300

Who to the Dean, and filver bell can swear,
And fees at Cannons what was never there;
Who reads, but with a luft to misapply,
Make Satire a Lampoon, and Fiction Lie.
A lash like mine no honest man shall dread,
But all fuch babling blockheads in his stead.
Let Sporus tremble-A. What? that thing of
filk,
305
Sporus, that mere white curd of Afs's milk?
Satire or Senfe, alas! can Sporus feel?
Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?

P. Yet let me flap this bug with gilded wings,
This painted child of dirt, that stinks and stings ;
Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys, 311
Yet wit ne'er taftes, and beauty ne'er enjoys:
So well-bred spaniels civilly delight

In mumbling of the game they dare not bite.
Eternal fmiles his emptinefs betray,
315
As fhallow ftreams run dimpling all the way.
Whether in florid impotence he speaks,
And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks;
Or

NOTES.

VER. 299. Who to the Dean, and filver bell, etc.] Meaning the man who would have perfuaded the Duke of Chandos that Mr. P. meant him in thofe circumstances ridiculed in the Epiftle on Tafle. See Mr. Pope's letter to the Earl of Burlington concerning this matter. P.

VER. 306. That mere white curd of Afs's milk?] Alluding, I fuppofe, to his having been cured of a cenfumptive habit by that Dict.

Or at the ear of Eve, familiar Toad,

Half froth, half venom, fpits himself abroad, 320
In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies,

Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blafphemies.
His wit all fee-faw, between that and this,
Now high, now low, now mafter up, now mifs,
And he himself one vile Antithefis.
325
Amphibious thing! that acting either part,
The trifling head, or the corrupted heart,
Fop at the toilet, flatt'rer at the board,
Now trips a Lady, and now ftruts a Lord.
Eve's tempter thus the Rabbins have expreft, 330
A Cherub's face, a reptile all the reft,

Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will truft,
Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the duft.

Not Fortune's worshipper, nor Fashion's fool, Not Lucre's madman, nor Ambition's tool, 335 Not proud, nor fervile; Be one Poet's praise, That, if he pleas'd, he pleas'd by manly ways: That Flatt'ry, ev'n to Kings, he held a shame, And thought a Lie in verse or prose the same.

NOTES.

VER. 319. See Milton, Book iv. P.

That

VER. 320. Half froth,] Alluding to thofe frothy excretions, called by the people, Toad-fpits, feen in fummer-time hanging upon plants, and emitted by young infects which lie hid in the midft of them for their prefervation, while in their helpless state.

That not in Fancy's maze he wander'd long, 340

But ftoop'd to Truth, and moraliz'd his fong:

That

NOTES.

VER. 340. That not in Fancy's maze he wander'd long,] His merit in this will appear very great, if we confider, that in this walk he had all the advantages which the most poetic Imagination could give to a great Genius. M. Voltaire, in a MS. letter now before me, writes thus from England to a friend in Paris. "I intend to fend you two or three poems "of Mr. Pope, the best Poet of England, and at present of "all the world. I hope you are acquainted enough with the English tongue, to be fenfible of all the charms of his "works. For my part, I look upon his poem called the "Effay on Criticifm as fuperior to the Art of Poetry of Horace; and his Rape of the Lock is, in my opinion, above "the Lutrin of Defpreaux. I never faw fo amiable an ima"gination, fo gentle graces, fo great variety, so much wit, "and fo refined knowledge of the world, as in this little performance." MS. Lett. Oct. 15, 1726.

66

66

VER. 341. But floop'd to Truth, and moraliz'd his fong :] This may be faid no lefs in commendation of his literary, than of his moral character. And his fuperior excellence in poetry is owing to it. He foon difcovered in what his force lay; and he made the best of that advantage, by a fedulous cultivation of his proper talent. For having read Quintilian early, this precept did not efcape him, Sunt haec duo vitanda prorfus: unum ne tentes quod effici non poffit; alterum, ne ab eo, quod quis optime facit, in aliud, cui minus eft idoneus, transferas. It was in this knowledge and cultivation of his genius that he had principally the advantage of his great mafter, Dryden; who, by his Mac-Flecno, his Abfolom and Achitophel, but chiefly by his Prologues and Epilogues, appears to have had great talents for this fpecies of moral poetry; but, unluckily, he feemed neither to understand nor attend to it.

Ibid. But fcop'd to Truth,] The term is from falconry; and the allufion to one of thofe untam❜d birds of spirit, which fometimes wantons at large in airy circles before it regards, or tops to, its prey.

That not for Fame, but Virtue's better end,
He stood the furious foe, the timid friend,
The damning critic, half-approving wit,
The coxcomb hit, or fearing to be hit; 345
Laugh'd at the loss of friends he never had,
The dull, the proud, the wicked, and the mad;
The diftant threats of vengeance on his head,
The blow unfelt, the tear he never fhed;
The tale reviv'd, the lie fo oft o'erthrown, 350
Th' imputed trash, and dulness not his own;
The morals blacken'd when the writings 'scape,
The libell'd perfon, and the pictur'd shape;
Abuse, on all he lov'd, or lov'd him, spread,
A friend in exile, or a father, dead;

NOTES.

355

The

VER. 343. He flood the furious foe, the timid friend,] His ranking the timid friend, with one of the higheft evils of life, a furious foe, has great juftnefs and dignity of fentiment: for, with the timid friend, he had to combat the false maxims of prudence, which fuch a friend would have to object to him; and thefe could not be handled as they deferved, without detecting the low, paltry views of the adviser, covered over with the name of Friendship.

VER. 350. The lie fo oft o'erthrown,] As, that he received fubfcriptions for Shakespear, that he fet his name to Mr. Broome's verfes, etc. which, though publicly difproved, were nevertheless fhamelessly repeated in the Libels, and even in that called the Nobleman's Epistle. P.

VER. 351. Th' imputed trash,] Such as profane Pfalms, Court Poems, and other fcandalous things, printed in his name by Curl and others.

VER. 354. Abuse, on all he lov'd, or lov'd him, fpread,] Namely, on the Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Burlington, Lord

Bathurst,

The whisper, that to Greatness ftill too near,
Perhaps, yet vibrates on his Sov'REIGN's Ear--
Welcome for thee, fair Virtue! all the paft:
For thee, fair Virtue! welcome ev'n the last!

A. But why infult the poor, affront the great?
P. A knave's a knave to me, in ev'ry ftate: 36r
Alike my scorn, if he fucceed or fail,
Sporus at court, or Japhet in a jail,

A hireling fcribler, or a hireling peer,
Knight of the poft corrupt, or of the fhire; 365
If on a Pillory, or near a Throne,

He gain his Prince's ear, or lofe his own.

NOTES.

Yet

Bathurst, Lord Bolingbroke, Bishop Atterbury, Dr. Swift,Dr. Arbuthnot, Mr. Gay, his Friends, his Parents, and his very Nurfe, afperfed in printed papers, by James Moore, G.Ducket, L. Welfted, Tho. Bentley, and other obfcure perfons. P.

VER. 356. The whisper, that to Greatness still too near,] By the whisper is meant calumniating honeft characters. Shakefpear has finely expreffed this office of the fycophant of Greatnefs in the following line:

"Rain facrificial whifp'rings in his ear."

By which is meant the immolating men's reputations to the vice or vanity of his Patron.

VER. 357. Perhaps, yet vibrates] What force and elegance of Expreffion! which, in one word, conveys to us the phyfical effects of found, and the moral effects of an often repeated flander.

VER. 359. For thee, fair Virtue! welcome ev'n the laft!] This line is remarkable for prefenting us with the most amiable image of steddy Virtue, mixed with a modeft concern for his being forced to undergo the fevereft proofs of his love for it; which was the being thought hardly of by his SOVEREIGN.