalrefinements. He found a ready-made style which was assumed to becorrect; he had to write in regular rhymed couplets, as neatly rhymedand tersely expressed as might be; and the diction was equally settled. He was to keep to Homer for the substance, but he could throw in anylittle ornaments to suit the taste of his readers; and if they found outa want of scrupulous fidelity, he might freely say that he did not aimat such details. Working, therefore, upon the given data, he couldenjoy a considerable amount of freedom, and throw his whole energy intothe task of forcible expression without feeling himself trammelled atevery step. The result would certainly not be Homer, but it might be afine epic poem as epic poetry was understood in the days of Anne andGeorge I. --a hybrid genus, at the best, something without enoughconstitutional vigour to be valuable when really original, but notwithout a merit of its own when modelled upon the lines laid down in thegreat archetype. When we look at Pope's Iliad upon this understanding, we cannot fail, I think, to admit that it has merits which makes itsgreat success intelligible. If we read it as a purely English poem, thesustained vivacity and emphasis of the style give it a decisivesuperiority over its rivals. It has become the fashion to quote Chapmansince the noble sonnet in which Keats, in testifying to the power of theElizabethan translator, testifies rather to his own exquisiteperception. Chapman was a poet worthy of our great poetic period, andPope himself testifies to the "daring fiery spirit" which animates histranslation, and says that it is not unlike what Homer himself mighthave written in his youth--surely not a grudging praise. But though thisis true, I will venture to assert that Chapman also sins, not merely byhis love of quaintness, but by constantly indulging in sheer doggerel. If his lines do not stagnate, they foam and fret like a mountain brook, instead of flowing continuously and majestically like a great river. Hesurpasses Pope chiefly, as it seems to me, where Pope's conventionalverbiage smothers and conceals some vivid image from nature. Pope, ofcourse, was a thorough man of forms, and when he has to speak of sea orsky or mountain generally draws upon the current coin of poeticphraseology, which has lost all sharpness of impression in its longcirculation. Here, for example, is Pope's version of a simile in thefourth book:--

 As when the winds, ascending by degrees First move the whitening surface of the seas, The billows float in order to the shore, The waves behind roll on the waves before, Till with the growing storm the deeps arise, Foam o'er the rocks, and thunder to the skies. 

Each phrase is either wrong or escapes from error by vagueness, and onewould swear that Pope had never seen the sea. Chapman says, --

 And as when with the west wind flaws, the sea thrusts up her waves One after other, thick and high, upon the groaning shores, First in herself loud, but opposed with banks and rocks she roars, And all her back in bristles set, spits every way her foam. 

This is both clumsy and introduces the quaint and unauthorized image ofa pig, but it is unmistakably vivid. Pope is equally troubled when hehas to deal with Homer's downright vernacular. He sometimes venturesapologetically to give the original word. He allows Achilles to speakpretty vigorously to Agamemnon in the first book:--

 O monster! mix'd of insolence and fear, Thou dog in forehead, but in heart a deer!

Chapman translates the phrase more fully, but adds a characteristicquibble:--

 Thou ever steep'd in wine, Dog's face, with heart but of a hart. 

Tickell manages the imputation of drink, but has to slur over the dogand the deer:--

 Valiant with wine and furious from the bowl, Thou fierce-look'd talker, with a coward soul. 

Elsewhere Pope hesitates in the use of such plain speaking. He allowsTeucer to call Hector a dog, but apologizes in a note. "This is literalfrom the Greek, " he says, "and I have ventured it;" though he quotesMilton's "dogs of hell" to back himself with a precedent. But he cannotquite stand Homer's downright comparison of Ajax to an ass, and speaksof him in gingerly fashion as--

 The slow beast with heavy strength endued. 

Pope himself thinks the passage "inimitably just and beautiful;" but onthe whole, he says, "a translator owes so much to the taste of the agein which he lives as not to make too great a compliment to the former[age]; and this induced me to omit the mention of the word _ass_ in thetranslation. " Boileau and Longinus, he tells us, would approve theomission of mean and vulgar words. "Ass" is the vilest word imaginablein English or Latin, but of dignity enough in Greek and Hebrew to beemployed "on the most magnificent occasions. "

The Homeric phrase is thus often muffled and deadened by Pope'sverbiage. Dignity of a kind is gained at the cost of energy. If suchchanges admit of some apology as an attempt to preserve what isundoubtedly a Homeric characteristic, we must admit that the "dignity"is often false; it rests upon mere mouthing instead of simplicity anddirectness, and suggests that Pope might have approved the famousemendation "he died in indigent circumstances, " for "he died poor. " Thesame weakness is perhaps more annoying when it leads to sins ofcommission. Pope never scruples to amend Homer by little epigrammaticamplifications, which are characteristic of the contemporary rhetoric. Asingle illustration of a fault sufficiently notorious will besufficient. When Nestor, in the eleventh book, rouses Diomed at night, Pope naturally smoothes down the testy remark of the sleepy warrior;but he tries to improve Nestor's directions. Nestor tells Diomed, inmost direct terms, that the need is great, and that he must go at onceand rouse Ajax. In Pope's translation we have--

 Each single Greek in this conclusive strife Stands on the sharpest edge of death or life; Yet if my years thy kind regard engage, Employ thy youth as I employ my age; Succeed to these my cares, and rouse the rest; He serves me most, who serves his country best. 

The false air of epigram which Pope gives to the fourth line ischaracteristic; and the concluding tag, which is quite unauthorized, reminds us irresistibly of one of the rhymes which an actor alwaysspouted to the audience by way of winding up an act in the contemporarydrama. Such embroidery is profusely applied by Pope wherever he thinksthat Homer, like Diomed, is slumbering too deeply. And, of course, thatis not the way in which Nestor roused Diomed or Homer keeps his readersawake. 

Such faults have been so fully exposed that we need not dwell upon themfurther. They come to this, that Pope was really a wit of the days ofQueen Anne, and saw only that aspect of Homer which was visible to hiskind. The poetic mood was not for him a fine frenzy--for good sense mustcondemn all frenzy--but a deliberate elevation of the bard byhigh-heeled shoes and a full-bottomed wig. Seas and mountains, beinginvisible from Button's, could only be described by worn phrases fromthe Latin grammar. Even his narrative must be full of epigrams to avoidthe one deadly sin of dulness, and his language must be decorous even atthe price of being sometimes emasculated. But accept these conditions, and much still remains. After all, a wit was still a human being, andmuch more nearly related to us than an ancient Greek. Pope's style, whenhe is at his best, has the merit of being thoroughly alive; there are nodead masses of useless verbiage; every excrescence has been carefullypruned away; slovenly paraphrases and indistinct slurrings over of themeaning have disappeared. He corrected carefully and scrupulously, ashis own statement implies, not with a view of transferring as large aportion as possible of his author's meaning to his own verses, but inorder to make the versification as smooth and the sense as transparentas possible. We have the pleasure which we receive from really polishedoratory; every point is made to tell; if the emphasis is too oftenpointed by some showy antithesis, we are at least never uncertain as tothe meaning; and if the versification is often monotonous, it isarticulate and easily caught at first sight. These are the essentialmerits of good declamation, and it is in the true declamatory passagesthat Pope is at his best. The speeches of his heroes are oftenadmirable, full of spirit, well balanced and skilfully arranged piecesof rhetoric--not a mere inorganic series of observations. Undoubtedlythe warriors are a little too epigrammatic and too consciously didactic;and we feel almost scandalized when they take to downright blows, asthough Walpole and St. John were interrupting a debate in the House ofCommons by fisticuffs. They would be better in the senate than thefield. But the brilliant rhetoric implies also a sense of dignity whichis not mere artificial mouthing. Pope, as it seems to me, rises to alevel of sustained eloquence when he has to act as interpreter for thedirect expression of broad magnanimous sentiment. Classical critics mayexplain by what shades of feeling the aristocratic grandeur of soul ofan English noble differed from the analogous quality in heroic Greece, and find the difference reflected in the "grand style" of Pope ascompared with that of Homer. But Pope could at least assume withadmirable readiness the lofty air of superiority to personal fears andpatriotic devotion to a great cause, which is common to the type inevery age. His tendency to didactic platitudes is at least out of placein such cases, and his dread of vulgarity and quaintness, with hisgenuine feeling for breadth of effect, frequently enables him to bereally dignified and impressive. It will perhaps be sufficientillustration of these qualities if I conclude these remarks by givinghis translation of Hector's speech to Polydamas in the twelfth book, with its famous +eis oiônos aristos amynesthai peri patrês+. 

 To him then Hector with disdain return'd; (Fierce as he spoke, his eyes with fury burn'd)-- Are these the faithful counsels of thy tongue? Thy will is partial, not thy reason wrong; Or if the purpose of thy heart thou sent, Sure Heaven resumes the little sense it lent-- What coward counsels would thy madness move Against the word, the will reveal'd of Jove? The leading sign, the irrevocable nod And happy thunders of the favouring God? These shall I slight? And guide my wavering mind By wand'ring birds that flit with every wind? Ye vagrants of the sky! your wings extend Or where the suns arise or where descend; To right or left, unheeded take your way, While I the dictates of high heaven obey. Without a sigh his sword the brave man draws, And asks no omen but his country's cause. But why should'st thou suspect the war's success? None fears it more, as none promotes it less. Tho' all our ships amid yon ships expire, Trust thy own cowardice to escape the fire. Troy and her sons may find a general grave, But thou canst live, for thou canst be a slave. Yet should the fears that wary mind suggests Spread their cold poison through our soldiers' breasts, My javelin can revenge so base a part, And free the soul that quivers in thy heart. 

The six volumes of the Iliad were published during the years 1715-1720, and were closed by a dedication to Congreve, who, as an eminent man ofletters, not too closely connected with either Whigs or Tories, was themost appropriate recipient of such a compliment. Pope was enriched byhis success, and no doubt wearied by his labours. But his restlessintellect would never leave him to indulge in prolonged repose, and, though not avaricious, he was not more averse than other men toincreasing his fortune. He soon undertook two sufficiently laboriousworks. The first was an edition of Shakspeare, for which he onlyreceived 217_l. _ 10_s. _, and which seems to have been regarded as afailure. It led, like his other publications, to a quarrel to behereafter mentioned, but need not detain us at present. It appeared in1725, when he was already deep in another project. The success of theIliad naturally suggested an attempt upon the Odyssey. Pope, however, was tired of translating, and he arranged for assistance. He took intoalliance a couple of Cambridge men, who were small poets capable offairly adopting his versification. One of them was William Broome, aclergyman who held several livings and married a rich widow. Unfortunately his independence did not restrain him from writing poetry, for which want of means would have been the only sufficient excuse. Hewas a man of some classical attainments, and had helped Pope incompiling notes to the Iliad from Eustathius, an author whom Pope wouldhave been scarcely able to read without such assistance. Elijah Fenton, his other assistant, was a Cambridge man who had sacrificed his claimsof preferment by becoming a non-juror, and picked up a living partly bywriting and chiefly by acting as tutor to Lord Orrery, and afterwards inthe family of Trumball's widow. Pope, who introduced him to LadyTrumball, had also introduced him to Craggs, who, when Secretary ofState, felt his want of a decent education, and wished to be polished bysome competent person. He seems to have been a kindly, idle, honourableman, who died, says Pope, of indolence, and more immediately, itappears, of the gout. The alliance thus formed was rather a delicateone, and was embittered by some of Pope's usual trickery. In issuing hisproposals he spoke in ambiguous terms of two friends who were to renderhim some undefined assistance, and did not claim to be the translator, but to have undertaken the translation. The assistants, in fact, didhalf the work, Broome translating eight, and Fenton four, out of thetwenty-four books. Pope was unwilling to acknowledge the full amount oftheir contributions; he persuaded Broome--a weak, good-natured man--toset his hand to a postscript to the Odyssey, in which only three booksare given to Broome himself, and only two to Fenton. When Pope wasattacked for passing off other people's verses as his own, he boldlyappealed to this statement to prove that he had only received Broome'shelp in three books, and at the same time stated the whole amount whichhe had paid for the eight, as though it had been paid for the three. When Broome, in spite of his subservience, became a little restive underthis treatment, Pope indirectly admitted the truth by claiming onlytwelve books in an advertisement to his works, and in a note to the_Dunciad_, but did not explicitly retract the other statement. Broomecould not effectively rebuke his fellow-sinner. He had, in fact, conspired with Pope to attract the public by the use of the most popularname, and could not even claim his own afterwards. He had, indeed, talked too much, according to Pope; and the poet's morality is oddlyillustrated in a letter, in which he complains of Broome's indiscretionfor letting out the secret; and explains that, as the facts are so farknown, it would now be "unjust and dishonourable" to continue theconcealment. It would be impossible to accept more frankly the theorythat lying is wrong when it is found out. Meanwhile Pope's conduct tohis victims or accomplices was not over-generous. He made over 3500_l. _after paying Broome 500_l. _ (including 100_l. _ for notes) and Fenton200_l. _, that is, 50_l. _ a book. The rate of pay was as high as the workwas worth, and as much as it would fetch in the open market. The largesum was entirely due to Pope's reputation, though obtained, so far asthe true authorship was concealed, upon something like false pretences. Still, we could have wished that he had been a little more liberal withhis share of the plunder. A coolness ensued between the principal andhis partners in consequence of these questionable dealings. Fenton seemsnever to have been reconciled to Pope, though they did not openlyquarrel and Pope wrote a laudatory epitaph for him on his death in 1730. Broome--a weaker man--though insulted by Pope in the _Dunciad_ and theMiscellanies, accepted a reconciliation, for which Pope seems to havebeen eager, perhaps feeling some touch of remorse for the injuries whichhe had inflicted. 

The shares of the three colleagues in the Odyssey are not to be easilydistinguished by internal evidence. On trying the experiment by acursory reading I confess (though a critic does not willingly admit hisfallibility) that I took some of Broome's work for Pope's, and, thoughcloser study or an acuter perception might discriminate more accurately, I do not think that the distinction would be easy. This may be taken toconfirm the common theory that Pope's versification was a meremechanical trick. Without admitting this, it must be admitted that theexternal characteristics of his manner were easily caught; and that itwas not hard for a clever versifier to produce something closelyresembling his inferior work, especially when following the sameoriginal. But it may be added that Pope's Odyssey was really inferior tothe Iliad, both because his declamatory style is more out of place inits romantic narrative, and because he was weary and languid, and gladto turn his fame to account without more labour than necessary. TheOdyssey, I may say, in conclusion, led to one incidental advantage. Itwas criticized by Spence, a mild and cultivated scholar, who wasprofessor of poetry at Oxford. His observations, according to Johnson, were candid, though not indicative of a powerful mind. Pope, he adds, had in Spence, the first experience of a critic "who censured withrespect and praised with alacrity. " Pope made Spence's acquaintance, recommended him to patrons, and was repaid by warm admiration. 

FOOTNOTES:

[6] See Elwin's Pope, Correspondence, vol. Iii. P. 129. 

CHAPTER IV. 

POPE AT TWICKENHAM. 

When Pope finished his translation of the Iliad, he was congratulated byhis friend Gay in a pleasant copy of verses marked by the usual_bonhomie_ of the fat kindly man. Gay supposes himself to be welcominghis friend on the return from his long expedition. 

 Did I not see thee when thou first sett'st sail, To seek adventures fair in Homer's land? Did I not see thy sinking spirits fail, And wish thy bark had never left the strand? Even in mid ocean often didst thou quail, And oft lift up thy holy eye and hand, Praying to virgin dear and saintly choir Back to the port to bring thy bark entire. 

And now the bark is sailing up the Thames, with bells ringing, bonfiresblazing, and "bones and cleavers" clashing. So splendid a show suggestsLord Mayor's Day, but in fact it is only the crowd of Pope's friendscome to welcome him on his successful achievement; and a long cataloguefollows, in which each is indicated by some appropriate epithet. Thelist includes some doubtful sympathizers, such as Gildon, who comes"hearing thou hast riches, " and even Dennis, who in fact continued togrowl out criticisms against the triumphant poet. Steele, too, andTickell, --

 Whose skiff (in partnership they say) Set forth for Greece but founder'd on the way, would not applaud very cordially. Addison, their common hero, was beyondthe reach of satire or praise. Parnell, who had contributed a life ofHomer, died in 1718; and Rowe and Garth, sound Whigs, but friends andoften boon companions of the little papist, had followed. Swift wasbreathing "Boeotian air" in his deanery, and St. John was "confined toforeign climates" for very sufficient reasons. Any such roll-call offriends must show melancholy gaps, and sometimes the gaps are moresignificant than the names. Yet Pope could boast of a numerous body ofmen, many of them of high distinction, who were ready to give him a warmwelcome. There were, indeed, few eminent persons of the time, either inthe political or literary worlds, with whom this sensitive and restlesslittle invalid did not come into contact, hostile or friendly, at somepart of his career. His friendships were keen and his hostilities morethan proportionally bitter. We see his fragile figure, glancing rapidlyfrom one hospitable circle to another, but always standing a littleapart; now paying court to some conspicuous wit, or philosopher, orstatesman, or beauty; now taking deadly offence for some utterlyinexplicable reason; writhing with agony under clumsy blows which arobuster nature would have met with contemptuous laughter; racking hiswits to contrive exquisite compliments, and suddenly exploding in sheerBillingsgate; making a mountain of every mole-hill in his pilgrimage;always preoccupied with his last literary project, and yet finding timefor innumerable intrigues; for carrying out schemes of vengeance forwounded vanity, and for introducing himself into every quarrel that wasgoing on around him. In all his multifarious schemes and occupations hefound it convenient to cover himself by elaborate mystifications, andwas as anxious (it would seem) to deceive posterity as to impose uponcontemporaries; and hence it is as difficult clearly to disentangle thetwisted threads of his complex history as to give an intelligiblepicture of the result of the investigation. The publication of theIliad, however, marks a kind of central point in his history. Pope hasreached independence, and become the acknowledged head of the literaryworld; and it will be convenient here to take a brief survey of hisposition, before following out two or three different series of events, which can scarcely be given in chronological order. Pope, when he firstcame to town and followed Wycherley about like a dog, had tried toassume the airs of a rake. The same tone is adopted in many of hisearlier letters. At Binfield he became demure, correct, and respectfulto the religious scruples of his parents. In his visits to London andBath he is little better than one of the wicked. In a copy of verses(not too decent) written in 1715, as a "Farewell to London, " he gives usto understand that he has been hearing the chimes at midnight, and knowswhere the bona-robas dwell. He is forced to leave his jovial friends andhis worrying publishers "for Homer (damn him!) calls. " He is, so heassures us, Still idle, with a busy air Deep whimsies to contrive; The gayest valetudinaire, Most thinking rake alive. 

And he takes a sad leave of London pleasures. 

 Luxurious lobster nights, farewell, For sober, studious days! And Burlington's delicious meal For salads, tarts, and pease. 

Writing from Bath a little earlier, to Teresa and Martha Blount, heemploys the same jaunty strain. "Every one, " he says, "values Mr. Pope, but every one for a different reason. One for his adherence to theCatholic faith, another for his neglect of Popish superstition; one forhis good behaviour, another for his whimsicalities; Mr. Titcomb for hispretty atheistical jests; Mr. Caryll for his moral and Christiansentences; Mrs. Teresa for his reflections on Mrs. Patty; Mrs. Patty forhis reflections on Mrs. Teresa. " He is an "agreeable rattle;" theaccomplished rake, drinking with the wits, though above boozing with thesquire, and capable of alleging his drunkenness as an excuse for writingvery questionable letters to ladies. 

Pope was too sickly and too serious to indulge long in such youthfulfopperies. He had no fund of high spirits to draw upon, and hisplayfulness was too near deadly earnest for the comedy of common life. He had too much intellect to be a mere fribble, and had not the stronganimal passions of the thorough debauchee. Age came upon him rapidly, and he had sown his wild oats, such as they were, while still a youngman. Meanwhile his reputation and his circle of acquaintances wererapidly spreading, and in spite of all his disqualifications for thecoarser forms of conviviality, he took the keenest possible interest inthe life that went on around him. A satirist may not be a pleasantcompanion, but he must frequent society; he must be on the watch for hisnatural prey; he must describe the gossip of the day, for it is the rawmaterial from which he spins his finished fabric. Pope, as his writingsshow, was an eager recipient of all current rumours, whether theyaffected his aristocratic friends or the humble denizens of Grub Street. Fully to elucidate his poems, a commentator requires to have at hisfinger's ends the whole _chronique scandaleuse_ of the day. With suchtastes, it was natural that, as the subscriptions for his Homer began topour in, he should be anxious to move nearer the great social centre. London itself might be too exciting for his health and too destructiveof literary leisure. Accordingly, in 1716, the little property atBinfield was sold, and the Pope family moved to Mawson's New Buildings, on the bank of the river at Chiswick, and "under the wing of my LordBurlington. " He seems to have been a little ashamed of the residence;the name of it is certainly neither aristocratic nor poetical. Two yearslater, on the death of his father, he moved up the river to the villa atTwickenham, which has always been associated with his name, and was hishome for the last twenty-five years of his life. There he had theadvantage of being just on the boundary of the great world. He waswithin easy reach of Hampton Court, Richmond, and Kew; places which, during Pope's residence, were frequently glorified by the presence ofGeorge II. And his heir and natural enemy, Frederick, Prince of Wales. Pope, indeed, did not enjoy the honour of any personal interview withroyalty. George is said to have called him a very honest man afterreading his Dunciad; but Pope's references to his Sovereign were notcomplimentary. There was a report, referred to by Swift, that Pope hadpurposely avoided a visit from Queen Caroline. He was on very friendlyterms with Mrs. Howard--afterwards Lady Suffolk--the powerless mistress, who was intimate with two of his chief friends, Bathurst andPeterborough, and who settled at Marble Villa, in Twickenham. Pope andBathurst helped to lay out her grounds, and she stayed there to become afriendly neighbour of Horace Walpole, who, unluckily for lovers ofgossip, did not become a Twickenhamite until three years after Pope'sdeath. Pope was naturally more allied with the Prince of Wales, whooccasionally visited him, and became intimate with the band of patriotsand enthusiasts who saw in the heir to the throne the coming "patriotking. " Bolingbroke, too, the great inspirer of the opposition, andPope's most revered friend, was for ten years at Dawley, within an easydrive. London was easily accessible by road and by the river whichbounded his lawn. His waterman appears to have been one of the regularmembers of his household. There he had every opportunity for theindulgence of his favourite tastes. The villa was on one of theloveliest reaches of the Thames, not yet polluted by the encroachmentsof London. The house itself was destroyed in the beginning of thiscentury; and the garden (if we may trust Horace Walpole) had beenpreviously spoilt. This garden, says Walpole, was a little bit of groundof five acres, enclosed by three lanes. "Pope had twisted and twirledand rhymed and harmonized this, till it appeared two or three sweetlittle lawns, opening and opening beyond one another, and the wholesurrounded with impenetrable woods. " These, it appears, were hacked andhewed into mere desolation by the next proprietor. Pope was, indeed, anardent lover of the rising art of landscape gardening; he was familiarwith Bridgeman and Kent, the great authorities of the time, and hisexample and precepts helped to promote the development of a less formalstyle. His theories are partly indicated in the description of Timon'svilla. 

 His gardens next your admiration call On every side you look, behold the wall! No pleasing intricacies intervene, No artful wildness to perplex the scene; Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother, And half the platform just reflects the other. 

Pope's taste, indeed, tolerated various old-fashioned excrescences whichwe profess to despise. He admired mock classical temples and obeliskserected judiciously at the ends of vistas. His most famous piece ofhandiwork, the grotto at Twickenham, still remains, and is in fact ashort tunnel under the high road to connect his grounds with the lawnwhich slopes to the river. He describes in a letter to one of hisfriends, his "temple wholly comprised of shells in the rustic manner, "and his famous grotto so provided with mirrors that when the doors areshut it becomes a camera obscura, reflecting hills, river, and boats, and when lighted up glitters with rays reflected from bits oflooking-glass in angular form. His friends pleased him by sending piecesof spar from the mines of Cornwall and Derbyshire, petrifactions, marble, coral, crystals, and humming-birds' nests. It was in fact agorgeous example of the kind of architecture with which the citdelighted to adorn his country box. The hobby, whether in good taste ornot, gave Pope never-ceasing amusement; and he wrote some characteristicverses in its praise. 

In his grotto, as he declares in another place, he could sit in peacewith his friends, undisturbed by the distant din of the world. 

 There my retreat the best companions grace, Chiefs out of war, and statesmen out of place; There St. John mingles with my friendly bowl The feast of reason and the flow of soul; And he whose lightning pierced the Iberian lines Now forms my quincunx and now ranks my vines, Or tames the genius of the stubborn plain Almost as quickly as he conquer'd Spain. 

The grotto, one would fear, was better fitted for frogs than forphilosophers capable of rheumatic twinges. But deducting what we pleasefrom such utterances on the score of affectation, the picture of Popeamusing himself with his grotto and his plantations, directing old JohnSearle, his gardener, and conversing with the friends whom hecompliments so gracefully, is, perhaps, the pleasantest in his history. He was far too restless and too keenly interested in society andliterature to resign himself permanently to any such retreat. 

Pope's constitutional irritability kept him constantly on the wing. Though little interested in politics, he liked to be on the edge of anypolitical commotion. He appeared in London on the death of QueenCaroline, in 1737; and Bathurst remarked that "he was as sure to bethere in a bustle as a porpoise in a storm. " "Our friend Pope, " saidJervas not long before, "is off and on, here and there, everywhere andnowhere, _à son ordinaire_, and, therefore as well as we can hope for acarcase so crazy. " The Twickenham villa, though nominally dedicated torepose, became of course a centre of attraction for the interviewers ofthe day. The opening lines of the Prologue to the Satires give avivacious description of the crowds of authors who rushed to "Twitnam, "to obtain his patronage or countenance, in a day when editors were notthe natural scapegoats of such aspirants. 

 What walls can guard me, or what shades can hide? They pierce my thickets, through my grot they glide; By land, by water, they renew the charge; They stop the chariot and they board the barge: No place is sacred, not the church is free, E'en Sunday shines no Sabbath-day to me. 

And even at an earlier period he occasionally retreated from the bustleto find time for his Homer. Lord Harcourt, the Chancellor in the lastyears of Queen Anne, allowed him to take up his residence in his oldhouse of Stanton Harcourt, in Oxfordshire. He inscribed on a pane ofglass in an upper room, "In the year 1718 Alexander Pope finished herethe fifth volume of Homer. " In his earlier days he was often ramblingabout on horseback. A letter from Jervas gives the plan of one suchjaunt (in 1715) with Arbuthnot and Disney for companions. Arbuthnot isto be commander-in-chief, and allows only a shirt and a cravat to becarried in each traveller's pocket. They are to make a moderate journeyeach day, and stay at the houses of various friends, ending ultimatelyat Bath. Another letter of about the same date describes a ride toOxford, in which Pope is overtaken by his publisher, Lintot, who letshim into various secrets of the trade, and proposes that Pope shouldturn an ode of Horace whilst sitting under the trees to rest. "Lord, ifyou pleased, what a clever miscellany might you make at leisure hours!"exclaims the man of business; and though Pope laughed at the advice, wemight fancy that he took it to heart. He always had bits of verse on theanvil, ready to be hammered and polished at any moment. But even Popecould not be always writing, and the mere mention of these ramblessuggests pleasant lounging through old-world country lanes of the quietcentury. We think of the road-side life seen by Parson Adams or HumphryClinker, and of which Mr. Borrow caught the last glimpse when dwellingin the tents of the Romany. In later days Pope had to put his "crazycarcase" into a carriage, and occasionally came in for less pleasantexperiences. Whilst driving home one night from Dawley, inBolingbroke's carriage and six, he was upset in a stream. He escapeddrowning, though the water was "up to the knots of his periwig, " but hewas so cut by the broken glass that he nearly lost the use of his righthand. On another occasion Spence was delighted by the sudden appearanceof the poet at Oxford, "dreadfully fatigued;" he had good-naturedly lenthis own chariot to a lady who had been hurt in an upset, and had walkedthree miles to Oxford on a sultry day. 

A man of such brilliant wit, familiar with so many social circles, should have been a charming companion. It must, however, be admittedthat the accounts which have come down to us do not confirm suchpreconceived impressions. Like his great rival, Addison, though forother reasons, he was generally disappointing in society. Pope, as maybe guessed from Spence's reports, had a large fund of interestingliterary talk, such as youthful aspirants to fame would be delighted toreceive with reverence; he had the reputation for telling anecdotesskilfully, and we may suppose that when he felt at ease, with arespectful and safe companion, he could do himself justice. But he musthave been very trying to his hosts. He could seldom lay aside hisself-consciousness sufficiently to write an easy letter; and the samefault probably spoilt his conversation. Swift complains of him as asilent and inattentive companion. He went to sleep at his own table, says Johnson, when the Prince of Wales was talking poetry tohim--certainly a severe trial. He would, we may guess, be silent till hehad something to say worthy of the great Pope, and would then doubtwhether it was not wise to treasure it up for preservation in a couplet. His sister declared that she had never seen him laugh heartily; andSpence, who records the saying, is surprised, because Pope was said tohave been very lively in his youth; but admits that in later years henever went beyond a "particular easy smile. " A hearty laugh would havesounded strangely from the touchy, moody, intriguing little man, whocould "hardly drink tea without a stratagem. " His sensitiveness, indeed, appearing by his often weeping when he read moving passages; but we canhardly imagine him as ever capable of genial self-abandonment. 

His unsocial habits, indeed, were a natural consequence of ill-health. He never seems to have been thoroughly well for many days together. Heimplied no more than the truth when he speaks of his Muse as helping himthrough that "long disease, his life. " Writing to Bathurst in 1728, hesays that he does not expect to enjoy any health for four days together;and, not long after, Bathurst remonstrates with him for hiscarelessness, asking him whether it is not enough to have the headachefor four days in the week and be sick for the other three. It is nosmall proof of intellectual energy that he managed to do so muchthorough work under such disadvantages, and his letters show less of theinvalid's querulous spirit than we might well have pardoned. Johnsongives a painful account of his physical defects, on the authority of anold servant of Lord Oxford, who frequently saw him in his later years. He was so weak as to be unable to rise to dress himself without help. Hewas so sensitive to cold that he had to wear a kind of fur doublet undera coarse linen shirt; one of his sides was contracted, and he couldscarcely stand upright till he was laced into a boddice made of stiffcanvas; his legs were so slender that he had to wear three pairs ofstockings, which he was unable to draw on and off without help. Hisseat had to be raised to bring him to a level with common tables. In oneof his papers in the _Guardian_ he describes himself apparently as DickDistich: "a lively little creature, with long legs and arms; a spider[7]is no ill emblem of him; he has been taken at a distance for a smallwindmill. " His face, says Johnson, was "not displeasing, " and theportraits are eminently characteristic. The thin, drawn features wearthe expression of habitual pain, but are brightened up by the vivid andpenetrating eye, which seems to be the characteristic poetical beauty. 

It was after all a gallant spirit which got so much work out of thiscrazy carcase, and kept it going, spite of all its feebleness, forfifty-six years. The servant whom Johnson quotes, said that she wascalled from her bed four times in one night, "in the dreadful winter ofForty, " to supply him with paper, lest he should lose a thought. Hisconstitution was already breaking down, but the intellect was stillstriving to save every moment allowed to him. His friends laughed at hishabit of scribbling upon odd bits of paper. "Paper-sparing" Pope is theepithet bestowed upon him by Swift, and a great part of the Iliad iswritten upon the backs of letters. The habit seems to have been regardedas illustrative of his economical habits; but it was also natural to aman who was on the watch to turn every fragment of time to account. Ifanything was to be finished, he must snatch at the brief intervalsallowed by his many infirmities. Naturally, he fell into many of theself-indulgent and troublesome ways of the valetudinarian. He wasconstantly wanting coffee, which seems to have soothed his headaches;and for this and his other wants he used to wear out the servants inhis friends' houses, by "frequent and frivolous errands. " Yet he wasapparently a kind master. His servants lived with him till they becamefriends, and he took care to pay so well the unfortunate servant whosesleep was broken by his calls, that she said that she would want nowages in a family where she had to wait upon Mr. Pope. Another form ofself-indulgence was more injurious to himself. He pampered his appetitewith highly seasoned dishes, and liked to receive delicacies from hisfriends. His death was imputed by some of his friends, says Johnson, to"a silver saucepan in which it was his delight to eat potted lampreys. "He would always get up for dinner, in spite of headache, when told thatthis delicacy was provided. Yet, as Johnson also observes, the excessescannot have been very great, as they did not sooner cut short so fragilean existence. "Two bites and a sup more than your stint, " says Swift, "will cost you more than others pay for a regular debauch. "

At home, indeed, he appears to have been generally abstemious. Probablythe habits of his parents' little household were very simple; and Pope, like Swift, knew the value of independence well enough to besystematically economical. Swift, indeed, had a more generous heart, anda lordly indifference to making money by his writings, which Pope, whoowed his fortune chiefly to his Homer, did not attempt to rival. Swiftalludes in his letters to an anecdote, which we may hope does notrepresent his habitual practice. Pope, it appears, was entertaining acouple of friends, and when four glasses had been consumed from a pint, retired, saying, "Gentlemen I leave you to your wine. " I tell that storyto everybody, says Swift, "in commendation of Mr. Pope'sabstemiousness;" but he tells it, one may guess, with something of arueful countenance. At times, however, it seems that Pope could give a"splendid dinner, " and show no want of the "skill and elegance whichsuch performances require. " Pope, in fact, seems to have shown acombination of qualities which is not uncommon, though sometimes calledinconsistent. He valued money, as a man values it who has been poor andfeels it essential to his comfort to be fairly beyond the reach of want, and was accordingly pretty sharp at making a bargain with a publisher orin arranging terms with a collaborator. But he could also be liberal onoccasion. Johnson says that his whole income amounted to about 800_l. _ ayear, out of which he professed himself able to assign 100_l. _ tocharity; and though the figures are doubtful, and all Pope's statementsabout his own proceedings liable to suspicion, he appears to have beenoften generous in helping the distressed with money, as well as withadvice or recommendations to his powerful friends. Pope, by hisinfirmities and his talents, belonged to the dependent class of mankind. He was in no sense capable of standing firmly upon his own legs. He hada longing, sometimes pathetic and sometimes humiliating, for theapplause of his fellows and the sympathy of friends. With feelings somorbidly sensitive, and with such a lamentable incapacity forstraightforward openness in any relation of life, he was naturally adangerous companion. He might be brooding over some fancied injury orneglect, and meditating revenge, when he appeared to be on good terms;when really desiring to do a service to a friend, he might adopt sometortuous means for obtaining his ends, which would convert the serviceinto an injury; and, if he had once become alienated, the pastfriendship would be remembered by him as involving a kind ofhumiliation, and therefore supplying additional keenness to hisresentment. And yet it is plain that throughout life he was alwaysanxious to lean upon some stronger nature; to have a sturdy supporterwhom he was too apt to turn into an accomplice; or at least to have somegood-natured, easy-going companion, in whose society he might findrepose for his tortured nerves. And therefore, though the story of hisfriendships is unfortunately intertwined with the story of bitterquarrels and indefensible acts of treachery, it also reveals a touchingdesire for the kind of consolation which would be most valuable to oneso accessible to the pettiest stings of his enemies. He had many warmfriends, moreover, who, by good fortune or the exercise of unusualprudence, never excited his wrath, and whom he repaid by genuineaffection. Some of these friendships have become famous, and will bebest noticed in connexion with passages in his future career. It will besufficient if I here notice a few names, in order to show that acomplete picture of Pope's life, if it could now be produced, wouldinclude many figures of which we only catch occasional glimpses. 

Pope, as I have said, though most closely connected with the Tories andJacobites, disclaimed any close party connexion, and had some relationswith the Whigs. Some courtesies even passed between him and the greatSir Robert Walpole, whose interest in literature was a vanishingquantity, and whose bitterest enemies were Pope's greatest friends. Walpole, however, as we have seen, asked for preferment for Pope's oldfriend, and Pope repaid him with more than one compliment. Thus, in theEpilogue to the Satires, he says, --

 Seen him I have, but in his happier hour Of social pleasure, ill exchanged for power. Seen him, encumber'd with the venal tribe, Smile without art and win without a bribe. 

Another Whig statesman for whom Pope seems to have entertained anespecially warm regard was James Craggs, Addison's successor asSecretary of State, who died whilst under suspicion of peculation in theSouth Sea business (1721). The Whig connexion might have been turned toaccount. Craggs during his brief tenure of office offered Pope a pensionof 300_l. _ a year (from the secret service money), which Pope declined, whilst saying that, if in want of money, he would apply to Craggs as afriend. A negotiation of the same kind took place with Halifax, whoaimed at the glory of being the great literary patron. It seems that hewas anxious to have the Homer dedicated to him, and Pope, beingunwilling to gratify him, or, as Johnson says, being less eager formoney than Halifax for praise, sent a cool answer, and the negotiationpassed off. Pope afterwards revenged himself for this offence by hisbitter satire on _Bufo_ in the Prologue to his Satires, though he hadnot the courage to admit its obvious application. 

Pope deserves the credit of preserving his independence. He would notstoop low enough to take a pension at the price virtually demanded bythe party in power. He was not, however, inaccessible to aristocraticblandishments, and was proud to be the valued and petted guest in manygreat houses. Through Swift he had become acquainted with Oxford, thecolleague of Bolingbroke, and was a frequent and intimate guest of thesecond Earl, from whose servant Johnson derived the curious informationas to his habits. Harcourt, Oxford's Chancellor, lent him a housewhilst translating Homer. Sheffield, the Duke of Buckingham, had been anearly patron, and after the duke's death, Pope, at the request of hiseccentric duchess, the illegitimate daughter of James II. , edited someof his works and got into trouble for some Jacobite phrases contained inthem. His most familiar friend among the opposition magnates was LordBathurst, a man of uncommon vivacity and good-humour. He was born fouryears before Pope, and died more than thirty years later at the age ofninety-one. One of the finest passages in Burke's American speechesturns upon the vast changes which had taken place during Bathurst'slifetime. He lived to see his son Chancellor. Two years before his deaththe son left the father's dinner-table with some remark upon theadvantage of regular habits. "Now the old gentleman's gone, " said thelively youth of eighty-nine to the remaining guests, "let's crack theother bottle. " Bathurst delighted in planting, and Pope in giving himadvice, and in discussing the opening of vistas and erection of temples, and the poet was apt to be vexed when his advice was not taken. 

Another friend, even more restless and comet-like in his appearances, was the famous Peterborough, the man who had seen more kings andpostilions than any one in Europe; of whom Walsh injudiciously remarkedthat he had too much wit to be entrusted with the command of an army;and whose victories soon after the unlucky remark had been made, were sobrilliant as to resemble strategical epigrams. Pope seems to have beendazzled by the amazing vivacity of the man, and has left a curiousdescription of his last days. Pope found him on the eve of the voyage inwhich he died, sick of an agonizing disease, crying out for pain atnight, fainting away twice in the morning, lying like a dead man for atime, and in the intervals of pain giving a dinner to ten people, laughing, talking, declaiming against the corruption of the times, giving directions to his workmen, and insisting upon going to sea in ayacht without preparations for landing anywhere in particular. Popeseems to have been specially attracted by such men, with intellects asrestless as his own, but with infinitely more vitality to stand theconsequent wear and tear. 

We should be better pleased if we could restore a vivid image of theinner circle upon which his happiness most intimately depended. In onerelation of life Pope's conduct was not only blameless, but thoroughlyloveable. He was, it is plain, the best of sons. Even here, it is true, he is a little too consciously virtuous. Yet when he speaks of hisfather and mother there are tears in his voice, and it is impossible notto recognize genuine warmth of heart. 

 Me let the tender office long engage To rock the cradle of reposing age, With lenient arts extend a mother's breath, Make languor smile, and soothe the bed of death, Explore the thought, explain the asking eye, And keep awhile one parent from the sky![8]

Such verses are a spring in the desert, a gush of the true feeling, which contrasts with the strained and factitious sentiment in hisearlier rhetoric, and almost forces us to love the writer. Could Popehave preserved that higher mood, he would have held our affections as heoften delights our intellect. 

Unluckily we can catch but few glimpses of Pope's family life; of theold mother and father and the affectionate nurse, who lived with himtill 1721, and died during a dangerous illness of his mother's. Thefather, of whom we hear little after his early criticism of the son'sbad "rhymes, " died in 1717, and a brief note to Martha Blount givesPope's feeling as fully as many pages: "My poor father died last night. Believe, since I don't forget you this moment, I never shall. " Themother survived till 1733, tenderly watched by Pope, who would never belong absent from her, and whose references to her are uniformly tenderand beautiful. One or two of her letters are preserved. "My Deare, --Aletter from your sister just now is come and gone, Mr. Mennock andCharls Rackitt, to take his leve of us; but being nothing in it, doe notsend it. . . . Your sister is very well, but your brother is not. There'sMr. Blunt of Maypell Durom is dead, the same day that Mr. Inglefielddied. My servis to Mrs. Blounts, and all that ask of me. I hope to herefrom you, and that you are well, which is my dalye prayers; this with myblessing. " The old lady had peculiar views of orthography, and Pope, itis said, gave her the pleasure of copying out some of his Homer, thoughthe necessary corrections gave him and the printers more trouble thanwould be saved by such an amanuensis. Three days after her death hewrote to Richardson, the painter. "I thank God, " he says, "her death wasas easy as her life was innocent; and as it cost her not a groan, noreven a sigh, there is yet upon her countenance such an expression oftranquillity, nay, almost of pleasure, that it is even enviable tobehold it. It would afford the finest image of a saint expired that everpainter drew, and it would be the greatest obligation which ever thatobliging art could ever bestow upon a friend, if you would come andsketch it for me. I am sure if there be no very prevalent obstacle, youwill leave any common business to do this, and I shall hope to see youthis evening as late as you will, or to-morrow morning as early, beforethis winter flower is faded. " Swift's comment, on hearing the news, gives the only consolation which Pope could have felt. "She died inextreme old age, " he writes, "without pain, under the care of the mostdutiful son I have ever known or heard of, which is a felicity nothappening to one in a million. " And with her death, its most touchingand ennobling influence faded from Pope's life. There is no particularmerit in loving a mother, but few biographies give a more striking proofthat the loving discharge of a common duty may give a charm to a wholecharacter. It is melancholy to add that we often have to appeal to thispart of his story, to assure ourselves that Pope was really deserving ofsome affection. 

The part of Pope's history which naturally follows brings us again tothe region of unsolved mysteries. The one prescription which a spiritualphysician would have suggested in Pope's case would have been the loveof a good and sensible woman. A nature so capable of tender feeling andso essentially dependent upon others, might have been at once soothedand supported by a happy domestic life; though it must be admitted thatit would have required no common qualifications in a wife to calm soirritable and jealous a spirit. Pope was unfortunate in hissurroundings. The bachelor society of that day, not only the society ofthe Wycherleys and Cromwells, but the more virtuous society of Addisonand his friends, was certainly not remarkable for any exalted tone aboutwomen. Bolingbroke, Peterborough, and Bathurst, Pope's most admiredfriends, were all more or less flagrantly licentious; and Swift'smysterious story shows that if he could love a woman, his love might beas dangerous as hatred. In such a school, Pope, eminently malleable tothe opinions of his companions, was not likely to acquire a highstandard of sentiment. His personal defects were equally against him. His frame was not adapted for the robust gallantry of the time. Hewanted a nurse rather than a wife; and if his infirmities might excitepity, pity is akin to contempt as well as to love. The poor littleinvalid, brutally abused for his deformity by such men as Dennis and hisfriends, was stung beyond all self-control by their coarse laughter, andby the consciousness that it only echoed, in a more brutal shape, thejudgment of the fine ladies of the time. His language about women, sometimes expressing coarse contempt and sometimes rising to ferocity, is the reaction of his morbid sensibility under such real and imaginedscorn. 

Such feelings must be remembered in speaking briefly of two loveaffairs, if they are such, which profoundly affected his happiness. LadyMary Wortley Montagu is amongst the most conspicuous figures of thetime. She had been made a toast at the Kitcat Club at the age of eight, and she translated Epictetus (from the Latin) before she was twenty. Shewrote verses, some of them amazingly coarse, though decidedly clever, and had married Mr. Edward Wortley Montagu in defiance of her father'swill, though even in this, her most romantic proceeding, there arecurious indications of a respect for prudential considerations. Herhusband was a friend of Addison's, and a Whig; and she accompanied himon an embassy to Constantinople in 1716-17, where she wrote theexcellent letters published after her death, and whence she imported thepractice of inoculation in spite of much opposition. A distinguishedleader of society, she was also a woman of shrewd intellect andmasculine character. In 1739 she left her husband, though no quarrelpreceded or followed the separation, and settled for many years inItaly. Her letters are characteristic of the keen woman of the world, with an underlying vein of nobler feeling, perverted by harsh experienceinto a prevailing cynicism. Pope had made her acquaintance before sheleft England. He wrote poems to her and corrected her verses till shecruelly refused his services, on the painfully plausible ground that hewould claim all the good for himself and leave all the bad for her. Theycorresponded during her first absence abroad. The common sense is all onthe lady's side, whilst Pope puts on his most elaborate manners andaddresses her in the strained compliments of old-fashioned gallantry. Heacts the lover, though it is obviously mere acting, and his language isstained by indelicacies, which could scarcely offend Lady Mary, if wemay judge her by her own poetical attempts. The most characteristic ofPope's letters related to an incident at Stanton Harcourt. Two rusticlovers were surprised by a thunderstorm in a field near the house; theywere struck by lightning, and found lying dead in each other's arms. Here was an admirable chance for Pope, who was staying in the house withhis friend Gay. He wrote off a beautiful letter to Lady Mary, [9]descriptive of the event--a true prose pastoral in the Strephon andChloe style. He got Lord Harcourt to erect a monument over the commongrave of the lovers, and composed a couple of epitaphs, which hesubmitted to Lady Mary's opinion. She replied by a cruel dose of commonsense, and a doggrel epitaph, which turned his fine phrases intomerciless ridicule. If the lovers had been spared, she suggests, thefirst year might probably have seen a beaten wife and a deceivedhusband, cursing their marriage chain. 

 Now they are happy in their doom, For Pope has writ upon their tomb. 

On Lady Mary's return the intimacy was continued. She took a house atTwickenham. He got Kneller to paint her portrait, and wrote lettersexpressive of humble adoration. But the tone which did well enough whenthe pair were separated by the whole breadth of Europe, was lesssuitable when they were in the same parish. After a time the intimacyfaded and changed into mutual antipathy. The specific cause of thequarrel, if cause there was, has not been clearly revealed. One account, said to come from Lady Mary, is at least not intrinsically[10]improbable. According to this story, the unfortunate poet forgot for amoment that he was a contemptible cripple, and forgot also the existenceof Mr. Edward Wortley Montagu, and a passionate declaration of love drewfrom the lady an "immoderate fit of laughter. " Ever afterwards, it isadded, he was her implacable enemy. Doubtless, if the story be true, Lady Mary acted like a sensible woman of the world, and Pope was sillyas well as immoral. And yet one cannot refuse some pity to theunfortunate wretch, thus roughly jerked back into the consciousnessthat a fine lady might make a pretty plaything of him, but could notseriously regard him with anything but scorn. Whatever the precisefacts, a breach of some sort might have been anticipated. A game ofgallantry in which the natural parts are inverted, and the gentlemanacts the sentimentalist to the lady's performance of the shrewd cynic, is likely to have awkward results. Pope brooded over his resentment, andyears afterwards took a revenge only too characteristic. The first ofhis Imitations of Horace appeared in 1733. It contained a couplet, toogross for quotation, making the most outrageous imputation upon thecharacter of "Sappho. " Now, the accusation itself had no relationwhatever either to facts or even (as I suppose) to any existing scandal. It was simply throwing filth at random. Thus, when Lady Mary took it toherself, and applied to Pope through Peterborough for an explanation, Pope could make a defence verbally impregnable. There was no reason whyLady Mary should fancy that such a cap fitted; and it was far moreappropriate, as he added, to other women notorious for immorality aswell as authorship. In fact, however, there can be no doubt that Popeintended his abuse to reach its mark. Sappho was an obvious name for themost famous of poetic ladies. Pope himself, in one of his last lettersto her, says that fragments of her writing would please him likefragments of Sappho's; and their mediator, Peterborough, writes of herunder the same name in some complimentary and once well-known verses toMrs. Howard. Pope had himself alluded to her as Sappho in some versesaddressed (about 1722) to another lady, Judith Cowper, afterwards Mrs. Madan, who was for a time the object of some of his artificialgallantry. The only thing that can be said is that his abuse was asheer piece of Billingsgate, too devoid of plausibility to be more thanan expression of virulent hatred. He was like a dirty boy who throws mudfrom an ambush, and declares that he did not see the victimbespattered. [11]

A bitter and humiliating quarrel followed. Lord Hervey, who had beendescribed as "Lord Fanny, " in the same satire, joined with his friend, Lady Mary, in writing lampoons upon Pope. The best known was a copy ofverses, chiefly, if not exclusively by Lady Mary, in which Pope isbrutally taunted with the personal deformities of his "wretched littlecarcass, " which, it seems, are the only cause of his being "unwhipt, unblanketed, unkicked. " One verse seems to have stung him more deeply, which says that his "crabbed numbers" are

 Hard as his heart and as his birth obscure. 

To this and other assaults Pope replied by a long letter, suppressed, however, for the time, which, as Johnson says, exhibits to later readers"nothing but tedious malignity, " and is, in fact, a careful rakingtogether of everything likely to give pain to his victim. It was notpublished till 1751, when both Pope and Hervey were dead. In his laterwritings he made references to Sappho, which fixed the name upon her, and amongst other pleasant insinuations, speaks of a weakness which sheshared with Dr. Johnson, --an inadequate appreciation of clean linen. More malignant accusations are implied both in his acknowledged andanonymous writings. The most ferocious of all his assaults, however, isthe character of Sporus, that is Lord Hervey, in the epistle toArbuthnot, where he seems to be actually screaming with malignant fury. He returns the taunts as to effeminacy, and calls his adversary a "merewhite curd of asses' milk, "--an innocent drink, which he was himself inthe habit of consuming. 

We turn gladly from these miserable hostilities, disgraceful to allconcerned. Were any excuse available for Pope, it would be in thebrutality of taunts, coming not only from rough dwellers in Grub Street, but from the most polished representatives of the highest classes, uponpersonal defects, which the most ungenerous assailant might surely havespared. But it must also be granted that Pope was neither the last togive provocation, nor at all inclined to refrain from the use ofpoisoned weapons. 

The other connexion of which I have spoken has also its mystery, --likeeverything else in Pope's career. Pope had been early acquainted withTeresa and Martha Blount. Teresa was born in the same year as Pope, andMartha two years later. [12] They were daughters of Lister Blount, ofMapledurham, and after his death, in 1710, and the marriage of theironly brother, in 1711, they lived with their mother in London, andpassed much of the summer near Twickenham. They seem to have been livelyyoung women, who had been educated at Paris. Teresa was the mostreligious, and the greatest lover of London society. I have alreadyquoted a passage or two from the early letters addressed to the twosisters. It has also to be said that he was guilty of writing to themstuff which it is inconceivable that any decent man should havecommunicated to a modest woman. They do not seem to have taken offence. He professes himself the slave of both alternately or together. "Evenfrom my infancy, " he says (in 1714) "I have been in love with one orother of you week by week, and my journey to Bath fell out in the 376thweek of the reign of my sovereign lady Sylvia. At the present writinghereof, it is the 389th week of the reign of your most serene majesty, in whose service I was listed some weeks before I beheld your sister. "He had suggested to Lady Mary that the concluding lines of Eloisacontained a delicate compliment to her; and he characteristically made asimilar insinuation to Martha Blount about the same passage. Pope wasdecidedly an economist even of his compliments. Some later letters arein less artificial language, and there is a really touching and naturalletter to Teresa in regard to an illness of her sister's. After a time, we find that some difficulty has arisen. He feels that his presencegives pain; when he comes he either makes her (apparently Teresa)uneasy, or he sees her unkind. Teresa, it would seem, is jealous anddisapproves of his attentions to Martha. In the midst of this we findthat in 1717 Pope settled an annuity upon Teresa of 40_l. _ a year forsix years, on condition of her not being married during that time. Thefact has suggested various speculations, but was, perhaps, only a partof some family arrangement, made convenient by the diminished fortunesof the ladies. Whatever the history, Pope gradually became attached toMartha, and simultaneously came to regard Teresa with antipathy. Martha, in fact, became by degrees almost a member of his household. Hiscorrespondents take for granted that she is his regular companion. Hewrites of her to Gay, in 1730, as "a friend--a woman friend, God helpme!--with whom I have spent three or four hours a day these fifteenyears. " In his last years, when he was most dependent upon kindness, heseems to have expected that she should be invited to any house which hewas himself to visit. Such a close connexion naturally caused somescandal. In 1725, he defends himself against "villanous lying tales" ofthis kind to his old friend Caryll, with whom the Blounts wereconnected. At the same time he is making bitter complaints of Teresa. Heaccused her afterwards (1729) of having an intrigue with a married man, of "striking, pinching, and abusing her mother to the utmostshamefulness. " The mother, he thinks, is too meek to resent thistyranny, and Martha, as it appears, refuses to believe the reportsagainst her sister. Pope audaciously suggests that it would be a goodthing if the mother could be induced to retire to a convent, and isanxious to persuade Martha to leave so painful a home. The samecomplaints reappear in many letters, but the position remainedunaltered. It is impossible to say with any certainty what may have beenthe real facts. Pope's mania for suspicion deprives his suggestions ofthe slightest value. The only inference to be drawn is, that he drewcloser to Martha Blount as years went by; and was anxious that sheshould become independent of her family. This naturally led to mutualdislike and suspicion, but nobody can now say whether Teresa pinchedher mother, nor what would have been her account of Martha's relationsto Pope. 

Johnson repeats a story that Martha neglected Pope "with shamefulunkindness, " in his later years. It is clearly exaggerated or quiteunfounded. At any rate, the poor sickly man, in his premature andchildless old age, looked up to her with fond affection, and left to hernearly the whole of his fortune. His biographers have indulged indiscussions--surely superfluous--as to the morality of the connexion. There is no question of seduction, or of tampering with the affectionsof an innocent woman. Pope was but too clearly disqualified from actingthe part of Lothario. There was not in his case any Vanessa to give atragic turn to the connexion, which, otherwise, resembled Swift'sconnexion with Stella. Miss Blount, from all that appears, was quitecapable of taking care of herself, and had she wished for marriage, needonly have intimated her commands to her lover. It is probable enoughthat the relations between them led to very unpleasant scenes in herfamily; but she did not suffer otherwise in accepting Pope's attentions. The probability seems to be that the friendship had become imperceptiblycloser, and that what began as an idle affectation of gallantry wasslowly changed into a devoted attachment, but not until Pope's healthwas so broken that marriage would then, if not always, have appeared tobe a mockery. 

Poets have a bad reputation as husbands. Strong passions and keensensibilities may easily disqualify a man for domestic tranquillity, andprompt a revolt against rules essential to social welfare. Pope, likeother poets from Shakspeare to Shelley, was unfortunate in his loveaffairs; but his ill-fortune took a characteristic shape. He was notcarried away, like Byron and Burns, by overpowering passions. Ratherthe emotional power which lay in his nature was prevented fromdisplaying itself by his physical infirmities, and his strangetrickiness and morbid irritability. A man who could not make tea withouta stratagem, could hardly be a downright lover. We may imagine that hewould at once make advances and retract them; that he would beintolerably touchy and suspicious; that every coolness would beinterpreted as a deliberate insult, and that the slightest hint would beenough to set his jealousy in a flame. A woman would feel that, whateverhis genius and his genuine kindliness, one thing was impossible withhim--that is, a real confidence in his sincerity; and, therefore, on thewhole, it may, perhaps, be reckoned as a piece of good fortune for themost wayward and excitable of sane mankind, that if he never fullygained the most essential condition of all human happiness, he yetformed a deep and lasting attachment to a woman who, more or less, returned his feeling. In a life so full of bitterness, so harassed byphysical pain, one is glad to think, even whilst admitting that thesuffering was in great part foolish self-torture, and in part inflictedas a retribution for injuries to others, that some glow of femininekindliness might enlighten the dreary stages of his progress throughlife. The years left to him after the death of his mother were few andevil, and it would be hard to grudge him such consolation as he couldreceive from the glances of Patty Blount's blue eyes--the eyes which, onWalpole's testimony, were the last remains of her beauty. 

FOOTNOTES:

[7] The same comparison is made by Cibber in a rather unsavoury passage. 

[8] It is curious to compare these verses with the original copycontained in a letter to Aaron Hill. The comparison shows how skilfullyPope polished his most successful passages. 

[9] Pope, after his quarrel, wanted to sink his previous intimacy withLady Mary, and printed this letter as addressed by Gay to Fortescue, adding one to the innumerable mystifications of his correspondence. Mr. Moy Thomas doubts also whether Lady Mary's answer was really sent at theassigned date. The contrast of sentiment is equally characteristic inany case. 

[10] Mr. Moy Thomas, in his edition of Lady Mary's letters, considersthis story to be merely an echo of old scandal, and makes a differentconjecture as to the immediate cause of quarrel. His conjecture seemsvery improbable to me; but the declaration story is clearly of verydoubtful authenticity. 

[11] Another couplet in the second book of the Dunciad about "haplessMonsieur" and "Lady Maries, " was also applied at the time to Lady M. W. Montagu: and Pope in a later note affects to deny, thus really pointingthe allusion. But the obvious meaning of the whole passage is that"duchesses and Lady Maries" might be personated by abandoned women, which would certainly be unpleasant for them, but does not imply anyimputation upon their character. If Lady Mary was really the author of a"Pop upon Pope"--a story of Pope's supposed whipping in the vein of hisown attack upon Dennis, she already considered him as the author of somescandal. The line in the Dunciad was taken to allude to a story about aM. Rémond which has been fully cleared up. 

[12] The statements as to the date of the acquaintance arecontradictory. Martha told Spence that she first knew Pope as a "verylittle girl, " but added that it was after the publication of the Essayon Criticism, when she was twenty-one; and at another time, that it wasafter he had begun the Iliad, which was later than part of the publishedcorrespondence. 

CHAPTER V. 

THE WAR WITH THE DUNCES. 

In the Dunciad, published soon after the Odyssey, Pope laments ten yearsspent as a commentator and translator. He was not without compensation. The drudgery--for the latter part of his task must have been felt asdrudgery--once over, he found himself in a thoroughly independentposition, still on the right side of forty, and able to devote histalents to any task which might please him. The task which he actuallychose was not calculated to promote his happiness. We must look back toan earlier period to explain its history. During the last years of QueenAnne, Pope had belonged to a "little senate" in which Swift was thechief figure. Though Swift did not exercise either so gentle or soimperial a sway as Addison, the cohesion between the more independentmembers of this rival clique was strong and lasting. They amusedthemselves by projecting the Scriblerus Club, a body which never had, itwould seem, any definite organization, but was held to exist for theprosecution of a design never fully executed. Martinus Scriblerus wasthe name of an imaginary pedant--a precursor and relative of Dr. Dryasdust--whose memoirs and works were to form a satire upon stupidityin the guise of learning. The various members of the club were to sharein the compilation; and if such joint-stock undertakings werepracticable in literature, it would be difficult to collect a morebrilliant set of contributors. After Swift--the terrible humourist ofwhom we can hardly think without a mixture of horror and compassion--thechief members were Atterbury, Arbuthnot, Gay, Parnell, and Pope himself. Parnell, an amiable man, died in 1717, leaving works which were editedby Pope in 1722. Atterbury, a potential Wolsey or Laud born in anuncongenial period, was a man of fine literary taste--a warm admirer ofMilton (though he did exhort Pope to put Samson Agonistes into civilisedcostume--one of the most unlucky suggestions ever made by mortal man), ajudicious critic of Pope himself, and one who had already given proofsof his capacity in literary warfare by his share in the famouscontroversy with Bentley. Though no one now doubts the measurelesssuperiority of Bentley, the clique of Swift and Pope still cherished thebelief that the wit of Atterbury and his allies had triumphed over theponderous learning of the pedant. Arbuthnot, whom Swift had introducedto Pope as a man who could do everything but walk, was an amiable andaccomplished physician. He was a strong Tory and high churchman, andretired for a time to France upon the death of Anne and the overthrow ofhis party. He returned, however, to England, resumed his practice, andwon Pope's warmest gratitude by his skill and care. He was a man oflearning, and had employed it in an attack upon Woodward's geologicalspeculations, as already savouring of heterodoxy. He possessed also avein of genuine humour, resembling that of Swift, though it has ratherlost its savour, perhaps, because it was not salted by the Dean'smisanthropic bitterness. If his good humour weakened his wit, it gainedhim the affections of his friends, and was never soured by thesufferings of his later years. Finally, John Gay, though fat, lazy, andwanting in manliness of spirit, had an illimitable flow of good-temperedbanter; and if he could not supply the learning of Arbuthnot, he couldgive what was more valuable, touches of fresh natural simplicity, whichstill explain the liking of his friends. Gay, as Johnson says, was thegeneral favourite of the wits, though a playfellow rather than apartner, and treated with more fondness than respect. Pope seems to haveloved him better than any one, and was probably soothed by hiseasy-going, unsuspicious temper. They were of the same age; and Gay, whohad been apprenticed to a linendraper, managed to gain notice by hispoetical talents, and was taken up by various great people. Pope said ofhim that he wanted independence of spirit, which is indeed obviousenough. He would have been a fitting inmate of Thomson's Castle ofIndolence. He was one of those people who consider that Providence isbound to put food into their mouths without giving them any trouble;and, as sometimes happens, his draft upon the general system of thingswas honoured. He was made comfortable by various patrons; the Duchess ofQueensberry petted him in his later years, and the duke kept his moneyfor him. His friends chose to make a grievance of the neglect ofGovernment to add to his comfort by a good place; they encouraged him torefuse the only place offered as not sufficiently dignified; and he evenbecame something of a martyr when his _Polly_, a sequel to the _Beggars'Opera_, was prohibited by the Lord Chamberlain, and a good subscriptionmade him ample amends. Pope has immortalized the complaint by lamentingthe fate of "neglected genius" in the Epistle to Arbuthnot, anddeclaring that the "sole return" of all Gay's "blameless life" was

 My verse and Queensberry weeping o'er thy urn. 

Pope's alliance with Gay had various results. Gay continued the war withAmbrose Philips by writing burlesque pastorals, of which Johnson trulysays that they show "the effect of reality and truth, even when theintention was to show them grovelling and degraded. " They may still beglanced at with pleasure. Soon after the publication of the mockpastorals, the two friends, in company with Arbuthnot, had made anadventure more in the spirit of the Scriblerus Club. A farce called_Three Hours after Marriage_ was produced and damned in 1717. It wasintended (amongst other things) to satirize Pope's old enemy Dennis, called "Sir Tremendous, " as an embodiment of pedantic criticism, andArbuthnot's old antagonist Woodward. A taste for fossils, mummies, orantiquities, was at that time regarded as a fair butt for unsparingridicule; but the three great wits managed their assault so clumsily asto become ridiculous themselves; and Pope, as we shall presently see, smarted as usual under failure. 

After Swift's retirement to Ireland, and during Pope's absorption inHomer, the Scriblerus Club languished. Some fragments, however, of thegreat design were executed by the four chief members, and the dormantproject was revived, after Pope had finished his Homer, on occasion ofthe last two visits of Swift to England. He passed six months in Englandfrom March to August, 1726, and had brought with him the MS. OfGulliver's Travels, the greatest satire produced by the Scriblerians. Hepassed a great part of his time at Twickenham, and in rambling withPope or Gay about the country. Those who do not know how often theencounter of brilliant wits tends to neutralize rather than stimulatetheir activity, may wish to have been present at a dinner which tookplace at Twickenham on July 6th, 1726, when the party was made up ofPope, the most finished poet of the day; Swift, the deepest humourist;Bolingbroke, the most brilliant politician; Congreve, the wittiestwriter of comedy; and Gay, the author of the most successful burlesque. The envious may console themselves by thinking that Pope very likelywent to sleep, that Swift was deaf and overbearing, that Congreve andBolingbroke were painfully witty, and Gay frightened into silence. Whenin 1727 Swift again visited England, and stayed at Twickenham, theclouds were gathering. The scene is set before us in some of Swift'sverses:--

 Pope has the talent well to speak, But not to reach the ear; His loudest voice is low and weak, The deaf too deaf to hear. 

 Awhile they on each other look, Then different studies choose; The dean sits plodding o'er a book, Pope walks and courts the muse. 

"Two sick friends, " says Swift in a letter written after his return toIreland, "never did well together. " It is plain that their infirmitieshad been mutually trying, and on the last day of August Swift suddenlywithdrew from Twickenham, in spite of Pope's entreaties. He had heard ofthe last illness of Stella, which was finally to crush his happiness. Unable to endure the company of friends, he went to London in very badhealth, and thence, after a short stay, to Ireland, leaving behind hima letter which, says Pope, "affected me so much that it made me like agirl. " It was a gloomy parting, and the last. The stern Dean retired todie "like a poisoned rat in a hole, " after long years of bitterness, andfinally of slow intellectual decay. He always retained perfectconfidence in his friend's affection. Poor Pope, as he says in theverses on his own death, --

 will grieve a month, and Gay A week, and Arbuthnot a day;

and they were the only friends to whom he attributes sincere sorrow. 

Meanwhile two volumes of Miscellanies, the joint work of the four wits, appeared in June, 1727, and a third in March, 1728. A fourth, hastilygot up, was published in 1732. They do not appear to have beensuccessful. The copyright of the three volumes was sold for 225_l. _, ofwhich Arbuthnot and Gay received each 50_l. _, whilst the remainder wasshared between Pope and Swift; and Swift seems to have given his part, according to his custom, to the widow of a respectable Dublinbookseller. Pope's correspondence with the publisher shows that he wasentrusted with the financial details, and arranged them with thesharpness of a practised man of business. The whole collection was madeup in great part of old scraps, and savoured of bookmaking, though Popespeaks complacently of the joint volumes, in which he says to Swift, "Welook like friends, side by side, serious and merry by turns, conversinginterchangeably, and walking down, hand in hand, to posterity. " Of thevarious fragments contributed by Pope, there is only one which need bementioned here--the treatise on Bathos in the third volume, in which hewas helped by Arbuthnot. He told Swift privately that he had "entirelymethodized and in a manner written it all, " though, he afterwards choseto denounce the very same statement as a lie when the treatise broughthim into trouble. It is the most amusing of his prose writings, consisting essentially of a collection of absurdities from variousauthors, with some apparently invented for the occasion, such as thefamiliar

 Ye gods, annihilate but space and time, And make two lovers happy!

and ending with the ingenious receipt to make an epic poem. Most of thepassages ridiculed--and, it must be said, very deservedly--were selectedfrom some of the various writers to whom, for one reason or another, heowed a grudge. Ambrose Philips and Dennis, his old enemies, andTheobald, who had criticised his edition of Shakespeare, supply severalillustrations. Blackmore had spoken very strongly of the immorality ofthe wits in some prose essays; Swift's Tale of a Tub, and a parody ofthe first psalm, anonymously circulated, but known to be Pope's, hadbeen severely condemned; and Pope took a cutting revenge by plentifulcitations from Blackmore's most ludicrous bombast; and even Broome, hiscolleague in Homer, came in for a passing stroke, for Broome and Popewere now at enmity. Finally, Pope fired a general volley into the wholecrowd of bad authors by grouping them under the head of variousanimals--tortoises, parrots, frogs, and so forth--and adding under eachhead the initials of the persons described. He had the audacity todeclare that the initials were selected at random. If so, a marvellouscoincidence made nearly every pair of letters correspond to the name andsurname of some contemporary poetaster. The classification was rathervague, but seems to have given special offence. 

Meanwhile Pope was planning a more elaborate campaign against hisadversaries. He now appeared for the first time as a formal satirist, and the Dunciad, in which he came forward as the champion of Wit, takenin its broad sense, against its natural antithesis, Dulness, is in somerespect his masterpiece. It is addressed to Swift, who probably assistedat some of its early stages. O thou, exclaims the poet, --

 O thou, whatever title please thine ear, Dean, Drapier, Bickerstaff, or Gulliver! Whether thou choose Cervantes' serious air, Or laugh and shake in Rabelais's easy chair, --

And we feel that Swift is present in spirit throughout the composition. "The great fault of the Dunciad, " says Warton, an intelligent andcertainly not an over-severe critic, "is the excessive vehemence of thesatire. It has been compared, " he adds, "to the geysers propelling avast column of boiling water by the force of subterranean fire;" and hespeaks of some one who after reading a book of the Dunciad, alwayssoothes himself by a canto of the Faery Queen. Certainly a greatercontrast could not easily be suggested; and yet, I think, that theremark requires at least modification. The Dunciad, indeed, is beyondall question full of coarse abuse. The second book, in particular, illustrates that strange delight in the physically disgusting whichJohnson notices as characteristic of Pope and his master, Swift. In theletter prefixed to the Dunciad, Pope tries to justify his abuse of hisenemies by the example of Boileau, whom he appears to have considered ashis great prototype. But Boileau would have been revolted by the brutalimages which Pope does not hesitate to introduce; and it is a curiousphenomenon that the poet who is pre-eminently the representative ofpolished society should openly take such pleasure in unmixed filth. Polish is sometimes very thin. It has been suggested that Swift, who waswith Pope during the composition, may have been directly responsible forsome of these brutalities. At any rate, as I have said, Pope has herebeen working in the Swift spirit, and this gives, I think, the keynoteof his Dunciad. 

The geyser comparison is so far misleading that Pope is not in his mostspiteful mood. There is not that infusion of personal venom whichappears so strongly in the character of Sporus and similar passages. Inreading them we feel that the poet is writhing under some bittermortification, and trying with concentrated malice to sting hisadversary in the tenderest places. We hear a tortured victim screamingout the shrillest taunts at his tormentor. The abuse in the Dunciad isby comparison broad and even jovial. The tone at which Pope is aiming isthat suggested by the "laughing and shaking in Rabelais' easy chair. " Itis meant to be a boisterous guffaw from capacious lungs, an enormousexplosion of superlative contempt for the mob of stupid thickskinnedscribblers. They are to be overwhelmed with gigantic cachinnations, ducked in the dirtiest of drains, rolled over and over with roughhorseplay, pelted with the least savoury of rotten eggs, not skilfullyanatomized or pierced with dexterously directed needles. Pope has reallystood by too long, watching their tiresome antics and receiving theirtaunts, and he must once for all speak out and give them a lesson. 

 Out with it Dunciad! let the secret pass, That secret to each fool--that he's an ass!

That is his account of his feelings in the Prologue to the Satires, andhe answers the probable remonstrance. 

 You think this cruel? Take it for a rule, No creature smarts so little as a fool. 

To reconcile us to such laughter, it should have a more genial tone thanPope could find in his nature. We ought to feel, and we certainly do notfeel, that after the joke has been fired off there should be somepossibility of reconciliation, or, at least, we should find somerecognition of the fact that the victims are not to be hated simplybecause they were not such clever fellows as Pope. There is somethingcruel in Pope's laughter, as in Swift's. The missiles are not merefilth, but are weighted with hard materials that bruise and mangle. Heprofesses that his enemies were the first aggressors, a plea which canbe only true in part; and he defends himself, feebly enough, against theobvious charge that he has ridiculed men for being obscure, poor, andstupid--faults not to be amended by satire, nor rightfully provocativeof enmity. In fact, Pope knows in his better moments that a man is notnecessarily wicked because he sleeps on a bulk, or writes verses in agarret; but he also knows that to mention those facts will give hisenemies pain, and he cannot refrain from the use of so handy a weapon. 

Such faults make one half ashamed of confessing to reading the Dunciadwith pleasure; and yet it is frequently written with such force andfreedom that we half pardon the cruel little persecutor, and admire thevigour with which he throws down the gauntlet to the natural enemies ofgenius. The Dunciad is modelled upon the Mac Flecknoe, in which Drydencelebrates the appointment of Elkanah Shadwell to succeed Flecknoe asmonarch of the realms of Dulness, and describes the coronationceremonies. Pope imitates many passages, and adopts the general design. Though he does not equal the vigour of some of Dryden's lines, and wageswar in a more ungenerous spirit, the Dunciad has a wider scope than itsoriginal, and shows Pope's command of his weapons in occasionalfelicitous phrases, in the vigour of the versification, and in thegeneral sense of form and clear presentation of the scene imagined. Fora successor to the great empire of dulness he chose (in the originalform of the poem) the unlucky Theobald, a writer to whom the merit isattributed of having first illustrated Shakspeare by a study of thecontemporary literature. In doing this he had fallen foul of Pope, whocould claim no such merit for his own editorial work, and Pope thereforeregarded him as a grovelling antiquarian. As such, he was a fitpretender enough to the throne once occupied by Settle. The Dunciadbegins by a spirited description of the goddess brooding in her cellupon the eve of a Lord Mayor's day, when the proud scene was o'er, But lived in Settle's numbers one day more. 

The predestined hero is meanwhile musing in his Gothic library, andaddresses a solemn invocation to Dulness, who accepts his sacrifice--apile of his own works--transports him to her temple, and declares him tobe the legitimate successor to the former rulers of her kingdom. Thesecond book describes the games held in honour of the new ruler. Some ofthem are, as a frank critic observes, "beastly;" but a brief report ofthe least objectionable may serve as a specimen of the wholeperformance. Dulness, with her court descends

 To where Fleet Ditch with disemboguing streams Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames, The king of dykes than whom no sluice of mud With deeper sable blots the silver flood. -- Here strip, my children, here at once leap in; Here prove who best can dash through thick and thin, And who the most in love of dirt excel. 

And, certainly by the poet's account, they all love it as well as theirbetters. The competitors in this contest are drawn from the unfortunatesimmersed in what Warburton calls "the common sink of all such writers(as Ralph)--a political newspaper. " They were all hateful, partlybecause they were on the side of Walpole, and therefore, by Pope'slogic, unprincipled hirelings, and more, because in that cause, asothers, they had assaulted Pope and his friend. There is Oldmixon, ahack writer employed in compilations, who accused Atterbury offalsifying Clarendon, and was accused of himself falsifying historicaldocuments in the interests of Whiggism; and Smedley, an Irish clergyman, a special enemy of Swift's, who had just printed a collection ofassaults upon the miscellanies called Gulliveriana; and Concanen, another Irishman, an ally of Theobald's, and (it may be noted) ofWarburton's, who attacked the _Bathos_, and received--of course, for theworst services--an appointment in Jamaica; and Arnall, one of Walpole'smost favoured journalists, who was said to have received for himself orothers near 11, 000_l. _ in four years. Each dives in a way supposed to becharacteristic, Oldmixon with the pathetic exclamation, And am I now threescore? Ah, why, ye gods, should two and two make four?

Concanen, "a cold, long-winded native of the deep, " dives perseveringly, but without causing a ripple in the stream:

 Not so bold Arnall--with a weight of skull Furious he dives, precipitately dull, and ultimately emerges to claim the prize, "with half the bottom on hishead. " But Smedley, who has been given up for lost, comes up, Shaking the horrors of his sable brows, and relates how he has been sucked in by the mud-nymphs, and how theyhave shown him a branch of Styx which here pours into the Thames, anddiffuses its soporific vapours over the Temple and its purlieus. He issolemnly welcomed by Milbourn (a reverend antagonist of Dryden), whotells him to "receive these robes which once were mine, "

 Dulness is sacred in a sound divine. 

The games are concluded in the second book; and in the third the hero, sleeping in the Temple of Dulness, meets in a vision the ghost ofSettle, who reveals to him the future of his empire; tells how dulnessis to overspread the world, and revive the triumphs of Goths and monks;how the hated Dennis, and Gildon, and others, are to overwhelm scorners, and set up at court, and preside over arts and sciences, though a fit oftemporary sanity causes him to give a warning to the deists--

 But learn ye dunces! not to scorn your God--

and how posterity is to witness the decay of the stage, under a delugeof silly farce, opera, and sensation dramas; how bad architects are todeface the works of Wren and Inigo Jones; whilst the universities andpublic schools are to be given up to games and idleness, and the birchis to be abolished. 

Fragments of the prediction have not been entirely falsified, though thelast couplet intimates a hope. 

 Enough! enough! the raptured monarch cries, And through the ivory gate the vision flies. 

The Dunciad was thus a declaration of war against the whole tribe ofscribblers; and, like other such declarations, it brought moreconsequences than Pope foresaw. It introduced Pope to a very dangerousline of conduct. Swift had written to Pope in 1725: "Take care that thebad poets do not outwit you, as they have served the good ones in everyage, whom they have provoked to transmit their names to posterity;" andthe Dunciad has been generally censured from Swift's point of view. Satire, it is said, is wasted upon such insignificant persons. To thisPope might have replied, with some plausibility, that the interest ofsatire must always depend upon its internal qualities, not upon ourindependent knowledge of its object. Though Gildon and Arnall areforgotten, the type "dunce" is eternal. The warfare, however, wasdemoralizing in another sense. Whatever may have been the injustice ofPope's attacks upon individuals, the moral standard of the Grub Streetpopulation was far from exalted. The poor scribbler had too manytemptations to sell himself, and to evade the occasional severity of thelaws of libel by humiliating contrivances. Moreover, the uncertainty ofthe law of copyright encouraged the lower class of booksellers toundertake all kinds of piratical enterprises, and to trade in variousways upon the fame of well-known authors, by attributing trash to them, or purloining and publishing what the authors would have suppressed. Dublin was to London what New York is now, and successful books were atonce reproduced in Ireland. Thus the lower strata of the literary classfrequently practised with impunity all manner of more or lessdiscreditable trickery, and Pope, with his morbid propensity formystification, was only too apt a pupil in such arts. Though the tone ofhis public utterances was always of the loftiest, he was like acivilised commander who, in carrying on a war with savages, finds itconvenient to adopt the practices which he professes to disapprove. 

The whole publication of the Dunciad was surrounded with tricks, intended partly to evade possible consequences, and partly to excitepublic interest or to cause amusement at the expense of the bewilderedvictims. Part of the plot was concerted with Swift, who, however, doesnot appear to have been quite in the secret. The complete poem wasintended to appear with an elaborate mock commentary by Scriblerus, explaining some of the allusions, and with "proeme, prolegomena, testimonia scriptorum, index auctorum, and notĉ variorum. " In the firstinstance, however, it appeared in a mangled form without this burlesqueapparatus or the lines to Swift. Four editions were issued in this formin 1728, and with a mock notice from the publisher, expressing a hopethat the author would be provoked to give a more perfect edition. This, accordingly, appeared in 1729. Pope seems to have been partly led tothis device by a principle which he avowed to Warburton. When he hadanything specially sharp to say he kept it for a second edition, where, it would, he thought, pass with less offence. But he may also have beenunder the impression that all the mystery of apparently spuriouseditions would excite public curiosity. He adopted other devices foravoiding unpleasant consequences. It was possible that his victims mightappeal to the law. In order to throw dust in their eyes, two editionsappeared in Dublin and London, the Dublin edition professing to be areprint from a London edition, whilst the London edition professed inthe same way to be the reprint of a Dublin edition. To oppose anotherobstacle to prosecutors, he assigned the Dunciad to threenoblemen--Lords Bathurst, Burlington, and Oxford--who transferred theirright to Pope's publisher. Pope would be sheltered behind theseresponsible persons, and an aggrieved person might be slower to attackpersons of high position and property. By yet another device Popeapplied for an injunction in Chancery to suppress a piratical Londonedition; but ensured the failure of his application by not supplying thenecessary proofs of property. This trick, repeated, as we shall see, onanother occasion, was intended either to shirk responsibility or toincrease the notoriety of the book. A further mystification was equallycharacteristic. To the Dunciad in its enlarged form is prefixed aletter, really written by Pope himself, but praising his morality andgenius, and justifying his satire in terms which would have been absurdin Pope's own mouth. He therefore induced a Major Cleland, a retiredofficer of some position, to put his name to the letter, which it ispossible that he may have partly written. The device was transparent, and only brought ridicule upon its author. Finally, Pope published anaccount of the publication in the name of Savage, known by Johnson'sbiography, who seems to have been a humble ally of the great man--atonce a convenient source of information and a tool for carrying on thisunderground warfare. Pope afterwards incorporated this statement--whichwas meant to prove, by some palpable falsehoods, that the dunces hadnot been the aggressors--in his own notes, without Savage's name. Thislabyrinth of unworthy devices was more or less visible to Pope'santagonists. It might in some degree be excusable as a huge practicaljoke, absurdly elaborate for the purpose, but it led Pope into someslippery ways, where no such excuse is available. 

Pope, says Johnson, contemplated his victory over the dunces with greatexultation. Through his mouthpiece, Savage, he described the scene onthe day of publication; how a crowd of authors besieged the shop andthreatened him with violence; how the booksellers and hawkers struggledwith small success for copies; how the dunces formed clubs to devisemeasures of retaliation; how one wrote to ministers to denounce Pope asa traitor, and another brought an image in clay to execute him ineffigy; and how successive editions, genuine and spurious, followed eachother, distinguished by an owl or an ass on the frontispiece, andprovoking infinite controversy amongst rival vendors. It is unpleasantto have ugly names hurled at one by the first writer of the day; but theabuse was for the most part too general to be libellous. Nor would therebe any great interest now in exactly distributing the blame between Popeand his enemies. A word or two may be said of one of the mostconspicuous quarrels. 

Aaron Hill was a fussy and ambitious person, full of literary and otherschemes; devising a plan for extracting oil from beech-nuts, and writinga Pindaric ode on the occasion; felling forests in the Highlands toprovide timber for the navy; and, as might be inferred, spending insteadof making a fortune. He was a stage-manager, translated Voltaire'sMerope, wrote words for Handel's first composition in England, wroteunsuccessful plays, a quantity of unreadable poetry, and correspondedwith most of the literary celebrities. Pope put his initials, A. H. , under the head of "Flying Fishes, " in the Bathos, as authors who now andthen rise upon their fins and fly, but soon drop again to the profound. In the Dunciad, he reappeared amongst the divers. 

 Then * * tried, but hardly snatch'd from sight Instant buoys up and rises into light: He bears no token of the sable streams, And mounts far off amongst the swans of Thames. 

A note applied the lines to Hill, with whom he had had a formermisunderstanding. Hill replied to these assaults by a ponderous satirein verse upon "tuneful Alexis;" it had, however, some tolerable lines atthe opening, imitated from Pope's own verses upon Addison, andattributing to him the same jealousy of merit in others. Hill soonafterwards wrote a civil note to Pope, complaining of the passage in theDunciad. Pope might have relied upon the really satisfactory answer thatthe lines were, on the whole, complimentary; indeed, more complimentarythan true. But with his natural propensity for lying, he resorted to hisold devices. In answer to this and a subsequent letter, in which Hillretorted with unanswerable force, Pope went on to declare that he wasnot the author of the notes, that the extracts had been chosen atrandom, that he would "use his influence with the editors of the Dunciadto get the note altered"; and, finally, by an ingenious evasion, pointedout that the blank in the Dunciad required to be filled up by adissyllable. This, in the form of the lines as quoted above, is quitetrue, but in the first edition of the Dunciad the first verse had been

 H-- tried the next, but hardly snatch'd from sight. 

Hill did not detect this specimen of what Pope somewhere calls "prettygenteel equivocation. " He was reconciled to Pope, and taught the poorpoet by experience that his friendship was worse than his enmity. Hewrote him letters of criticism; he forced poor Pope to negotiate for himwith managers and to bring distinguished friends to the performances ofhis dreary plays; nay, to read through, or to say that he had readthrough, one of them in manuscript four times, and make correctionsmixed with elaborate eulogy. No doubt Pope came to regard a letter fromHill with terror, though Hill compared him to Horace and Juvenal, andhoped that he would live till the virtues which his spirit wouldpropagate became as general as the esteem of his genius. In short, Hill, who was a florid flatterer, is so complimentary that we are notsurprised to find him telling Richardson, after Pope's death, that thepoet's popularity was due to a certain "bladdery swell of management. ""But, " he concludes, "rest his memory in in peace! It will very rarelybe disturbed by that time he himself is ashes. "

The war raged for some time. Dennis, Smedley, Moore-Smythe, Welsted, andothers, retorted by various pamphlets, the names of which were publishedby Pope in an appendix to future editions of the "Dunciad, " by way ofproving that his own blows had told. Lady Mary was credited, perhapsunjustly, with an abusive performance called a "Pop upon Pope, " relatinghow Pope had been soundly whipped by a couple of his victims--of coursea pure fiction. Some such vengeance, however, was seriously threatened. As Pope was dining one day at Lord Bathurst's, the servant brought inthe agreeable message that a young man was waiting for Mr. Pope in thelane outside, and that the young man's name was Dennis. He was the sonof the critic, and prepared to avenge his father's wrongs; but Bathurstpersuaded him to retire, without the glory of thrashing a cripple. Reports of such possibilities were circulated, and Pope thought itprudent to walk out with his big Danish dog Bounce, and a pair ofpistols. Spence tried to persuade the little man not to go out alone, but Pope declared that he would not go a step out of his way for suchvillains, and that it was better to die than to live in fear of them. Hecontinued, indeed, to give fresh provocation. A weekly paper, called theGrub-street Journal, was started in January, 1730, and continued toappear till the end of 1737. It included a continuous series of epigramsand abuse, in the Scriblerian vein, and aimed against the heroes of theDunciad, amongst whom poor James Moore-Smythe seems to have had thelargest share of abuse. It was impossible, however, for Pope, busied ashe was in literature and society, and constantly out of health, to bethe efficient editor of such a performance; but though he denied havingany concern in it, it is equally out of the question that any one reallyunconnected with Pope should have taken up the huge burden of hisquarrels in this fashion. Though he concealed, and on occasions deniedhis connexion, he no doubt inspired the editors and contributed articlesto its pages, especially during its early years. It is a singularfact--or rather, it would have been singular, had Pope been a man ofless abnormal character--that he should have devoted so much energy tothis paltry subterranean warfare against the objects of his complexantipathies. Pope was so anxious for concealment, that he kept hissecret even from his friendly legal adviser Fortescue; and Fortescueinnocently requested Pope to get up evidence to support a charge oflibel against his own organ. The evidence which Pope collected--indefence of a quack-doctor, Ward--was not, as we may suppose, veryvaluable. Two volumes of the Grub-street Journal were printed in 1737, and a fragment or two was admitted by Pope into his works. It is said, in the preface to the collected pieces, that the journal was killed bythe growing popularity of the Gentleman's Magazine, which is accused ofliving by plunder. But in truth the reader will infer that, if theselection includes the best pieces, the journal may well have died fromcongenital weakness. 

The Dunciad was yet to go through a transformation, and to lead to a newquarrel; and though this happened at a much later period, it will bemost convenient to complete the story here. Pope had formed an alliancewith Warburton, of which I shall presently have to speak; and it wasunder Warburton's influence that he resolved to add a fourth book to theDunciad. This supplement seems to have been really made up of fragmentsprovided for another scheme. The Essay on Man--to be presentlymentioned--was to be followed by a kind of poetical essay upon thenature and limits of the human understanding, and a satire upon themisapplication of the serious faculties. [13] It was a design manifestlybeyond the author's powers; and even the fragment which is turned intothe fourth book of the Dunciad takes him plainly out of his depth. Hewas no philosopher, and therefore an incompetent assailant of the abusesof philosophy. The fourth book consists chiefly of ridicule uponpedagogues who teach words instead of things; upon the unlucky"virtuosos" who care for old medals, plants, and butterflies--pursuitswhich afforded an unceasing supply of ridicule to the essayists of thetime; a denunciation of the corruption of modern youth, who learnnothing but new forms of vice in the grand tour; and a fresh assaultupon Toland, Tindal, and other freethinkers of the day. There were somepassages marked by Pope's usual dexterity, but the whole is awkwardlyconstructed, and has no very intelligible connexion with the first part. It was highly admired at the time, and, amongst others, by Gray. Hespecially praises a passage which has often been quoted as representingPope's highest achievement in his art. At the conclusion the goddessDulness yawns, and a blight falls upon art, science, and philosophy. Iquote the lines, which Pope himself could not repeat without emotion, and which have received the highest eulogies from Johnson and Thackeray. 

 In vain, in vain--the all-composing Hour Resistless falls; the Muse obeys the Power-- She comes! she comes! the sable throne behold Of night primeval and of chaos old! Before her Fancy's gilded clouds decay, And all its varying rainbows die away. Wit shoots in vain its momentary fires, The meteor drops, and in a flash expires, As one by one, at dread Medea's strain, The sickening stars fade off the ethereal plain; As Argus' eyes by Hermes' wand oppress'd Closed one by one to everlasting rest; Thus at her felt approach, and secret might, Art after art goes out, and all is night. See skulking Truth to her old cavern fled, Mountains of casuistry heaped o'er her head! Philosophy, that lean'd on heaven before, Shrinks to her second cause, and is no more. Physic of Metaphysic begs defence, And Metaphysic calls for aid on Sense! See Mystery to Mathematics fly! In vain! They gaze, turn giddy, rave and die. Religion blushing veils her sacred fires And unawares Morality expires. Nor public flame, nor private, dares to shine; Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine! Lo! thy dread empire, Chaos! is restored; Light dies before thy uncreating word; Thy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtain fall And universal darkness buries all. 

The most conspicuous figure in this new Dunciad (published March, 1742), is Bentley--taken as the representative of a pedant rampant. Bentley is, I think, the only man of real genius of whom Pope has spoken in termsimplying gross misappreciation. With all his faults, Pope was a reallyfine judge of literature, and has made fewer blunders than such men asAddison, Gray, and Johnson, infinitely superior to him in generosity offeeling towards the living. He could even appreciate Bentley, and hadwritten, in his copy of Bentley's Milton, "_Pulchre, bene, recte_, "against some of the happier emendations in the great critic's mostunsuccessful performance. The assault in the Dunciad is not the lessunsparing and ignorantly contemptuous of scholarship. The explanation iseasy. Bentley, who had spoken contemptuously of Pope's Homer, said ofPope, "the portentous cub never forgives. " But this was not all. Bentleyhad provoked enemies by his intense pugnacity almost as freely as Popeby his sneaking malice. Swift and Atterbury, objects of Pope's friendlyadmiration, had been his antagonists, and Pope would naturally accepttheir view of his merits. And, moreover, Pope's great ally of thisperiod had a dislike of his own to Bentley. Bentley had said ofWarburton that he was a man of monstrous appetite and bad digestion. The remark hit Warburton's most obvious weakness. Warburton, with hisimperfect scholarship, and vast masses of badly assimilated learning, was jealous of the reputation of the thoroughly trained and accuratecritic. It was the dislike of a charlatan for the excellence which heendeavoured to simulate. Bolingbroke, it may be added, was equallycontemptuous in his language about men of learning, and for much thesame reason. He depreciated what he could not rival. Pope, always underthe influence of some stronger companions, naturally adopted theirshallow prejudices, and recklessly abused a writer who should have beenrecognized as amongst the most effective combatants against dulness. 

Bentley died a few months after the publication of the Dunciad. But Popefound a living antagonist, who succeeded in giving him pain enough togratify the vilified dunces. This was Colley Cibber--most lively andmercurial of actors--author of some successful plays, with too littlestuff in them for permanence, and of an Apology for his own Life, whichis still exceedingly amusing as well as useful for the history of thestage. He was now approaching seventy, though he was to survive Pope forthirteen years, and as good-tempered a specimen of the lively, if nottoo particular, old man of the world as could well have been found. Popeowed him a grudge. Cibber, in playing the _Rehearsal_, had introducedsome ridicule of the unlucky _Three Hours after Marriage_. Pope, hesays, came behind the scenes foaming and choking with fury, andforbidding Cibber ever to repeat the insult. Cibber laughed at him, saidthat he would repeat it as long as the _Rehearsal_ was performed, andkept his word. Pope took his revenge by many incidental hits at Cibber, and Cibber made a good-humoured reference to this abuse in the Apology. Hereupon Pope, in the new Dunciad, described him as reclining on the lapof the goddess, and added various personalities in the notes. Cibberstraightway published a letter to Pope, the more cutting because stillin perfect good-humour, and told the story about the original quarrel. He added an irritating anecdote in order to provoke the poet stillfurther. It described Pope as introduced by Cibber and Lord Warwick tovery bad company. The story was one which could only be told by agraceless old representative of the old school of comedy, but it hit itsmark. The two Richardsons once found Pope reading one of Cibber'spamphlets. He said, "These things are my diversion;" but they saw hisfeatures writhing with anguish, and young Richardson, as they went home, observed to his father that he hoped to be preserved from suchdiversions as Pope had enjoyed. The poet resolved to avenge himself, andhe did it to the lasting injury of his poem. He dethroned Theobald, who, as a plodding antiquarian, was an excellent exponent of dulness, andinstalled Cibber in his place, who might be a representative of folly, but was as little of a dullard as Pope himself. The consequentalterations make the hero of the poem a thoroughly incongruous figure, and greatly injure the general design. The poem appeared in this form in1743, with a ponderous prefatory discourse by Ricardus Aristarchus, contributed by the faithful Warburton, and illustrating his ponderousvein of elephantine pleasantry. 

Pope was nearing the grave, and many of his victims had gone before him. It was a melancholy employment for an invalid, breaking down visiblymonth by month; and one might fancy that the eminent Christian divinemight have used his influence to better purpose than in fanning thedying flame, and adding the strokes of his bludgeon to the keen stabs ofPope's stiletto. In the fourteen years which had elapsed since the firstDunciad, Pope had found less unworthy employment for his pen; but, before dealing with the works produced at this time, which include someof his highest achievements, I must tell a story which is in some ways anatural supplement to the war with the dunces. In describing Pope'sentangled history, it seems most convenient to follow each separate lineof discharge of his multifarious energy, rather than to adhere tochronological order. 

FOOTNOTES:

[13] See Pope to Swift, March 25, 1736. 

CHAPTER VI. [14]

CORRESPONDENCE. 

I have now to describe one of the most singular series of transactionsto be found in the annals of literature. A complete knowledge of theirvarious details has only been obtained by recent researches. I cannotfollow within my limits of space all the ins and outs of the complicatedlabyrinth of more than diplomatic trickery which those researches haverevealed, though I hope to render the main facts sufficientlyintelligible. It is painful to track the strange deceptions of a man ofgenius as a detective unravels the misdeeds of an accomplished swindler;but without telling the story at some length, it is impossible to give afaithful exhibition of Pope's character. 

In the year 1726, when Pope had just finished his labours upon Homer, Curll published the juvenile letters to Cromwell. There was no mysteryabout this transaction. Curll was the chief of all piraticalbooksellers, and versed in every dirty trick of the Grub-street trade. He is described in that mad book, Amory's _John Buncle_, as tall, thin, ungainly, white-faced, with light grey goggle eyes, purblind, splay-footed, and "baker-kneed. " According to the same queer authority, who professes to have lodged in Curll's house, he was drunk, as often ashe could drink for nothing, and intimate in every London haunt of vice. "His translators lay three in a bed at the Pewter Platter Inn inHolborn, " and helped to compile his indecent, piratical, and catchpennyproductions. He had lost his ears for some obscene publication; butAmory adds, "to his glory, " that he died "as great a penitent as everexpired. " He had one strong point as an antagonist. Having no characterto lose, he could reveal his own practices without a blush, if therevelation injured others. 

Pope had already come into collision with this awkward antagonist. In1716 Curll threatened to publish the Town Eclogues, burlesques uponAmbrose Philips, written by Lady Mary, with the help of Pope and perhapsGay. Pope, with Lintot, had a meeting with Curll in the hopes ofsuppressing a publication calculated to injure his friends. The partyhad some wine, and Curll on going home was very sick. He declared--andthere are reasons for believing his story--that Pope had given him anemetic, by way of coarse practical joke. Pope, at any rate, tookadvantage of the accident to write a couple of squibs upon Curll, recording the bookseller's ravings under the action of the drug, as hehad described the ravings of Dennis provoked by Cato. Curll had hisrevenge afterwards; but meanwhile he wanted no extraneous motive toinduce him to publish the Cromwell letters. Cromwell had given theletters to a mistress, who fell into distress and sold them to Curll forten guineas. 

The correspondence was received with some favour, and suggested to Popea new mode of gratifying his vanity. An occasion soon offered itself. Theobald, the hero of the Dunciad, edited in 1728 the posthumous worksof Wycherley. Pope extracted from this circumstance a far-fetched excusefor publishing the Wycherley correspondence. He said that it was due toWycherley's memory to prove, by the publication of their correspondence, that the posthumous publication of the works was opposed to theirauthor's wishes. As a matter of fact the letters have no tendency toprove anything of the kind, or rather, they support the opposite theory;but poor Pope was always a hand-to-mouth liar, and took the firstpretext that offered, without caring for consistency or confirmation. His next step was to write to his friend, Lord Oxford, son of QueenAnne's minister. Oxford was a weak, good-natured man. By cultivating avariety of expensive tastes, without the knowledge to guide them, hemanaged to run through a splendid fortune and die in embarrassment. Hisfamous library was one of his special hobbies. Pope now applied to himto allow the Wycherley letters to be deposited in the library, andfurther requested that the fact of their being in this quasi-publicplace might be mentioned in the preface as a guarantee of theirauthenticity. Oxford consented, and Pope quietly took a further stepwithout authority. He told Oxford that he had decided to make hispublishers say that copies of the letters had been obtained from LordOxford. He told the same story to Swift, speaking of the "connivance" ofhis noble friend, and adding that, though he did not himself "muchapprove" of the publication, he was not ashamed of it. He thusingeniously intimated that the correspondence, which he had himselfcarefully prepared and sent to press, had been printed without hisconsent by the officious zeal of Oxford and the booksellers. 

The book (which was called the second volume of Wycherley's works) hasentirely disappeared. It was advertised at the time, but not a singlecopy is known to exist. One cause of this disappearance now appears tobe that it had no sale at first, and that Pope preserved the sheets foruse in a more elaborate device which followed. Oxford probably objectedto the misuse of his name, as the fiction which made him responsible wasafterwards dropped. Pope found, or thought that he had found, on thenext occasion, a more convenient cat's-paw. Curll, it could not bedoubted, would snatch at any chance of publishing more correspondence;and, as Pope was anxious to have his letters stolen and Curll was readyto steal, the one thing necessary was a convenient go-between, who couldbe disowned or altogether concealed. Pope went systematically to work. He began by writing to his friends, begging them to return his letters. After Curll's piracy, he declared, he could not feel himself safe, andshould be unhappy till he had the letters in his own custody. Letterswere sent in, though in some cases with reluctance; and Caryll, inparticular, who had the largest number, privately took copies beforereturning them (a measure which ultimately secured the detection of manyof Pope's manoeuvres). This, however, was unknown to Pope. He had theletters copied out; after (according to his own stating) burningthree-fourths of them, and (as we are now aware) carefully editing theremainder, he had the copy deposited in Lord Oxford's library. Hisobject was, as he said, partly to have documents ready in case of therevival of scandals, and partly to preserve the memory of hisfriendships. The next point was to get these letters stolen. For thispurpose he created a man of straw, a mysterious "P. T. , " who could bepersonated on occasion by some of the underlings employed in theunderground transactions connected with the Dunciad and the Grub-streetJournal. P. T. Began by writing to Curll in 1733, and offering to sellhim a collection of Pope's letters. The negotiation went off for a time, because P. T. Insisted upon Curll's first committing himself bypublishing an advertisement, declaring himself to be already inpossession of the originals. Curll was too wary to commit himself tosuch a statement, which would have made him responsible for the theft;or, perhaps, have justified Pope in publishing the originals inself-defence. The matter slept till March 1735, when Curll wrote to Popeproposing a cessation of hostilities, and as a proof of goodwill sendinghim the old P. T. Advertisement. This step fell in so happily withPope's designs that it has been suggested that Curll was prompted insome indirect manner by one of Pope's agents. Pope, at any rate, turnedit to account. He at once published an insulting advertisement. Curll(he said in this manifesto) had pretended to have had the offer from P. T. Of a large collection of Pope's letters; Pope knew nothing of P. T. , believed the letters to be forgeries, and would take no more trouble inthe matter. Whilst Curll was presumably smarting under this summary slapon the face, the insidious P. T. Stepped in once more. P. T. Now saidthat he was in possession of the printed sheets of the correspondence, and the negotiation went on swimmingly. Curll put out the requiredadvertisement; a "short, squat" man, in a clergyman's gown and withbarrister's bands, calling himself Smythe, came to his house at night asP. T. 's agent, and showed him some printed sheets and original letters;the bargain was struck; 240 copies of the book were delivered, and itwas published on May 12th. 

So far the plot had succeeded. Pope had printed his own correspondence, and had tricked Curll into publishing the book piratically, whilst thepublic was quite prepared to believe that Curll had performed a newpiratical feat. Pope, however, was now bound to shriek as loudly as hecould at the outrage under which he was suffering. He should have beenprepared also to answer an obvious question. Every one would naturallyinquire how Curll had procured the letters, which by Pope's own accountwere safely deposited in Lord Oxford's library. Without, as it wouldseem, properly weighing the difficulty of meeting this demand, Popecalled out loudly for vengeance. When the Dunciad appeared, he hadapplied (as I have said) for an injunction in Chancery, and had at thesame time secured the failure of his application. The same device wastried in a still more imposing fashion. The House of Lords had recentlydecided that it was a breach of privilege to publish a peer's letterswithout his consent. Pope availed himself of this rule to fire the mostsounding of blank shots across the path of the piratical Curll. He wasas anxious to allow the publication, as to demand its suppression in themost emphatic manner. Accordingly he got his friend, Lord Ilay, to callthe attention of the peers to Curll's advertisement, which was so wordedas to imply that there were in the book letters from, as well as to, peers. Pope himself attended the house "to stimulate the resentment ofhis friends. " The book was at once seized by a messenger, and Curllordered to attend the next day. But on examination it immediately turnedout that it contained no letters from peers, and the whole farce wouldhave ended at once but for a further trick. Lord Ilay said that acertain letter to Jervas contained a reflection upon Lord Burlington. Now the letter was found in a first batch of fifty copies sent toCurll, and which had been sold before the appearance of the Lords'messenger. But the letter had been suppressed in a second batch of 190copies, which the messenger was just in time to seize. Pope had ofcourse foreseen and prepared this result. 

The whole proceeding in the Lords was thus rendered abortive. The bookswere restored to Curll, and the sale continued. But the device meanwhilehad recoiled upon its author; the very danger against which he shouldhave guarded himself had now occurred. How were the letters procured?Not till Curll was coming up for examination does it seem to haveoccurred to Pope that the Lords would inevitably ask the awkwardquestion. He then saw that Curll's answer might lead to a discovery. Hewrote a letter to Curll (in Smythe's name) intended to meet thedifficulty. He entreated Curll to take the whole of the responsibilityof procuring the letters upon himself, and by way of inducement held outhopes of another volume of correspondence. In a second note he tried tothrow Curll off the scent of another significant little fact. The sheets(as I have mentioned) were partly made up from the volume of Wycherleycorrespondence;[15] this would give a clue to further inquiries; P. T. Therefore allowed Smythe to say (ostensibly to show his confidence inCurll) that he (P. T. ) had been employed in getting up the formervolume, and had had some additional sheets struck off for himself, towhich he had added letters subsequently obtained. The letter was asignal blunder. Curll saw at once that it put the game in his hands. Hewas not going to tell lies to please the slippery P. T. , or the shortsquat lawyer-clergyman. He had begun to see through the wholemanoeuvre. He went straight off to the Lords' committee, told thewhole story, and produced as a voucher the letters in which P. T. Beggedfor secrecy. Curll's word was good for little by itself, but his storyhung together and the letter confirmed it. And if, as now seemed clear, Curll was speaking the truth, the question remained, who was P. T. , andhow did he get the letters? The answer, as Pope must have felt, was onlytoo clear. 

But Curll now took the offensive. In reply to another letter fromSmythe, complaining of his evidence, he went roundly to work; he saidthat he should at once publish all the correspondence. P. T. Hadprudently asked for the return of his letters; but Curll had keptcopies, and was prepared to swear to their fidelity. Accordingly he soonadvertised what was called the _Initial Correspondence_. Pope was nowcaught in his own trap. He had tried to avert suspicion by publiclyoffering a reward to Smythe and P. T. , if they would "discover the wholeaffair. " The letters, as he admitted, must have been procured eitherfrom his own library or from Lord Oxford's. The correspondence to bepublished by Curll would help to identify the mysterious appropriators, and whatever excuses could be made ought now to be forthcoming. Popeadopted a singular plan. It was announced that the clergyman concernedwith P. T. And Curll had "discovered the whole transaction. " A narrativewas forthwith published to anticipate Curll and to clear up the mystery. If good for anything, it should have given, or helped to give, the keyto the great puzzle--the mode of obtaining the letters. There wasnothing else for Smythe or P. T. To "discover. " Readers must have beenstrangely disappointed on finding not a single word to throw light uponthis subject, and merely a long account of the negotiations betweenCurll and P. T. The narrative might serve to distract attention from themain point, which it clearly did nothing to elucidate. But Curll nowstated his own case. He reprinted the narrative with some pungent notes;he gave in full some letters omitted by P. T. , and he added a storywhich was most unpleasantly significant. P. T. Had spoken, as I havesaid, of his connexion with the Wycherley volume. The object of thisstatement was to get rid of an awkward bit of evidence. But Curll nowannounced, on the authority of Gilliver, the publisher of the volume, that Pope had himself bought up the remaining sheets. The inference wasclear. Unless the story could be contradicted, and it never was, Popewas himself the thief. The sheets common to the two volumes had beentraced to his possession. Nor was there a word in the P. T. Narrative todiminish the force of these presumptions. Indeed it was curiouslyinconsistent, for it vaguely accused Curll of stealing the lettershimself, whilst in the same breath it told how he had bought them fromP. T. In fact, P. T. Was beginning to resolve himself into thin air, like the phantom in the Dunciad. As he vanished, it required no greatacuteness to distinguish behind him the features of his ingeniouscreator. It was already believed at the time that the whole affair wasan elaborate contrivance of Pope's, and subsequent revelations havedemonstrated the truth of the hypothesis. Even the go-between, Smythe, was identified as one James Worsdale, a painter, actor, and author, ofthe Bohemian variety. 

Though Curll had fairly won the game, and Pope's intrigue was even atthe time sufficiently exposed, it seems to have given less scandal thanmight have been expected. Probably it was suspected only in literarycircles, and perhaps it might be thought that, silly as was theelaborate device, the disreputable Curll was fair game for his naturalenemy. Indeed, such is the irony of fate, Pope won credit with simplepeople. The effect of the publication, as Johnson tells us, was to fillthe nation with praises of the admirable moral qualities revealed inPope's letters. Amongst the admirers was Ralph Allen, who had made alarge fortune by farming the cross-posts. His princely benevolence andsterling worth were universally admitted, and have been immortalized bythe best contemporary judge of character. He was the original ofFielding's Allworthy. Like that excellent person, he seems to have hadthe common weakness of good men in taking others too easily at their ownvaluation. Pope imposed upon him just as Blifil imposed upon hisrepresentative. He was so much pleased with the correspondence, that hesought Pope's acquaintance, and offered to publish a genuine edition athis own expense. An authoritative edition appeared accordingly in 1737. Pope preferred to publish by subscription, which does not seem to havefilled very rapidly, though the work ultimately made a fair profit. Pope's underhand manoeuvres were abundantly illustrated in the historyof this new edition. It is impossible to give the details; but I maybriefly state that he was responsible for a nominally spurious editionwhich appeared directly after, and was simply a reproduction of Curll'spublication. Although he complained of the garbling and interpolationssupposed to have been due to the wicked Curll or the phantom P. T. , andalthough he omitted in his avowed edition certain letters which hadgiven offence, he nevertheless substantially reproduced in it Curll'sversion of the letters. As this differs from the originals which havebeen preserved, Pope thus gave an additional proof that he was reallyresponsible for Curll's supposed garbling. This evidence was adducedwith conclusive force by Bowles in a later controversy, and would beenough by itself to convict Pope of the imputed deception. Finally, itmay be added that Pope's delay in producing his own edition is explainedby the fact that it contained many falsifications of his correspondencewith Caryll, and that he delayed the acknowledgment of the genuinecharacter of the letters until Caryll's death removed the danger ofdetection. 

The whole of this elaborate machinery was devised in order that Popemight avoid the ridicule of publishing his own correspondence. There hadbeen few examples of a similar publication of private letters; andPope's volume, according to Johnson, did not attract very muchattention. This is, perhaps, hardly consistent with Johnson's otherassertion that it filled the nation with praises of his virtue. In anycase it stimulated his appetite for such praises, and led him to a freshintrigue, more successful and also more disgraceful. The deviceoriginally adopted in publishing the Dunciad apparently suggested partof the new plot. The letters hitherto published did not include the mostinteresting correspondence in which Pope had been engaged. He had beenin the habit of writing to Swift since their first acquaintance, andBolingbroke had occasionally joined him. These letters, which connectedPope with two of his most famous contemporaries, would be far moreinteresting than the letters to Cromwell or Wycherley, or even than theletters addressed to Addison and Steele, which were mere stiltedfabrications. How could they be got before the world, and in such a wayas to conceal his own complicity?

Pope had told Swift (in 1730) that he had kept some of the letters in avolume for his own secret satisfaction; and Swift had preserved allPope's letters along with those of other distinguished men. Here was anattractive booty for such parties as the unprincipled Curll! In 1735Curll had committed his wicked piracy, and Pope pressed Swift to returnhis letters, in order to "secure him against that rascal printer. " Theentreaties were often renewed, but Swift for some reason turned his deafear to the suggestion. He promised, indeed (Sept. 3, 1735), that theletters should be burnt--a most effectual security againstrepublication, but one not at all to Pope's taste. Pope then admittedthat, having been forced to publish some of his other letters, he shouldlike to make use of some of those to Swift, as none would be morehonourable to him. Nay, he says, he meant to erect such a minutemonument of their friendship as would put to shame all ancient memorialsof the same kind. [16] This avowal of his intention to publish did notconciliate Swift. Curll next published in 1736 a couple of letters toSwift, and Pope took advantage of this publication (perhaps he hadindirectly supplied Curll with copies) to urge upon Swift the insecurityof the letters in his keeping. Swift ignored the request, and hisletters about this time began to show that his memory was failing andhis intellect growing weak. 

Pope now applied to their common friend Lord Orrery. Orrery was the dullmember of a family eminent for its talents. His father had left avaluable library to Christ Church, ostensibly because the son was notcapable of profiting by books, though a less creditable reason has beenassigned. [17] The son, eager to wipe off the imputation, speciallyaffected the society of wits, and was elaborately polite both to Swiftand Pope. Pope now got Orrery to intercede with Swift, urging that theletters were no longer safe in the custody of a failing old man. Orrerysucceeded, and brought the letters in a sealed packet to Pope in thesummer of 1737. Swift, it must be added, had an impression that therewas a gap of six years in the collection; he became confused as to whathad or had not been sent, and had a vague belief in a "great collection"of letters "placed in some very safe hand. "[18] Pope, being thus inpossession of the whole correspondence, proceeded to perform amanoeuvre resembling those already employed in the case of the Dunciadand of the P. T. Letters. He printed the correspondence clandestinely. He then sent the printed volume to Swift, accompanied by an anonymousletter. This letter purported to come from some persons who, fromadmiration of Swift's private and public virtues, had resolved topreserve letters so creditable to him, and had accordingly put them intype. They suggested that the volume would be suppressed if it fell intothe hands of Bolingbroke and Pope (a most audacious suggestion!), andintimated that Swift should himself publish it. No other copy, theysaid, was in existence. Poor Swift fell at once into the trap. Heought, of course, to have consulted Pope or Bolingbroke, and wouldprobably have done so had his mind been sound. Seeing, however, a volumealready printed, he might naturally suppose that, in spite of theanonymous assurance, it was already too late to stop the publication. Atany rate, he at once sent it to his publisher, Faulkner, and desired himto bring it out at once. Swift was in that most melancholy state inwhich a man's friends perceive him to be incompetent to manage hisaffairs, and are yet not able to use actual restraint. Mrs. Whiteway, the sensible and affectionate cousin who took care of him at this time, did her best to protest against the publication, but in vain. Swiftinsisted. So far Pope's device was successful. The printed letters hadbeen placed in the hands of his bookseller by Swift himself, andpublication was apparently secured. But Pope had still the same problemas in the previous case. Though he had talked of erecting a monument toSwift and himself, he was anxious that the monument should apparently beerected by some one else. His vanity could only be satisfied by theappearance that the publication was forced upon him. He had, therefore, to dissociate himself from the publication by some protest at onceemphatic and ineffectual; and, consequently, to explain the means bywhich the letters had been surreptitiously obtained. 

The first aim was unexpectedly difficult. Faulkner turned out to be anhonest bookseller. Instead of sharing Curll's rapacity, he consented, atMrs. Whiteway's request, to wait until Pope had an opportunity ofexpressing his wishes. Pope, if he consented, could no longer complain;if he dissented, Faulkner would suppress the letters. In this dilemma, Pope first wrote to Faulkner to refuse permission, and at the same timetook care that his letter should be delayed for a month. He hoped thatFaulkner would lose patience, and publish. But Faulkner, with provokingcivility, stopped the press as soon as he heard of Pope's objection. Pope hereupon discovered that the letters were certain to be published, as they were already printed, and doubtless by some mysterious"confederacy of people" in London. All he could wish was to revise thembefore appearance. Meanwhile he begged Lord Orrery to inspect the book, and say what he thought of it. "Guess in what a situation I must be, "exclaimed this sincere and modest person, "not to be able to see whatall the world is to read as mine!" Orrery was quite as provoking asFaulkner. He got the book from Faulkner, read it, and instead of beggingPope not to deprive the world of so delightful a treat, said with dullintegrity, that he thought the collection "unworthy to be published. "Orrery, however, was innocent enough to accept Pope's suggestion, thatletters which had once got into such hands would certainly come outsooner or later. After some more haggling, Pope ultimately decided totake this ground. He would, he said, have nothing to do with theletters; they would come out in any case; their appearance would pleasethe Dean, and he (Pope) would stand clear of all responsibility. Hetried, indeed, to get Faulkner to prefix a statement tending to fix thewhole transaction upon Swift; but the bookseller declined, and theletters ultimately came out with a simple statement that they were areprint. 

Pope had thus virtually sanctioned the publication. He was not the lessemphatic in complaining of it to his friends. To Orrery, who knew thefacts, he represented the printed copy sent to Swift as a proof thatthe letters were beyond his power; and to others, such as his friendAllen, he kept silence as to this copy altogether; and gave them tounderstand that poor Swift--or some member of Swift's family--was theprime mover in the business. His mystification had, as before, drivenhim into perplexities upon which he had never calculated. In fact, itwas still more difficult here than in the previous case to account forthe original misappropriation of the letters. Who could the thief havebeen? Orrery, as we have seen, had himself taken a packet of letters toPope, which would be of course the letters from Pope to Swift. Thepacket being sealed, Orrery did not know the contents, and Pope assertedthat he had burnt it almost as soon as received. It was, however, truethat Swift had been in the habit of showing the originals to hisfriends, and some might possibly have been stolen or copied by designingpeople. But this would not account for the publication of Swift'sletters to Pope, which had never been out of Pope's possession. As hehad certainly been in possession of the other letters, it was easiest, even for himself, to suppose that some of his own servants were theguilty persons; his own honour being, of course, beyond question. 

To meet these difficulties, Pope made great use of some stray phrasesdropped by Swift in the decline of his memory, and set up a story of hishaving himself returned some letters to Swift, of which important factall traces had disappeared. One characteristic device will be asufficient specimen. Swift wrote that a great collection of "_my_letters to _you_" is somewhere "in a safe hand. " He meant, of course, "acollection of _your_ letters to _me_"--the only letters of which hecould know anything. Observing the slip of the pen, he altered thephrase by writing the correct words above the line. It now stood--

 "your me my letters to you. "

Pope laid great stress upon this, interpreting it to mean that the"great collection" included letters from each correspondent to theother--the fact being that Swift had only the letters from Pope tohimself. The omission of an erasure (whether by Swift or Pope) causedthe whole meaning to be altered. As the great difficulty was to explainthe publication of Swift's letters to Pope, this change supplied a veryimportant link in the evidence. It implied that Swift had been at sometime in possession of the letters in question, and had trusted them tosome one supposed to be safe. The whole paragraph, meanwhile, appears, from the unimpeachable evidence of Mrs. Whiteway, to have involved oneof the illusions of memory, for which he (Swift) apologizes in theletter from which this is extracted. By insisting upon this passage, andupon certain other letters dexterously confounded with those published, Pope succeeded in raising dust enough to blind Lord Orrery's not verypiercing intelligence. The inference which he desired to suggest wasthat some persons in Swift's family had obtained possession of theletters. Mrs. Whiteway, indeed, met the suggestion so clearly, and gavesuch good reasons for assigning Twickenham as the probable centre of theplot, that she must have suspected the truth. Pope did not venture toassail her publicly, though he continued to talk of treachery or evilinfluence. 

To accuse innocent people of a crime which you know yourself to havecommitted is bad enough. It is, perhaps, even baser to lay a trap for afriend, and reproach him for falling into it. Swift had denied thepublication of the letters, and Pope would have had some grounds ofcomplaint had he not been aware of the failure of Swift's mind, and hadhe not been himself the tempter. His position, however, forced him toblame his friend. It was a necessary part of his case to impute at leasta breach of confidence to his victim. He therefore took the attitude--itmust, one hopes, have cost him a blush--of one who is seriouslyaggrieved, but who is generously anxious to shield a friend inconsideration of his known infirmity. He is forced, in sorrow, to admitthat Swift has erred, but he will not allow himself to be annoyed. Themost humiliating words ever written by a man not utterly vile, must havebeen those which Pope set down in a letter to Nugent, after giving hisown version of the case: "I think I can make no reflections upon thisstrange incident but what are truly melancholy, and humble the pride ofhuman nature. That the greatest of geniuses, though prudence may havebeen the companion of wit (which is very rare) for their whole livespast, may have nothing left them but their vanity. No decay of body ishalf so miserable. " The most audacious hypocrite of fiction pales besidethis. Pope, condescending to the meanest complication of lies to justifya paltry vanity, taking advantage of his old friend's dotage to trickhim into complicity, then giving a false account of his error, andfinally moralizing, with all the airs of philosophic charity, and takingcredit for his generosity, is altogether a picture to set fiction atdefiance. 

I must add a remark not so edifying. Pope went down to his grave soonafterwards, without exciting suspicion except among two or three peopleintimately concerned. A whisper of doubt was soon hushed. Even thebiographers who were on the track of his former deception did notsuspect this similar iniquity. The last of them, Mr. Carruthers, writingin 1857, observes upon the pain given to Pope by the treachery ofSwift--a treachery of course palliated by Swift's failure of mind. Atlast Mr. Dilke discovered the truth, which has been placed beyond doubtby the still later discovery of the letters to Orrery. The moral is, apparently, that it is better to cheat a respectable man than a rogue;for the respectable tacitly form a society for mutual support ofcharacter, whilst the open rogue will be only too glad to show that youare even such an one as himself. 

It was not probable that letters thus published should be printed withscrupulous accuracy. Pope, indeed, can scarcely have attempted toconceal the fact that they had been a good deal altered. And so long asthe letters were regarded merely as literary compositions, the practicewas at least pardonable. But Pope went further; and the full extent ofhis audacious changes was not seen until Mr. Dilke became possessed ofthe Caryll correspondence. On comparing the copies preserved by Caryllwith the letters published by Pope, it became evident that Pope hadregarded these letters as so much raw material, which he might carveinto shape at pleasure, and with such alterations of date and address asmight be convenient, to the confusion of all biographers and editorsignorant of his peculiar method of editing. The details of these verydisgraceful falsifications have been fully described by Mr. Elwin, [19]but I turn gladly from this lamentable narrative to say something of theliterary value of the correspondence. Every critic has made the obviousremark that Pope's letters are artificial and self-conscious. Popeclaimed the opposite merit. "It is many years, " he says to Swift in---4, "since I wrote as a wit. " He smiles to think "how Curll would bebit were our epistles to fall into his hands, and how gloriously theywould fall short of every ingenious reader's anticipations. " Warburtonadds in a note that Pope used to "value himself upon this particular. "It is indeed true that Pope had dropped the boyish affectation of hisletters to Wycherley and Cromwell. But such a statement in the mouth ofa man who plotted to secure Curll's publication of his letters, withdevices elaborate enough to make the reputation of an unscrupulousdiplomatist, is of course only one more example of the superlativedegree of affectation, the affectation of being unaffected. We should beindeed disappointed were we to expect in Pope's letters what we find inthe best specimens of the art: the charm which belongs to a simpleoutpouring of friendly feeling in private intercourse; the sweetplayfulness of Cowper, or the grave humour of Gray, or even the sparkleand brilliance of Walpole's admirable letters. Though Walpole had an eyeto posterity, and has his own mode of affectation, he is for the momentintent on amusing, and is free from the most annoying blemish in Pope'swriting, the resolution to appear always in full dress, and to mount asoften as possible upon the stilts of moral self-approbation. All this isobvious to the hasty reader; and yet I must confess my own convictionthat there is scarcely a more interesting volume in the language thanthat which contains the correspondence of Swift, Bolingbroke, and Pope. To enjoy it, indeed, we must not expect to be in sympathy with thewriters. Rather we must adopt the mental attitude of spectators of ascene of high comedy--the comedy which is dashed with satire and has atragical side to it. We are behind the scenes in Vanity Fair, andlistening to the talk of three of its most famous performers, doubtingwhether they most deceive each other or the public or themselves. Thesecret is an open one for us, now that the illusion which perplexedcontemporaries has worn itself threadbare. 

The most impressive letters are undoubtedly those of Swift--the sternsad humourist, frowning upon the world which has rejected him, andcovering his wrath with an affectation, not of fine sentiment, but ofmisanthropy. A soured man prefers to turn his worst side outwards. Thereare phrases in his letters which brand themselves upon the memory likethose of no other man; and we are softened into pity as the strong mindis seen gradually sinking into decay. The two other sharers in thecolloquy are in effective contrast. We see through Bolingbroke'smagnificent self-deceit; the flowing manners of the statesman who, though the game is lost, is longing for a favourable turn of the card, but still affects to solace himself with philosophy, and wraps himselfin dignified reflections upon the blessings of retirement, contrast withSwift's downright avowal of indignant scorn for himself and mankind. Andyet we have a sense of the man's amazing cleverness, and regret that hehas no chance of trying one more fall with his antagonists in the openarena. Pope's affectation is perhaps the most transparent and the mostgratuitous. His career had been pre-eminently successful; his talentshad found their natural outlet; and he had only to be what he apparentlypersuaded himself that he was, to be happy in spite of illness. He isconstantly flourishing his admirable moral sense in our faces, dilatingupon his simplicity, modesty, fidelity to his friends, indifference tothe charms of fame, till we are almost convinced that he has imposedupon himself. By some strange piece of legerdemain he must surely havesucceeded in regarding even his deliberate artifices, with theastonishing masses of hypocritical falsehoods which they entailed, as insome way legitimate weapons against a world full of piratical Curlls anddeep laid plots. And, indeed, with all his delinquencies, and with allhis affectations, there are moments in which we forget to preserve thecorrect tone of moral indignation. Every now and then genuine feelingseems to come to the surface. For a time the superincumbent masses ofhypocrisy vanish. In speaking of his mother or his pursuits he forgetsto wear his mask. He feels a genuine enthusiasm about his friends; hebelieves with almost pathetic earnestness in the amazing talents ofBolingbroke, and the patriotic devotion of the younger men who arerising up to overthrow the corruptions of Walpole; he takes theaffectation of his friends as seriously as a simple-minded man who hasnever fairly realized the possibility of deliberate hypocrisy; and heutters sentiments about human life and its objects which, if a littletainted with commonplace, have yet a certain ring of sincerity and, aswe may believe, were really sincere for the time. At such moments weseem to see the man behind the veil--the really loveable nature whichcould know as well as simulate feeling. And, indeed, it is this qualitywhich makes Pope endurable. He was--if we must speak bluntly--a liar anda hypocrite; but the foundation of his character was not selfish orgrovelling. On the contrary, no man could be more warmly affectionate ormore exquisitely sensitive to many noble emotions. The misfortune wasthat his constitutional infirmities, acted upon by unfavourableconditions, developed his craving for applause and his fear of censure, till certain morbid tendencies in him assumed proportions which, compared to the same weaknesses in ordinary mankind, are as the growthof plants in a tropical forest to their stunted representatives in theNorth. 

FOOTNOTES:

[14] The evidence by which the statements in this chapter are supportedis fully set forth in Mr. Elwin's edition of Pope's Works, Vol. I. , andin the notes to the Orrery Correspondence in the third volume ofletters. 

[15] This is proved by a note referring to "the present edition of theposthumous works of Mr. Wycherley, " which, by an oversight, was allowedto remain in the Curll volume. 

[16] These expressions come from two letters of Pope to Lord Orrery inMarch, 1737, and may not accurately reproduce his statements to Swift;but they probably represent approximately what he had said. 

[17] It is said that the son objected to allow his wife to meet hisfather's mistress. 

[18] See Elwin's edition of Pope's Correspondence, iii. , 399, note. 

[19] Pope's Works, vol. I. P. Cxxi. 

CHAPTER VII. 

THE ESSAY ON MAN. 

It is a relief to turn from this miserable record of Pope's petty ormalicious deceptions to the history of his legitimate career. I go backto the period when he was still in full power. Having finished theDunciad, he was soon employed on a more ambitious task. Pope resembledone of the inferior bodies of the solar system, whose orbit is dependentupon that of some more massive planet; and having been a satellite ofSwift, he was now swept into the train of the more imposing Bolingbroke. He had been originally introduced to Bolingbroke by Swift, but hadprobably seen little of the brilliant minister who, in the first yearsof their acquaintance, had too many occupations to give much time to therising poet. Bolingbroke, however, had been suffering a long eclipse, whilst Pope was gathering fresh splendour. In his exile, Bolingbroke, though never really weaned from political ambition, had amused himselfwith superficial philosophical studies. In political life it was hisspecial glory to extemporize statesmanship without sacrificing pleasure. He could be at once the most reckless of rakes and the leading spirit inthe Cabinet or the House of Commons. He seems to have thought thatphilosophical eminence was obtainable in the same offhand fashion, andthat a brilliant style would justify a man in laying down the law tometaphysicians as well as to diplomatists and politicians. Hisphilosophical writings are equally superficial and arrogant, though theyshow here and there the practised debater's power of making a good pointagainst his antagonist without really grasping the real problems atissue. 

Bolingbroke received a pardon in 1723, and returned to England, crossingAtterbury, who had just been convicted of treasonable practices. In 1725Bolingbroke settled at Dawley, near Uxbridge, and for the next ten yearshe was alternately amusing himself in playing the retired philosopher, and endeavouring, with more serious purpose, to animate the oppositionto Walpole. Pope, who was his frequent guest, sympathized with hisschemes, and was completely dazzled by his eminence. He spoke of himwith bated breath, as a being almost superior to humanity. "It looks, "said Pope once, "as if that great man had been placed here by mistake. When the comet appeared a month or two ago, " he added, "I sometimesfancied that it might be come to carry him home, as a coach comes toone's door for other visitors. " Of all the graceful compliments inPope's poetry, none are more ardent or more obviously sincere than thoseaddressed to this "guide, philosopher, and friend. " He delighted to baskin the sunshine of the great man's presence. Writing to Swift in 1728, he (Pope) says that he is holding the pen "for my Lord Bolingbroke, " whois reading your letter between two haycocks, with his attentionoccasionally distracted by a threatening shower. Bolingbroke is actingthe temperate recluse, having nothing for dinner but mutton-broth, beansand bacon, and a barndoor fowl. Whilst his lordship is running after acart, Pope snatches a moment to tell how the day before this noblefarmer had engaged a painter for 200_l. _ to give the correctagricultural air to his country hall by ornamenting it with trophies ofspades, rakes, and prongs. Pope saw that the zeal for retirement was notfree from affectation, but he sat at the teacher's feet with profoundbelief in the value of the lessons which flowed from his lips. 

The connexion was to bear remarkable fruit. Under the direction ofBolingbroke, Pope resolved to compose a great philosophical poem. "DoesPope talk to you, " says Bolingbroke to Swift in 1731, "of the noble workwhich, at my instigation, he has begun in such a manner that he must beconvinced by this time I judged better of his talents than he did?" AndBolingbroke proceeds to describe the Essay on Man, of which it seemsthat three (out of four) epistles were now finished. The first of theseepistles appeared in 1733. Pope, being apparently nervous on his firstappearance as a philosopher, withheld his name. The other parts followedin the course of 1733 and 1734, and the authorship was soon avowed. TheEssay on Man is Pope's most ambitious performance, and the one by whichhe was best known beyond his own country. It has been frequentlytranslated, it was imitated both in France and Germany, and provoked acontroversy, not like others in Pope's history of the purely personalkind. 

The Essay on Man professes to be a theodicy. Pope, with an echo of theMiltonic phrase, proposes to

 Vindicate the ways of God to man. 

He is thus attempting the greatest task to which poet or philosopher candevote himself--the exhibition of an organic and harmonious view of theuniverse. In a time when men's minds are dominated by a definitereligious creed, the poet may hope to achieve success in such anundertaking without departing from his legitimate method. His visionpierces to the world hidden from our senses, and realizes in thetransitory present a scene in the slow development of a divine drama. Tomake us share his vision is to give his justification of Providence. When Milton told the story of the war in heaven and the fall of man, hegave implicitly his theory of the true relations of man to his Creator, but the abstract doctrine was clothed in the flesh and blood of aconcrete mythology. 

In Pope's day the traditional belief had lost its hold upon men's mindstoo completely to be used for imaginative purposes. The story of Adamand Eve would itself require to be justified or to be rationalized intothin allegory. Nothing was left possessed of any vitality but a bareskeleton of abstract theology, dependent upon argument instead oftradition, and which might use or might dispense with a Christianphraseology. Its deity was not a historical personage, but the name of ametaphysical conception. For a revelation was substituted ademonstration. To vindicate Providence meant no longer to stimulateimagination by pure and sublime rendering of accepted truths, but tosolve certain philosophical problems, and especially the granddifficulty of reconciling the existence of evil with divine omnipotenceand benevolence. 

Pope might conceivably have written a really great poem on these terms, though deprived of the concrete imagery of a Dante or a Milton. If hehad fairly grasped some definite conception of the universe, whetherpantheistic or atheistic, optimist or pessimist, proclaiming a solutionof the mystery, or declaring all solutions to be impossible, he mighthave given forcible expression to the corresponding emotions. He mighthave uttered the melancholy resignation and the confident hope incitedin different minds by a contemplation of the mysterious world. He mightagain conceivably have written an interesting work, though it wouldhardly have been a poem--if he had versified the arguments by which acoherent theory might be supported. Unluckily, he was quite unqualifiedfor either undertaking, and, at the same time, he more or less aimed atboth. Anything like sustained reasoning was beyond his reach. Pope feltand thought by shocks and electric flashes. He could only obtain acontinuous effect when working clearly upon lines already provided forhim, or simulate one by fitting together fragments struck out atintervals. The defect was aggravated or caused by the physicalinfirmities which put sustained intellectual labour out of the question. The laborious and patient meditation which brings a converging series ofarguments to bear upon a single point, was to him as impossible as thepower of devising an elaborate strategical combination to a dashingPrince Rupert. The reasonings in the Essay are confused, contradictory, and often childish. He was equally far from having assimilated anydefinite system of thought. Brought up as a Catholic, he had graduallyswung into vague deistic belief. But he had never studied any philosophyor theology whatever, and he accepts in perfect unconsciousnessfragments of the most heterogeneous systems. 

Swift, in verses from which I have already quoted, describes his methodof composition, which is characteristic of Pope's habits of work. 

 Now backs of letters, though design'd For those who more will need 'em, Are fill'd with hints and interlined, Himself can scarcely read 'em. 

 Each atom by some other struck All turns and motions tries; Till in a lump together stuck Behold a poem rise!

It was strange enough that any poem should arise by such means; but itwould have been miraculous if a poem so constructed had been at once ademonstration and an exposition of a harmonious philosophical system. The confession which he made to Warburton will be a sufficientindication of his qualifications as a student. He says (in 1739) that henever in his life read a line of Leibnitz, nor knew, till he found it ina confutation of his Essay, that there was such a term aspre-established harmony. That is almost as if a modern reconciler offaith and science were to say that he had never read a line of Mr. Darwin, or heard of such a phrase as the struggle for existence. It wasto pronounce himself absolutely disqualified to speak as a philosopher. 

How, then, could Pope obtain even an appearance of success? The problemshould puzzle no one at the present day. Every smart essayist knows howto settle the most abstruse metaphysical puzzles after studies limitedto the pages of a monthly magazine; and Pope was much in the state ofmind of such extemporizing philosophers. He had dipped into the bookswhich everybody read; Locke's Essay, and Shaftesbury's Characteristics, and Wollaston's Religion of Nature, and Clarke on the Attributes, andArchbishop King on the Origin of Evil, had probably amused his sparemoments. They were all, we may suppose, in Bolingbroke's library; and ifthat passing shower commemorated in Pope's letter drove them back to thehouse, Bolingbroke might discourse from the page which happened to beopen, and Pope would try to versify it on the back of an envelope. [20]Nor must we forget, like some of his commentators, that after all Popewas an exceedingly clever man. His rapidly perceptive mind was fullyqualified to imbibe the crude versions of philosophic theories whichfloat upon the surface of ordinary talk, and are not always so inferiorto their prototypes in philosophic qualities, as philosophers would haveus believe. He could by snatches seize with admirable quickness thegeneral spirit of a doctrine, though unable to sustain himself at a highintellectual level for any length of time. He was ready with abundanceof poetical illustrations, not, perhaps, very closely adapted to thelogic, but capable of being elaborated into effective passages; and, finally, Pope had always a certain number of more or less appropriatecommonplaces or renderings into verse of some passages which had struckhim in Pascal, or Rochefoucauld, or Bacon, all of them favouriteauthors, and which could be wrought into the structure at a slight costof coherence. By such means he could put together a poem, which wascertainly not an organic whole, but which might contain many strikingsayings and passages of great rhetorical effect. 

The logical framework was, we may guess, supplied mainly by Bolingbroke. Bathurst told Warton that Bolingbroke had given Pope the essay in prose, and that Pope had only turned it into verse; and Mallet--a friend ofboth--is said to have seen the very manuscript from which Pope worked. Johnson, on hearing this from Boswell, remarked that it must be anoverstatement. Pope might have had from Bolingbroke the "philosophicalstamina" of the essay, but he must, at least, have contributed the"poetical imagery, " and have had more independent power than the storyimplied. It is, indeed, impossible accurately to fix the relations ofthe teacher and his disciple. Pope acknowledged in the strongestpossible terms his dependence upon Bolingbroke, and Bolingbroke claimswith equal distinctness the position of instigator and inspirer. Hismore elaborate philosophical works are in the form of letters to Pope, and profess to be a redaction of the conversations which they had hadtogether. These were not written till after the Essay on Man; but aseries of fragments appear to represent what he actually set down forPope's guidance. They are professedly addressed to Pope. "I write, " hesays (fragment 65), "to you and for you, and you would think yourselflittle obliged to me if I took the pains of explaining in prose what youwould not think it necessary to explain in verse, "--that is, thefree-will puzzle. The manuscripts seen by Mallet may probably have beena commonplace book in which Bolingbroke had set down some of thesefragments, by way of instructing Pope, and preparing for his own moresystematic work. No reader of the fragments can, I think, doubt as tothe immediate source of Pope's inspiration. Most of the ideas expressedwere the common property of many contemporary writers, but Pope acceptsthe particular modification presented by Bolingbroke. [21] Pope'smanipulation of these materials causes much of the Essay on Man toresemble (as Mr. Pattison puts it) an exquisite mosaic work. A detailedexamination of his mode of transmutation would be a curious study in thetechnical secrets of literary execution. A specimen or two willsufficiently indicate the general character of Pope's method ofconstructing his essay. 

The forty-third fragment of Bolingbroke is virtually a prose version ofmuch of Pope's poetry. A few phrases will exhibit the relation:--

 Through worlds unnumber'd though the God be known, 'Tis ours to _trace Him only in our own_. He who through vast immensity can pierce, See worlds on worlds _compose one universe_, Observe how _system into system runs_, What other planets circle other suns, What varied being peoples every star, May tell why Heaven has made us what we are. But of this frame the bearings and _the ties_, The strong _connexions_, nice _dependencies_, _Gradations_ just, has thy pervading soul Looked through, or can a part contain the whole?

"The universe, " I quote only a few phrases from Bolingbroke, "is animmense aggregate of systems. Every one of these, _if we may judge byour own_, contains several, and every one of these again, _if we mayjudge by our own_, is made up of a multitude of different modes ofbeing, animated and inanimated, thinking and unthinking . . . But allconcurring in one common system. . . . Just so it is with respect to thevarious systems and _systems of systems that compose the universe_. Asdistant as they are, and as different as we may imagine them to be, theyare all _tied_ together by relations and _connexions_, _gradations_, and_dependencies_. " The verbal coincidence is here as marked as thecoincidence in argument. Warton refers to an eloquent passage inShaftesbury, which contains a similar thought; but one can hardly doubtthat Bolingbroke was in this case the immediate source. A quaintpassage a little farther on, in which Pope represents man as complainingbecause he has not "the strength of bulls or the fur of bears, " may betraced with equal plausibility to Shaftesbury or to Sir Thomas Browne;but I have not noticed it in Bolingbroke. 

One more passage will be sufficient. Pope asks whether we are to demandthe suspension of laws of nature whenever they might produce amischievous result? Is Etna to cease an eruption to spare a sage, orshould "new motions be impressed upon sea and air" for the advantage ofblameless Bethel?

 When the loose mountain trembles from on high Shall gravitation cease, if you go by? Or some old temple, nodding to its fall, For Chartres' head reserve the hanging-wall?

Chartres is Pope's typical villain. This is a terse version, withconcrete cases, of Bolingbroke's vaguer generalities. "The laws ofgravitation, " he says, "must sometimes be suspended (if specialProvidence be admitted), and sometimes their effect must beprecipitated. The tottering edifice must be kept miraculously fromfalling, whilst innocent men lived in it or passed under it, and thefall of it must be as miraculously determined to crush the guiltyinhabitant or passenger. " Here, again, we have the alternative ofWollaston, who uses a similar illustration, and in one phrase comesnearer to Pope. He speaks of "new motions being impressed upon theatmosphere. " We may suppose that the two friends had been dipping intoWollaston together. Elsewhere Pope seems to have stolen for himself. Inthe beginning of the second epistle, Pope, in describing man as "theglory, jest, and riddle of the world, " is simply versifying Pascal; anda little farther on, when he speaks of reason as the wind and passionas the gale on life's vast ocean, he is adapting his comparison fromLocke's treatise on government. 

If all such cases were adduced, we should have nearly picked theargumentative part of the essay to pieces; but Bolingbroke suppliesthroughout the most characteristic element. The fragments cohere byexternal cement, not by an internal unity of thought; and Pope too oftendescends to the level of mere satire, or indulges in a quaint conceit orpalpable sophistry. Yet it would be very unjust to ignore the highqualities which are to be found in this incongruous whole. The style isoften admirable. When Pope is at his best every word tells. Hisprecision and firmness of touch enables him to get the greatest possiblemeaning into a narrow compass. He uses only one epithet, but it is theright one, and never boggles and patches or, in his own phrase, "blunders round about a meaning. " Warton gives, as a specimen of thispower, the lines:--

 But errs not nature from this gracious end, From burning suns when livid deaths descend, When earthquakes swallow or when tempests sweep Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep?

And Mr. Pattison reinforces the criticism by quoting Voltaire's feebleimitation:--

 Quand des vents du midi les funestes haleines De semence de mort ont inondé nos plaines, Direz-vous que jamais le ciel en son courroux Ne laissa la santé séjourner parmi nous?

It is true that in the effort to be compressed, Pope has here and therecut to the quick and suppressed essential parts of speech, till thelines can only be construed by our independent knowledge of theirmeaning. The famous line--

 Man never is but always to be blest, is an example of defective construction, though his language is oftentortured by more elliptical phrases. [22] This power of charging lineswith great fulness of meaning enables Pope to soar for brief periodsinto genuine and impressive poetry. Whatever his philosophical weaknessand his moral obliquity, he is often moved by genuine emotion. He has avein of generous sympathy for human sufferings and of righteousindignation against bigots, and if he only half understands his ownoptimism, that "whatever is is right, " the vision, rather poetical thanphilosophical, of a harmonious universe lifts him at times into a regionloftier than that of frigid and pedantic platitude. The most popularpassages were certain purple patches, not arising very spontaneously orwith much relevance, but also showing something more than the practisedrhetorician. The "poor Indian" in one of the most highly-polishedparagraphs--

 Who thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company, intrudes rather at the expense of logic, and is a decidedly conventionalperson. But this passage has a certain glow of fine humanity and istouched with real pathos. A further passage or two may sufficientlyindicate his higher qualities. In the end of the third epistle Pope isdiscussing the origin of government and the state of nature, anddiscussing them in such a way as to show conclusively that he does notin the least understand the theories in question or their application. His state of Nature is a sham reproduction of the golden age of poets, made to do duty in a scientific speculation. A flimsy hypothesis learntfrom Bolingbroke is not improved when overlaid with Pope's conventionalornamentation. The imaginary history proceeds to relate the growth ofsuperstition, which destroys the primeval innocence; but why or whendoes not very clearly appear; yet, though the general theory isincoherent, he catches a distinct view of one aspect of the question andexpresses a tolerably trite view of the question with singularterseness. Who, he asks, --

 First taught souls enslaved and realms undone, The enormous faith of many made for one?

He replies, --

 Force first made conquest and that conquest law; Till Superstition taught the tyrant awe, Then shared the tyranny, then lent it aid, And gods of conquerors, slaves of subjects made; She, 'mid the lightning's blaze and thunder's sound, When rock'd the mountains and when groan'd the ground-- She taught the weak to trust, the proud to pray To Power unseen and mightier far than they; She from the rending earth and bursting skies Saw gods descend and fiends infernal rise; There fix'd the dreadful, there the blest abodes; Fear made her devils, and weak hope her gods; Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust, Whose attributes were rage, revenge, or lust; Such as the souls of cowards might conceive, And, framed like tyrants, tyrants would believe. 

If the test of poetry were the power of expressing a theory more closelyand pointedly than prose, such writing would take a very high place. Some popular philosophers would make a sounding chapter out of thosesixteen lines. 

The Essay on Man brought Pope into difficulties. The central thesis, "whatever is is right, " might be understood in various senses, and insome sense it would be accepted by every theist. But, in Bolingbroke'steaching, it received a heterodox application, and in Pope's imperfectversion of Bolingbroke the taint was not removed. The logical outcome ofthe rationalistic theory of the time was some form of pantheism, and thetendency is still more marked in a poetical statement, where it wasdifficult to state the refined distinctions by which the conclusion isaverted. When theology is regarded as demonstrable by reason, the needof a revelation ceases to be obvious. The optimistic view which sees theproof of divine order in the vast harmony of the whole visible world, throws into the background the darker side of the universe reflected inthe theological doctrines of human corruption, and the consequent needof a future judgment in separation of good from evil. I need not inquirewhether any optimistic theory is really tenable; but the popular versionof the creed involved the attempt to ignore the evils under which allcreation groans, and produced in different minds the powerful retort ofButler's Analogy, and the biting sarcasm of Voltaire's Candide. Pope, accepting the doctrine without any perception of these difficulties, unintentionally fell into sheer pantheism. He was not yielding to thelogical instinct which carries out a theory to its legitimatedevelopment; but obeying the imaginative impulse which cannot stop tolisten to the usual qualifications and safeguards of the orthodoxreasoner. The best passages in the essay are those in which he isfrankly pantheistic, and is swept, like Shaftesbury, into enthusiasticassertion of the universal harmony of things. 

 All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body nature is, and God the soul; That changed thro' all and yet in all the same, Great in the earth as in the ethereal frame; Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees; Lives thro' all life, extends thro' all extent, Spreads undivided, operates unspent; Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart; As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns, As the rapt seraph that adores and burns; To him, no high, no low, no great, no small, He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. 

In spite of some awkward phrases (hair and heart is a vile antithesis!), the passage is eloquent but can hardly be called orthodox. And it wasstill worse when Pope undertook to show that even evil passions andvices were part of the harmony; that "a Borgia and a Cataline" were asmuch a part of the divine order as a plague or an earthquake, and thatself-love and lust were essential to social welfare. 

Pope's own religious position is characteristic and easily definable. Ifit is not quite defensible on the strictest principles of plainspeaking, it is also certain that we could not condemn him withoutcondemning many of the best and most catholic-spirited of men. Thedogmatic system in which he had presumably been educated had softenedunder the influence of the cultivated thought of the day. Pope, as themember of a persecuted sect, had learnt to share that righteous hatredof bigotry which is the honourable characteristic of his bestcontemporaries. He considered the persecuting spirit of his own churchto be its worst fault. [23] In the early Essay on Criticism he offendedsome of his own sect by a vigorous denunciation of the doctrine whichpromotes persecution by limiting salvation to a particular creed. Hischaritable conviction that a divine element is to be found in allcreeds, from that of the "poor Indian" upwards, animates the highestpassages in his works. But though he sympathizes with a generoustoleration, and the specific dogmas of his creed sat very loosely on hismind, he did not consider that an open secession was necessary or evenhonourable. He called himself a true Catholic, though rather asrespectfully sympathizing with the spirit of Fénelon than as holding toany dogmatic system. The most dignified letter that he ever wrote was inanswer to a suggestion from Atterbury (1717), that he might change hisreligion upon the death of his father. Pope replies that his worldlyinterests would be promoted by such a step; and, in fact, it cannot bedoubted that Pope might have had a share in the good things thenobtainable by successful writers, if he had qualified by taking theoaths. But he adds, that such a change would hurt his mother's feelings, and that he was more certain of his duty to promote her happiness thanof any speculative tenet whatever. He was sure that he could mean aswell in the religion he now professed as in any other; and that beingso, he thought that a change even to an equally good religion could notbe justified. A similar statement appears in a letter to Swift, in 1729. "I am of the religion of Erasmus, a Catholic. So I live, so shall I die, and hope one day to meet you, Bishop Atterbury, the younger Craggs, Dr. Garth, Dean Berkeley, and Mr. Hutchison in that place to which God ofhis infinite mercy bring us and everybody. " To these Protestants hewould doubtless have joined the freethinking Bolingbroke. At a laterperiod he told Warburton, in less elevated language, that the change ofhis creed would bring him many enemies and do no good to any one. 

Pope could feel nobly and act honourably when his morbid vanity did notexpose him to some temptation; and I think that in this matter hisattitude was in every way creditable. He showed, indeed, the prejudiceentertained by many of the rationalist divines for the freethinkers whowere a little more outspoken than himself. The deist whose creed wasvarnished with Christian phrases, was often bitter against the deist whorejected the varnish; and Pope put Toland and Tindal into the Dunciad asscandalous assailants of all religion. From his point of view it was aswicked to attack any creed as to regard any creed as exclusively true;and certainly Pope was not disposed to join any party which was hatedand maligned by the mass of the respectable world. For it must beremembered that, in spite of much that has been said to the contrary, and in spite of the true tendency of much so-called orthodoxy, theprofession of open dissent from Christian doctrine was then regardedwith extreme disapproval. It might be a fashion, as Butler and othersdeclare, to talk infidelity in cultivated circles; but a publicpromulgation of unbelief was condemned as criminal, and worthy only ofthe Grub-street faction. Pope, therefore, was terribly shocked when hefound himself accused of heterodoxy. His poem was at once translated, and, we are told, spread rapidly in France, where Voltaire and manyinferior writers were introducing the contagion of English freethinking. A solid Swiss pastor and professor of philosophy, Jean Pierre Crousaz(1663-1750), undertook the task of refutation, and published anexamination of Pope's philosophy in 1737 and 1738. A serious examinationof this bundle of half-digested opinions was in itself absurd. Someyears afterwards (1751) Pope came under a more powerful critic. TheBerlin Academy of Sciences offered a prize for a similar essay, andLessing published a short tract called _Pope ein Metaphysiker_! If anyone cares to see a demonstration that Pope did not understand the systemof Leibnitz, and that the bubble blown by a great philosopher has moreapparent cohesion than that of a half-read poet, he may find asufficient statement of the case in Lessing. But Lessing sensiblyprotests from the start against the intrusion of such a work intoserious discussion; and that is the only ground which is worth taking inthe matter. 

The most remarkable result of the Essay on Man, it may beparenthetically noticed, was its effect upon Voltaire. In 1751 Voltairewrote a poem on Natural Law, which is a comparatively feeble applicationof Pope's principles. It is addressed to Frederick instead ofBolingbroke, and contains a warm eulogy of Pope's philosophy. But a fewyears later the earthquake at Lisbon suggested certain doubts toVoltaire as to the completeness of the optimist theory; and, in some ofthe most impressive verses of the century, he issued an energeticprotest against the platitudes applied by Pope and his followers todeaden our sense of the miseries under which the race suffers. Verbally, indeed, Voltaire still makes his bow to the optimist theory, and the twopoems appeared together in 1756; but his noble outcry against the emptyand complacent deductions which it covers, led to his famous controversywith Rousseau. The history of this conflict falls beyond my subject, and I must be content with this brief reference, which proves, amongstother things, the interest created by Pope's advocacy of the mostcharacteristic doctrines of his time on the minds of the greatestleaders of the revolutionary movement. 

Meanwhile, however, Crousaz was translated into English, and Pope wasterribly alarmed. His "guide, philosopher, and friend" had returned tothe Continent (in 1735), disgusted with his political failure, but wasagain in England from June, 1738, to May, 1739. We know not what comforthe may have given to his unlucky disciple, but an unexpected championsuddenly arose. William Warburton (born 1698) was gradually pushing hisway to success. He had been an attorney's clerk, and had not received auniversity education; but his multifarious reading was making himconspicuous, helped by great energy, and by a quality which gave someplausibility to the title bestowed on him by Mallet, "The most impudentman living. " In his humble days he had been intimate with Pope'senemies, Concanen and Theobald, and had spoken scornfully of Pope, saying, amongst other things, that he "borrowed for want of genius, " asAddison borrowed from modesty and Milton from pride. In 1736 he hadpublished his first important work, the Alliance between Church andState, and in 1738 followed the first instalment of his principalperformance, the Divine Legation. During the following years he was themost conspicuous theologian of the day, dreaded and hated by hisopponents, whom he unsparingly bullied, and dominating a small clique ofabject admirers. He is said to have condemned the Essay on Man when itfirst appeared. He called it a collection of the worst passages of theworst authors, and declared that it taught rank atheism. The appearanceof Crousaz's book suddenly induced him to make a complete change offront. He declared that Pope spoke "truth uniformly throughout, " andcomplimented him on his strong and delicate reasoning. 

It is idle to seek motives for this proceeding. Warburton lovedparadoxes, and delighted in brandishing them in the most offensiveterms. He enjoyed the exercise of his own ingenuity, and therefore hisponderous writings, though amusing by their audacity and width ofreading, are absolutely valueless for their ostensible purpose. Theexposition of Pope (the first part of which appeared in December, 1738)is one of his most tiresome performances; nor need any human being atthe present day study the painful wire-drawings and sophistries by whichhe tries to give logical cohesion and orthodox intention to the Essay onMan. 

If Warburton was simply practising his dialectical skill, the result wasa failure. But if he had an eye to certain lower ends, his successsurpassed his expectations. Pope was in ecstasies. He fell uponWarburton's neck--or rather at his feet--and overwhelmed him withprofessions of gratitude. He invited him to Twickenham; met him withcompliments which astonished a bystander, and wrote to him in terms ofsurprising humility. "You understand me, " he exclaims in his firstletter, "as well as I do myself; but you express me much better than Icould express myself. " For the rest of his life Pope adopted the sametone. He sheltered himself behind this burly defender, and could neverpraise him enough. He declared Mr. Warburton to be the greatest generalcritic he ever knew, and was glad to instal him in the position ofchampion in ordinary. Warburton was consulted about new editions;annotated Pope's poems; stood sponsor to the last Dunciad, and wasassured by his admiring friend that the comment would prolong the lifeof the poetry. Pope left all his copyrights to this friend, whilst hisMSS. Were given to Bolingbroke. 

When the University of Oxford proposed to confer an honorary degree uponPope, he declined to receive the compliment, because the proposal toconfer a smaller honour upon Warburton had been at the same time thrownout by the University. In fact, Pope looked up to Warburton with areverence almost equal to that which he felt for Bolingbroke. If suchadmiration for such an idol was rather humiliating, we must rememberthat Pope was unable to detect the charlatan in the pretentious butreally vigorous writer; and we may perhaps admit that there is somethingpathetic in Pope's constant eagerness to be supported by some sturdierarm. We find the same tendency throughout his life. The weak andmorbidly sensitive nature may be forgiven if its dependence leads toexcessive veneration. 

Warburton derived advantages from the connexion, the prospect of which, we may hope, was not the motive of his first advocacy. To be recognizedby the most eminent man of letters of the day was to receive a kind ofcertificate of excellence, valuable to a man who had not the regularuniversity hall-mark. More definite results followed. Pope introducedWarburton to Allen, and to Murray, afterwards Lord Mansfield. ThroughMurray he was appointed preacher at Lincoln's Inn, and from Allen hederived greater benefits--the hand of his niece and heiress, and anintroduction to Pitt, which gained for him the bishopric of Gloucester. 

Pope's allegiance to Bolingbroke was not weakened by this new alliance. He sought to bring the two together, when Bolingbroke again visitedEngland in 1743. The only result was an angry explosion, as, indeed, might have been foreseen; for Bolingbroke was not likely to bewell-disposed to the clever parson whose dexterous sleight-of-hand hadtransferred Pope to the orthodox camp; nor was it natural thatWarburton, the most combative and insulting of controversialists, shouldtalk on friendly terms to one of his natural antagonists--an antagonist, moreover, who was not likely to have bishoprics in his gift. Thequarrel, as we shall see, broke out fiercely over Pope's grave. 

FOOTNOTES:

[20] "No letter with an envelope could give him more delight, " saysSwift. 

[21] It would be out of place to discuss this in detail; but I may saythat Pope's crude theory of the state of nature, his psychology as toreason and instinct, and self-love, and his doctrine of the scale ofbeings, all seem to have the specific Bolingbroke stamp. 

[22] Perhaps the most curious example, too long for quotation, is apassage near the end of the last epistle, in which he sums up his moralsystem by a series of predicates for which it is impossible to find anysubject. One couplet runs--

Never elated whilst one man's depress'd, Never dejected whilst another'sblest. 

It is impressive, but it is quite impossible to discover by the rules ofgrammatical construction who is to be never elated and depressed. 

[23] Spence, p. 364. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

EPISTLES AND SATIRES. 

Pope had tried a considerable number of poetical experiments when theDunciad appeared, but he had not yet discovered in what direction histalents could be most efficiently exerted. Bystanders are sometimesacuter in detecting a man's true forte than the performer himself. In1722 Atterbury had seen Pope's lines upon Addison, and reported that nopiece of his writing was ever so much sought after. "Since you nowknow, " he added, "in what direction your strength lies, I hope you willnot suffer that talent to be unemployed. " Atterbury seems to have beenrather fond of giving advice to Pope, and puts on a decidedly pedagogicair when writing to him. The present suggestion was more likely to fallon willing ears than another made shortly before their final separation. Atterbury then presented Pope with a Bible, and recommended him to studyits pages. If Pope had taken to heart some of St. Paul's exhortations toChristian charity, he would scarcely have published his lines uponAddison, and English literature would have lost some of its mostbrilliant pages. 

Satire of the kind represented by those lines was so obviously adaptedto Pope's peculiar talent, that we rather wonder at his having taken toit seriously at a comparatively late period, and even then havingdrifted into it by accident rather than by deliberate adoption. He hadaimed, as has been said, at being a philosophic and didactic poet. TheEssay on Man formed part of a much larger plan, of which two or threefragmentary sketches are given by Spence. [24] Bolingbroke and Pope wroteto Swift in November, 1729, about a scheme then in course of execution. Bolingbroke declares that Pope is now exerting what was eminently andpeculiarly his talents, above all writers, living or dead, withoutexcepting Horace; whilst Pope explained that this was a "system ofethics in the Horatian way. " The language seems to apply best to thepoems afterwards called the Ethic Epistles, though, at this time, Pope, perhaps, had not a very clear plan in his head, and was working atdifferent parts simultaneously. The Essay on Man, his most distinctscheme, was to form the opening book of his poem. Three others were totreat of knowledge and its limits, of government--ecclesiastical andcivil--and of morality. The last book itself involved an elaborate plan. There were to be three epistles about each cardinal virtue--one, forexample, upon avarice; another on the contrary extreme of prodigality;and a third, upon the judicious mean of a moderate use of riches. Popetold Spence that he had dropped the plan chiefly because his third bookwould have provoked every Church on the face of the earth, and he didnot care for always being in boiling water. The scheme, however, was fartoo wide and too systematic for Pope's powers. His spasmodic energyenabled him only to fill up corners of the canvas, and from what he did, it is sufficiently evident that his classification would have beenincoherent and his philosophy unequal to the task. Part of his work wasused for the fourth book of the Dunciad, and the remainder correspondsto what are now called the Ethic Epistles. These, as they now stand, include five poems. One of these has no real connexion with the others. It is a poem addressed to Addison, "occasioned by his dialogue onmedals, " written (according to Pope) in 1715, and first published inTickell's edition of Addison's works in 1721. The epistle to Burlingtonon taste was afterwards called the Use of Riches, and appended toanother with the same title, thus filling a place in the ethical scheme, though devoted to a very subsidiary branch of the subject. It appearedin 1731. The epistle "of the use of riches" appeared in 1732, that ofthe knowledge and characters of men in 1733, and that of the charactersof women in 1735. The last three are all that would seem to belong tothe wider treatise contemplated; but Pope composed so much in fragmentsthat it is difficult to say what bits he might have originally intendedfor any given purpose. 

Another distraction seems to have done more than his fear of boilingwater to arrest the progress of the elaborate plan. Bolingbroke comingone day into his room, took up a Horace, and observed that the firstsatire of the second book would suit Pope's style. Pope translated it ina morning or two, and sent it to press almost immediately (1733). Thepoem had a brilliant success. It contained, amongst other things, thecouplet which provoked his war with Lady Mary and Lord Hervey. This, again, led to his putting together the epistle to Arbuthnot, whichincludes the bitter attack upon Hervey, as part of a general _apologiapro vita sua_. It was afterwards called the Prologue to the Satires. Ofhis other imitations of Horace, one appeared in 1734 (the second satireof the second book), and four more (the first and sixth epistles of thefirst book and the first and second of the second book) in 1738. Finally, in 1737, he published two dialogues, first called "1738" andafterwards "The Epilogue to the Satires, " which are in the same vein asthe epistle to Arbuthnot. These epistles and imitations of Horace, withthe so-called prologue and epilogue, took up the greatest part of Pope'senergy during the years in which his intellect was at its best, and showhis finest technical qualities. The Essay on Man was on hand during theearly part of this period, the epistles and satires representing aramification from the same inquiry. But the essay shows the weak side ofPope, whilst his most remarkable qualities are best represented by thesesubsidiary writings. The reason will be sufficiently apparent after abrief examination, which will also give occasion for saying what stillremains to be said in regard to Pope as a literary artist. 

The weakness already conspicuous in the Essay on Man mars the effect ofthe Ethic Epistles. His work tends to be rather an aggregation than anorganic whole. He was (if I may borrow a phrase from the philologists)an agglutinative writer, and composed by sticking together independentfragments. His mode of composition was natural to a mind incapable ofsustained and continuous thought. In the epistles, he professes to beworking on a plan. The first expounds his favourite theory (also treatedin the essay) of a "ruling passion. " Each man has such a passion, ifonly you can find it, which explains the apparent inconsistency of hisconduct. This theory, which has exposed him to a charge of fatalism(especially from people who did not very well know what fatalismmeans), is sufficiently striking for his purpose; but it rather turns upat intervals than really binds the epistle into a whole. But thearrangement of his portrait gallery is really unsystematic; theaffectation of system is rather in the way. The most striking charactersin the essay on women were inserted (whenever composed) some time afterits first appearance, and the construction is too loose to make anyinterruption of the argument perceptible. The poems contain some ofPope's most brilliant bits, but we can scarcely remember them as awhole. The characters of Wharton and Villiers, of Atossa, of the Man ofRoss, and Sir Balaam, stand out as brilliant passages which would doalmost as well in any other setting. In the imitations of Horace he is, of course, guided by lines already laid down for him; and he has shownadmirable skill in translating the substance as well as the words of hisauthor by the nearest equivalents. This peculiar mode of imitation hadbeen tried by other writers, but in Pope's hands it succeeded beyond allprecedent. There is so much congeniality between Horace and Pope, andthe social orders of which they were the spokesmen, that he canrepresent his original without giving us any sense of constraint. Yeteven here he sometimes obscures the thread of connexion, and we feelmore or less clearly that the order of thought is not that which wouldhave spontaneously arisen in his own mind. So, for example, in theimitation of Horace's first epistle of the first book, the references tothe Stoical and Epicurean morals imply a connexion of ideas to whichnothing corresponds in Pope's reproduction. Horace is describing agenuine experience, while Pope is only putting together a string ofcommonplaces. The most interesting part of these imitations are those inwhich Pope takes advantage of the suggestions in Horace to bethoroughly autobiographical. He manages to run his own experience andfeelings into the moulds provided for him by his predecessor. One of thehappiest passages is that in which he turns the serious panegyric onAugustus into a bitter irony against the other Augustus, whose name wasGeorge, and who, according to Lord Hervey, was so contrasted with hisprototype, that whereas personal courage was the one weak point of theemperor, it was the one strong point of the English king. As soon asPope has a chance of expressing his personal antipathies or (to do himbare justice) his personal attachments, his lines begin to glow. When heis trying to preach, to be ethical and philosophical, he is apt to fallinto mouthing and to lose his place; but when he can forget his stilts, or point his morality by some concrete and personal instance, every wordis alive. And it is this which makes the epilogues, and more especiallythe prologue to the satires, his most impressive performances. The unitywhich is very ill-supplied by some ostensible philosophical thesis, oreven by the leading strings of Horace, is given by his own intenseinterest in himself. The best way of learning to enjoy Pope is to get byheart the epistle to Arbuthnot. That epistle is, as I have said, hisApologia. In its some 400 lines, he has managed to compress more of hisfeelings and thoughts than would fill an ordinary autobiography. It istrue that the epistle requires a commentator. It wants some familiaritywith the events of Pope's life, and many lines convey only a part oftheir meaning unless we are familiar not only with the events, but withthe characters of the persons mentioned. Passages over which we passcarelessly at the first reading then come out with wonderful freshness, and single phrases throw a sudden light upon hidden depths of feeling. It is also true, unluckily, that parts of it must be read by the rule ofcontraries. They tell us not what Pope really was, but what he wishedothers to think him, and what he probably endeavoured to persuadehimself that he was. How far he succeeded in imposing upon himself isindeed a very curious question which can never be fully answered. Thereis the strangest mixture of honesty and hypocrisy. Let me, he says, livemy own and die so too--

 (To live and die is all I have to do) Maintain a poet's dignity and ease, And see what friends and read what books I please!

Well, he was independent in his fashion, and we can at least believethat he so far believed in himself. But when he goes on to say that he"can sleep without a poem in his head, Nor know if Dennis be alive or dead, "

we remember his calling up the maid four times a night in the dreadfulwinter of 1740 to save a thought, and the features writhing in anguishas he read a hostile pamphlet. Presently he informs us that "he thinks alie in prose or verse the same"--only too much the same! and that "if hepleased, he pleased by manly ways. " Alas! for the manliness. And yetagain when he speaks of his parents, Unspotted names and venerable long If there be force in virtue or in song, can we doubt that he is speaking from the heart? We should perhaps liketo forget that the really exquisite and touching lines in which hespeaks of his mother had been so carefully elaborated. 

 Me let the tender office long engage To rock the cradle of declining age, With lenient acts extend a mother's breath, Make languor smile and smooth the bed of death, Explore the thought, explain the asking eye, And keep awhile one parent from the sky!

If there are more tender and exquisitely expressed lines in thelanguage, I know not where to find them; and yet again I should be gladnot to be reminded by a cruel commentator that poor Mrs. Pope had beendead for two years when they were published, and that even this touchingeffusion has therefore a taint of dramatic affectation. 

To me, I confess, it seems most probable, though at first sightincredible, that these utterances were thoroughly sincere for themoment. I fancy that under Pope's elaborate masks of hypocrisy andmystification there was a heart always abnormally sensitive. Unfortunately it was as capable of bitter resentment as of warmaffection, and was always liable to be misled by the suggestions of hisstrangely irritable vanity. And this seems to me to give the true key toPope's poetical as well as to his personal characteristics. 

To explain either, we must remember that he was a man of impulses; atone instant a mere incarnate thrill of gratitude or generosity, and inthe next of spite or jealousy. A spasm of wounded vanity would make himfor the time as mean and selfish as other men are made by a frenzy ofbodily fear. He would instinctively snatch at a lie even when a moment'sreflection would have shown that the plain truth would be moreconvenient, and therefore he had to accumulate lie upon lie, eachintended to patch up some previous blunder. Though nominally the poet ofreason, he was the very antithesis of the man who is reasonable in thehighest sense: who is truthful in word and deed because his conduct isregulated by harmonious and invariable principles. Pope was governed bythe instantaneous feeling. His emotion came in sudden jets and gushes, instead of a continuous stream. The same peculiarity deprives his poetryof continuous harmony or profound unity of conception. His lively senseof form and proportion enables him indeed to fill up a simple framework(generally of borrowed design) with an eye to general effect, as in theRape of the Lock or the first Dunciad. But even there his flight isshort; and when a poem should be governed by the evolution of someprofound principle or complex mood of sentiment, he becomes incoherentand perplexed. But on the other hand he can perceive admirably all thatcan be seen at a glance from a single point of view. Though he could notbe continuous, he could return again and again to the same point; hecould polish, correct, eliminate superfluities, and compress his meaningmore and more closely, till he has constructed short passages ofimperishable excellence. This microscopic attention to fragmentssometimes injures the connexion, and often involves a mutilation ofconstruction. He corrects and prunes too closely. He could, he says, inreference to the Essay on Man, put things more briefly in verse than inprose; one reason being that he could take liberties of this kind notpermitted in prose writing. But the injury is compensated by thesingular terseness and vivacity of his best style. Scarcely any one, asis often remarked, has left so large a proportion of quotablephrases, [25] and, indeed, to the present he survives chiefly by thecurrent coinage of that kind which bears his image and superscription. 

This familiar remark may help us to solve the old problem whether Popewas, or rather in what sense he was, a poet. Much of his work may befairly described as rhymed prose, differing from prose not in substanceor tone of feeling, but only in the form of expression. Every poet hasan invisible audience, as an orator has a visible one, who deserve agreat part of the merit of his works. Some men may write for thereligious or philosophic recluse, and therefore utter the emotions whichcome to ordinary mortals in the rare moments when the music of thespheres, generally drowned by the din of the commonplace world, becomesaudible to their dull senses. Pope, on the other hand, writes for thewits who never listen to such strains, and moreover writes for theirordinary moods. He aims at giving us the refined and doubly distilledessence of the conversation of the statesmen and courtiers of his time. The standard of good writing always implicitly present to his mind isthe fitness of his poetry to pass muster when shown by Gay to hisduchess, or read after dinner to a party composed of Swift, Bolingbroke, and Congreve. That imaginary audience is always looking over hisshoulder, applauding a good hit, chuckling over allusions to the lastbit of scandal, and ridiculing any extravagance tending to romance orsentimentalism. 

The limitations imposed by such a condition are obvious. As men oftaste, Pope's friends would make their bow to the recognizedauthorities. They would praise _Paradise Lost_, but a new Milton wouldbe as much out of place with them as the real Milton at the court ofCharles II. They would really prefer to have his verses tagged byDryden, or the Samson polished by Pope. They would have ridiculedWordsworth's mysticism or Shelley's idealism, as they laughed at thereligious "enthusiasm" of Law or Wesley, or the metaphysical subtletiesof Berkeley and Hume. They preferred the philosophy of the Essay on Man, which might be appropriated by a common-sense preacher, or the rhetoricof _Eloisa and Abelard_, bits of which might be used to excellent effect(as indeed Pope himself used the peroration) by a fine gentlemanaddressing his gallantry to a contemporary Sappho. It is only too easyto expose their shallowness, and therefore to overlook what was genuinein their feelings. After all, Pope's eminent friends were no meretailor's blocks for the display of laced coats. Swift and Bolingbrokewere not enthusiasts nor philosophers, but certainly they were no fools. They liked in the first place thorough polish. They could appreciate aperfectly turned phrase, an epigram which concentrated into a couplet avolume of quick observations, a smart saying from Rochefoucauld or LaBruyère, which gave an edge to worldly wisdom; a really brilliantutterance of one of those maxims, half true and not over profound, butstill presenting one aspect of life as they saw it, which have sincegrown rather threadbare. This sort of moralizing, which is the staple ofPope's epistles upon the ruling passion or upon avarice, strikes us nowas unpleasantly obvious. We have got beyond it and want some morerefined analysis and more complex psychology. Take, for example, Pope'sepistle to Bathurst, which was in hand for two years, and is just 400lines in length. The simplicity of the remarks is almost comic. Nobodywants to be told now that bribery is facilitated by modern system ofcredit. 

 Blest paper-credit! last and best supply That lends corruption lighter wings to fly!

This triteness blinds us to the singular felicity with which theobservations have been verified, a felicity which makes many of thephrases still proverbial. The mark is so plain that we do scant justiceto the accuracy and precision with which it is hit. Yet when we noticehow every epithet tells, and how perfectly the writer does what he triesto do, we may understand why Pope extorted contemporary admiration. Wemay, for example, read once more the familiar passage about Buckingham. The picture, such as it is, could not be drawn more strikingly withfewer lines. 

 In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half-hung, The floors of plaister and the walls of dung, On once a flock-bed but repair'd with straw, With tape-ty'd curtains never meant to draw, The George and Garter dangling from that bed, Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red, Great Villiers lies! alas, how changed from him, That life of pleasure and that soul of whim! Gallant and gay in Cliveden's proud alcove, The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love; As great as gay, at council in a ring Of mimick'd statesmen, and their merry king. No wit to flatter left of all his store! No fool to laugh at, which he valued more. Thus, victor of his health, of fortune, friends, And fame, the lord of useless thousands ends. 

It is as graphic as a page of Dickens, and has the advantage of beingless grotesque, if the sentiment is equally obvious. When Pope has madehis hit, he does not blur the effect by trying to repeat it. 

In these epistles, it must be owned that the sentiment is not onlyobvious but prosaic. The moral maxims are delivered like advice offeredby one sensible man to another, not with the impassioned fervour of aprophet. Nor can Pope often rise to that level at which alone satire istransmuted into the higher class of poetry. To accomplish that feat, if, indeed, it be possible, the poet must not simply ridicule the fantastictricks of poor mortals, but show how they appear to the angels who weepover them. The petty figures must be projected against a background ofthe infinite, and we must feel the relations of our tiny eddies of lifeto the oceanic currents of human history. Pope can never rise above thecrowd. He is looking at his equals, not contemplating them from theheight which reveals their insignificance. The element, which may fairlybe called poetical, is derived from an inferior source; but sometimeshas passion enough in it to lift him above mere prose. 

In one of his most animated passages, Pope relates his desire to--

 Brand the bold front of shameless guilty men, Dash the proud gamester in his gilded car, Bare the mean heart that lurks beneath a star. 

For the moment he takes himself seriously; and, indeed, he seems to havepersuaded both himself and his friends that he was really a greatdefender of virtue. Arbuthnot begged him, almost with his dying breath, to continue his "noble disdain and abhorrence of vice, " and, with a dueregard to his own safety, to try rather to reform than chastise; andPope accepts the office ostentatiously. His provocation is "the strongantipathy of good to bad, " and he exclaims, --

 Yes! I am proud--I must be proud to see Men not afraid of God, afraid of me. Safe from the bar, the pulpit, and the throne, Yet touch'd and shamed by ridicule alone. 

If the sentiment provokes a slight incredulity, it is yet worth whileto understand its real meaning; and the explanation is not very far toseek. 

Pope's best writing, I have said, is the essence of conversation. It hasthe quick movement, the boldness and brilliance, which we suppose to bethe attributes of the best talk. Of course the apparent facility is dueto conscientious labour. In the Prologue and Epilogue and the best partsof the imitations of Horace, he shows such consummate mastery of hispeculiar style, that we forget the monotonous metre. The openingpassage, for example, of the Prologue is written apparently with theperfect freedom of real dialogue; in fact, it is of course far morepointed and compressed than any dialogue could ever be. The dramaticvivacity with which the whole scene is given, shows that he could usemetre as the most skilful performer could command a musical instrument. Pope, indeed, shows in the Essay on Criticism, that his view about theuniformity of sound and sense were crude enough; they are analogous tothe tricks by which a musician might decently imitate the cries ofanimals or the murmurs of a crowd; and his art excludes any attempt atrivalling the melody of the great poets who aim at producing a harmonyquite independent of the direct meaning of their words. I am onlyspeaking of the felicity with which he can move in metre, without theslightest appearance of restraint, so as to give a kind of idealizedrepresentation of the tone of animated verbal intercourse. Whatevercomes within this province he can produce with admirable fidelity. Nowin such talks as we imagine with Swift and Bolingbroke, we may be quitesure that there would be some very forcible denunciation ofcorruption--corruption being of course regarded as due to the diabolicalagency of Walpole. During his later years, Pope became a friend of allthe Opposition clique, which was undermining the power of the greatminister. In his last letters to Swift, Pope speaks of the new circle ofpromising patriots who were rising round him, and from whom heentertained hopes of the regeneration of this corrupt country. Sentiments of this kind were the staple talk of the circles in which hemoved; and all the young men of promise believed, or persuadedthemselves to fancy, that a political millennium would follow thedownfall of Walpole. Pope, susceptible as always to the influences ofhis social surroundings, took in all this, and delighted in figuringhimself as the prophet of the new era and the denouncer of wickedness inhigh places. He sees "old England's genius" dragged in the dust, hearsthe black trumpet of vice proclaiming that "not to be corrupted is theshame, " and declares that he will draw the last pen for freedom, and usehis "sacred weapon" in truth's defence. 

To imagine Pope at his best, we must place ourselves in Twickenham onsome fine day, when the long disease has relaxed its grasp for a moment;when he has taken a turn through his garden, and comforted his poorframe with potted lampreys and a glass or two from his frugal pint. Suppose two or three friends to be sitting with him, the statelyBolingbroke or the mercurial Bathurst, with one of the patriotic hopesof mankind, Marchmont or Lyttelton, to stimulate his ardour, and theamiable Spence, or Mrs. Patty Blount to listen reverentially to hismorality. Let the conversation kindle into vivacity, and host and guestsfall into a friendly rivalry, whetting each other's wits by livelyrepartee, and airing the little fragments of worldly wisdom which passmuster for profound observation at Court; for a time they talkplatitudes, though striking out now and then brilliant flashes, as fromthe collision of polished rapiers; they diverge, perhaps, intoliterature, and Pope shines in discussing the secrets of the art towhich his whole life has been devoted with untiring fidelity. Suddenlythe mention of some noted name provokes a startling outburst of personalinvective from Pope; his friends judiciously divert the current of wrathinto a new channel, and he becomes for the moment a generous patriotdeclaiming against the growth of luxury; the mention of somesympathizing friend brings out a compliment, so exquisitely turned, asto be a permanent title of honour, conferred by genius instead of power;or the thought of his parents makes his voice tremble, and his eyesshine with pathetic softness; and you forgive the occasional affectationwhich you can never quite forget, or even the occasional grossness orharshness of sentiment which contrasts so strongly with the superficialpolish. A genuine report of even the best conversation would beintolerably prosy and unimaginative. But imagine the very pith andessence of such talk brought to a focus, concentrated into the smallestpossible space with the infinite dexterity of a thoroughly trained hand, and you have the kind of writing in which Pope is unrivalled; polishedprose with occasional gleams of genuine poetry--the epistle to Arbuthnotand the epilogue to the Satires. 

One point remains to be briefly noticed. The virtue on which Pope pridedhimself was correctness; and I have interpreted this to mean the qualitywhich is gained by incessant labour, guided by quick feeling, and alwaysunder the strict supervision of common sense. The next literaryrevolution led to a depreciation of this quality. Warton (like Macaulaylong afterwards) argued that in a higher sense, the Elizabethan poetswere really as correct as Pope. Their poetry embodied a higher and morecomplex law, though it neglected the narrow cut-and-dried preceptsrecognized in the Queen Anne period. The new school came to express tooundiscriminating a contempt for the whole theory and practice of Popeand his followers. Pope, said Cowper, and a thousand critics have echoedhis words, --

 Made poetry a mere mechanic art And every warbler had his tune by heart. 

Without discussing the wider question, I may here briefly remark thatthis judgment, taken absolutely, gives a very false impression of Pope'sartistic quality. Pope is undoubtedly monotonous. Except in one or twolyrics, such as the Ode on St. Cecilia's Day, which must be reckonedamongst his utter failures, he invariably employed the same metre. Thediscontinuity of his style, and the strict rules which he adopted, tendto disintegrate his poems. They are a series of brilliant passages, often of brilliant couplets, stuck together in a conglomerate; and asthe inferior connecting matter decays, the interstices open and allowthe whole to fall into ruin. To read a series of such couplets, eachcomplete in itself, and each so constructed as to allow of a very smallvariety of form, is naturally to receive an impression of monotony. Pope's antitheses fall into a few common forms, which are repeated overand over again, and seem copy to each other. And, in a sense, such workcan be very easily imitated. A very inferior artist can obtain most ofhis efforts, and all the external qualities of his style. Oneten-syllabled rhyming couplet, with the whole sense strictly confinedwithin its limits, and allowing only of such variety as follows fromchanging the pauses, is undoubtedly very much like another. Andaccordingly one may read in any collection of British poets innumerablepages of versification which--if you do not look too close--are exactlylike Pope. All poets who have any marked style are more or lessimitable; in the present age of revivals, a clever versifier is capableof adopting the manners of his leading contemporaries, or that of anypoet from Spenser to Shelley or Keats. The quantity of work scarcelydistinguishable from that of the worst passages in Mr. Tennyson, Mr. Browning, and Mr. Swinburne, seems to be limited only by the supply ofstationery at the disposal of practised performers. That which makes theimitations of Pope prominent is partly the extent of his sovereignty;the vast number of writers who confined themselves exclusively to hisstyle; and partly the fact that what is easily imitable in him is soconspicuous an element of the whole. The rigid framework which headopted is easily definable with mathematical precision. The differencebetween the best work of Pope and the ordinary work of his followers isconfined within narrow limits, and not easily perceived at a glance. Thedifference between blank verse in the hands of its few masters and inthe hands of a third-rate imitator strikes the ear in every line. Farmore is left to the individual idiosyncrasy. But it does not at allfollow, and in fact it is quite untrue that the distinction which turnson an apparently insignificant element is therefore unimportant. Thevalue of all good work ultimately depends on touches so fine as to eludethe sight. And the proof is that although Pope was so constantlyimitated, no later and contemporary writer succeeded in approaching hisexcellence. Young, of the _Night Thoughts_, was an extraordinarilyclever writer and talker, even if he did not (as one of his hearersasserts) eclipse Voltaire by the brilliance of his conversation. Young's satires show abundance of wit, and one may not be able to say ata glance in what they are inferior to Pope. Yet they have hopelesslyperished, whilst Pope's work remains classical. Of all the crowd ofeighteenth-century writers in Pope's manner, only two made an approachto him worth notice. Johnson's _Vanity of Human Wishes_ surpasses Popein general sense of power, and Goldsmith's two poems in the same stylehave phrases of a higher order than Pope's. But even these poems havenot made so deep a mark. In the last generation, Gifford's _Baviad andMĉviad_, and Byron's _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_, were cleverreproductions of the manner; but Gifford is already unreadable, andByron is pale beside his original; and, therefore, making full allowancefor Pope's monotony, and the tiresome prominence of certain mechanicaleffects, we must, I think, admit that he has after all succeeded indoing with unsurpassable excellence what innumerable rivals have failedto do as well. The explanation is--if the phrase explains anything--thathe was a man of genius, or that he brought to a task, not of the highestclass, a keenness of sensibility, a conscientious desire to do his verybest, and a capacity for taking pains with his work, which enabled himto be as indisputably the first in his own peculiar line, as ourgreatest men have been in far more lofty undertakings. 

The man who could not publish Pastorals without getting into quarrels, was hardly likely to become a professed satirist without giving offence. Besides numerous stabs administered to old enemies, Pope opened somefresh animosities by passages in these poems. Some pointed ridicule wasaimed at Montagu, Earl of Halifax, in the Prologue; for there can be nodoubt that Halifax[26] was pointed out in the character of Bufo. Popetold a story in later days of an introduction to Halifax, the greatpatron of the early years of the century, who wished to hear him readhis Homer. After the reading Halifax suggested that one passage shouldbe improved. Pope retired rather puzzled by his vague remarks, but, byGarth's advice, returned some time afterwards, and read the same passagewithout alteration. "Ay, now Mr. Pope, " said Halifax, "they areperfectly right; nothing can be better!" This little incident perhapssuggested to Pope that Halifax was a humbug, and there seems, as alreadynoticed, to have been some difficulty about the desired dedication ofthe Iliad. Though Halifax had been dead for twenty years when thePrologue appeared, Pope may have been in the right in satirizing thepompous would-be patron, from whom he had received nothing, and whosepretences he had seen through. But the bitterness of the attack isdisagreeable when we add that Pope paid Halifax high compliments in thepreface to the Iliad, and boasted of his friendship, shortly after thesatire, in the Epilogue to the Satires. A more disagreeable affair atthe moment was the description, in the Epistle on Taste, of Canons, thesplendid seat of the Duke of Chandos. Chandos, being still alive, resented the attack, and Pope had not the courage to avow his meaning, which might in that case have been justifiable. He declared toBurlington (to whom the epistle was addressed), and to Chandos, that hehad not intended Canons, and tried to make peace by saying in anotherepistle that "gracious Chandos is beloved at sight. " This exculpation, says Johnson, was received by the duke "with great magnanimity, as by aman who accepted his excuse, without believing his professions. " Nobody, in fact, believed, and even Warburton let out the secret by a comicoversight. Pope had prophesied in his poem that another age would seethe destruction of "Timon's Villa, " when laughing Ceres would reassumethe land. Had he lived three years longer, said Warburton in a note, Pope would have seen his prophecy fulfilled, namely, by the destructionof Canons. The note was corrected, but the admission that Canonsbelonged to Timon had been made. 

To such accusations Pope had a general answer. He described the type, not the individual. The fault was with the public, who chose to fit thecap. His friend remonstrates in the Epilogue against his personalsatire. "Come on, then, Satire, general, unconfined, " exclaims the poet, Spread thy broad wing and souse on all the kind

 * * * * *

 Ye reverend atheists. (Friend) Scandal! name them! who? (Pope) Why, that's the thing you bade me not to do. Who starved a sister, who forswore a debt, I never named; the town's inquiring yet. The pois'ning dame-- (F. ) You mean-- (P. ) I don't. (F. ) You do. (P. ) See, now, I keep the secret, and not you!

It must in fact be admitted that from the purely artistic point of view, Pope is right. Prosaic commentators are always asking, Who is meant by apoet, as though a poem were a legal document. It may be interesting, forvarious purposes, to know who was in the writer's mind, or what factsuggested the general picture. But we have no right to look outside thepoem itself, or to infer anything not within the four corners of thestatement. It matters not for such purposes whether there was, or wasnot, any real person corresponding to Sir Balaam, to whom his wife said, when he was enriched by Cornish wreckers, "live like yourself, "

 When lo! two puddings smoked upon the board, in place of the previous one on Sabbath days. Nor does it even matterwhether Atticus meant Addison, or Sappho Lady Mary. The satire isequally good, whether its objects are mere names or realities. 

But the moral question is quite distinct. In that case we must askwhether Pope used words calculated or intended to fix an imputation uponparticular people. Whether he did it in prose or verse, the offence wasthe same. In many cases he gives real names, and in many others givesunmistakable indications, which must have fixed his satire to particularpeople. If he had written Addison for Atticus (as he did at first), orLady Mary for Sappho, or Halifax for Bufo, the insinuation could nothave been clearer. His attempt to evade his responsibility was a mereequivocation--a device which he seems to have preferred to direct lying. The character of Bufo might be equally suitable to others; but noreasonable man could doubt that every one would fix it upon Halifax. Insome cases--possibly in that of Chandos--he may have thought that hislanguage was too general to apply, and occasionally it seems that hesometimes tried to evade consequences by adding some inconsistentcharacteristic to his portraits. 

I say this, because I am here forced to notice the worst of all theimputations upon Pope's character. The epistle on the characters ofwomen now includes the famous lines on Atossa, which did not appear tillafter Pope's death. [27] They were (in 1746) at once applied to thefamous Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough; and a story immediately becamecurrent that the duchess had paid Pope 1000_l. _ to suppress them, butthat he preserved them, with a view to their ultimate publication. Thisstory was repeated by Warton and by Walpole; it has been accepted by Mr. Carruthers, who suggests, by way of palliation, that Pope was desirousat the time of providing for Martha Blount, and probably took the sum inorder to buy an annuity for her. Now, if the story were proved, it mustbe admitted that it would reveal a baseness in Pope which would beworthy only of the lowest and most venal literary marauders. No moredisgraceful imputation could have been made upon Curll, or Curll'smiserable dependents. A man who could so prostitute his talents musthave been utterly vile. Pope has sins enough to answer for; but hisother meannesses were either sacrifices to his morbid vanity, or (likehis offence against Swift, or his lies to Aaron Hill and Chandos)collateral results of spasmodic attempts to escape from humiliation. Inmoney-matters he seems to have been generally independent. He refusedgifts from his rich friends, and confuted the rather similar calumnythat he had received 500_l. _ from the Duke of Chandos. If the accountrested upon mere contemporary scandal, we might reject it on the groundof its inconsistency with his known character, and its likeness to otherfabrications of his enemies. There is, however, further evidence. It issuch evidence as would, at most, justify a verdict of "not proven" in acourt of justice. But the critic is not bound by legal rules, and has tosay what is the most probable solution, without fear or favour. 

I cannot here go into the minute details. This much, however, may betaken as established. Pope was printing a new edition of his works atthe time of his death. He had just distributed to his friends somecopies of the Ethic Epistles, and in those copies the Atossa appeared. Bolingbroke, to whom Pope had left his unpublished papers, discoveredit, and immediately identified it with the duchess, who (it must benoticed) was still alive. He wrote to Marchmont, one of Pope'sexecutors, that there could be "no excuse for Pope's design ofpublishing it after the favour you and I know. " This is furtherexplained by a note added in pencil by Marchmont's executor, "1000_l. _;"and the son of this executor, who published the Marchmont papers, saysthat this was the favour received by Pope from the duchess. This, however, is far from proving a direct bribe. It is, in fact, hardlyconceivable that the duchess and Pope should have made such a bargain indirect black and white, and equally inconceivable that two men likeBolingbroke and Marchmont should have been privy to such a transaction, and spoken of it in such terms. Bolingbroke thinks that the favourreceived laid Pope under an obligation, but evidently does not thinkthat it implied a contract. Mr. Dilke has further pointed out that thereare many touches in the character which distinctly apply to the Duchessof Buckingham, with whom Pope had certainly quarrelled, and which willnot apply to the Duchess of Marlborough, who had undoubtedly madefriends with him during the last years of his life. Walpole again tellsa story, partly confirmed by Warton, that Pope had shown the characterto each duchess (Warton says only to Marlborough), saying that it wasmeant for the other. The Duchess of Buckingham, he says, believed him;the other had more sense and paid him 1000_l. _ to suppress it. Walpoleis no trustworthy authority; but the coincidence implies at least thatsuch a story was soon current. 

The most probable solution must conform to these data. Pope's Atossa wasa portrait which would fit either lady, though it would be naturallyapplied to the most famous. It seems certain also that Pope had receivedsome favours (possibly the 1000_l. _ on some occasion unknown) from theDuchess of Marlborough, which was felt by his friends to make any attackupon her unjustifiable. We can scarcely believe that there should havebeen a direct compact of the kind described. If Pope had been a personof duly sensitive conscience he would have suppressed his work. But tosuppress anything that he had written, and especially a passage socarefully laboured, was always agony to him. He preferred, as we mayperhaps conjecture, to settle in his own mind that it would fit theDuchess of Buckingham, and possibly introduced some of the touches towhich Mr. Dilke refers. He thought it sufficiently disguised to bewilling to publish it whilst the person with whom it was naturallyidentified was still alive. Had she complained, he would have reliedupon those touches, and have equivocated as he equivocated to Hill andChandos. He always seems to have fancied that he could conceal himselfby very thin disguises. But he ought to have known, and perhaps didknow, that it would be immediately applied to the person who hadconferred an obligation. From that guilt no hypothesis can relieve him;but it is certainly not proved, and seems, on the whole, improbable thathe was so base as the concessions of his biographers would indicate. 

FOOTNOTES:

[24] Spence, pp. 16, 48, 137, 315. 

[25] To take an obviously uncertain test, I find that in Bartlett'sdictionary of familiar quotations, Shakspeare fills 70 pages; Milton, 23; Pope, 18; Wordsworth, 16; and Byron, 15. The rest are nowhere. 

[26] Roscoe's attempt at a denial was conclusively answered by Bowles inone of his pamphlets. 

[27] On this subject Mr. Dilke's _Papers of a Critic_. 

CHAPTER IX. 

THE END. 

The last satires were published in 1738. Six years of life stillremained to Pope; his intellectual powers were still vigorous, and hispleasure in their exercise had not ceased. The only fruit, however, ofhis labours during this period was the fourth book of the Dunciad. Hespent much time upon bringing out new editions of his works, and uponthe various intrigues connected with the Swift correspondence. But hishealth was beginning to fail. The ricketty framework was giving way, andfailing to answer the demands of the fretful and excitable brain. In thespring of 1744 the poet was visibly breaking up; he suffered fromdropsical asthma, and seems to have made matters worse by puttinghimself in the hands of a notorious quack--a Dr. Thomson. The end wasevidently near as he completed his fifty-sixth year. Friends, old andnew, were often in attendance. Above all, Bolingbroke, the veneratedfriend of thirty years' standing; Patty Blount, the woman whom he lovedbest; and the excellent Spence, who preserved some of the last words ofthe dying man. The scene, as he saw it, was pathetic; perhaps it is notless pathetic to us, for whom it has another side as of grim tragichumour. 

Three weeks before his death Pope was sending off copies of the EthicEpistles--apparently with the Atossa lines--to his friends. "Here I am, like Socrates, " he said, "dispensing my morality amongst my friends justas I am dying. " Spence watched him as anxiously as his disciples watchedSocrates. He was still sensible to kindness. Whenever Miss Blount camein, the failing spirits rallied for a moment. He was always sayingsomething kindly of his friends, "as if his humanity had outlasted hisunderstanding. " Bolingbroke, when Spence made the remark, said that hehad never known a man with so tender a heart for his own friends or formankind. "I have known him, " he added, "these thirty years, and valuemyself more for that man's love than--" and his voice was lost in tears. At moments Pope could still be playful. "Here I am, dying of a hundredgood symptoms, " he replied to some flattering report, but his mind wasbeginning to wander. He complained of seeing things as through acurtain. "What's that?" he said, pointing to the air, and then, with asmile of great pleasure, added softly, "'twas a vision. " His religioussentiments still edified his hearers. "I am so certain, " he said, "ofthe soul's being immortal, that I seem to feel it within me, as it wereby intuition;" and early one morning he rose from bed and tried to beginan essay upon immortality, apparently in a state of semi-delirium. Onhis last day he sacrificed, as Chesterfield rather cynically observes, his cock to Ĉsculapius. Hooke, a zealous Catholic friend, asked himwhether he would not send for a priest. "I do not suppose that it isessential, " said Pope, "but it will look right, and I heartily thank youfor putting me in mind of it. " A priest was brought, and Pope receivedthe last sacraments with great fervour and resignation. Next day, on May30th, 1744, he died so peacefully that his friends could not determinethe exact moment of death. 

It was a soft and touching end; and yet we must once more look at theother side. Warburton and Bolingbroke both appear to have been at theside of the dying man, and before very long they were to be quarrellingover his grave. Pope's will showed at once that his quarrels were hardlyto end with his death. He had quarrelled, though the quarrel had beenmade up, with the generous Allen, for some cause not ascertainable, except that it arose from the mutual displeasure of Mrs. Allen and MissBlount. It is pleasant to notice that, in the course of the quarrel, Pope mentioned Warburton, in a letter to Miss Blount, as a sneakingparson; but Warburton was not aware of the flash of sarcasm. Pope, asJohnson puts it, "polluted his will with female resentment. " He left alegacy of 150_l. _ to Allen, being, as he added, the amount received fromhis friend--for himself or for charitable purposes; and requested Allen, if he should refuse the legacy for himself, to pay it to the BathHospital. Allen adopted this suggestion, saying quietly that Pope hadalways been a bad accountant, and would have come nearer the truth if hehad added a cypher to the figures. 

Another fact came to light, which produced a fiercer outburst. Pope, itwas found, had printed a whole edition (1500 copies) of the _PatriotKing_, Bolingbroke's most polished work. The motive could have beennothing but a desire to preserve to posterity what Pope considered to bea monument worthy of the highest genius, and was so far complimentary toBolingbroke. Bolingbroke, however, considered it as an act of grosstreachery. Pope had received the work on condition of keeping itstrictly private, and showing it to only a few friends. Moreover, hehad corrected it, arranged it, and altered or omitted passages accordingto his own taste, which naturally did not suit the author's. In 1749Bolingbroke gave a copy to Mallet for publication, and prefixed an angrystatement to expose the breach of trust of "a man on whom the authorthought he could entirely depend. " Warburton rushed to the defence ofPope and the demolition of Bolingbroke. A savage controversy followed, which survives only in the title of one of Bolingbroke's pamphlets, AFamiliar Epistle to the most Impudent Man living--a transparentparaphrase for Warburton. Pope's behaviour is too much of a piece withprevious underhand transactions, but scarcely deserves furthercondemnation. 

A single touch remains. Pope was buried, by his own directions, in avault in Twickenham church, near the monument erected to his parents. Itcontained a simple inscription ending with the words "_Parentibus benemerentibus filius fecit. _" To this, as he directed in his will, was tobe added simply "_et sibi_. " This was done; but seventeen yearsafterwards the clumsy Warburton erected in the same church anothermonument to Pope himself, with this stupid inscription. _Poetaloquitur. _

 _For one who would not lie buried in Westminster Abbey. _

 Heroes and kings, your distance keep! In peace let one poor poet sleep Who never flatter'd folks like you; Let Horace blush and Virgil too. 

Most of us can tell from experience how grievously our posthumousceremonials often jar upon the tenderest feelings of survivors. Pope'svalued friends seem to have done their best to surround the last sceneof his life with painful associations; and Pope, alas! was anunconscious accomplice. To us of a later generation it is impossible toclose this strange history without a singular mixture of feelings. Admiration for the extraordinary literary talents, respect for theenergy which, under all disadvantages of health and position, turnedthese talents to the best account; love of the real tender-heartednesswhich formed the basis of the man's character; pity for the manysufferings to which his morbid sensitiveness exposed him; contempt forthe meannesses into which he was hurried; ridicule for the insatiablevanity which prompted his most degrading subterfuges; horror for thebitter animosities which must have tortured the man who cherished themeven more than his victims--are suggested simultaneously by the name ofPope. As we look at him in one or other aspect, each feeling may comeuppermost in turn. The most abiding sentiment--when we think of him as aliterary phenomenon--is admiration for the exquisite skill which enabledhim to discharge a function, not of the highest kind, with a perfectionrare in any department of literature. It is more difficult to say whatwill be the final element in our feeling about the man. Let us hope thatit may be the pity which, after a certain lapse of years, we may beexcused for conceding to the victim of moral as well as physicaldiseases. 

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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:

Variant spellings of William Shakspeare's name have been standardized inthe text, but not in the advertisements at the end of the book. 

The following words use an oe ligature in the original:

 Boeotian Breboeuf manoeuvre manoeuvres Phoebus

The following corrections have been made to the text:

 page 6: Like so many other poets, he took[original has comma] infinite delight in

 page 14: his companions could practice[original has practise] with comparative impunity

 page 17: we have already[original has aleady] reached

 page 25: refine as the reasoning faculties develop[original has develope]

 page 50: Addison gave to Lady M. W. Montagu[original has Montague]

 page 51: _Ib. _, March[original has comma] 25

 page 54: when dying in distress[original has distres]

 page 55: Addison recognizes[original has recognises] his true character

 page 66: philologists and antiquarians in the background[original has back-ground]

 page 73: He allows Teucer to call Hector a dog, but apologizes[original has apologises] in a note. 

 page 84: for his neglect of Popish superstition[original has supersition]

 page 86: he was familiar[original has familar] with Bridgeman and Kent

 page 125: what the authors would have suppressed[original has suppresed]

 page 125: he was like a civilised[original has civilized] commander

 page 126: either to shirk responsibility[original has reponsibility]

 page 127: and how successive[original has sucessive] editions

 page 135: installed Cibber in[original has in in] his place

 page 146: was simply a reproduction of[original has comma] Curll's publication

 page 156: ---4[original has 3 spaces preceding the numeral]

 page 166: manuscripts seen by Mallet may probably[original has probable] have been a commonplace book

 page 169: But errs not nature from this gracious end, [original is missing comma]

 page 175: more outspoken than himself[original has himseif]

 page 192: And fame, the lord of useless thousands ends. [original is missing period]

 page 193: Brand the bold front of shameless guilty men, [comma missing in original]

 page 198: any collection of British poets innumerable pages of versification[original has verification]

 page 199: by the brilliance of his conversation. [original has comma]

 Footnote 19: Pope's Works, vol. I. P. [period missing in original] cxxi. 

 Advertising at end of the book:

 HUME. By Professor[original has Pofessor] HUXLEY

 Burns' [original has Burn's] poetry

 SOUTHEY. By Professor[original has Pofessor] DOWDEN.