book is a convincing proof that Pope had some motive, incompatible with

innocence, for his studious perversion of the truth. The desire to

obliterate the traces of his delinquency reappears in the preface to the

quarto. He writes with implied censure of Swift for his sanction of the

Dublin edition, and has the disingenuousness to conceal that he had

merely allowed Faulkner to reproduce in Ireland a volume which had been

printed in England--a volume over which the Dean had no control, and

which being printed, he knew would inevitably be published.

The artful wording of the very note in which Pope refers to the printed

book betrays his desire to keep the fact out of sight. His statement

could enlighten no one who was previously ignorant. It was not from

choice that he promulgated, however obscurely, the allegation of Mrs.

Whiteway that the work had its origin in London. But he was forced upon

one of two evils, and he selected the least. Mrs. Whiteway knew that the

letters must either have been printed by Pope, or have found their way

to the press by the corruption of those who had access to his papers.

She acquitted Pope, out of courtesy, perhaps, to his own protestations,

and accepted the second conclusion, that the London booksellers had

procured the manuscripts by bribes, though she could hardly have

entertained the serious belief that the Curlls had been at the expense

of purchasing and printing them, for no other purpose than to ship a

solitary copy to Ireland. She was eager to be cleared from any possible

imputation of abusing the trust which devolved on her through the

imbecility of Swift,[144] and her anxiety to absolve herself and the

Dean, is the secret of her son-in-law insisting upon writing a preface

to prove that the traitors must have been in England and not in Ireland.

He alone would have been responsible for the facts and arguments he

adduced, and they would have appeared in the edition of Faulkner, where

they would not have claimed the sanction of Pope. His ignorance could be

no reason why an independent person should not tell what he knew and

believed, and his unwillingness to be justified was in direct opposition

to his conduct through life. It was for a different cause that he

interfered with the execution of the design. Mr. Swift would have

disclosed the fact that the letters of the poet had been returned to him

through Lord Orrery, in 1737, that he had exclusive possession of the

letters of the Dean, that the ground-work of the collection was at

Twickenham, that it had been printed at London, and had come printed to

Dublin. When he insisted upon fulfilling his intention, Pope, to divert

him from it, must have been driven to propose the insertion of the

exculpatory note. He drew it up in a form which would bear one meaning

to those who were acquainted with the facts, and another to the

multitude who were in the dark. He had the contradictory ends to answer

of propitiating Mrs. Whiteway and concealing the truth, and his

language, like everything he wrote on the question, is consequently

vague and evasive.

In the same letter in which Pope ignored the existence of the printed

book to Allen, and pretended that the Irish edition was taken directly

from the originals, he further asserted that the "Dean's people" had at

length consented to give up the manuscripts. If the originals were

really in their possession there would be strong grounds for concluding

that the conspirators were at Dublin. If, on the contrary, the

allegation of the poet was a wilful untruth, this additional

misrepresentation must lead us to conclude that he was the author of a

fraud from which he defended himself by falsehood. Mrs. Whiteway had, it

is true, commissioned Mr. Nugent to acquaint him that she had secured

several of his letters. Mr. Nugent, having delivered the message in

March, 1740, informs her in April that he was authorised to receive

them, and begs her to transmit them to him in London by a safe

hand.[145] She evidently preferred that they should go direct to their

owner, and wrote to Pope in May, that she would forward them by the

first trustworthy messenger who would deliver them to Pope himself. It

was agreed between them that Mr. M'Aulay should be the person; but they

were ultimately sent to Lord Orrery, at his country seat in Ireland, in

January or February, 1741, and were, no doubt, conveyed by him to their

final destination when he visited England in March. The critic in the

Athenaeum plausibly conjectures that they were the letters which had been

written since the transmission of the collection in June, 1737, and the

late period at which they were received would account for none of them

appearing in the quarto, which was published by the middle of April,

1741.

When Pope, at the beginning of August, 1740, heard from Faulkner that

the Dean had given him permission to print, or rather to reprint, the

correspondence, he expressed his conviction to Mr. Nugent, who was still

meddling in the business, that the offer of returning the letters was a

feint. "I presume now," he added, "that she would have sent but a few of

no consequence, for the bookseller tells me there are several of Lord

Bolingbroke's, &c., which must have been in the Dean's own

custody."[146] Mrs. Whiteway had merely undertaken to return to Pope

the letters which were written by Pope, and it is not apparent why the

printing of several of the letters of Bolingbroke should have involved

the conclusion that she was practising a feint, and would only have sent

a few of no consequence. The incongruity of the observation seems to

have been the result of the guilt which dictated it. The poet was aware

that the originals promised him were a comparatively small number, which

had no connection with the printed letters, and he was meeting the

circumstance by anticipation, in the probable event of its reaching the

ears of Mr. Nugent. The rest of the correspondence was already in his

possession, and he assigned a foolish reason why Mrs. Whiteway would not

have sent it, because the real reason could not be stated.

It was several months subsequent to this communication to Mr. Nugent,

and after he had received the comments of Mrs. Whiteway on the volume

which came from England, that he opened his griefs to Mr. Allen. The

letter is not dated; but a letter to Warburton, which gives a portion of

the same information as a piece of novel intelligence, bears the date of

February 4, 1741. "They now offer," Pope tells Allen, "to send me the

originals, which have been so long detained, and I will accept of them,

though they have done their job." A few months later he reverted to the

subject and says to Allen, "It will please you to know that I have

received the packet of letters safe from Ireland by the means of Lord

Orrery."[147] He has not the candour to acknowledge that the letters

were voluntarily tendered him by Mrs. Whiteway long before the printed

collection had been heard of. He wished to have it believed that they

had only been offered to him since the booksellers "had done their job,"

and the motive for this deception must have been the desire to identify

the letters from Mrs. Whiteway with the letters in Faulkner's volume,

while he had a secret consciousness that they had nothing in common. It

might be conjectured, indeed, that he was speaking of a distinct

occurrence, and that Lord Orrery was the bearer of two sets of letters,

though Pope mentions only one, if it were not certain, as I shall now

proceed to show, that the originals of the printed collection sent to

Dublin were never offered to him at all.

After the collection had been consigned to Faulkner, Mrs. Whiteway wrote

her sentiments at large to Lord Orrery. She asked him, with reference to

a letter of Pope's, if he believed the collection genuine, and slight as

were her doubts, the question would have been absurd if she had

professedly the originals of the correspondence in her hands. She

declared her conviction that the poet had been betrayed by his own

servants, and since the letters extended over three and twenty years,

she could not have imagined that they had all the while been intercepted

on their road to the post, but must have assumed that they had been

abstracted from the cabinets in which they were stored away at

Twickenham. The main stress of her argument against the theory that the

work had been concocted in Ireland, was laid upon the presence of the

letters of the Dean, which Pope alone could command, and not upon the

letters of Pope, which might have been copied while they remained in the

possession of Swift; but she pointed out the improbability of the

supposition by remarking that no use had been made of the book in which

Swift had stitched specimens of the correspondence of various eminent

men, and which was peculiarly accessible from his habit of circulating

it among his friends. In particular, she noticed that she had formerly

his permission to take from it a letter of Pope, and she triumphantly

remarks that this letter had not been printed. The boast could have had

no force if all the printed correspondence had been the same

correspondence she had promised to return. The notion that she had

offered to send back the originals of the collection of 1741 is

inconsistent with every part of her defence--a defence in which she was

not afraid to challenge contradiction, since she authorised Lord Orrery

to pass it on to Pope. Neither could the originals have been offered by

Faulkner; for both at the time and afterwards he asserted that his

volume was only a reprint. Pope may even be said to bear testimony

against himself. He was eager to make it appear that the work was

composed of materials which must have been drawn from the papers of

Swift, and he took advantage of the erroneous phrase in Swift's

postscript of August 24, to add, in a note, "The book that is now

printed _seems_ to be part of the collection here spoken of." The

announcement that the "Dean's people" had acknowledged that they

possessed a large proportion of the originals would have decided the

question, and the silence of the poet is an admission that he dared not

repeat in public, where it would meet the eye of the persons implicated,

the fable he had palmed off upon Allen in private. Nay, when stating in

the quarto that Mrs. Whiteway and her son-in-law charged the whole

proceeding upon the corrupt practices of the London printers, he still

did not venture to retort that the originals had never left the custody

of the "Dean's people," who detained them in Dublin until, according to

his own expression, the Dublin printers had "done their job." The fact

was, that Allen had intimated his apprehension that Pope would be

suspected of being concerned in the publication, and Pope replied that

"the whole thing was so circumstanced that this could never be the

case." To stifle the suggestion, he based a falsehood upon a foundation

of truth, and spoke of the letters which Mrs. Whiteway had offered to

send him, in the beginning of 1740, as though they had been the

originals of the printed correspondence. His invention of a fiction to

establish his innocence, is a sure indication of his guilt.

The Dean's people promised Pope the copy of the correspondence, that he

might correct and expunge what he pleased. "I dare not," he wrote to

Allen, "even do this, for they would say I revised it." His mind

immediately veered from decision to uncertainty, and in the next

sentence but one he states that "he knows not whether to make any use of

the permission or not." A little further, and he comes to the conclusion

that until he sees the letters he can form no judgment of the proper

measures to be pursued. "The excessive earnestness," he adds, "the Dean

has been in for publishing them makes me hope they are castigated in

some degree; or he must be totally deprived of his understanding." Lord

Mansfield deposed, from the personal information of Pope, that his

imperfect memory of their contents increased his anxiety to stop the

publication.[148] In the midst of his apprehensions, his knowledge of

Swift's incapacity, and his conviction that it would be insanity to

allow the correspondence to go forth in its integrity, he yet resolved

not to expurgate the copy, and then doubted whether he would expurgate

it or not. This easy kind of hesitation, which has none of the

appearance of genuine alarm, was what might be expected in a man who had

already revised the letters to his heart's content, and was poorly

performing a borrowed part. Though he ended by refusing to retouch a

text of his own preparing, he employed the interval while the sheets

were submitted to his criticism in forestalling the Dublin edition. Mr.

D. Swift believed that the correspondence was first published in

Ireland. Faulkner asserted that it was first published in England, and

Faulkner, who could not well be mistaken, was right. No advertisement of

the Irish volume is to be found in the "Dublin News Letter" till some

time after the English volume was on sale, and no copy exists in the

public libraries, or after long search could be heard of from the

second-hand booksellers, which does not contain the additional matter

inserted in the quarto.[149] In the prefatory notice to the quarto

itself we are told that the letters are taken "from an impression sent

from Dublin, and said to be printed by the Dean's direction." This was

the impression which had been privately forwarded to Pope, and the

language seems to have been carefully selected to avoid the assertion

that there had been a publication of the work. The poet's scheme may be

discerned in the account he gave to Allen. He informed him that the

book, being most of it printed, was "put past preventing," but that he

was "trying all the means possible to retard it." In plain words, he was

manoeuvring to keep back the Irish edition till his rival reprint was

in the market. When he had succeeded in his device, he repeated his old

tactics of advertising that the surreptitious collection was the cause

of his own, and at the same time bespoke the preference for his reprint

by announcing that it would contain "several additional letters."[150]

Apart from these additions, the quarto of Pope is a reproduction, with

some variations, of the Dublin impression, and a few notes which

Faulkner had doubtless found in the volume sent from England, are said

in the quarto to be taken from Faulkner. Nevertheless there is strong

internal evidence that a portion of the quarto had an independent

origin, and had been printed off before the Irish edition was received.

The correspondence consists of 209 pages, which are numbered

consecutively from 1 to 115. At this point the letters of Swift to Gay

commence, and instead of the numbers proceeding in regular order, they

go back to page 89, and are thence continued without any break to the

final page, 182. That the arrangement is not a typographical mistake is

clear from the signatures of the sheets being in accordance with the

paging,--a coincidence which was barely possible if the figures had been

a misprint. The correspondence of Swift with Gay begins on sheet N,

which is the letter of the alphabet that answers to page 89 in a quarto

volume, and this keeping between the letters and the figures is

preserved throughout. But there is a second coincidence which is

absolutely fatal to the idea that the confusion in the paging was an

error of the press. The quarto edition was accompanied by an edition in

folio, which was the same impression with the matter parcelled out into

pages of greater length, and with the requisite changes in the numbering

of the pages and the signatures of the sheets. In spite of the change

there is the identical peculiarity that distinguishes the quarto. The

numbers run on unbroken from 1 to 108, when we arrive at the letters to

Gay. Here we recommence with page 85, and starting from this new basis

the figures proceed in regular succession to the end. The sheet at page

85 is marked Y, the proper letter for the folio size, and as in the

quarto the signatures, in every instance, correspond with the pages. The

defect cannot be explained by the supposition that the work had been

divided into portions, which were printed separately for the sake of

expedition. With the text of the Dublin copy to guide his calculations,

no compositor could have committed the error of pronouncing that matter

which covers 115 pages could he contained in 88. The evident cause of

the anomaly is that, after the quarto in its original form had passed

through the press, Pope saw reason to cancel the opening part of the

volume which preceded Swift's correspondence with Gay. The materials in

their second form occupied more space than in their first, and instead

of filling only 88 pages in the quarto, and 84 in the folio, run on to

115 in the one, and 108 in the other. The consequence is that the pages

in excess bear the same numbers with the succeeding uncancelled pages

which could not be altered. The process is rendered further apparent by

the signatures to the sheets. In both folio and quarto, those on the

surplus pages, in the cancelled division of the volume, have an asterisk

affixed to denote that the signatures had been already employed;[151]

but though the sheets have this mark of repetition, they are placed in

the volume before the uncancelled sheets which retain the primitive

signatures, and which did not admit of any change. In the quarto, again,

a half sheet precedes the letters to Gay, which could not have happened

unless it had been a subsequent interpolation, when the matter was

insufficient to make the sheet complete. The half-sheet, the duplicate

paging, and the duplicate signatures, are all the result of the

insertion of fresh materials after the work was struck off, and betray

that there was an earlier form of the quarto of 1741, which contained

less than the Dublin edition, and which, therefore, being prior to it,

is a proof that the correspondence was originally printed by Pope. The

letters in the quarto are numbered, and since the series is unbroken

throughout, the original cancelled division must ostensibly have

comprised as many letters as when it was subsequently enlarged. But a

letter to Gay, dated Nov. 23, 1727, is found by the copies preserved in

the Oxford papers, to be compounded of three distinct letters, and this

system of fusion would have permitted the introduction of large

additions without deranging the continuity Of the numbers, which Pope

would have been anxious to preserve. The cancels he made to suit his

varying views were in accordance with his practice. The miscellaneous

prose works, which follow the letters, have in one place alone a cancel

of upwards of a hundred pages. Equally characteristic was the desire to

preserve any of the old sheets which could be retained, regardless of

the blemish to the book, and the trace they might afford of his

manoeuvres. It was a repetition of the paper-sparing policy which led

him to incorporate the suppressed sheets of his Wycherley into the

volume of 1735.[152]

On the 22nd of March, 1741, Pope called upon Lord Orrery at his house in

London, and found him writing to Swift. The poet took the pen from his

hand, and continued the letter. After large professions of affection, he

went on to say, "I must confess, a late incident has given me some pain;

but I am satisfied you were persuaded it would not have given me any,

and whatever unpleasant circumstances the printing our letters might be

attended with, there was one that pleased me,--that the strict

friendship we have borne each other so long is thus made known to all

mankind. As far as it was your will, I cannot be angry at what, in all

other respects, I am quite uneasy under. Had you asked me, before you

gave them away, I think I could have proposed some better monument for

our friendship, or, at least, of better materials." Any words addressed

to Swift were lost upon him now, and Pope in reality was speaking to

Lord Orrery, and to those who might hereafter read his protestations. He

had apparently forgotten that just four years before he had complained

to the same Lord Orrery, that the Dean had denied his request when he

wished to insert some of the letters in the quarto of 1737.[153] The

monument he was eager to erect to their friendship in 1737, he

repudiated in 1741. He affirmed that he could have proposed a better,

but never hinted what it was; or at least of choicer materials, but

never troubled himself further about them. This was the smallest part of

the contradiction. He refused his consent to the reprint of the book

sent to Dublin, and had even tried, he told Allen, to stop it by threats

of law. It is true, he confessed to Mr. Nugent at the outset, and

continued to confess to Allen, that he had no hope of prevailing; but

his efforts are not the less the measure of his pretended disgust. Yet

he instantly appropriated the correspondence he was anxious to stifle in

its birth, contrived to anticipate the Dublin edition, incorporated the

entire collection into his works, and published it simultaneously in

folio, quarto, and octavo. He stated in the prefatory notice, that he

had refused to revise the letters, because they were committed to the

press without his consent; but the annoyance which would not permit him

to revise the letters was no check to his haste in adopting, or to his

zeal in circulating them. For a man who was "quite uneasy" at their

appearance, his eagerness to countenance, to parade, and to propagate

them was amazing, and the manifest duplicity is not the least forcible

of the arguments which bring the whole contrivance home to Pope.

Warburton applauded him for the little resentment "he expressed at the

indiscretion of his old friend." He affected far more than his advocate

supposed; but if it had been otherwise it is strange that Warburton

should not have perceived that to talk of resentment was ridiculous when

the poet was espousing "the indiscretion," and was doing his utmost to

disseminate the letters he feigned a wish to suppress.

Curll republished the letters under the title of "Dean Swift's Literary

Correspondence." Pope filed a bill in Chancery against Curll on June 4,

1741. The poet not only demanded protection for his own letters, but

desired that the bookseller should be restrained from vending the

letters of Swift, who was not a party to the suit, nor had commissioned

any one to interfere on his behalf. The case was memorable both from its

intrinsic importance, and from the celebrity of the plaintiff. In his

answer, on the 13th of June, Curll admitted that nobody had authorised

his work. He rested his defence on three propositions. He maintained

that private correspondence did not come within the Copyright Act of

Queen Anne, because the Act was declared in the title to be for the

"Encouragement of _Learning_," whereas letters on familiar subjects were

not _learned_ productions; and because the Act was designed to protect

books which were avowedly composed for the press, whereas letters were

written without the intention of converting them into a literary

commodity. He said that he was informed, and believed, that the letters

were first "printed"[154] at Dublin, and he contended that all persons

in England had a right to reproduce books which were first "published"

in Ireland. He finally argued that letters were in the nature of a gift

to the receiver, and that after they were delivered to the Dean they

became his property. On the motion to dissolve the injunction on these

grounds, Lord Hardwicke decided that they were none of them valid. He

refused to recognise a distinction between letters and other

compositions. He denied that a prior publication in Ireland could

deprive an English author of his English rights. He, above all,

determined that though the paper on which the letter was written might

possibly be the property of the receiver, the matter remained the

property of the writer. For the same reason that he admitted Pope's

title to his own letters, he declined to continue the injunction with

respect to the letters addressed to him, which had never ceased to

belong to the persons who penned them.[155] The celebrated Murray was

one of the counsel for the poet,[156] and afterwards, when Lord Chief

Justice, he quoted and confirmed the decision of the Chancellor. "The

question," he said, "was whether the property was not transferred to the

correspondent. Lord Hardwicke thought not, and that the writer was still

the proprietor."[157] "Dean Swift," he said subsequently, "was certainly

the proprietor of the paper upon which Pope's letters to him were

written; but no disposition, no transfer of paper upon which the

composition is written can be construed a conveyance of the copy,

without the author's express consent to print and publish, much less

against his will."[158] Just and valuable as is the rule of law which

prohibits the publication of a letter without the permission of its

author, the manner in which Pope invoked it was singular. According to

his statement it was Swift that had prepared and put forth a

correspondence, in which more of the letters were from the pen of the

Dean than from the pen of the poet. Pope, while professing to be vexed

beyond measure at this exposure of private papers, asked for an

injunction, not for the purpose of suppressing them, but to obtain a

monopoly of the sale. He was not even content to reclaim his personal

share in the publication of the friend whom he upbraided for the act.

He tried to prevent any one except himself from profiting by Swift's

part of the book, and at the same time that he was endeavouring to

secure goods which did not belong to him, he reproached their owner for

displaying them. His conduct once more betrayed the truth he laboured to

conceal. He was the compiler of the collection, and instinctively

regarded a rival edition as an invasion of his rights. His proceedings

were unnatural, if Swift was the sole originator of the work; but if it

had a different source we can perceive why Pope was jealous of the least

interference with property which, from the outset, he considered to be

exclusively his own.

A fatality attended the correspondence of Pope. Curll, in defiance of

him, printed his letters to Cromwell. Lord Oxford, in spite of his

disapproval, printed his letters to Wycherley. An unknown person, by

unknown means, obtained the whole of the collection of 1735, printed it

secretly at his own expense, and sold it for a song. To render the

history uniform and complete, Swift, who would not permit Pope to print

their letters, printed them himself, while Pope, changing sides with

him, remonstrated and threatened. That nothing might be wanting to the

singularity of the case, the three last sets of letters stole into the

world when they were under the vigilant guardianship of the poet, and

the two last sets got abroad after the abiding paroxysm of terror,

engendered by the indiscretion of a single dissolute friend, had induced

him to wrest his correspondence from friends of every degree for the

purpose of securing it from the possibility of publication. Mrs.

Whiteway remarked to Lord Orrery, that among the letters in the Dean's

stitched book were numbers from the greatest men in England for genius,

learning, and power,--from Bolingbroke, Oxford, Bathurst, and

Peterborough; from Addison, Congreve, Prior, Parnell, and Gay. She said

these were as easily pilfered, and would have been as interesting to the

world, as the letters of Pope and Swift;[159] but nobody invaded the

sanctity of the private correspondence of the poet's contemporaries,

even when the papers were open to half the gossips of Dublin. He stood

alone in a misfortune which happened to him no less than four times,

and which it is to be feared would have happened a fifth if he had lived

long enough to accumulate the materials for a fresh volume. He relaxed

his correspondence with Caryll in 1729, and with Swift in 1737, as a

means to compel them to resign his former letters, and to both he used

the same expression,--that "he did not write upon the terms of other

_honest_ men."[160] The fallacy of the parallel was in the epithet. If

he had resembled other men in their honesty he might have shared in

their immunity from the alleged treachery of friends like Oxford and

Swift, and of enemies like Curll.

Of all the deceptions which the poet practised to get his correspondence

under the eye of the world, his dealings towards Swift are the worst. He

had failed to gain his consent to putting forth the letters while any

judgment yet remained to him; but no sooner had he sunk into dotage

than, trusting to his inability to detect the cheat, Pope beguiled him

into sanctioning the publication by sending him the volume ready

printed, with a flattering exhortation, the echo of what he had written

on a former occasion,[161] "importing that it was criminal to suppress

such an amiable picture of the Dean and his private character."[162] The

moment Swift fell into the pit his friend had dug for him, his friend

denounced him for the act. "I think," he wrote to Mr. Nugent, "I can

make no reflections upon this strange incident but what are truly

melancholy, and humble the pride of human nature,--that the greatest of

geniuses, though prudence may have been the companion of wit (which is

very rare) for their whole lives past, may have nothing left them at

last but their vanity. No decay of body is half so miserable!"

Extraordinary language to come from the pen of the man whose vanity,

without any excuse from the decay of his faculties, had made him eager

to print the letters in 1737, and who had been only thwarted in his

desire because Swift was wanting in the vanity by which he himself was

impelled,--infamous language when the deed he reprobated was his own,

and Swift the innocent dupe; and when having traded successfully in the

mental afflictions of his friend, he proceeded to hold up his victim, as

the criminal. But the simulated indignation is less revolting than the

simulated fondness. "When the heart is full of tenderness," he said to

the Dean, in the letter of March 22, 1741, "it must be full of concern

at the absolute impotency of all words to come up to [it]. I value and

enjoy more the memory of the pleasure and endearing obligations I have

formerly received from you than the perfect possession of any other.

Think it not possible that my affection can cease but with my last

breath. If I could think yours was exhausted I should grieve, but not

reproach you. If I felt myself even hurt by you I should be confident

you knew not the blow you gave, but had your hand guided by another."

The hand which guided him was the same hand that was at that moment

aiming a blow at his reputation. Taking advantage of his cruel malady

and prostrate understanding, Pope was even then endeavouring to fasten

upon him the stigma of his own personal treachery, and this pretended

magnanimity in forgiving a deed which he had contrived and instigated

was in itself a calumny and a fraud.

If any doubt could exist that it was Pope who put forth the collection

of 1735, and the Swift collection of 1741, we have still in the quarto

of 1737 his own avowed version of a large portion of his correspondence.

He published it with the express object of correcting the corrupt text

of spurious editions, and there remains the inquiry whether he published

it truly. When he burnt three-fourths of it, and deposited copies of the

rest in the library of Lord Oxford, he professed to have preserved the

originals from which the copies were taken. Lord Bolingbroke discovered

a great number of returned letters among his papers after his death, and

told Dr. Heberden that they contained many alterations and corrections,

which he supposed had been made with the intention of printing them some

time or other.[163] From this it would be inferred that those which had

been printed were not part of the collection, and that the poet had

found it inexpedient to retain vouchers, which would condemn if they did

not acquit him. Unfortunately the whole of the manuscripts were

destroyed by Lord Bolingbroke, and beyond the unsatisfactory information

conveyed in his remark, nothing can now be known of them. The literal

interpretation of his language is favoured by the evidence yet within

our reach, and we should conclude that Pope had not kept originals which

would have revealed alterations in the published letters of a far more

serious nature than any which Bolingbroke appears to have suspected.

John Caryll, a Roman Catholic country gentleman residing in Sussex, was

among the intimate correspondents of Pope for twenty-five years, from

1710 to 1735. The poet wrote to him on Nov. 19, 1712, and asked to have

the "whole cargo of his epistles returned," which he said might be of

use "in a design he had lately engaged in." This design was probably to

furnish some essays to the "Guardian," which commenced on the 12th of

March, 1713. He promised to restore the letters when he had done with

them, and his friend at once complied with his desire. After the

surreptitious publication of his correspondence with Cromwell, Pope, in

December, 1726, renewed his petition to Caryll to make over to him "all

such papers as he had too partially preserved;" but the object of the

request this time was "to put them out of the power of Curll." The poet

announced that he would send back those which could do no hurt to the

character of himself, his friend, or any other person; that he would

retain those which "would serve to bear testimony of his own love for

good men, or theirs for him;" and implied, as a consequence, that he

would destroy those which did not fall under either of these heads. By

this division the insignificant letters alone would have been restored

to Caryll, and whether he was mistrustful of the use to which Pope might

apply the remainder, or whether he was anxious to preserve intact the

memorials of his intimacy with a celebrated man, he did not think fit to

accede to the demand. A diminution in the frequency and cordiality of

their correspondence ensued, and lasted for upwards of two years. Caryll

at length complained, and Pope replied in February 1729, that he could

not open his mind to his acquaintances unless they would return him at

the end of every year "the forfeitures of his discretion, and commit to

his justice what he trusted only to their indulgence." Upon this

intimation that compliance was to be the condition of intimacy, Caryll

yielded the point, and the receipt of the letters was acknowledged by

the poet on the 8th of April. The Sussex squire defeated the purpose for

which they were extorted by copying the greater part of the collection.

He persevered in the practice till near the close of his life. The last

letter from Pope which he caused to be transcribed is dated July 17,

1735, and he died on the 6th of April, 1736. When his grandson sold the

hereditary estate in 1767, and retired from England to the continent,

the family papers were left behind, stowed away in boxes, where they

remained for nearly three quarters of a century. They then came into the

possession of Mr. Dilke, and have since been presented by his grandson,

Sir Charles W. Dilke, to the British Museum. Among the manuscripts were

a dozen folio books, containing the farm and domestic accounts, and in a

volume similar in appearance Mr. Dilke discovered the copies of the

letters of Pope, together with copies of others from the Dukes of

Berwick, Beaufort, and Norfolk, from Dryden, Wycherley, Steele, Roger

Lestrange, St. Evremond, and Le Grand. The external and internal

evidence leaves no doubt of their authenticity. One unexpected

confirmation of their genuineness turned up in an autograph letter of

Pope to the younger Caryll, dated Nov. 8, 1712, and which was sent by

Mr. Tuckwell to Mr. Croker. The letters to the younger Caryll remained

with his widow. The few which exist are originals in the custody of

different collectors, and this letter of Nov. 8 is a link in a series of

facts that are only known through the transcripts in the Caryll folio.

The recovery of documents, which Pope did not suspect were in existence,

discloses to us his mode of dealing with his correspondence when, having

no idea that it could rise up against him, he ventured to use it without

reserve.

After calling in his letters to his friends, Pope proceeded to arrange

them in order, and said "they formed altogether an unimportant, but yet

an innocent history of himself." "You make, I assure you," he wrote to

Caryll, July 8, 1729, "no small figure in these annals from 1710 to 1720

odd. Upon my word, sir, I am glad to see how long, and how often, and

how much I have been obliged to you, as well as how long, how often, and

how much I have been sensible of and expressed it." Notwithstanding this

assurance, Caryll made a very small figure indeed in the published

collection. Four letters only were addressed to the "Hon. J. C., Esq."

in the volume of 1735, and these initials, in the quarto of 1737, were

added to a fifth letter which had previously been headed, "Mr. Pope to

----." One other letter, in the quarto, bore the title to "Mr. C----";

but it was separated from the former group, and it is from the Caryll

copy that we learn how to fill up the blank. Both in the edition of 1735

and 1737 Pope published a letter to the "Hon. James Craggs, Esq.," which

induced Roscoe to conclude that he was the person indicated by the

initials, and it is not improbable that the poet designed to mislead his

readers, especially as the claim of Caryll to be styled Honourable was

only a Jacobite assumption, derived from his being heir to his uncle,

who had been created a peer by the exiled James II. But though Pope did

not wish to repeat in public his profuse professions in private, and

appear as the familiar friend and constant correspondent of a Roman

Catholic country gentleman, he as little desired to suppress the choicer

portions of the effusions he had addressed to him. He conceived the idea

of re-directing them, and compiled from them, in whole or in part, four

fictitious letters to Blount, four to Addison, two to Congreve, and one

each to Wycherley, Steele, Trumbull, and Digby. A second letter to

Digby, which appeared in the edition of 1735, was transferred to

Arbuthnot in the quarto of 1737. Half a dozen letters at most were

allotted to the initials of the Sussex squire, while fifteen were

assigned to more imposing names, and a sixteenth was printed in a group

of three to the "Hon. ----" Rather than credit an imposition so

childish, and yet so unwarrantable, we should have recourse to the

theory that Pope sometimes sent the same letter to different persons.

Swift assured him that the best system extant for the conduct of human

life might be collected from his epistles, and they certainly abound in

generalities which, like the clown's answer, that suited all questions,

might have been written to anybody. But a comparison of the printed

letters with the Caryll copies, shows that this solution is

inadmissible, and the observation of the clown, when his answer proved

inopportune, is equally applicable to the contrivance of Pope--"I see

things may serve long, and not serve ever."[164]

The "Spectator" of the 10th of November, 1712, contained some remarks by

Pope on the verses which the Emperor Hadrian composed when he was dying.

The poet asked Caryll's opinion of the criticism, and the substance of

his reply is embodied in the rejoinder of Pope. "The supposition you

draw from the suspicion that Adrian was addicted to magic, seems to me a

little uncharitable,--that he might fear no sort of Deity, good or

bad,--since in the third verse he plainly testifies his apprehension of

a future state by being solicitous whither his soul was going. As to

what you mention of his using gay and ludicrous expressions, I have

already owned my opinion that the expressions are not so, but that

diminutives are often in Latin taken for expressions of tenderness and

concern." This comment is introduced, in the printed correspondence,

into the letter to Steele of November 29, 1712, and if it was sent to

him as well as to Caryll both must have objected to the gay and

ludicrous expressions of Hadrian, both must have spoken of the suspicion

that he was addicted to magic, both must have inferred from it that he

feared no sort of Deity, good or bad, and the language of both must have

been as identical as their ideas.

"I know," Pope wrote to Caryll, August 22, 1717, "you will take part in

rejoicing for the victory of Prince Eugene over the Turks, in the zeal

you bear to the Christian interest, though your cousin of Oxford, with

whom I dined yesterday, says there is no other difference in the

Christians beating the Turks or the Turks beating the Christians, than

whether the Emperor shall first declare war against Spain, or Spain

declare it against the Emperor." In the published version the passage

forms part of a letter to Edward Blount dated September 8, 1717, and

either we must admit that it was never written to him, or believe that

Caryll and Blount had each an Oxford cousin, that the poet dined with

the Oxford cousin of Caryll on August 21, and with the Oxford cousin of

Blount on September 7, that both these cousins made, at their respective

dinners, the same epigrammatic observation in the very same words, and

that the extraordinary coincidence struck Pope so little that he did not

even remark upon it.

Another passage of a letter to Caryll, dated September 20, [1713]

reappears in a letter to Blount dated February 10, 1716. "I am just

returned from the country, whither Mr. Rowe did me the favour to

accompany me, and to pass a week at Binfield. I need not tell you how

much a man of his turn could not but entertain me; but I must acquaint

you there is a vivacity and gaiety of disposition almost peculiar to

that gentleman, which renders it impossible to part from him without

that uneasiness and chagrin which generally succeeds all great

pleasures. I have just been taking a solitary walk by moonshine in St.

James's Park, full of reflections of the transitory nature of all human

delights, and giving my thoughts a loose into the contemplation of those

sensations of satisfaction which probably we may taste in the more

exalted company of separate spirits, when we range the starry walks

above." Thus Pope, who on his return to town in September, 1713, after a

week's companionship with Rowe, took a solitary walk by moonlight and

meditated on the transitory nature of human delights, and the happy

intercourse of spirits, was led by the power of association, after

another week spent at Binfield with Rowe in February, 1716, to renew the

solitary walk by moonlight the instant he returned, and indulge in the

old contemplation on the transitory nature of human delights, and the

happy intercourse of separate spirits. What renders more singular the

second moonlight walk is that the date assigned to it was the memorable

season when the Thames was frozen over, and when the quantity of snow

was as unusual as the intensity of the cold. The thaw commenced the day

before the fragile little bard sallied out for his stroll, and he must

indeed have been lost in contemplation "of the starry walks above" not

to have been checked in his moonlight rambles by the deplorable

condition of the walks below. None of the phenomena which were

attracting the attention of the rest of the world,--the breaking up of

the long and terrible winter, the deluge of melting snow, the chilling

atmosphere, the dreary prospect,--received a passing notice from him. He

saw nothing except the moonshine, despite its watery gleam, and thought

of nothing except the spirits in the stars.

In the collection of 1735 there appeared a letter to Digby, which is

dated September 10, 1724, and is compounded from two letters, to Caryll

of November 23 and December 25, 1725. In the letter of November 23, Pope

says to Caryll, "My time has been spent in a trembling attendance upon

death, which has at last seized one of our family,--my poor old nurse."

This sentence was inserted in the letter to Digby, but as the nurse did

not die till November 5, 1725, the information could not have been

communicated to him in September, 1724. The motive of the poet in

altering the dates of his letters when he assigned a fanciful address to

them was probably to adapt the chronology to the circumstances of his

new _dramatis personae_. His earliest letter to Edward Blount is dated

August, 1714, and when he transferred the moonlight reverie from 1713 to

1716, he may have been influenced by the consideration that in the

former year his correspondence with Blount had not commenced. The letter

to Caryll of November 23, and the letter to Digby of September 10, both

open with the same compliment on their return from the Continent, and

the date may have been altered from 1725 to 1724 to make it harmonise

with Digby's travels abroad. In remedying one inconsistency, Pope fell

into another. A new use was found for the letter in the quarto of 1737.

Arbuthnot died in February, 1735, at the very time when there is reason

to suppose that the poet printed the P. T. collection. The final letter

in the volume is from the Doctor, and it was apparently added at the

last moment. It was then too late to be thinking of a re-distribution of

the materials, and the idea was not executed, or perhaps conceived till

1737, when the address, which had been changed from Caryll to Digby, was

once more changed from Digby to Arbuthnot. In the interval Pope appears

to have detected the anachronism. He retained the day of the month, but

struck out the year. He preserved the announcement, "death has seized

one of our family," but dropped the words "my poor old nurse." Her death

nevertheless could alone have been meant; for in the letters to Caryll,

as in the letter to Digby, several contemporaneous particulars are

mentioned, which being repeated in the letter to Arbuthnot, limit its

date to the period of the poor old nurse's decease. In both cases Pope's

time had been spent in attending upon the dying patient, in both cases

he and his mother had been ill together, in both cases these incidents

had hindered his writing, in both cases he had been questioned

respecting the effect produced upon his mind by the attacks upon his

translation of the "Odyssey," and in both cases he had been less

troubled by the criticisms upon his writings than by the imputations

upon his morals, in consequence of some reports which had been spread of

his intrigues with Martha Blount. It follows that the letter to

Arbuthnot, though dated September 10, must have been written subsequent

to the death of the nurse on November 5. But there is unanswerable

evidence that at that time, and for weeks and months afterwards, he had

constant personal intercourse with the poet. He was at his elbow, and

not on the Continent,[165] and the event could not have been

communicated to him as news upon his return from any journey he ever

made to France. The year was omitted by Pope exactly because he could

fix upon none which would bear the test of examination.[166] When it is

plain that the letter could not have been addressed to Arbuthnot, it is

superfluous to dwell upon the improbability that he and Caryll should

have put the same question with regard to the "railing papers about the

'Odyssey,'" or to enumerate the other coincidences which are beyond the

range of belief. The letter in all its shapes contains a passage which

forms a strange comment upon Pope's proceedings, and is the bitterest

sentence that will ever be pronounced upon them: "Falsehood is folly,

says Homer, and liars and calumniators at last hurt none but themselves,

even in this world. In the next, it is charity to say, God have mercy on

them. They were the devil's vice-regents upon earth, who is the father

of lies, and, I fear, has a right to dispose of his children."

On June 12, 1713, Pope wrote to Caryll, "As I hope, and would flatter

myself, that you know me and my thoughts so entirely as never to be

mistaken in either, so it is a pleasure to me that you guessed so right

in regard to the author of that 'Guardian' you mentioned." On June 23 he

wrote again, and said, "Your last is the more obliging as it hints at

some little niceties in my conduct which your candour and affection

prompt you to recommend to me." Both these sentences are inserted in an

undated letter to Addison, which is compiled from three letters to

Caryll, and no one could credit that Caryll and Addison had

independently, and almost simultaneously communicated their guesses to

Pope that he was the author of a particular essay in the "Guardian," and

at the same time "hinted at little niceties in his conduct." The

remainder of the letter to Addison is full of inconsistencies. The

result of the imposition is to confound dates, events, opinions, and

persons. Addison knows Pope and his thoughts so entirely as never to be

mistaken in either; Addison's candour and affection prompt him to advise

Pope in little niceties of conduct, and the perfect knowledge, the

affection, the candour, and the advice, which are represented as

proceeding from the most exquisite genius of the age, all appertain to

an obscure country gentleman whose intimacy could not confer, in the

eyes of the world, any lustre upon his friend. The whole of the letters

to Addison are an absolute fiction. Four out of the five are from the

Caryll correspondence, and the internal evidence is opposed to the

genuineness of the fifth. The deception is aggravated by the erroneous

aspect it imparts to the celebrated quarrel. In the letters which

preceded the commencing rupture Pope appears as the zealous champion and

bosom associate of the man he afterwards maligned, and we are left to

suppose that the vaunted generosity on one side had been met by envy and

hostility on the other. It is of virtual forgeries like these, which

were specially concocted for the public, that the poet had the hardihood

to say in his preface, "Many of them having been written on the most

trying occasions, and all in the openness of friendship, are a proof

what were his real sentiments, as they flowed warm from his heart,

without the least thought that ever the world should be witness to

them." He not only pretended that they derived a value from being the

spontaneous expression of his feelings as they rose, but pledged his

word that his motive in treasuring them up was to supply an authentic

register of historical, literary, and personal events, and especially to

provide a corrective to the misrepresentations of less scrupulous

chroniclers. "I think more and more of it," he said to Lord Oxford,

September 15, 1729, when dwelling upon the value of the collected

letters and the importance of preserving them, "as finding what a number

of facts they will settle the truth of, both relating to history and

criticism, and parts of private life and character of the eminent men of

my time." In the preface to the quarto of 1737 he made a statement of

the same nature, and protested that the letters he kept were selected

from the letters he destroyed, "merely as they preserved the memory of

some friendships which would be ever dear to him, or set in a true light

some matters of fact from which the scribblers of the times had taken

occasion to asperse either his friends or himself." He volunteered the

declaration to Lord Oxford when he was engaged in the manufacture of the

correspondence which was to falsify the facts he pretended it "would

settle the truth of," and he renewed the assertion in public as a

prelude to the fabrications themselves.

The Wycherley correspondence furnishes fresh illustrations of the

malpractices of the poet. For Pope's own share in it the published

version is our only authority. The originals of Wycherley's part in it

were placed in Lord Oxford's library in October, 1729, and withdrawn in

June, 1735; but there still exist among the Oxford papers copies of six

out of the eighteen published letters, besides six which are

unpublished.[167] Imperfect as is the series, it is sufficient to show

the infidelity of the work Pope put forth to the world. The letter

borrowed from the Caryll group may conveniently be considered in

connection with the rest. It was probably not included in the original

volume of the Wycherley correspondence, which Pope published in 1729,

for it is printed in the edition of 1735 on an interpolated half sheet

signed * C. This is placed between sheet B and sheet C, and the numbers

of its four pages--11 to 14--are repeated on sheet C. The space being

greater than was required the letter has been divided into an unusual

number of paragraphs, which are double the ordinary distance from each

other, and as this device for spreading out the matter only brought it

three or four lines over the top of the fourth page the remainder is

left blank, contrary to the plan adopted in the rest of the book.[168]

Pope we may presume had not completed in 1729 his task of reconstructing

his letters to Caryll, and first introduced the manufactured letter into

the old sheets of the Wycherley when he incorporated them into the

volume of 1735. A single circumstance is enough to prove that the letter

is fictitious. It is made up of extracts from two letters to Caryll of

July 31, 1710, and January 25, 1711, and in the former of the two the

poet quotes a remark from the "Tatler" on the reason why women are

vainer than men. The passage is repeated in the letter to Wycherley

which is dated June 23, 1705, nearly four years before the "Tatler"

commenced, and Pope imagined he had obliterated the anachronism by

changing the phrase "the 'Tatler' observes of women" into the general

formula "it is observed of women."

The concoction of the letter to Wycherley out of the letters to Caryll

is attended by the usual distortion of facts. The extract from the

letter of July 31 is an expostulation against Caryll's extravagant

compliments. A few months after the date which Pope assigned to the

passage when he applied it to Wycherley, the old dramatist had addressed

a kindred remonstrance to Pope. "I must confess," he wrote March 22,

1705-6, "you try my patience, as you say in the beginning of your

letter, not by the many lines in it, but the too many compliments you

make me for nothing, in which you prove yourself, though a sincere

friend, a man of too much fiction; for I have not seen so much poetry in

prose a great while, since your letter is filled with so many fine words

and acknowledgments of your obligations to me, the only asseverations of

yours I dare contradict; for I must tell you your letter is like an

author's epistle before his book,--written more to show his wit to the

world than his sincerity or gratitude to his friend, whom he libels with

praise, so that you have provoked my modesty even whilst you have

soothed my vanity; for I know not whether I am more complimented than

abused, since too much praise turns irony, as too great thanks for small

favours turns ingratitude, or too much ceremony in religion

hypocrisy."[169] Pope thought fit in the published letters to reverse

the parts. He ascribed the adulation to Wycherley, and the rebuke of it

to himself. He gives a false air of manly independence to his youthful

character, and does it at the expense of his friend.

The extract from the letter to Caryll of January 25, 1711, which forms

the second portion of the made-up letter to Wycherley of June 23, 1705,

is a comment on the eulogy lavished by Caryll on some verses of the

poet. The change of name and date flattered in a double manner the

vanity of Pope,--the applause appeared to proceed from a celebrated wit

instead of from a country squire, and to be bestowed upon a lad of

seventeen instead of upon a man who was nearly twenty-three. He always

aspired to the credit of precocity, and some of his falsifications seem

to have had no other purpose than to exaggerate his juvenile fame.

Wycherley wrote to him on February 19, 1708-9, and spoke of the genius

which promised him immortality, of his great, vigorous and active mind.

In a postscript it is mentioned that the "Miscellany," which contained

Pope's Pastorals, would not be out for three weeks.[170] Pope

suppressed, amongst other passages, the allusion which fixed the period

at which the panegyric was penned, and altered the year to 1706-7, for

no perceptible reason except that he wished to antedate the praise.

There can be little doubt that his opening letter to Wycherley was

manufactured or misplaced with a similar object. It is printed in the

edition of 1735 on an interpolated half sheet, marked *B, the pages of

which are correctly numbered from 1 to 4. As the first page of sheet B

which follows is numbered 3, it is evident that it was originally

preceded by only two pages, which must have been cancelled, and the

present letter put in their place.[171] This new letter is dated

December 26, 1704, and contains his reflections on a compliment which he

alleges had been paid to him by Wycherley--that his compositions were

above the attacks of envious critics. "It is pleasant to remark," says

Dr. Johnson, "how soon Pope learned the cant of an author, and began to

treat critics with contempt, though he had yet suffered nothing from

them."[172] He did not in fact publish a single line till more than four

years later, and with our present evidence that the letter was an

interpolated after-thought, we cannot but suspect that Wycherley's

premature compliment, and Pope's premature cant both belonged to a

subsequent period, or perhaps were fabricated for the press. "The

author's age then sixteen," says the poet in a note, and in this

ostentatious announcement we have the motive to the act. The opinion of

Warburton, that the letters of the boy displayed all the characteristics

of the man, is an argument the more that they were the productions of

the man and not of the boy.

"I have received," writes Wycherley, in an unpublished letter, dated

December 6, 1707, "yours of the 29th of November, which has so much

overpaid mine in kindness that, as Voiture says, I doubt whether the

best effects of those fine expressions of your friendship to me can be

more obliging than they themselves; and for my humility you talk of, you

have lessened while you magnify it, as by commending my good nature with

so much more of yours you have made me almost incapable of being

grateful to you; for you have said so many kind things of me you have

hardly left me anything of the same kind to return you, and the best

actions are not capable of making you amends for so many good words you

have given me, by which you justly magnify them and yourself by saying

they are sincere, so that you have obliged me to be vain rather than not

think you a Plain Dealer. Thus, even against your own opinion, your

freedom with me proves not you a fool, but me so, especially if I could

think half the good you say of me my due. As for the good book you sent

me I took it as kindly as the reprimand from the good man, which I think

you heard, and was that I should not stand in my own light."[173] Pope

printed his letter of November 29, to which this letter was a reply, and

it touches upon none of the topics to which Wycherley refers. There are

none of the fine expressions of friendship, none of the many honied

words, none of the encomiums on his correspondent's good nature and

humility. He reproves him, on the contrary, in rather a lofty tone for

his excessive acknowledgments for trifling services, tells him he will

continue the revision of the poems the old dramatist had submitted to

him, insists that he must be permitted to alter and add as well as omit,

and in answer to an observation of Wycherley, that "the sprightliness of

wit despises method," assures him that if method is neglected his verses

had better be converted into separate maxims in prose. As Pope's letter

does not contain one syllable upon the subjects to which Wycherley

alludes in his reply, so the reply takes no notice of the subjects which

monopolise the epistle of Pope. Though he had discoursed exclusively

upon the remodelling of Wycherley's poems, Wycherley himself disdains to

offer in return a single word of thanks, of encouragement, of

acquiescence, or dissent. The omission cannot be explained by the

supposition that the copy was abridged. Whatever passages might have

been left out, those would certainly have been retained which confirmed

under Wycherley's own hand the particulars which were Pope's professed

justification for printing the letters, and his excuse for depositing

them in the library of Lord Oxford.

The Wycherley correspondence concludes with a letter from Pope dated May

2, 1710. A coldness then ensued of which Dr. Johnson gives this

account: "The fondness of Wycherley was too violent to last. His esteem

of Pope was such that he submitted some poems to his revision, and when

Pope, perhaps proud of such confidence, was sufficiently bold in his

criticisms and liberal in his alterations, the old scribbler was angry

to see his pages defaced, and felt more pain from the detection than

content from the amendment of his faults. They parted, but Pope always

considered him with kindness, and visited him a little time before he

died."[174] The statement is incomplete. Pope engaged in the revision as

early as April, 1706, when he describes to Wycherley the nature of the

emendations he has made: "Some parts I have contracted as we do

sun-beams to improve their energy and force; some I have taken quite

away, as we take branches from a tree to add to the fruit; others I have

entirely new expressed, and turned more into poetry." In November, 1707,

he informs his friend that he has subjected the poem on "Dullness" to

the same process, that he has condensed the piece one half, suppressed

deficiencies, heightened the language, and smoothed the versification.

Far from being angry at these "bold criticisms and liberal alterations,"

the old scribbler was profuse in his thanks, and replied to Pope's

request, that he would keep the assistance a secret, by declaring that

he always does, and always will own to whose genius and judgment he is

indebted for the improvement of his unmusical numbers and harsher sense.

Between three and four years afterwards he submitted a fresh set of

poems to Pope's castigation, and in two successive letters of April 1

and April 11, 1710, entreats him to show no mercy in his corrections;

"for I had rather," he says, "be condemned by my friend in private, than

exposed to my foes in public." Pope answered that the repetitions were

more numerous than he anticipated, and that crossing them out defaced

the copy to a degree that he feared would be displeasing. "Let me know,"

he added, "if I am to go on at this rate, or if you would prescribe any

other method." Wycherley rejoined that tautology was the last fault of

which he would be guilty, that he thought with care he could remove the

blemish, and that he would not occupy Pope in a task which might

"prevent his writing on new subjects of his own." "All," he continues,

"that I desire of you is to mark in the margin, without defacing the

copy at all, any repetition of words, matter, or sense, which if you

will be so kind as to do for me, you will supply my want of memory with

your good one, and my deficiencies of sense with the infallibilities of

yours,--which if you do you will most infinitely oblige me, who almost

repent the trouble I have given you, since so much." The comment on

Pope's strong criticism is equally cordial: "As to what you call freedom

with me, which you desire me to forgive, you may be assured I would not

forgive you unless you did use it; for I am so far from thinking your

plainness a fault or an offence to me that I think it a charity and an

obligation, which I shall always acknowledge with all sort of gratitude

to you for it, who am therefore, dear Mr. Pope, your most obliged humble

servant." Dr. Johnson overlooked the rude ordeal to which Wycherley's

vanity had been exposed in April, 1706, and the proof he then gave that

he had not in his character the slightest tincture of irritable

impatience at the wholesale correction of his works. He implored a

renewal of the rigour when he invoked, with full experience of the

treatment he was to expect, the same good offices in April, 1710, and

the anger which Johnson imputes to him on that occasion at the detection

of his faults is not only in singular contradiction to the whole of his

previous conduct, but is belied, as we have seen, by his letter to Pope.

The notion that he was offended at the freedom of his friend's remarks

was an inference drawn from the tone of Pope's reply, and not from the

language of Wycherley himself.

"I am sorry," Pope commences, "you persist to take ill my not accepting

your invitation, and to find, if I mistake not, your exception not

unmixed with some suspicion." The letter of Wycherley is dated April 27,

1710, and if the contents of the letter of Pope, which is dated May 2,

did not show that it was the answer, all doubt would be removed by the

fact that it was headed "The Answer" by the poet, both in the octavo of

1735, and the quarto of 1737. This led to the conclusion that Wycherley,

while professing to receive the strictures on his verses with kindness,

had at the same time manifested in his letter some displeasure which

his friend thought proper to omit, and which connected their quarrel

with the secret soreness of the author at the candour of the

critic.[175] Pope did indeed suppress the beginning and the end of

Wycherley's communication; but the passages he kept back betray the

falsity of his own insinuation. "I answered," the letter begins, "yours

of the 15th, which I think was the last I had from you, about three days

after my receiving it; but having not yet received any answer to it from

you, I doubt your old pain of the head-ache has prevented it, which

gives me a great deal of concern for you, insomuch that I have had

thoughts of making you a visit before my journey into Shropshire, which

has been delayed by delays and disappointments to me out of the

country." The end is as follows: "My most humble service pray to Sir

William Trumbull, and your good father and mother, whilst I can assure

you from hence all the world here are your servants and friends. I know

not but I may see you very suddenly at Binfield after all my broken

promises."[176] Instead, therefore, of Wycherley being annoyed at Pope's

refusal to accept his invitation, it was Wycherley who was designing to

visit Pope; and instead of his persisting to take ill any part of his

friend's conduct, his language was throughout expressive of cordiality

and kindness.

The first intimation of a rupture is in a letter of Pope to Cromwell, on

August 21, 1710, in which he says, "Since Mr. Wycherley left London, I

have not heard a word from him, though just before, and once since, I

writ to him, and though I know myself guilty of no offence but of doing

sincerely just what he bid me." On October 28, he reverts to the

subject, and protests by everything that is holy that he is not

acquainted with the cause of the estrangement. He goes on, however, to

state that he did not suppose any man could have been so suspicious as

not to credit his own experience of a friend, and avers that he had done

nothing which deserved to be concealed--a defence which seems to

indicate a consciousness that Wycherley had heard some disparaging

report. It was subsequently asserted by Pope's enemies, and never

contradicted by Pope, that the alienation was produced by a copy of

satirical verses he had written on the man he affected to caress. His

offensive reply of May 2, to the genial letter of April 27, might alone

explain the resentment of Wycherley, if the ungracious answer in its

printed shape could be received as authentic. But I have shown that the

opening sentence, in which Pope regrets that his correspondent persisted

in taking ill his not accepting an invitation, is altogether fictitious,

and with the evidence before us in the critical epistle of November 29,

1707, that he replaced his complimentary effusions by unvarnished

truths, we may suspect that the uncompromising tone of his final letter

was softened in the original, and that the published version is merely

another instance of his anxiety to conceal the deference he had shown to

Wycherley before the celebrity of the old dramatist had been eclipsed by

the fame of the youthful poet. The almost eastern style which Pope

adopted towards him a year and a half after the close of their

correspondence, may be seen in one of his genuine epistles to Cromwell,

which was printed by Curll. "I am highly pleased," the poet writes,

November 12, 1711, "with the knowledge you give me of Mr. Wycherley's

present temper, which seems so favourable to me. I shall ever have such

a fund of affection for him, as to be agreeable to myself when I am so

to him, and cannot but be gay when he is in good humour, as the surface

of the earth, if you will pardon a poetical similitude, is clearer or

gloomier, just as the sun is brighter or more overcast." Whatever may

have caused the sun to be overcast, there could have been little ground

of complaint against Wycherley, or Pope would not have fabricated the

pretence that he had provoked his anger by declining an invitation.

On the appearance of Theobald's edition of the Posthumous Works of

Wycherley, the poet poured out his indignation to Lord Oxford. "I

foresaw," he said, October 6, 1729, "some dirty trick in connection with

my friend Wycherley's papers which they were publishing, and nothing can

at once do justice so well to him and to me, who was by him employed in

them, as the divulging of some parts of his and my letters." At the

moment that he was penning this denunciation against "dirty tricks in

relation to Wycherley's papers," though no trick had been practised, he

was busily engaged in aspersing his friend by garbling the papers he

professed to divulge out of justice to his memory. His motives were not

malignant. He was simply desirous to do credit to himself, but to effect

this end he did not scruple to falsify their private correspondence, and

under the plea of justifying a man who was in his grave, took advantage

of his death to libel him in safety. When with our scanty means of

testing the fidelity of the letters, we find that part of them were

misplaced, distorted, and invented, the rest of the series must be

received with distrust, and some which cannot be proved to be fabricated

are among the most suspicious of the whole.

Where the originals of Pope's letters were in hostile hands, as was the

case with his letters to Cromwell and to Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, he

was compelled to be sparing in his operations. He omitted sentences and

altered phrases, but could not venture upon wholesale perversions of the

truth. Of the bulk of the letters he published we have neither the

originals nor reliable copies; but when we chance to light upon the

materials from which he worked, we find, as might be expected, that he

was not more conscientious in his use of them than in his reckless

falsification of his correspondence with Wycherley and Caryll. The

volume of 1735 concludes with a letter from Arbuthnot, dated July 17,

1734, and in the quarto of 1737 we have the pretended reply of the poet.

Among the Arbuthnot papers in the possession of Mr. Baillie, is the

actual answer sent by Pope, and it turns out that the printed substitute

is an elaborate composition that has hardly any resemblance to the

genuine text. He must have revised the letter of Arbuthnot as well as

remodelled his own. "I am almost displeased," he remarks in the real,

not in the counterfeit reply, "at your expression '_scarcely_ any of

those suspicions or jealousies which affect the truest friendships;' for

I know of _not one_ on my part." He accordingly erased from Arbuthnot's

letter the expression he disapproved, and fathered upon him the

unqualified assertion, "I think since our first acquaintance there has

not been any of those little suspicions or jealousies that often affect

the sincerest friendships." To what extent he may have carried this

principle of altering the opinions of his correspondents to fit his

personal views cannot be discovered. A single instance of the artifice

in a man so unscrupulous destroys all confidence in the documents which

rest on his unsupported authority, and there is often reason to suspect

that he gives us not what others said, but what he thought it

advantageous to himself that they should say.

In comparison with this perversion of facts, the attempt of Pope to

improve his letters, regarded as literary productions, would be of

trifling moment, if it did not present another example of the audacious

falsehoods he imposed upon the world. Speaking in the preface to the

quarto of 1737 of the correspondence he reprinted from what he calls the

surreptitious editions, he says "for the chasms in it, we had not the

means to supply them, the author having destroyed too many letters to

preserve a series." He intends us to infer that the selection was not

his own, though the passage is virtually an admission that the

collection of P. T. was the collection deposited with Lord Oxford, or

there could not have been such an identity between them as that none of

the gaps in the P. T. volume could be filled up from the bound book in

the Oxford library. "Nor," he continues, "would he go about to amend

them, except by the omission of some passages improper, or at least

impertinent to be divulged to the public, or of such entire letters as

were either not his, or not approved of by him." He would have us

believe that they had been dragged before the world in their first crude

state, without a single subsequent touch from his pen, though he had

previously amended them with studious care--had culled the best

passages, blended extracts from two or three letters into one, and

constantly corrected composition which had been originally laboured.

Some of his ambitious epistles, like his letter to Arbuthnot of July

26, 1734, were no doubt mere essays, which were only written when they

were committed to the press. In the quarto of 1741, he repeated the

device he had employed in the quarto of 1737. He pretended in both cases

that the correspondence he printed himself had been printed by others

without his knowledge, and in defiance of his wish. He next adopted and

republished the letters he affected to repudiate, and having already

revised them to the uttermost, asserted that he could not be induced to

revise them at all. So completely had truth with him been swallowed up

in vanity. "Had he," he tells us in the preface to the quarto of 1737,

"sat down with a design to draw his own picture, he could not have done

it so truly, for whoever sits for it, whether to himself or another,

will inevitably find his features more composed than his appear in these

letters; but if an author's hand, like a painter's, be more

distinguishable in a slight sketch than a finished picture, this very

carelessness will make them the better known from such counterfeits as

have been, and may be, imputed to him." He did everything he professed

to have left undone. The careless sketch was a studied portrait got up

for exhibition, and the minutest details had been disposed with a view

to flatter the likeness and increase the effect.

In the conduct of Pope to Bolingbroke there are points of resemblance to

his conduct in the case of the correspondence, which render the evidence

a material supplement to the present inquiry. Bolingbroke allowed him to

get put into type the political letters on "The Spirit of Patriotism,"

on "The Idea of a Patriot King," and on "The State of Parties," under

the promise that the pamphlet should be confined to five or six persons,

who were named by the author. Pope fulfilled his pledge by causing a

separate edition of 1500 copies to be struck off, and enjoined the

printer to lay by the sheets "with great secresy till further

orders."[177] In the dangerous manoeuvre of printing covertly the

original volume of the Swift correspondence which he sent to the Dean,

he may, perhaps, have remained concealed from the inferior agents, and

have conducted the details of the business through the medium of

Worsdale. In the instance of the pamphlet he was not afraid to put

himself into the power of the printer, who, says Bolingbroke, "kept his

word with him better than he kept his with his friend."[178] The poet

not only committed a breach of trust in preparing a work for sale which

he received upon the condition that it should remain strictly private,

but he had the boldness to tamper with the substance of the work, and in

the impression, which was ultimately designed for the public, "he took

upon him to divide the subject, and to alter and omit passages according

to the suggestions of his own fancy."[179] From Warburton we learn that

Pope "frequently told his acquaintance that Lord Bolingbroke would at

his death leave his writings to his disposal,"[180] and the changes he

introduced by anticipation into the single instalment within his power

show the manner in which he designed to discharge his functions, and

strengthen the suspicion that he may have falsified the letters of his

correspondents as well as his own. Johnson, in censuring Lyttelton for

publishing the posthumous edition of Thomson's poem on "Liberty," in an

abridged form, condemns a practice "which, as it has a manifest tendency

to lessen the confidence of society, and to confound the characters of

authors, by making one man write by the judgment of another, cannot be

justified by any supposed propriety of the alteration or kindness of the

friend."[181] The freedom used by Pope was especially reprehensible from

the concealment he practised. The copy of the pamphlet which he sent to

Bolingbroke, and the other privileged persons, did not exhibit the

modified text, and though the occurrence took place several years before

the death of the poet he never, in all that time, whispered one word

upon the subject to the author of the tracts, from which it is clear

that he neither intended him to learn what he had done, nor expected him

to approve the changes he had made. It was not till he was in his grave

that his deception was divulged by the application of the printer to

Bolingbroke for instructions how to dispose of the impression. Warburton

argued that Pope must have wished his friend to have a knowledge of the

clandestine edition and clandestine alterations, or he would have

ordered the work to be destroyed during his final illness,[182] as if,

in the lingering hope that life would be protracted a little longer, it

had not happened times out of number that men had deferred burning

tale-telling papers till their minds were diverted from the duty by the

lassitude of sickness, and as if such procrastination was not in the

highest degree probable when the poet had been first at the pains of

revising the work, and next at the cost of an edition of 1500

copies.[183] He may even have believed that his secret, under any

circumstances, was safe with the printer. A theory which has been

verified by endless examples is a more credible alternative than to

assume that Pope had designed to leave behind him evidences of a

dishonesty which he had not dared to disclose during years of familiar

intercourse, and which, notwithstanding that Bolingbroke was perpetually

at his side, he did not venture to reveal in his dying hours when he

might have palliated his motives, and obtained pardon for his fault. But

if we admit the supposition of Warburton, and allow that he had

ultimately arrived at the resolution of suffering the course of events

to betray the misdoings he had not the courage to confess, there will

still remain the facts, which Warburton never questioned, that he

pretended to Bolingbroke that some half dozen copies had alone been

printed, when he had printed a distinct edition of 1500; that he handed

an impression to the author which was taken faithfully from the

manuscript, while the impression he hid from him was garbled and

adulterated; and that, having concealed the double treachery for years,

he left the world without an allusion to the wrongful act he had

committed. Johnson justly considered that the resentment of Bolingbroke

at this violation of faith was with reason "more acrimonious in

proportion as the violator had been more trusted or loved," for the

professions which win confidence increase the baseness of betraying it;

but with equal justice Johnson condemned the "thirst for vengeance"

which excited Bolingbroke "to blast the memory" of the man who had lived

with him in a constant interchange of affection, and who, both in public

and private, had paid him the tribute of his heartiest homage and

applause.[184]

The scrutiny to which the lives of celebrated men are subjected is one

of the severest penalties they pay for fame. Their private weaknesses

have often been exposed with wanton cruelty; but the delinquencies of

Pope are public acts by which he himself has challenged inquiry. He

endeavoured to pass off a sophisticated correspondence for genuine, and

the interests of truth demand that the deception should be exposed. He

laboured to throw his own misdoings upon innocent men, and justice

requires that his victims should be absolved, and the discredit,

augmented beyond measure by the perfidy and deceit, be laid where it is

due. He was the bitter satirist of individuals out of an assumed

indignation at everything base, and his claim to adopt this lofty

strain, his sincerity in it, and his fairness, are all involved in his

personal dealings. The office of an editor is neither that of an

advocate nor of an accuser. He is a judge, whose only client is truth. I

have endeavoured to investigate the facts with impartiality, and narrate

them with fidelity, and if I have anywhere failed, it is from

unconscious, not from wilful error; but having once been satisfied of

the guilt of Pope, I do not pretend to think that genius is an

extenuation of rascality. He rightly refused others the benefit of the

plea, and said in the Essay on Man, whoever is "wickedly wise is but the

more a fool, the more a knave." The sketch which Lord Macaulay has given

of his character, when describing his conduct on the appearance of

Tickell's version of the first book of the Iliad, is not too severe for

the treacheries and falsehoods which were the instruments of his

malevolence, cowardice and vanity. "An odious suspicion had sprung up in

the mind of Pope. He fancied, and he soon firmly believed, that there

was a deep conspiracy against his fame and his fortunes. The work on

which he had staked his reputation was to be depreciated. The

subscription, on which rested his hopes of a competence, was to be

defeated. With this view, Addison had made a rival translation; Tickell

had consented to father it, and the wits at Button's had consented to

puff it. We do not accuse Pope of bringing an accusation which he knew

to be false. We have not the smallest doubt that he believed it to be

true; and the evidence on which he believed it he found in his own bad

heart. His own life was one long series of tricks, as mean and as

malicious as that of which he had suspected Addison and Tickell. He was

all stiletto and mask. To injure, to insult, and to save himself from

the consequences of injury and insult by lying and equivocating, was the

habit of his life. He published a lampoon on the Duke of Chandos; he was

taxed with it; and he lied and equivocated. He published a lampoon on

Aaron Hill; he was taxed with it; and he lied and equivocated. He

published a still fouler lampoon on Lady Mary Wortley Montagu; he was

taxed with it; and he lied with more than usual effrontery and

vehemence. He puffed himself, and abused his enemies, under feigned

names. He robbed himself of his own letters, and then raised the hue and

cry after them. Besides his frauds of malignity, of fear, of interest,

and of vanity, there were frauds which he seems to have committed from a

love of fraud alone. He had a habit of stratagem, a pleasure in

outwitting all who came near him. Whatever his object might be, the

indirect road to it was that which he preferred. For Bolingbroke, Pope

undoubtedly felt as much love and veneration as it was in his nature to

feel for any human being. Yet Pope was scarcely dead, when it was

discovered that from no motive, except the mere love of artifice, he had

been guilty of an act of gross perfidy to Bolingbroke."[185] Many of the

falsehoods and perfidies I have detailed have come to light since

Macaulay wrote, and there are more behind which will appear in their

proper place in Pope's life and works. There have been no lack of men

whose moral conduct was in an almost inverse ratio with their

intellectual gifts; but there never was an author of equal genius, who

habitually practised such despicable deceptions for such paltry

purposes;

"Who for this end would earn a lasting name,

Join moral infamy to mental fame,

Would tear aside the friendly veil of night

To stand degraded in a blaze of light."

His crooked policy was ineffectual, even when his worst devices were

undetected. Few believed that he was vexed at the publication of his

letters, or that they were careless effusions, or that the virtues he

paraded in them were the just reflection of his mind. Both men and

compositions will seem to be what they are, and the poet's protestations

did not prevent the world from discovering that his epistles were

laboured, that many of his sentiments were feigned, and that he eagerly

promoted the publications he pretended to deplore.

Having finished a discussion which from its nature will be dull to many,

and from its length will be wearisome to all, I turn to speak of the

present edition of the Correspondence. The last edition published in the

lifetime of Pope comprised, according to Mr. Croker's calculation, 354

letters. These, Mr. Croker states, were increased by Warburton to 384,

by Warton to 502, by Bowles to 644, and by Roscoe to 708, or exactly

double the number that were included in the last edition of the poet.

The present edition will contain more new letters than were collected by

Warburton, Warton, Bowles, and Roscoe combined, and many of them are of

immeasurably greater importance in determining the character and conduct

of Pope than any which have previously appeared. There are others among

them which, under ordinary circumstances, would be too trivial to be

printed; but particulars, which are separately insignificant, have

assisted in dispelling some of the mystery or exposing some of the

deceptions in which it was the poet's pleasure to involve his life, and

as nobody can pronounce with certainty what facts may be of service to

future inquirers, I have thought it better to add a few superfluous

pages than to run the risk of rejecting materials which may prove useful

hereafter. I have, in like manner, admitted letters which had a

biographical value, although they were neither written by Pope nor to

him. Second-hand statements cannot supply the place of authentic

documents, and to have dissociated the subsidiary from the main

correspondence would have frequently deprived both of the increased

importance they derive from being read in connection.

In Pope's own, and every succeeding edition, the letters are divided

into groups. The arrangement of the entire collection in one consecutive

chronological series is, in his case, neither desirable nor possible. It

is not desirable because a unity of subject often runs through his

intercourse with particular persons, and the interposition of the topics

upon which he touched with other friends, far from presenting a

connected view of his thoughts and actions, would reduce the whole to a

medley of disjointed fragments. It is not possible because many of his

letters are undated, and, though we can frequently determine their place

in each class, there are no means of settling their order when all the

letters of doubtful date are thrown together. In numerous instances the

year in which they were written can at most be discovered, and the

attempt to fix their precedency within that period would be attended

with as much uncertainty as if they were shuffled like a pack of cards.

The liberties which Pope took with his correspondence in preparing it

for publication diminish the authority of that extensive portion of it

which we owe to his printed or manuscript copies alone, and have

rendered it essential to specify the source from which, every letter is

derived. Where the letter was sent to one person and was published by

Pope as if it had been addressed to another, it is inserted in its

proper place, and again in the group to which it was falsely assigned by

the writer. Unless the correspondence was exhibited in its double form,

a just idea could not easily be obtained of the shape and colour he

imparted to it, or of the relations which he pretended to have

maintained with his contemporaries. Where the direction was not changed,

and we possess both the genuine and the corrected letter, the true

version is given in the text, and any variations in his amended version

which seemed worthy of notice are pointed out in the notes. Even here,

from the nature and extent of the alterations, it has sometimes been

necessary to preserve a letter in its twofold state.

The greater part of the collection of 1735 was reproduced in the quarto

of 1737; but as the texts are not always identical the earliest has been

followed, except where there is manifestly an error of the press, or

where the quarto supplies passages which are not in the volume of P. T.

I had once intended to subjoin the whole of the various readings at the

foot of the page. I abandoned the design upon finding that the vast

majority of them were verbal, and apparently unimportant changes, which

could only have interested the few curious inquirers who would always

have recourse to the original editions. I have not the less carefully

collated these original editions throughout, and have thus got rid of

numerous mistakes which had become traditional in the subsequent

reprints. The notes signed "Pope, 1735," were first published in the P.

T. collection, with the exception of a few in the Wycherley group,

which, though they are only known to us through the P. T. volume, had

undoubtedly appeared in 1729. Many of the P. T. notes were transferred

to the authorised impression of 1737, and they were nearly all in the

copies which the poet delivered to Warburton for posthumous publication.

The notes signed "Pope, 1737," were added in the quarto of that year;

and those signed "Cooper, 1737," are from the octavos which bear the

name of this bookseller on the title-page.

Language was current in Pope's day which would be considered grossly

indelicate in ours, and though he abounds in refined and elevated

strains, he was yet among the worst offenders of his time. "He and

Swift," says Dr. Johnson, "had an unnatural delight in ideas physically

impure, such as every other tongue utters with unwillingness, and of

which every ear shrinks from the mention." His correspondence is not

altogether free from the defect; but no editor can now efface the blots

which Warburton, Warton, and Bowles felt bound to preserve. Roscoe set

aside a few sentences, and showed by his inconsistency the uselessness

of the process. He confined his expurgations to the part of Pope's works

which were little read, and where the omissions in consequence would

rarely be remarked; but did not venture to disturb a single syllable of

the far more numerous and more objectionable passages which occur in the

pieces that are in the hands of all the world. The stains which sully so

much of our beautiful literature are unhappily indelible, and it could

answer no useful end to adopt the capricious principle of Roscoe in

removing the lesser blemishes which are seldom noticed, and leaving the

worst and most conspicuous defilements undisturbed. More freedom may be

used with the unpublished letters; but I have exercised the discretion

very sparingly, and have not excluded every coarse word, phrase, or

idea, when it was characteristic of the age, the man, and his writings,

and when, though an offence against taste, it could not be injurious to

morals.

I have mentioned at the several places where their contributions are

inserted, the numerous persons to whose liberality Mr. Croker and myself

have been obliged for materials and assistance. The services rendered by

Mr. Dilke require to be noticed here. Until he published his articles in

the Athenaeum little had been added to our knowledge of Pope since

Johnson produced his masterly Life. The truths which Mr. Dilke

established, and the errors he dissipated, were not more important than

the change he gave to the former superficial investigations. His rigid

scrutiny became the standard for every subsequent inquirer. He loved his

studies for their own sake, and never did a man of letters work less for

personal ends. He at once placed at my disposal his Caryll

correspondence, which he had carefully annotated, and the explanation of

all its obscure allusions are due to him. He supplied me with a

multitude of letters which were widely scattered through books and

periodicals, and collated others with the originals in the British

Museum and Bodleian Library. Large masses of the letters are undated, or

dated falsely, and he was at the labour of fixing dates which sometimes

appeared to defy conjecture. He lent me his rare editions, was unwearied

in answering questions, in solving difficulties, in revising proofs, and

in communicating, without reserve, his stores of information. He was

then suffering from a long and painful illness, and he died when only

the first volume of correspondence was printed, or I should have had his

generous and invaluable aid to the end.

Mr. Bowles remarked in the course of the skirmish of pamphlets he

provoked, that the editorship of Pope's works had been to no one a bed

of roses. For the larger part of the discomforts his commentators may

have endured, Pope himself was responsible. His mysteries, his

double-dealings, his falsifications, and his quarrels have rendered half

the acts of his life a fertile theme for debate. None of the angry

controversialists who mingled fifty years ago in the fray had prepared

properly for the contest, and the insolence and assumption, the

virulence and the dogmatism, were commonly greatest with the persons

whose acquaintance with the subject was the least. The intemperate, and

usually ignorant warfare, left nearly all the vexed questions in

confusion, and it is only in recent years that a new generation of

dispassionate students have begun to replace the blunders of sciolism by

facts. In the many battles yet to be fought over Pope there will be this

advantage which will be certain to produce solid results, that the

critic will be in possession of the materials for judgment, and will not

have to write without knowledge of his cause.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Johnson, Lives of the Poets, ed. Cunningham, Vol. iii. p.

368.]

[Footnote 2: Marchmont Papers, Vol. ii. p. 335.]

[Footnote 3: Nichols, Lit. Anec. Vol. ii. p. 165.]

[Footnote 4: Johnson, Lives of the Poets, Vol. iii. p. 72.]

[Footnote 5: Prior's Life of Malone, p. 385.]

[Footnote 6: Prior's Malone, p. 370.]

[Footnote 7: Hurd said of Warburton's Pope, that "it was the best

edition that was ever given of any classic."]

[Footnote 8: Imit. Bk. i. Epist. vi. ver. 87.]

[Footnote 9: This last sentence was added by Warburton in the later

editions of his Pope.]

[Footnote 10: Nichols, Lit. Anec. Vol. IV. p. 429-437.]

[Footnote 11: Letters of Horace Walpole, ed. Cunningham, Vol. vi. p.

422.]

[Footnote 12: De Quincey, Works, ed. 1863. Vol. xv. p. 137. He usually

maintained the opposite view, and sided altogether with the "they who

could see nothing in Pope but 'dust a little gilt.'" "There is nothing,"

he says, "Pope would not have sacrificed, not the most solemn of his

opinions, nor the most pathetic memorial from his personal experiences,

in return for a sufficient consideration, which consideration meant

always with him poetic effect. Simply and constitutionally, he was

incapable of a sincere thought, or a sincere emotion. Nothing that ever

he uttered, were it even a prayer to God, but he had a fancy for reading

it backwards. And he was evermore false, not as loving or preferring

falsehood, but as one who could not in his heart perceive much real

difference between what people affected to call falsehood, and what they

affected to call truth."]

[Footnote 13: Macaulay's Essays, 1 Vol. ed. p. 719.]

[Footnote 14: Athenaeum, July 8, 1854, Sept. 1, Sept. 8, and Sept. 15,

1860.]

[Footnote 15: Mrs. Thomas to Cromwell, June 27, 1727.]

[Footnote 16: "Lives of the Poets," edited by Cunningham, Vol. III. p.

62.]

[Footnote 17: "The Curlliad," p. 22.]

[Footnote 18: Vol. I. p. xxxviii. Where no other work is mentioned, the

references throughout this Introduction are to the present edition of

Pope's Correspondence.]

[Footnote 19: Mr. Croker and myself have been indebted to the kindness

of the present Marquess of Bath for the use of the Oxford papers

preserved at Longleat. They are most important for the light they throw

upon the character and proceedings of Pope.]

[Footnote 20: Lord Oxford to Pope, Oct. 9, 1729.]

[Footnote 21: Pope to Lord Oxford, Oct. 16, 1729.]

[Footnote 22: Pope to Swift, Nov. 28, 1729.]

[Footnote 23: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 62.]

[Footnote 24: Vol. I. p. xxxvii.]

[Footnote 25: The father was probably Lord Digby, and the letters were

those addressed to the Hon. Robert Digby, who died in April, 1726.]

[Footnote 26: Vol. I. pp. xxxvii, xxxviii.]

[Footnote 27: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 423.]

[Footnote 28: Warton's "Essay on Pope," Vol. II. p. 255.]

[Footnote 29: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 424.]

[Footnote 30: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 425.]

[Footnote 31: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 421, 423.]

[Footnote 32: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 441.]

[Footnote 33: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 422.]

[Footnote 34: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 422.]

[Footnote 35: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 425, 441.]

[Footnote 36: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 442.]

[Footnote 37: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 432.]

[Footnote 38: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 434.]

[Footnote 39: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 443.]

[Footnote 40: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 428.]

[Footnote 41: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 428, 433.]

[Footnote 42: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 61. Mr. Roscoe says

that no evidence for this statement appears. Johnson is himself the

evidence. He went to London in 1737, when he was 28 years of age, to try

his fortunes as an author, and became intimate with Savage, who was the

ally of Pope, with Dodsley, who published the authentic edition of the

poet's correspondence, and with numerous other persons from whom he was

likely to have received reliable information upon a fact so recent. It

is not to be supposed that Johnson imagined or invented a circumstance

which there is nothing to discredit.]

[Footnote 43: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 433, 434.]

[Footnote 44: Though the work is printed in two thin volumes, it was

always done up as one.]

[Footnote 45: "Notes and Queries," No. 260, p. 485. This article is from

the same pen as the articles on Pope's correspondence in the

"Athenaeum."]

[Footnote 46: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 430. The statement occurs in a

private note written at the time to Smythe, before the bookseller had

any idea of appealing to the public, or suspected that the letters were

printed by Pope himself.]

[Footnote 47: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 442.]

[Footnote 48: Vol. I. p. xxxvi.]

[Footnote 49: Vol. I. pp. xl. xli. All the statements to which I have

referred occur in this preface of Pope to the quarto of 1737, and some

of them in many other places besides.]

[Footnote 50: Vol. I. p. xxxvii. Appendix, p. 419.]

[Footnote 51: Vol. I. p. xxxv.]

[Footnote 52: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 420.]

[Footnote 53: Vol. I. p. xxxviii. The anonymous friend was put in the

place of Lord Oxford. Half the notes relate to the Wycherley manuscripts

in the Harley library, and could only have proceeded from the author of

that fiction. Pope's official editor, Warburton, signed all the notes

with Pope's name.]

[Footnote 54: Vol. I. p. xxxv.]

[Footnote 55: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 445.]

[Footnote 56: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 444.]

[Footnote 57: This circumstance at once attracted the attention of

Swift. "I detest the House of Lords," he wrote to Lady Betty Germain,

from Dublin, June 8, 1735, "for their indulgence to such a profligate,

prostitute villain as Curll; but am at a loss how he could procure any

letters written to Mr. Pope, although by the vanity or indiscretion of

correspondents the rogue might have picked up some that went from him.

Those letters have not yet been sent hither; therefore I can form no

judgment on them." Swift's detestation of the House of Lords for not

punishing a man who was proved to be innocent of the offence with which

he was charged, is an instance of the kind of justice to be expected

from violent partisans.]

[Footnote 58: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 445.]

[Footnote 59: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 429.]

[Footnote 60: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 429, 445.]

[Footnote 61: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 439.]

[Footnote 62: P. T. said 380, but the 3 was probably a misprint for 4.]

[Footnote 63: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 429.]

[Footnote 64: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 430.]

[Footnote 65: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 423.]

[Footnote 66: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 438. Johnson's "Lives of the Poets,"

Vol. II. p. 261.]

[Footnote 67: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 435.]

[Footnote 68: Johnson's "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 61.]

[Footnote 69: "Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence," 12mo. Vol. II. p.

vi.]

[Footnote 70: vol. I. Appendix, p. 446.]

[Footnote 71: vol. I. Appendix, p. 430.]

[Footnote 72: vol. I. Appendix, p. 442.]

[Footnote 73: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 447.]

[Footnote 74: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 431, 435.]

[Footnote 75: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 431.]

[Footnote 76: Johnson's "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 61.]

[Footnote 77: "Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence," 12mo. Vol. III. p.

xii. Vol. I. Appendix, p. 439.]

[Footnote 78: The "Athenaeum" of Sept. 8, 1860.]

[Footnote 79: When Pope put forth his preface to the quarto he could not

have intended to disguise that he was the writer of the "Narrative," or

he would have been at greater pains to vary his language. If the general

resemblance had been less marked, an invention common to both

productions would reveal their common origin. In the "Narrative" we are

informed that the complete collection of Pope's had been copied into a

couple of books before Theobald published his edition of Wycherley's

posthumous works, and that it was from these manuscript books that the

Wycherley correspondence was transcribed for press. This assertion was

untrue. Theobald's volume came out in 1728, while Pope's collection, as

appears from his announcements to Lord Oxford, was still in the process

of formation in September, 1729, and he was only "causing it to be

fairly written" in October, after his own Wycherley volume had passed

through the press. The false account is repeated in the preface to the

quarto, where we are told that the posthumous works of Wycherley were

printed the year after the copy of Pope's collection of letters had been

deposited in the library of Lord Oxford, which throws back the deposit

of the letters from the close of 1729 to 1727. Since the poet revived

and authenticated an anonymous fiction respecting his personal acts, he

may reasonably be supposed to have been the author of it. The object of

the imposition was to uphold the tale he had advanced in his Wycherley

volume. He had ceased to state openly that the publication was the act

of Lord Oxford; but he wished to have it believed that the letters were

in the keeping of his noble friend at the time, and to leave the

impression that the notion of printing them had not originated with

himself.]

[Footnote 80: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 420.]

[Footnote 81: Vol. I. p. xxxix.]

[Footnote 82: Warton's Pope, Vol. II. p. 339.]

[Footnote 83: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 63.]

[Footnote 84: "Athenaeum," Sept. 8, 1860.]

[Footnote 85: Maloniana, p. 385.]

[Footnote 86: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 62.]

[Footnote 87: Vol. I. p. 417.]

[Footnote 88: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 430, 431, 443.]

[Footnote 89: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 431.]

[Footnote 90: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 431, 443.]

[Footnote 91: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 443.]

[Footnote 92: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 444, 445.]

[Footnote 93: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 431.]

[Footnote 94: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 432.]

[Footnote 95: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 423, 447.]

[Footnote 96: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 444.]

[Footnote 97: From a letter which Lord Oxford addressed to Swift on June

19, 1735, he would appear to have known no more than the rest of the

public. "Master Pope," he writes, "is under persecution from Curll, who

has by some means (wicked ones most certainly) got hold of some of

Pope's private letters, which he has printed, and threatens more."]

[Footnote 98: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 447.]

[Footnote 99: "Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence," 12mo. Vol. III, p.

x.]

[Footnote 100: Pope to Buckley, July 13, [1735].]

[Footnote 101: Art. Atterbury in "A General Biographical Dictionary

translated from Bayle, interspersed with several thousand lives never

before published. By Rev. J. P. Bernard, Rev. T. Birch, Mr. John

Lockman, and other hands." Vol II. p. 447.]

[Footnote 102: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 447.]

[Footnote 103: Pope to Fortescue, March 26, 1736, and April, 1736.]

[Footnote 104: Pope to Allen, June 5 and Nov. 6, 1736.]

[Footnote 105: Pope to Allen, Nov. 6, 1736.]

[Footnote 106: Pope to Fortescue, April, 1736.]

[Footnote 107: Pope to Allen, Nov. 6, 1736.]

[Footnote 108: Chancery Bill, Dodsley _v._ Watson.]

[Footnote 109: Johnson's "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 63.]

[Footnote 110: Ruffhead's "Life of Pope," p. 465.]

[Footnote 111: Vol. I. Appendix, pp. 423, 447.]

[Footnote 112: Pope to Allen, June 5, 1736.]

[Footnote 113: Pope probably kept back from the quarto the unpublished

letters he inserted in the octavo that their novelty might assist the

sale of the edition which was intended to come out last. He would not

use the new letters without his unfailing pretext that they "were in

such hands as to be in imminent danger of being printed."]

[Footnote 114: These particulars are derived from the Chancery Bill

_Dodsley_ v. _Watson_, and from the documents preserved by Pope's

solicitor, Mr. Cole, and now in the possession of his successors in the

business, Messrs. Janssen and Co. I owe the extracts from Cole's papers

to Mr. Dilke, who was indebted for them to the present members of the

firm.]

[Footnote 115: Vol. I. p. xliii.]

[Footnote 116: The words were introduced by the poet's friend and

counsel Murray when he revised, or, in legal phrase, settled the bill.

The rough draft submitted to him is among the papers of Mr. Cole, and

the parallel passage only states that the letters written and received

by Mr. Pope "having fallen into the hands of several booksellers, they

thought fit to print a surreptitious edition," which did not preclude

the supposition that one or more of the editions might be genuine.

Whenever Pope, throughout the business, could use equivocal language he

always selected it.]

[Footnote 117: "Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence," 12mo. Vol. III. p.

xii.]

[Footnote 118: Vol. I. Appendix, p. 423, 447.]

[Footnote 119: Vol. I. p. 1. He is speaking of Curll's reprint, which

has no letters that were not in the original P. T. volume.]

[Footnote 120: Pope to Swift, May 17, 1739.]

[Footnote 121: Covent Garden Journal, No. 23, March 21, 1752.]

[Footnote 122: Warton's Pope, Vol. I. p. lv.]

[Footnote 123: The second edition of the octavo has a few more notes

than the first edition. To distinguish it I have quoted it by the title

of Cooper 1737, from the name of the publisher. I had not seen the first

edition of the octavo till after Vol. I. of the Correspondence was

printed, and I have erroneously stated of one or two letters that they

originally appeared in the Cooper edition of 1737 which had not any new

letters.]

[Footnote 124: De Quincey, Works, Vol. xv. p. 132.]

[Footnote 125: Works, Vol. vii. p. 66.]

[Footnote 126: Carruthers, Life of Pope, p. 442.]

[Footnote 127: Warburton's Pope, Ed. 1753, Vol. IX. p. 111.]

[Footnote 128: Pope to Lord Orrery, March, 1737.]

[Footnote 129: Pope to Lord Orrery, March, 1737.]

[Footnote 130: It is among the papers of his friend Lord Bathurst. The

letter is undated, and was published without any date by Curll. When

Pope reproduced it in the quarto of 1737, he dated it August, 1723; and

in the quarto of 1741 he changed the date to January, 1723, which must

be incorrect, since Bolingbroke was then abroad, and did not return to

England till June. Swift's reply is dated September 20, and as it was

between this period and June that the joint letter must have been

written, August is either the true date, or a close approximation to

it.]

[Footnote 131: Pope to Lord Orrery, March, 1737.]

[Footnote 132: Mrs. Whiteway to Lord Orrery.]

[Footnote 133: It is stated in a note to the Dublin edition of the

collection of 1741 that the original of Bolingbroke's appendix had been

discovered among Swift's papers since the publication of the letter by

Curll.]

[Footnote 134: Lord Orrery to Pope, Oct. 4, 1738.]

[Footnote 135: Pope to Mr. Nugent, August 14, 1740. This letter was

first published in the "Gentleman's Magazine" for August, 1849. It is

printed, together with the other letters on the subject, among the Pope

and Swift correspondence in this edition.]

[Footnote 136: The earliest of the three letters bears in the body of

the work, the heading "Mr. Gay to Dr. Swift;" but in the Table of

Contents it is entitled "From Mr. Gay and Mr. Pope," and the language in

portions of the letter itself shows that it was the production of both.]

[Footnote 137: "I never," said the poet to Caryll, November 19, 1712,

"kept any copies of such stuff as I write," which would be decisive of

his custom at that early date, if much reliance could be placed on his

word. In 1716 he commenced correspondence with Lady Mary Wortley

Montagu, and afterwards published several of the letters among his

"Letters to Ladies." He was then at enmity with her, and as she retained

the originals, he must either have borrowed them prior to the quarrel

for the purpose of copying them, or else must have copied them before

they were sent. There is no direct evidence to show at what time he

commenced the practice of transcribing letters; but at the close of 1726

he began to compile the collection of 1735, and thenceforward he was

sure to let nothing escape which could contribute to his design.]

[Footnote 138: Mrs. Whiteway to Lord Orrery.]

[Footnote 139: Dr. Hawkesworth published a letter from Swift to Pope,

introducing his cousin, Mr. D. Swift, and three more were published by

Mr. D. Swift himself. He does not say by what means he obtained them,

but they form part of a collection of some seventy stray letters

addressed by Swift to thirty or forty different persons, who had

certainly not returned them.]

[Footnote 140: Pope to Lord Oxford, Dec. 14, 1725.]

[Footnote 141: Pope to Lord Oxford, Dec. 14, 1725.]

[Footnote 142: Nichols's "Illustrations of the Literary History of the

Eighteenth Century," Vol. V. p. 379.]

[Footnote 143: Birch MSS. Brit. Mus., quoted in Warton's Pope, Vol. II.

p. 339. When Mr. Gerrard was about to return to Ireland from Bath, Pope

wrote to him, May 17, 1740, to say that he had found another conveyance

for the letter he had intended to send by him to Swift. Mr. Gerrard may

nevertheless have carried over the printed correspondence, which would

not have been openly entrusted to him by Pope, who professed to know

nothing about it. The poet may have thought upon reflection that it

would look less suspicious if his avowed letter and the anonymous parcel

were not transmitted by the same bearer.]

[Footnote 144: Mrs. Whiteway to Lord Orrery.]

[Footnote 145: Pope to Mr. Nugent, March 26, 1740, and Mr. Nugent to

Mrs. Whiteway, April 2, 1740.]

[Footnote 146: Pope to Mr. Nugent, August 14, 1740.]

[Footnote 147: Ruffhead's "Life of Pope," p. 469. The letter to Allen

was not published till twenty-five years after Pope's death.]

[Footnote 148: Millar _v._ Taylor, Burrow's Reports, Vol. IV. p. 2397.]

[Footnote 149: "Athenaeum" for Sept. 15, 1860.]

[Footnote 150: "Whereas there is an impression of certain letters

between Dr. Swift and Mr. Pope openly printed in Dublin without Mr.

Pope's consent, and there is reason to think the same hath been, or will

be done clandestinely in London, notice is hereby given that they will

be speedily published with several additional letters, &c., composing

altogether a second volume of his works in prose."--"London Daily Post"

for March 24, 1741, quoted in the "Athenaeum" for September 15, 1860. The

advertisement displays the same cautious phraseology as was employed in

the prefatory notice to the quarto, and speaks of the Dublin volume as

only printed, not published. One motive which probably induced Faulkner

to delay it was, that the work would have been incomplete without the

additional letters.]

[Footnote 151: Page 89 in the quarto bears, in the cancelled division,

the signature M., and the later page 89 has the signature N. The cause

of the difference is plain. It is the ordinary habit to begin the body

of a work on sheet B, and reserve the signature A, for the preliminary

matter. This is the method adopted with the three previous quarto

volumes of Pope's works, and was followed in the original quarto

impression of the correspondence; but after the poet had cancelled the

beginning of the volume, the sheet commonly marked B was in the second

state of the quarto marked A, which occasioned the usual sheet N to

become M. The discrepancy is an additional proof that the opening sheets

had been cancelled and reprinted.]

[Footnote 152: There were probably minor cancels which did not disturb

the general arrangement, as at page 124, where there is a note which

purports to be copied from the Dublin edition. The final sheet of all

was evidently printed after Faulkner's volume was in type.]

[Footnote 153: Pope to Lord Orrery, March, 1737.]

[Footnote 154: Curll, who delivered his answer upon oath, was no doubt

aware that the work was not first published in Dublin. He therefore used

the evasive word "printed," and left it to his opponents to detect the

fallacy. The methods, however, by which Pope had obtained his priority

would not permit him to plead it, nor was he likely, by mooting the

question, to risk the revelation of his plot.]

[Footnote 155: Atkyns's Reports, Vol. II. p. 342.]

[Footnote 156: The other counsel were Sir Dudley Ryder, then

Attorney-General, and Mr. Noel. They all paid Pope the tribute of

refusing their fees.]

[Footnote 157: Tonson _v._ Collins, Blackstone's Reports, Vol. I. p.

311.]

[Footnote 158: Millar _v._ Taylor, Burrow's Reports, Vol. IV. p. 2396.

"I know," Lord Mansfield observed, "that Mr. Pope had no paper upon

which the letters were written," which means that he had received this

assurance from Pope, and supposed it to be true. In one particular the

memory of Lord Mansfield deceived him. Blackstone on the authority of

the preface to the quarto of 1741, stated, while arguing the case of

Tonson _v._ Collins, that the letters "were published with the

connivance at least, if not under the direction of Swift," to which Lord

Mansfield replied, "Certainly not. Dr. Swift disclaimed it, and was

extremely angry." But this is opposed to the united evidence of Mrs.

Whiteway, Faulkner, and Pope, who all concur in testifying that Swift

consented to the publication.]

[Footnote 159: Mrs. Whiteway to Lord Orrery.]

[Footnote 160: Pope to Caryll, Feb. 3, 1729. Pope to Swift, March 23,

1737.]

[Footnote 161: To Lord Orrery, March, 1737. "His humanity, his charity,

his condescension, his candour are equal to his wit, and require as good

and true a taste to be equally valued. When all this must die, I would

gladly have been the recorder of so great a part of it as shines in his

letters to me, and of which my own are but as so many

acknowledgements."]

[Footnote 162: Pope to Nugent, August 14, 1740.]

[Footnote 163: The statement is recorded by Dr. Birch in his Journal,

May 14, 1751. He received the information from Dr. Heberden, who was

then attending Lord Bolingbroke in his last illness.]

[Footnote 164: "All's Well that Ends Well." Act II. Scene 2.]

[Footnote 165: In September, 1725, Arbuthnot had an illness which was

expected to prove mortal. Pope, in announcing his recovery to Swift on

October 15, added, "He goes abroad again, and is more cheerful than even

health can make a man." He meant that Arbuthnot was able to go about

again, which was still one of the commonest significations of the

phrase. Arbuthnot did not leave England, and from his letter to Swift on

October 17, it is clear that he had never entertained the design.]

[Footnote 166: Roscoe dated the letter 1726. Without recapitulating the

circumstances, which are fatal to the conjecture, it is enough to say

that on September 10, 1726, Pope was unable to hold a pen, owing to the

injury he had received a day or two before when he was upset in

Bolingbroke's carriage. It was several weeks before he recovered the use

of his hand. In the case of Digby there is the additional difficulty

that as the nurse did not die till after September, 1725, so he himself

was dead before September, 1726.]

[Footnote 167: I did not discover the letters of Wycherley at Longleat

till after his correspondence with Pope had been printed off.]

[Footnote 168: "Notes and Queries," No. 260, p. 485.]

[Footnote 169: Oxford MSS.]

[Footnote 170: Oxford MSS.]

[Footnote 171: "Notes and Queries," No. 260, p. 485.]

[Footnote 172: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 9.]

[Footnote 173: Oxford MSS. The rest of the letter is taken up with an

account of some religious fanatics.]

[Footnote 174: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 10.]

[Footnote 175: The general impression produced by the correspondence was

expressed by Spence, when he observed to Pope, "People have pitied you

extremely on reading your letters to Wycherley. Surely it was a very

difficult thing for you to keep well with him." "The most difficult

thing in the world," was Pope's reply. On another occasion he said to

Spence, "Wycherley was really angry with me for correcting his verses so

much. I was extremely plagued, up and down, for almost two years with

them. However it went off pretty well at last." When Pope tampered with

the written records which he cited as evidence upon the question, we can

place no reliance on his passing words.]

[Footnote 176: Oxford MSS.]

[Footnote 177: This statement is from the edition of the pamphlet

published in 1749. Mallet was the nominal, and Bolingbroke the real

editor. The particulars of Pope's misconduct are related with much

asperity in a preliminary advertisement, of which the original,

corrected by Bolingbroke, is in the British Museum.]

[Footnote 178: Advertisement to the edition of 1749.]

[Footnote 179: Advertisement to the edition of 1749. In the same year

Warburton put forth a short pamphlet entitled, "A Letter to the Editor

of the Letters on the Spirit of Patriotism," &c., which was reprinted,

in 1769, in the Appendix to Ruffhead's Life of Pope. In this reply

Warburton extenuates, without justifying, the act of his friend, and is

more successful in his attack upon Bolingbroke for exposing the

treachery than in his defence of Pope for perpetrating it. The "Letter

to the Editor of the Letters" is chiefly valuable for its admission of

the principal charges against the poet. His advocate, who had seen both

the genuine and corrupted edition of the phamphlet, allows that he had

tampered with the text. Bolingbroke had only specified alterations and

ommissions. Warburton goes further, and speaks of interpolations. In the

body of Ruffhead's work it is stated that Pope altered nothing, and

"only struck out some insults on the throne and the then reigning

monarch." But this is opposed to the language of Warburton twenty years

before, when the subject was fresh, and Bolingbroke was

living.--Ruffhead's Life of Pope, p. 526. Appendix, p. 573.]

[Footnote 180: "A Letter to the Editor of the Letters" in Ruffhead, p.

573.]

[Footnote 181: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 232.]

[Footnote 182: "A Letter to the Editor of the Letters" in Ruffhead, p.

572.]

[Footnote 183: Warburton says that the expense had been

considerable.--Ruffhead, 571.]

[Footnote 184: "Lives of the Poets," Vol. III. p. 92.]

[Footnote 185: Macaulay's Essays. I Vol. edit. p. 718.]

THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

The clearness, the closeness, and the elegance of style with

which this preface is written, render it one of the best

pieces of prose in our language. It abounds in strong good

sense, and profound knowledge of life. It is written with

such simplicity that scarcely a single metaphor is to be

found in it.--WARTON.

This preface first appeared in the Works of Pope, 4to, 1717. The poet

submitted the manuscript to Atterbury, and the bishop thus replied in

December, 1716: "I return the preface, which I have read twice with

pleasure. The modesty and good sense there is in it, must please every

one that reads it. And since there is, as I said, nothing that can

offend, I see not why you should balance a moment about printing it,

always provided that there is nothing said there which you have occasion

to unsay hereafter, of which you yourself are the best, and the only

judge. This is my sincere opinion, which I give, because you ask it, and

which I would not give, though asked, but to a man I value as much as I

do you, being sensible how improper it is, on many accounts, for me to

interpose in things of this nature, which I never understood well, and

now understand somewhat less than ever I did." The suspicion which

Atterbury hinted to his friend, that some of the sentiments expressed in

the preface might hereafter be quoted against him, probably referred to

the vaunts in the concluding paragraphs. The poet paid no regard to the

warning, and lived to violate nearly all his professions. Johnson says

that the preface is "written with great sprightliness and elegance," but

the praise of Warton is hyperbolical when he terms it "one of the best

pieces of prose in our language." The style is often faulty, and never

rises to any extraordinary pitch of excellence; the "knowledge of life,"

which Warton calls "profound," is such as a little experience would

supply; and the "strong good sense" is interspersed with obvious

thoughts and erroneous maxims. The language of Atterbury is sober, and

even in writing to the author he was not betrayed by the partiality of

friendship into the exaggerations of Warton.

THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

I am inclined to think that both the writers of books, and the readers

of them, are generally not a little unreasonable in their expectations.

The first seem to fancy that the world must approve whatever they

produce, and the latter to imagine that authors are obliged to please

them at any rate. Methinks, as on the one hand, no single man is born

with a right of controlling the opinions of all the rest; so on the

other, the world has no title to demand, that the whole care and time of

any particular person should be sacrificed to its entertainment.

Therefore I cannot but believe that writers and readers are under equal

obligations for as much fame, or pleasure, as each affords the other.

Every one acknowledges, it would be a wild notion to expect perfection

in any work of man: and yet one would think the contrary was taken for

granted, by the judgment commonly passed upon poems. A critic supposes

he has done his part if he proves a writer to have failed in an

expression, or erred in any particular point: and can it then be

wondered at if the poets in general seem resolved not to own themselves

in any error? For as long as one side will make no allowances, the other

will be brought to no acknowledgments.[1]

I am afraid this extreme zeal on both sides is ill-placed; poetry and

criticism being by no means the universal concern of the world, but only

the affair of idle men who write in their closets, and of idle men who

read there. Yet sure, upon the whole, a bad author deserves better usage

than a bad critic: for a writer's endeavour, for the most part, is to

please his readers, and he fails merely through the misfortune of an ill

judgment; but such a critic's is to put them out of humour; a design he

could never go upon without both that and an ill temper.[2]

I think a good deal may be said to extenuate the fault of bad poets.

What we call a genius, is hard to be distinguished by a man himself,

from a strong inclination: and if his genius be ever so great, he cannot

at first discover it any other way than by giving way to that prevalent

propensity which renders him the more liable to be mistaken. The only

method he has is to make the experiment by writing, and appealing to the

judgment of others. Now if he happens to write ill, which is certainly

no sin in itself, he is immediately made an object of ridicule. I wish

we had the humanity to reflect that even the worst authors might, in

their endeavour to please us, deserve something at our hands. We have no

cause to quarrel with them but for their obstinacy in persisting to

write; and this too may admit of alleviating circumstances. Their

particular friends may be either ignorant or insincere; and the rest of

the world in general is too well-bred to shock them with a truth, which

generally their booksellers are the first that inform them of. This

happens not till they have spent too much of their time to apply to any

profession which might better fit their talents; and till such talents

as they have are so far discredited as to be but of small service to

them. For, what is the hardest case imaginable, the reputation of a man

generally depends upon the first steps he makes in the world; and people

will establish their opinion of us, from what we do at that season when

we have least judgment to direct us.

On the other hand, a good poet no sooner communicates his works with the

same desire of information, but it is imagined he is a vain young

creature given up to the ambition of fame, when perhaps the poor man is

all the while trembling with the fear of being ridiculous. If he is made

to hope he may please the world, he falls under very unlucky

circumstances: for, from the moment he prints, he must expect to hear no

more truth than if he were a prince or a beauty. If he has not very good

sense (and indeed there are twenty men of wit for one man of sense) his

living thus in a course of flattery may put him in no small danger of

becoming a coxcomb: if he has, he will consequently have so much

diffidence as not to reap any great satisfaction from his praise: since,

if it be given to his face, it can scarce be distinguished from

flattery, and if in his absence, it is hard to be certain of it. Were he

sure to be commended by the best and most knowing, he is as sure of

being envied by the worst and most ignorant, which are the majority;[3]

for it is with a fine genius as with a fine fashion, all those are

displeased at it who are not able to follow it: and it is to be feared

that esteem will seldom do any man so much good, as ill-will does him

harm. Then there is a third class of people, who make the largest part

of mankind,--those of ordinary or indifferent capacities--; and these,

to a man, will hate or suspect him: a hundred honest gentlemen will

dread him as a wit, and a hundred innocent women as a satirist. In a

word, whatever be his fate in poetry, it is ten to one but he must give

up all the reasonable aims of life for it. There are indeed some

advantages accruing from a genius to poetry, and they are all I can

think of,--the agreeable power of self-amusement when a man is idle or

alone; the privilege of being admitted into the best company; and the

freedom of saying as many careless things as other people, without being

so severely remarked upon.[4]

[5]I believe if any one, early in his life, should contemplate the

dangerous fate of authors, he would scarce be of their number on any

consideration. The life of a wit is a warfare upon earth; and the

present spirit of the learned world is such, that to attempt to serve it

any way one must have the constancy of a martyr, and a resolution to

suffer for its sake. 'I could wish people would believe, what I am

pretty certain they will not, that I have been much less concerned about

fame than I durst declare till this occasion, when methinks I should

find more credit than I could heretofore: since my writings have had

their fate already, and it is too late to think of prepossessing the

reader in their favour. I would plead it as some merit in me, that the

world has never been prepared for these trifles by prefaces,[6] biassed

by recommendations, dazzled with the names of great patrons,[7] wheedled

with fine reasons and pretences, or troubled with excuses.'[8] I confess

it was want of consideration that made me an author; I writ because it

amused me; I corrected because it was as pleasant to me to correct as to

write; and I published because I was told I might please such as it was

a credit to please. To what degree I have done this, I am really

ignorant. I had too much fondness for my productions to judge of them at

first, and too much judgment to be pleased with them at last. But I have

reason to think they can have no reputation which will continue long, or

which deserves to do so:[9] for they have always fallen short not only

of what I read of others, but even of my own ideas of poetry.

If any one should imagine I am not in earnest, I desire him to reflect,

that the ancients, to say the least of them, had as much genius as we;

and that to take more pains, and employ more time, cannot fail to

produce more complete pieces. They constantly applied themselves not

only to that art, but to that single branch of an art, to which their

talent was most powerfully bent; and it was the business of their lives

to correct and finish their works for posterity.[10] If we can pretend

to have used the same industry, let us expect the same immortality:

though, if we took the same care, we should still lie under a further

misfortune: they writ in languages that became universal and

everlasting, while ours are extremely limited both in extent and in

duration. A mighty foundation for our pride! when the utmost we can

hope,[11] is but to be read in one island, and to be thrown aside at the

end of one age.

All that is left us is to recommend our productions by the imitation of

the ancients;[12] and it will be found true, that in every age, the

highest character for sense and learning has been obtained by those who

have been most indebted to them. For, to say truth, whatever is very

good sense, must have been common sense in all times; and what we call

learning, is but the knowledge of the sense of our predecessors.

Therefore they who say our thoughts are not our own, because they

resemble the ancients, may as well say our faces are not our own,

because they are like our fathers: and, indeed, it is very unreasonable

that people should expect us to be scholars, and yet be angry to find us

so.[13]

I fairly confess that I have served myself all I could by reading; that

I made use of the judgment of authors dead and living; that I omitted no

means in my power to be informed of my errors, both by my friends and

enemies:[14] but the true reason these pieces are not more correct, is

owing to the consideration how short a time they, and I, have to

live.[15] One may be ashamed to consume half one's days in bringing

sense and rhyme together: and what critic can be so unreasonable, as not

to leave a man time enough for any more serious employment, or more

agreeable amusement?

The only plea I shall use for the favour of the public, is, that I have

as great a respect for it as most authors have for themselves; and that

I have sacrificed much of my own self-love for its sake, in preventing

not only many mean things from seeing the light, but many which I

thought tolerable. 'I would not be like those authors, who forgive

themselves some particular lines for the sake of a whole poem, and _vice

versa_ a whole poem for the sake of some particular lines.'[16] I

believe no one qualification is so likely to make a good writer as the

power of rejecting his own thoughts; and it must be this, if any thing,

that can give me a chance to be one. For what I have published I can

only hope to be pardoned; but for what I have burned I deserve to be

praised. On this account the world is under some obligation to me, and

owes me the justice in return to look upon no verses as mine that are

not inserted in this collection.[17] And perhaps nothing could make it

worth my while to own what are really so, but to avoid the imputation of

so many dull and immoral things, as partly by malice, and partly by

ignorance, have been ascribed to me. I must further acquit myself of the

presumption of having lent my name to recommend any Miscellanies,[18]

or works of other men;[19] a thing I never thought becoming a person who

has hardly credit enough to answer for his own.

In this office of collecting my pieces, I am altogether uncertain

whether to look upon myself as a man building a monument,[20] or burying

the dead. If time shall make it the former, may these poems, as long as

they last, remain as a testimony, that their author never made his

talents subservient to the mean and unworthy ends of party or

self-interest; the gratification of public prejudices or private

passions; the flattery of the undeserving, or the insult of the

unfortunate. If I have written well, let it be considered that it is

what no man can do without good sense, a quality that not only renders

one capable of being a good writer, but a good man. And if I have made

any acquisition in the opinion of any one under the notion of the

former, let it be continued to me under no other title than that of the

latter.[21]

But if this publication be only a more solemn funeral of my remains, I

desire it may be known that I die in charity, and in my senses, without

any murmurs against the justice of this age, or any mad appeals to

posterity. I declare I shall think the world in the right, and quietly

submit to every truth which time shall discover to the prejudice of

these writings; not so much as wishing so irrational a thing as that

every body should be deceived merely for my credit. However, I desire it

may then be considered, that there are very few things in this

collection which were not written under the age of five-and-twenty, so

that my youth may be made, as it never fails to be in executions, a case

of compassion; that I was never so concerned about my works as to

vindicate them in print, believing if any thing was good it would defend

itself, and what was bad could never be defended; that I used no

artifice to raise or continue a reputation, depreciated no dead author I

was obliged to, bribed no living one with unjust praise, insulted no

adversary with ill language,[22] or, when I could not attack a rival's

works, encouraged reports against his morals. To conclude, if this

volume perish, let it serve as a warning to the critics not to take too

much pains for the future to destroy such things as will die of

themselves; and a _memento mori_ to some of my vain contemporaries the

poets, to teach them that when real merit is wanting, it avails nothing

to have been encouraged by the great, commended by the eminent, and

favoured by the public in general.[23]

_Nov. 10, 1716._

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: In all editions till that of Warburton it was thus: "For as

long as one side despises a well meant endeavour, the other will not be

satisfied with a moderate approbation." The first sentence of the next

paragraph is expanded in the manuscript: "Indeed they both proceed in

such a manner as if they really believed that poetry was immediate

inspiration. It were to be wished they would reflect that this

extraordinary zeal and fury is ill placed, poetry and criticism being by

no means the universal concern of the world. I do not say this to

imitate those people who make a merit of undervaluing the arts and

qualifications without which they had never been taken notice of. I

think poetry as useful as any other art, because it is as entertaining,

and therefore as well deserving of mankind."]

[Footnote 2: Until the edition of Warburton the reading was slightly

different: "Yet sure upon the whole a bad author deserves better usage

than a bad critic; a man may be the former merely through the misfortune

of an ill judgment, but he cannot be the latter without both that and an

ill temper."]

[Footnote 3: The instance of Pope himself is a refutation of his theory

that the world was almost exclusively composed of flatterers and

detractors, and chiefly of the last. Where he could count the deniers of

his genius by tens he could number his admirers by thousands.]

[Footnote 4: What is here said of the privileges of the poetic character

will not, I believe, bear the test of truth and experience. Surely a

poet is not particularly allowed "the freedom of saying careless

things," and his moral character and manners are to be estimated, as

well as his talents, before he is entitled to a certain station in

society.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 5: In the MS. it followed thus: "For my part, I confess, had I

seen things in this view at first, the public had never been troubled

either with my writings, or with this apology for them. I am sensible

how difficult it is to speak of one's self with decency: but when a man

must speak of himself, the best way is to speak truth of himself, or, he

may depend upon it, others will do it for him. I will therefore make

this preface a general confession of all my thoughts of my own poetry,

resolving with the same freedom to expose myself, as it is in the power

of any other to expose them. In the first place, I thank God and nature

that I was born with a love to poetry; for nothing more conduces to fill

up all the intervals of our time, or, if rightly used, to make the whole

course of life entertaining: _Cantantes licet usque (minus via laedet)._

It is a vast happiness to possess the pleasures of the head, the only

pleasures in which a man is sufficient to himself, and the only part of

him which, to his satisfaction, he can employ all day long. The muses

are _amicae omnium horarum_; and, like our gay acquaintance, the best

company in the world as long as one expects no real service from them. I

confess there was a time when I was in love with myself, and my first

productions were the children of self-love upon innocence. I had made an

epic poem, and panegyrics on all the princes in Europe, and thought

myself the greatest genius that ever was. I cannot but regret those

delightful visions of my childhood, which, like the fine colours we see

when our eyes are shut, are vanished for ever. Many trials and sad

experience have so undeceived me by degrees, that I am utterly at a loss

at what rate to value myself. As for fame, I shall be glad of any I can

get, and not repine at any I miss; and as for vanity, I have enough to

keep me from hanging myself, or even from wishing those hanged who would

take it away. It was this that made me write. The sense of my faults

made me correct: besides that it was as pleasant to me to correct as to

write."--WARBURTON.

Spence relates that Pope said to Mr. Saville: "If I was to begin the

world again, and knew just what I do now, I would never write a verse."

In the passage from his manuscript preface, he intimates that he would

have amused himself by writing poetry, but would have forborne to

publish what he wrote. Either he was not honest in the opinion, or he

was self-deceived. He valued his fame above all things, and left no

means untried to protect and promote it.]

[Footnote 6: As was the practice of his master Dryden, who is severely

lashed for this in the Tale of a Tub.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 7: Pope was not justified in his boast. He dropped the

practice of fulsome dedications, but he made the most of his

distinguished friends in the body of his pieces, and though no "names of

great patrons" are given in this preface, he could not abstain from

announcing in the final sentence how much they had countenanced him.

This, moreover, was to proclaim the "recommendations" he repudiated, and

in every issue of his works the preface, which contained the

inconsistency, was followed in addition by a series of Recommendatory

Poems.]

[Footnote 8: The passage in inverted commas was first added in 1736.]

[Footnote 9: One of Pope's favourite topics is contempt for his own

poetry. For this, if it had been real, he would deserve no commendation;

and in this he was certainly not sincere, for his value of himself was

sufficiently observed; and of what could he be proud but of his poetry?

He writes, he says, when "he has just nothing else to do;" yet Swift

complains that he was never at leisure for conversation, because he "had

always some poetical scheme in his head." It was punctually required

that his writing-box should be set upon his bed before he rose; and Lord

Oxford's domestic related that in the dreadful winter of 1740, she was

called from her bed by him four times in one night to supply him with

paper lest he should lose a thought.--DR. JOHNSON.]

[Footnote 10: For the next sentence the manuscript has this passage:

"But I fear it is far otherwise with modern poets. We must bring our wit

to the press, as gardeners do their flowers to the market, which if they

cannot vend in the morning are sure to die before night. Were we

animated by the same noble ambition, and ready to prosecute it with

equal ardour, our languages are not only confined to a narrow extent of

country, but are in a perpetual flux, not so much as fixed by an

acknowledged grammar, while theirs were such as time and fate conspired

to make universal and everlasting."]

[Footnote 11: In place of the remainder of the sentence he had written

in the manuscript, "is but to live twenty years longer than Quarles, or

Withers, or Dennis." The doctrine of Pope was unworthy the countryman of

Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, and Milton. The first three had not been

"thrown aside at the end of one age," and no one who was capable of

comprehending the last could seriously believe that his reputation would

be ephemeral. The hypothesis, that the writers in a dead tongue can

alone secure a worthy audience, is altogether chimerical. The literature

of living languages has the ascendancy, and Shakespeare is more read,

and better appreciated, than AEschylus and Sophocles.]

[Footnote 12: I have frequently heard Dr. Young speak with great

disapprobation of the doctrine contained in this passage, with a view to

which he wrote his discourse on Original Composition.--WARTON.

The assertion of Pope is in the face of the facts. All the greatest

names in modern literature have a marked originality, and those authors

who have imitated the ancients, except in subordinate circumstances,

have usually produced tame and lifeless compositions, which were

speedily forgotten.]

[Footnote 13: The sophistry is transparent. A man may be a scholar

without being a plagiarist or an imitator.]

[Footnote 14: Here followed in the first edition, "and that I expect not

to be excused in any negligence on account of youth, want of leisure, or

any other idle allegations." This was inconsistent with his request, at

the conclusion of his preface, that those who condemned his poems would

remember his youth when he composed them. After the omitted sentence he

had added in the manuscript, "I have ever been fearful of making an ill

present to the world, for which I have as much respect as most poets

have for themselves. What I thought incorrect I suppressed; and what I

thought most finished I never published but with fear and trembling."]

[Footnote 15: From hence to the end of the paragraph the manuscript

continues thus: "A man that can expect but sixty years may be ashamed to

employ thirty in measuring syllables, and bringing sense and rhyme

together. We spend our youth in the pursuit of riches or fame in hopes

to enjoy them when we are old, and when we are old we find it is too

late to enjoy anything. I have got over the mistake pretty early. I

therefore hope the wits will pardon me if I leave myself time enough to

save my soul, and some wise men will be of my opinion even if I should

think a part of it better spent in the enjoyment of life than in

pleasing the critics."]

[Footnote 16: This sentence was in the manuscript, but Pope omitted it

in the edition of 1717, and restored it in 1736.]

[Footnote 17: In the manuscript he added, "which indeed was my chief

view in making it, for in the present liberty of the press, a man is

forced to appear as bad as he is, not to be thought worse." The

assertion is qualified in the text, but he could not entirely abandon

the affectation of pretending that he collected his works to escape the

disgrace of the pieces which were falsely attributed to him, and not to

obtain credit from his own performances.]

[Footnote 18: "I am always highly delighted," said Addison in the

Spectator, No. 523, Oct. 30, 1712, "with the discovery of any rising

genius among my countrymen. For this reason I have read over, with great

pleasure, the late Miscellany published by Mr. Pope, in which there are

many excellent compositions of that ingenious gentleman." The

announcement referred to the first edition of Lintot's Miscellany, and

from the literary intercourse which existed between Addison, Steele, and

Pope at the time, the compilation was not likely to have been ascribed

to the latter in the Spectator without sufficient authority. The

language of Pope seems carefully selected to avoid the direct denial

that he was the editor. The work was published anonymously, and he only

asserts that he had "never lent his _name_ to recommend any

miscellanies." The disclaimer was probably directed against the device

adopted by Lintot in the second edition, 1 vol. 8vo, 1714, which bore

this title, "Miscellaneous Poems and Translations. By several hands.

Particularly, etc." Here followed a list of Pope's contributions, and

his alone. Underneath the list a line was drawn across the page, and

below this line was printed in capital letters, "By Mr. Pope." The

complete separation between the list of pieces and the name of the poet

disconnected them to the eye, and left the impression that Pope was the

editor of the entire work. The same plan was continued till the fifth

edition, 2 vols. 12mo, 1727, when Lintot grew bolder, and inserted

bastard title-pages with the words, "Mr. Pope's Miscellany." The poet,

who corrected the proofs of his own pieces for the fifth edition,

assured Christopher Pitt, in a letter of July 23, 1726, that he had

never had anything to do with the remainder of the work; but the private

assurance, after many years, of a man who had no regard for truth does

not outweigh the assertion in the Spectator, when coupled with the

peculiar wording by which he evaded the public contradiction of the

statement.]

[Footnote 19: In 1721 he broke through his rule by recommending the

poems of Parnell to Lord Oxford in an Epistle in verse.--CUNNINGHAM.]

[Footnote 20: A few sentences before he had said, "for what I have

published I can only hope to be pardoned," and already he has forgotten

his mock modesty, and admits he has a hope that his works may prove "a

monument."]

[Footnote 21: The commendation of his own goodness is a theme which

constantly recurs in Pope, as if he hoped to conceal his delinquencies

by his loud profession of the contrary qualities. The topic is

introduced into this preface in a forced manner, and treated with

singular weakness. Intellectual capacity and literary pre-eminence are

no security for moral excellence; and it was idle to ask the public to

forget his reputation as a poet, which was his sole claim to fame, and

to commemorate him for virtues of which the world had no proof, and

which, if they were real, he shared with thousands.]

[Footnote 22: This was written in 1716; did our author recollect this

sentiment in 1729[8]?--WARTON.

Warton alludes to the Dunciad, but to have "insulted adversaries with

ill language" was only one out of several particulars, in which Pope's

subsequent career belied the protestations in his preface.]

[Footnote 23: This far-fetched excuse of Pope for rebuking the vanity of

contemporary poets, was a clumsy expedient to gratify his own vanity in

proclaiming to the world that "he had been encouraged by the great, and

commended by the eminent." He had not much title to reprove the vanity

of his brethren, when, in the same sentence, he recorded the praise

which the different orders of mankind had bestowed upon himself.]

PREFACE TO POPE'S WORKS.

VOL. II. 4TO, 1735.

THE AUTHOR TO THE READER.

All I had to say of my writings is contained in my preface to the first

of these volumes, printed for J. Tonson, and B. Lintot in quarto and

folio in the year 1717; and all I have to say of myself will be found in

my last Epistle.[1] I have nothing to add, but that this volume, and the

above-mentioned contain whatsoever I have written, and[2] designed for

the press, except my translation of the Iliad (with my preface and

notes), of twelve books of the Odyssey, with the postscript (not the

notes), the preface to Shakespeare, and a few Spectators[3] and

Guardians. Whatever besides I have written, or joined in writing with

Dr. Swift, Dr. Arbuthnot, or Mr. Gay (the only persons with whom I ever

wrote in conjunction) are to be found in the four volumes of

Miscellanies by us published.[4] I think them too inconsiderable to be

separated and reprinted here; nevertheless, that none of my faults may

be imputed to another, I must own that of the prose part, the Thoughts

on Various Subjects at the end of the second volume, were wholly mine;

and of the verses, the Happy Life of a Country Parson, the Alley in

imitation of Spenser, the characters of Macer, Artimesia, and Phryne,

the Verses to Mrs. M[artha] B[lount] on her Birth-day, and a few

epigrams.[5] It will be but justice to me to believe that nothing more

is mine, notwithstanding all that has been published in my name, or

added to my[6] miscellanies since 1717,[7] by any bookseller whatsoever.

A. POPE.

_Jan. 1, 1734-{5}._

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: In the reprint of this preface in 1740, Pope added the

words, "to Dr. Arbuthnot."]

[Footnote 2: In the octavo of 1735, Pope omitted the words "written,

and." In 1740 he again inserted them, and omitted the words, "and

designed for the press."]

[Footnote 3: The Messiah was first published in the Spectator, but as it

was also inserted in the quarto of 1717, the poet cannot have included

it among the pieces which were not contained in either the first or

second volume of his works. His only other known contribution to the

Spectator was a short letter in No. 532, Nov. 10, 1712, on the verses

which the Emperor Hadrian spoke when he was dying. The "few Spectators"

to which Pope referred have not been identified, and since he never

reproduced, or particularised them, it may be taken for granted that

they were of slight importance.]

[Footnote 4: In the edition of 1740 Pope affixed to this sentence the

clause, "or make part of the Memoirs of Scriblerus, not yet printed."

His enumeration of the Scriblerus among his genuine productions was

doubtless the consequence of his resolution to publish it, and it

accordingly appeared in 1741 in the second volume of his prose works.]

[Footnote 5: The passage from "I think" down to "epigrams," was left out

in 1740, for Pope soon admitted into his collected works those pieces in

the Miscellanies which he here said were "too inconsiderable to be

reprinted."]

[Footnote 6: "Any" in the edition of 1740.]

[Footnote 7: He omitted "1717" in 1740. His insinuation that none of the

other pieces ascribed to him were genuine, is in his ordinary style of

equivocation, and is now known to be erroneous.]

RECOMMENDATORY POEMS.[1]

JOHN SHEFFIELD, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.[2]

ON MR. POPE AND HIS POEMS.

With age decayed, with courts and bus'ness tired,

Caring for nothing but what ease required;

Too dully serious for the muses' sport,

And from the critics safe arrived in port;

I little thought of launching forth again, 5

Amidst advent'rous rovers of the pen:

And after so much undeserved success,

Thus hazarding at last to make it less.

Encomiums suit not this censorious time,

Itself a subject for satiric rhyme; 10

Ignorance honoured, wit and worth defamed,

Folly triumphant, and ev'n Homer blamed!

But to this genius, joined with so much art,

Such various learning mixed in ev'ry part,

Poets are bound a loud applause to pay; 15

Apollo bids it, and they must obey.

And yet so wonderful, sublime a thing

As the great Iliad, scarce could make me sing,

Except I justly could at once commend

A good companion, and as firm a friend, 20

One moral, or a mere well-natured deed

Can all desert in sciences exceed.

'Tis great delight to laugh at some men's ways,

But a much greater to give merit praise.

ANNE, COUNTESS OF WINCHELSEA.[3]

TO MR. POPE.

The muse, of ev'ry heav'nly gift allowed

To be the chief, is public, though not proud.

Widely extensive is the poet's aim,

And in each verse he draws a bill on fame.

For none have writ (whatever they pretend) 5

Singly to raise a patron, or a friend;

But whatsoe'er the theme or object be,

Some commendations to themselves foresee.

Then let us find, in your foregoing page,

The celebrating poems of the age; 10

Nor by injurious scruples think it fit

To hide their judgments who applaud your wit.

But let their pens to yours the heralds prove,

Who strive for you as Greece for Homer strove;

Whilst he who best your poetry asserts, 15

Asserts his own, by sympathy of parts.

Me panegyric verse does not inspire,

Who never well can praise what I admire;

Nor in those lofty trials dare appear,

But gently drop this counsel in your ear. 20

Go on, to gain applauses by desert,

Inform the head, whilst you dissolve the heart;

Inflame the soldier with harmonious rage,

Elate the young, and gravely warm the sage;

Allure with tender verse the female race, 25

And give their darling passion courtly grace;

Describe the Forest still in rural strains,

With vernal sweets fresh breathing from the plains.

Your tales be easy, natural, and gay,

Nor all the poet in that part display; 30

Nor let the critic there his skill unfold,

For Boccace thus, and Chaucer tales have told.

Soothe, as you only can, each diff'ring taste,

And for the future charm as in the past.

Then should the verse of ev'ry artful hand 35

Before your numbers eminently stand;

In you no vanity could thence be shown,

Unless, since short in beauty of your own,

Some envious scribbler might in spite declare,

That for comparison you placed them there. 40

But envy could not against you succeed, }

'Tis not from friends that write, or foes that read; }

Censure or praise must from ourselves proceed. }

MR. WYCHERLEY.

TO MR. POPE, ON HIS PASTORALS.[4]

In these more dull, as more censorious days,

When few dare give, and fewer merit praise,

A muse sincere, that never flatt'ry knew,

Pays what to friendship and desert is due.

Young, yet judicious; in your verse are found 5

Art strength'ning nature, sense improved by sound.

Unlike those wits whose numbers glide along

So smooth, no thought e'er interrupts the song:[5]

Laboriously enervate they appear,

And write not to the head, but to the ear: 10

Our minds unmoved and unconcerned they lull,

And are at best most musically dull:

So purling streams with even murmurs creep,

And hush the heavy hearers into sleep.

As smoothest speech is most deceitful found, } 15

The smoothest numbers oft are empty sound, }

And leave our lab'ring fancy quite aground.[6] }

But wit and judgment join at once in you,

Sprightly as youth, as age consummate too:

Your strains are regularly bold, and please } 20

With unforced care, and unaffected ease, }

With proper thoughts, and lively images: }

Such as by nature to the ancients shown,

Fancy improves, and judgment makes your own:

For great men's fashions to be followed are, 25

Although disgraceful 'tis their clothes to wear.

Some in a polished style write pastoral,

Arcadia speaks the language of the Mall;

Like some fair shepherdess, the sylvan muse,[7]

Decked in those flow'rs her native fields produce, 30

With modest charms would in plain neatness please, }

But seems a dowdy in the courtly dress, }

Whose awkward finery allures us less.[8] }

But the true measure of the shepherd's wit

Should, like his garb, be for the country fit: 35

Yet must his pure and unaffected thought

More nicely than the common swain's be wrought.

So, with becoming art, the players dress

In silks the shepherd and the shepherdess;

Yet still unchanged the form and mode remain, 40

Shaped like the homely russet of the swain.

Your rural muse appears to justify

The long lost graces of simplicity:

So rural beauties captivate our sense

With virgin charms, and native excellence. 45

Yet long her modesty those charms concealed,

'Till by men's envy to the world revealed;

For wits industrious to their trouble seem,

And needs will envy what they must esteem.

Live and enjoy their spite! nor mourn that fate, 50

Which would, if Virgil lived, on Virgil wait;

Whose muse did once, like thine, in plains delight;

Thine shall, like his, soon take a higher flight;

So larks, which first from lowly fields arise,

Mount by degrees, and reach at last the skies. 55

FR. KNAPP.[9]

TO MR. POPE, ON HIS WINDSOR FOREST.[10]

_Killala, in the county of Mayo, in Ireland, June 7, 1715._

Hail, sacred bard! a muse unknown before

Salutes thee from the bleak Atlantic shore.

To our dark world thy shining page is shown,

And Windsor's gay retreat becomes our own.

The Eastern pomp had just bespoke our care, 5

And India poured her gaudy treasures here:

A various spoil adorned our naked land, }

The pride of Persia glittered on our strand, }

And China's earth was cast on common sand: }

Tossed up and down the glossy fragments lay, 10

And dressed the rocky shelves, and paved the painted bay.

Thy treasures next arrived: and now we boast

A nobler cargo on our barren coast:

From thy luxuriant Forest we receive

More lasting glories than the East can give. 15

Where'er we dip in thy delightful page,

What pompous scenes our busy thoughts engage!

The pompous scenes in all their pride appear,

Fresh in the page, as in the grove they were;

Nor half so true the fair Lodona shows 20

The sylvan state that on her border grows,

While she the wond'ring shepherd entertains

With a new Windsor in her wat'ry plains;

Thy juster lays the lucid wave surpass,

The living scene is in the muse's glass. 25

Nor sweeter notes the echoing forests cheer,

When Philomela sits and warbles there,

Than when you sing the greens and op'ning glades,

And give us harmony as well as shades:

A Titian's hand might draw the grove, but you 30

Can paint the grove, and add the music too.

With vast variety thy pages shine;

A new creation starts in ev'ry line.

How sudden trees rise to the reader's sight, }

And make a doubtful scene of shade and light, } 35

And give at once the day, at once the night! }

And here again what sweet confusion reigns,

In dreary deserts mixed with painted plains!

And see! the deserts cast a pleasing gloom,

And shrubby heaths rejoice in purple bloom: 40

Whilst fruitful crops rise by their barren side,

And bearded groves display their annual pride.

Happy the man, who strings his tuneful lyre,

Where woods, and brooks, and breathing fields inspire!

Thrice happy you! and worthy best to dwell 45

Amidst the rural joys you sing so well.

I in a cold, and in a barren clime, }

Cold as my thought, and barren as my rhyme, }

Here on the western beach attempt to chime. }

O joyless flood! O rough tempestuous main! 50

Bordered with weeds, and solitudes obscene![11]

Let me ne'er flow like thee! nor make thy stream

My sad example, or my wretched theme.

Like bombast now thy raging billows roar,

And vainly dash themselves against the shore; 55

About like quibbles now thy froth is thrown,

And all extremes are in a moment shown.

Snatch me, ye gods! from these Atlantic shores,

And shelter me in Windsor's fragrant bow'rs;

Or to my much loved Isis' walks convey, 60

And on her flow'ry banks for ever lay.

Thence let me view the venerable scene,

The awful dome, the groves' eternal green:

Where sacred Hough[12] long found his famed retreat,

And brought the muses to the sylvan seat, 65

Reformed the wits, unlocked the classic store,

And made that music which was noise before.

There with illustrious bards I spent my days

Nor free from censure, nor unknown to praise,

Enjoyed the blessings that his reign bestowed, 70

Nor envied Windsor in the soft abode.

The golden minutes smoothly danced away,

And tuneful bards beguiled the tedious day:

They sung, nor sung in vain, with numbers fired

That Maro taught, or Addison inspired. 75

Ev'n I essayed to touch the trembling string:

Who could hear them, and not attempt to sing?

Roused from these dreams by thy commanding strain,

I rise and wander through the field or plain;

Led by thy muse, from sport to sport I run, 80

Mark the stretched line, or hear the thund'ring gun.

Ah! how I melt with pity, when I spy

On the cold earth the flutt'ring pheasant lie;

His gaudy robes in dazzling lines appear,

And ev'ry feather shines and varies there. 85

Nor can I pass the gen'rous courser by, }

But while the prancing steed allures my eye, }

He starts, he's gone! and now I see him fly }

O'er hills and dales, and now I lose the course,

Nor can the rapid sight pursue the flying horse. 90

O could thy Virgil from his orb look down,

He'd view a courser that might match his own!

Fired with the sport, and eager for the chase,

Lodona's murmurs stop me in the race.

Who can refuse Lodona's melting tale? 95

The soft complaint shall over time prevail;

The tale be told, when shades forsake her shore,

The nymph be sung, when she can flow no more.

Nor shall thy song, old Thames! forbear to shine,

At once the subject and the song divine; 100

Peace, sung by thee, shall please ev'n Britons more

Than all their shouts for victory before.

Oh! could Britannia imitate thy stream,

The world should tremble at her awful name:

From various springs divided waters glide, 105

In diff'rent colours roll a diff'rent tide,

Murmur along their crooked banks awhile,

At once they murmur and enrich the isle;

A while distinct through many channels run,

But meet at last, and sweetly flow in one; 110

There joy to lose their long-distinguished names,

And make one glorious and immortal Thames.

ELIJAH FENTON.

TO MR. POPE.

IN IMITATION OF A GREEK EPIGRAM ON HOMER.[13]

When Phoebus, and the nine harmonious maids,

Of old assembled in the Thespian shades;

What theme, they cried, what high immortal air,

Befit these harps to sound, and thee to hear?

Replied the god: "Your loftiest notes employ, 5

To sing young Peleus, and the fall of Troy."

The wond'rous song with rapture they rehearse;

Then ask who wrought that miracle of verse?

He answered with a frown: "I now reveal

A truth, that envy bids me not conceal: 10

Retiring frequent to this laureat vale,

I warbled to the lyre that fav'rite tale,

Which, unobserved, a wand'ring Greek and blind,

Heard me repeat, and treasured in his mind;

And fired with thirst of more than mortal praise, 15

From me, the god of wit, usurped the bays.

But let vain Greece indulge her growing fame,

Proud with celestial spoils to grace her name;

Yet when my arts shall triumph in the west,

And the white isle with female pow'r is blest; 20

Fame, I foresee, will make reprisals there,

And the translator's palm to me transfer.

With less regret my claim I now decline,

The world will think his English Iliad mine."

DR. THOMAS PARNELL.

TO MR. POPE.

To praise, and still with just respect to praise

A bard triumphant in immortal bays,

The learn'd to show, the sensible commend,

Yet still preserve the province of the friend;

What life, what vigour must the lines require? 5

What music tune them, what affection fire?

O might thy genius in my bosom shine,

Thou should'st not fail of numbers worthy thine:

The brightest ancients might at once agree

To sing within my lays, and sing of thee. 10

Horace himself would own thou dost excel

In candid arts to play the critic well.

Ovid himself might wish to sing the dame

Whom Windsor Forest sees a gliding stream;

On silver feet, with annual osier crowned, 15

She runs for ever through poetic ground.

How flame the glories of Belinda's hair,

Made by thy muse the envy of the fair!

Less shone the tresses Egypt's princess wore,

Which sweet Callimachus so sung before. 20

Here courtly trifles set the world at odds;

Belles war with beaus, and whims descend for gods.

The new machines, in names of ridicule,

Mock the grave phrenzy of the chomic fool.

But know, ye fair, a point concealed with art, 25

The sylphs and gnomes are but a woman's heart.

The graces stand in sight; a satire-train

Peeps o'er their head, and laughs behind the scene.

In Fame's fair temple, o'er the boldest wits

Inshrined on high the sacred Virgil sits, 30

And sits in measures such as Virgil's muse

To place thee near him might be fond to choose.

How might he tune th' alternate reed with thee,

Perhaps a Strephon thou, a Daphnis he;

While some old Damon, o'er the vulgar wise, 35

Thinks he deserves, and thou deserv'st the prize!

Rapt with the thought, my fancy seeks the plains,

And turns me shepherd while I hear the strains.

Indulgent nurse of ev'ry tender gale,

Parent of flow'rets, old Arcadia, hail! 40

Here in the cool my limbs at ease I spread,

Here let thy poplars whisper o'er my head:

Still slide thy waters soft among the trees,

Thy aspens quiver in a breathing breeze!

Smile, all ye valleys, in eternal spring, 45

Be hushed, ye winds, while Pope and Virgil sing.

In English lays, and all sublimely great,

Thy Homer warms with all his ancient heat;

He shines in council, thunders in the fight,

And flames with ev'ry sense of great delight. 50

Long has that poet reigned, and long unknown,

Like monarchs sparkling on a distant throne;

In all the majesty of Greek retired;

Himself unknown, his mighty name admired;

His language failing wrapt him round with night; 55

Thine, raised by thee, recalls the work to light.

So wealthy mines, that ages long before

Fed the large realms around with golden ore,

When choked by sinking banks, no more appear,

And shepherds only say, the "mines were here:" 60

Should some rich youth (if nature warm his heart,

And all his projects stand informed with art)

Here clear the caves, there ope the leading vein;

The mines detected flame with gold again.

How vast, how copious, are thy new designs! 65

How ev'ry music varies in thy lines!

Still, as I read, I feel my bosom beat,

And rise in raptures by another's heat.

Thus in the wood, when summer dressed the days,

While Windsor lent us tuneful hours of ease, 70

Our ears the lark, the thrush, the turtle blest,

And Philomela sweetest o'er the rest:

The shades resound with song--O softly tread,

While a whole season warbles round my head.

This to my friend--and when a friend inspires, 75

My silent harp its master's hand requires;

Shakes off the dust, and makes these rocks resound;

For fortune placed me in unfertile ground;

Far from the joys that with my soul agree,

From wit, from learning--very far from thee. 80

Here moss-grown trees expand the smallest leaf;

Here half an acre's corn is half a sheaf;[14]

Here hills with naked heads the tempest meet,

Rocks at their sides, and torrents at their feet;

Or lazy lakes unconscious of a flood, 85

Whose dull, brown naiads ever sleep in mud.

Yet here content can dwell, and learned ease,

A friend delight me, and an author please;

Ev'n here I sing, when POPE supplies the theme,

Show my own love, though not increase his fame. 90

THE HON. SIMON HARCOURT.[15]

TO MR. POPE,

ON THE PUBLISHING HIS WORKS.

He comes, he comes! bid ev'ry bard prepare

The song of triumph, and attend his car.

Great Sheffield's[16] muse the long procession heads,

And throws a lustre o'er the pomp she leads;

First gives the palm she fired him to obtain, 5

Crowns his gay brow, and shows him how to reign.

Thus young Alcides, by old Chiron taught,

Was formed for all the miracles he wrought:

Thus Chiron did the youth he taught applaud,

Pleased to behold the earnest of a god. 10

But hark, what shouts, what gath'ring crowds rejoice!

Unstained their praise by any venal voice,

Such as th' ambitious vainly think their due,

When prostitutes, or needy flatt'rers sue.

And see the chief! before him laurels borne; 15

Trophies from undeserving temples torn;

Here Rage enchained reluctant raves, and there

Pale Envy dumb, and sick'ning with despair;

Prone to the earth she bends her loathing eye,

Weak to support the blaze of majesty. 20

But what are they that turn the sacred page?

Three lovely virgins, and of equal age;

Intent they read, and all enamoured seem,

As he that met his likeness in the stream:[17]

The Graces these; and see how they contend, 25

Who most shall praise, who best shall recommend.

The chariot now the painful steep ascends,

The paeans cease; thy glorious labour ends.

Here fixed, the bright eternal temple stands,[18]

Its prospect an unbounded view commands: 30

Say, wond'rous youth, what column wilt thou choose,

What laurelled arch for thy triumphant muse?

Though each great ancient court thee to his shrine,

Though ev'ry laurel through the dome be thine,

(From the proud epic,[19] down to those that shade 35

The gentler brow of the soft Lesbian maid)

Go to the good and just, an awful train,[20]

Thy soul's delight, and glory of the fane:

While through the earth thy dear remembrance flies,

"Sweet to the world, and grateful to the skies." 40

WILLIAM BROOME.

TO MR. POPE.[21]

Let vulgar souls triumphal arches raise,

Or speaking marbles, to record their praise,

And picture (to the voice of fame unknown)

The mimic feature on the breathing stone;

Mere mortals! subject to death's total sway, 5

Reptiles of earth, and beings of a day!

'Tis thine, on ev'ry heart to grave thy praise,

A monument which worth alone can raise:

Sure to survive, when time shall whelm in dust

The arch, the marble, and the mimic bust: 10

Nor till the volumes of th' expanded sky

Blaze in one flame, shalt thou and Homer die:

Then sink together in the world's last fires,

What heav'n created, and what heav'n inspires.

If aught on earth, when once this breath is fled, 15

With human transport touch the mighty dead,

Shakespear, rejoice! his hand thy page refines;

Now ev'ry scene with native brightness shines;[22]

Just to thy fame, he gives thy genuine thought;

So Tully published what Lucretius wrote; 20

Pruned by his care, thy laurels loftier grow,

And bloom afresh on thy immortal brow.

Thus when thy draughts, O Raphael! time invades,

And the bold figure from the canvas fades,

A rival hand recalls from ev'ry part 25

Some latent grace, and equals art with art;

Transported we survey the dubious strife,

While each fair image starts again to life.[23]

How long, untuned, had Homer's sacred lyre

Jarred grating discord, all extinct his fire! 30

This you beheld; and taught by heav'n to sing,

Called the loud music from the sounding string.

Now waked from slumbers of three thousand years,

Once more Achilles in dread pomp appears,

Towers o'er the field of death; as fierce he turns, 35

Keen flash his arms, and all the hero burns;

With martial stalk, and more than mortal might,

He strides along, and meets the gods in fight:

Then the pale Titans, chained on burning floors,

Start at the din that rends th' infernal shores, 40

Tremble the tow'rs of heav'n, earth rocks her coasts,

And gloomy Pluto shakes with all his ghosts.

To ev'ry theme responds thy various lay;

Here rolls a torrent, there meanders play;

Sonorous as the storm thy numbers rise, 45

Toss the wild waves, and thunder in the skies;

Or softer than a yielding virgin's sigh,

The gentle breezes breathe away and die.

Thus, like the radiant god who sheds the day,

You paint the vale, or gild the azure way; 50

And while with ev'ry theme the verse complies,

Sink without grov'ling, without rashness rise.

Proceed, great bard! awake th' harmonious string,

Be ours all Homer; still Ulysses sing.

How long[24] that hero, by unskilful hands, 55

Stripped of his robes, a beggar trod our lands!

Such as he wandered o'er his native coast,

Shrunk by the wand, and all the warrior lost;

O'er his smooth skin a bark of wrinkles spread;

Old age disgraced the honours of his head; 60

Nor longer in his heavy eye-ball shined

The glance divine, forth-beaming from the mind.

But you, like Pallas, ev'ry limb infold

With royal robes, and bid him shine in gold;

Touched by your hand his manly frame improves 65

With grace divine, and like a god he moves.

Ev'n I, the meanest of the muses' train,

Inflamed by thee, attempt a nobler strain;

Advent'rous waken the Maeonian lyre,

Tuned by your hand, and sing as you inspire: 70

So armed by great Achilles for the fight,

Patroclus conquered in Achilles' right:

Like theirs, our friendship! and I boast my name

To thine united--for thy friendship's fame.

This labour past, of heav'nly subjects sing, 75

While hov'ring angels listen on the wing,

To hear from earth such heart-felt raptures rise,

As, when they sing, suspended hold the skies:

Or nobly rising in fair virtue's cause,

From thy own life transcribe th' unerring laws: 80

Teach a bad world beneath her sway to bend:

To verse like thine fierce savages attend,

And men more fierce: when Orpheus tunes the lay,

Ev'n fiends relenting hear their rage away.

LORD LYTTELTON.[25]

TO MR. POPE.[26]

_From Rome, 1730._

Immortal bard! for whom each muse has wove

The fairest garlands of th' Aonian grove;

Preserved, our drooping genius to restore,

When Addison and Congreve are no more;

After so many stars extinct in night, 5

The darkened age's last remaining light!

To thee from Latian realms this verse is writ,

Inspired by memory of ancient wit:

For now no more these climes their influence boast,

Fall'n is their glory, and their virtue lost: 10

From tyrants, and from priests, the muses fly,

Daughters of reason and of liberty.

Nor Baiae now, nor Umbria's plain they love,

Nor on the banks of Nar, or Mincio rove;

To Thames's flow'ry borders they retire, 15

And kindle in thy breast the Roman fire.

So in the shades, where cheered with summer rays

Melodious linnets warbled sprightly lays,

Soon as the faded, falling leaves complain

Of gloomy winter's unauspicious reign, 20

No tuneful voice is heard of joy or love,

But mournful silence saddens all the grove.

Unhappy Italy! whose altered state

Has felt the worst severity of fate:

Not that barbarian hands her fasces broke 25

And bowed her haughty neck beneath their yoke;

Nor that her palaces to earth are thrown,

Her cities desert, and her fields unsown;

But that her ancient spirit is decayed,

That sacred wisdom from her bounds is fled, 30

That there the source of science flows no more,

Whence its rich streams supplied the world before.

Illustrious names! that once in Latium shined,

Born to instruct, and to command mankind;

Chiefs, by whose virtue mighty Rome was raised, 35

And poets, who those chiefs sublimely praised!

Oft I the traces you have left explore,

Your ashes visit, and your urns adore;

Oft kiss, with lips devout, some mould'ring stone,

With ivy's venerable shade o'ergrown; 40

Those hallowed ruins better pleased to see

Than all the pomp of modern luxury.

As late on Virgil's tomb fresh flow'rs I strowed,

While with th' inspiring muse my bosom glowed,

Crowned with eternal bays my ravished eyes 45

Beheld the poet's awful form arise:

Stranger, he said, whose pious hand has paid

These grateful rites to my attentive shade,

When thou shalt breathe thy happy native air,

To Pope this message from his master bear: 50

"Great bard! whose numbers I myself inspire,

To whom I gave my own harmonious lyre,

If high exalted on the throne of wit,

Near me and Homer thou aspire to sit,

No more let meaner satire dim the rays, 55

That flow majestic from thy nobler bays;

In all the flow'ry paths of Pindus stray,

But shun that thorny, that unpleasing way;

Nor, when each soft engaging muse is thine,

Address the least attractive of the nine. 60

"Of thee more worthy were the task to raise

A lasting column to thy country's praise,

To sing the land, which yet alone can boast

That liberty corrupted Rome has lost,

Where science in the arms of peace is laid, 65

And plants her palm beneath the olive's shade.

Such was the theme for which my lyre I strung,

Such was the people whose exploits I sung;

Brave, yet refined, for arms and arts renowned,

With diff'rent bays by Mars and Phoebus crowned, 70

Dauntless opposers of tyrannic sway,

But pleased, a mild AUGUSTUS to obey.

"If these commands submissive thou receive,

Immortal and unblamed thy name shall live;

Envy to black Cocytus shall retire, 75

And howl with furies in tormenting fire;

Approving time shall consecrate thy lays,

And join the patriot's to the poet's praise."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: The Recommendatory poems addressed to Pope are without

exception dull, insipid productions, which never rise above mediocrity,

and sometimes fall below it. Only those are reprinted here which he

himself prefixed to his works. The first seven appeared in the quarto of

1717, and the remaining two in the octavo of 1736.]

[Footnote 2: Legally speaking, of Buckingham_shire_; for he would not

take the title of Buckingham, under a fear that there was lurking

somewhere or other a claim to that title amongst the connections of the

Villiers family. He was a pompous grandee, who lived in uneasy

splendour, and, as a writer, most extravagantly overrated: accordingly,

he is now forgotten. Such was his vanity, and his ridiculous mania for

allying himself with royalty, that he first of all had the presumption

to court the Princess (afterwards Queen) Anne. Being rejected, he then

offered himself to the illegitimate daughter of James II. by the

daughter of Sir Charles Sedley. She was as ostentatious as himself, and

accepted him.--DE QUINCEY.

Pope commenced the interchange of praise with the Duke of Buckingham by

celebrating him in the Essay on Criticism. The return verses of the Duke

are little better than drivelling. His Essay on Satire and Essay on

Poetry are his principal works, but though one was retouched by Dryden

and the other by Pope, they are very second-rate performances. The Duke

died in February, 1721, aged 72.]

[Footnote 3: Anne, wife of Heneage, fifth Earl of Winchelsea, and

daughter of Sir William Kingsmill. She died on Aug. 5, 1720.--CROKER.

She wrote a tragedy called Aristomenes, or the Royal Shepherd, to which

Pope may be supposed to allude in his letter to Caryll of Dec. 15, 1713,

where he says, "I was invited to dinner to my Lady Winchelsea, and after

dinner to hear a play read, at both which I sat in great disorder with

sickness at my head and stomach." Pope omitted her rugged, bald, prosaic

verses in 1736, probably because they were intrinsically worthless, and

because the name of the author had ceased to carry any weight. In 1727

and 1732 they were printed with Pope's poems in Lintot's Miscellany, and

doubtless with the sanction of Pope himself.]

[Footnote 4: These verses, with the heading, "To my friend Mr. Pope, on

his Pastorals," originally appeared in 1709, in the same volume of

Tonson's Miscellany which contained the Pastorals themselves. In the

fifth edition of Lintot's Miscellany, 1727, and in the sixth edition,

1732, the poem of Wycherley, who was then dead, is prefixed to Pope's

pieces, and bears the title, "To Mr. Pope at sixteen years old, on

occasion of his Pastorals." This was untrue, and seems designed to

convey a false idea of Pope's precocity. The lines were not addressed to

him till he was twenty, as appears from Wycherley's letter of May 18,

1708, in which he says, "I have made a compliment in verse upon the

printing your Pastorals which you shall see when you see me." Dennis,

and others, accused Pope of being the author of the flattering tribute.

The poet appealed in refutation of the charge to Wycherley's letters,

and added that the first draught, and corrected copy of the panegyric,

which were still extant in the Harley library in Wycherley's

handwriting, would show "that if they received any alteration from Mr.

Pope it was in the omission of some of his own praises." Documents to

which nobody had access proved nothing. Mr. Croker considered that there

was strong internal evidence from the smoothness of the rhythm, the

antithetical style, and the nature of the commendation, that Pope must

have assisted in reducing the lines to their present shape. The

mannerism of both authors can be clearly traced in them. They have the

stamp of Wycherley, improved by Pope.]

[Footnote 5: If Wycherley had been capable of anything of the kind,

this, and the previous couplet, might have been written after the Essay

on Criticism, but surely could not have been inspired by a perusal of

the manuscript of the Pastorals.--CROKER.]

[Footnote 6: This line was omitted by Pope in 1736.]

[Footnote 7: From Boileau's Art of Poetry, Chant ii. v. 1.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 8: This triplet was omitted by Pope in the edition of 1736.]

[Footnote 9: Francis Knapp, of Chilton, in Berkshire, Gent. He was of

St. John's College, Oxford, and afterwards demy of Magdalen

College.--CUNNINGHAM.

He graduated M.A. April 30, 1695, and as he could hardly have been an

M.A. before he was twenty-five, he would have been forty-five at the

date of these verses. There is a rhyming "Epistle to Mr. B----, by Mr.

Fr. Knapp, of Magdalen College, in Oxford," in Tonson's Fourth

Miscellany.--CROKER.

He died in, or before 1727; for in one of Lintot's advertisements of

that year he is described as the "_late_ Rev. Mr. Francis Knapp, Dean of

Killala."]

[Footnote 10: There are several lines in this copy of verses, which

could not be endured in a common magazine. So much is the public ear,

and public taste improved.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 11: The next six lines were left out by Pope in 1736.]

[Footnote 12: Hough was chosen president of Magdalen College in April,

1687, in defiance of the mandate sent by James II. to the fellows,

requiring them to elect Farmer, a profligate and a papist. The illegal

proceedings of the king in dispossessing the protestants, and filling

the college with romanists, alarmed and enraged the country, and

contributed largely to the Revolution of 1688. In May, 1690, Hough

became Bishop of Oxford. He was translated to Lichfield and Coventry in

1699, and to Worcester in 1717, where he remained till his death in May,

1743, at the age of ninety-three.]

[Footnote 13: By far the most elegant, and best turned compliment of all

addressed to our author, happily borrowed from a fine Greek epigram, and

most gracefully applied.--WARTON.

There is little merit in borrowing a compliment from the Anthology, and

the felicity of its application in the present instance may be

questioned, notwithstanding the emphatic praise of Warton. The

mythological basis of the lines, which is appropriate in the Greek,

becomes childish when adopted by an English poet, and the point of the

piece, which turns upon the assumption that Pope's translation was

vastly superior to the original, is too extravagant to be pleasing.

Fenton was a scholar, and could not have thought what he said.]

[Footnote 14: "I would add," says Dr. Johnson, in his Life of Parnell,

"that the description of barrenness in his verses to Pope was borrowed

from Secundus, but lately searching for the passage, which I had

formerly read, I could not find it." The borrowed description is the

only tolerable part of the poem, which is in a clumsy strain, unlike the

usual easy style of Parnell.]

[Footnote 15: He was only son to the Lord Chancellor Harcourt, and died

in 1720.--ROSCOE.]

[Footnote 16: It was paying pitiful homage to rank to call an

indifferent versifier, like the Duke of Buckingham, "great Sheffield,"

and pretend that he was the instructor and model of Pope.]

[Footnote 17: The comparison of the three Graces, admiring the

reflection of themselves in Pope's works, to Narcissus enamoured of his

own face in the stream, is a ludicrous conceit, and the execution is on

a par with the idea.]

[Footnote 18: This paragraph refers to Pope's Temple of Fame.]

[Footnote 19: Pope's genius was not epic, and the only epic poem he

composed was his juvenile effort, Alcander, which he burnt because it

was too worthless to be preserved.]

[Footnote 20: This and the concluding verse are from the Temple of

Fame.]

[Footnote 21: These lines first appeared in 1726, in the translation of

the Odyssey, where they were appended by Broome to the final note. Pope

inserted them in the 8vo edition of his works in 1736.]

[Footnote 22: This was a compliment our author could not take much

pleasure in reading; for he could not value himself on his edition of

Shakespeare.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 23: The comparison on both sides is wanting in truth. The

superficial researches, and meagre notes of Pope did not renovate

Shakespeare, and no second Raphael has repainted the pictures of Raphael

the first. Fitness of praise was a merit which the writers of

commendatory verses commonly despised. Their study was to outvie each

other in the grossness, and insincerity of their flattery.]

[Footnote 24: Odyssey, lib. xvi.--BROOME.]

[Footnote 25: Pope inserted this tribute among the Recommendatory poems

prefixed to the 8vo edition of his works, 1736. Lyttelton was not raised

to the peerage till November, 1757, twenty-seven years after the date of

his verses.]

[Footnote 26: Warton prefers Fenton's verses, but in my opinion these

lines of Lord Lyttelton's are much superior to all the other

recommendatory verses. They are as elegant and correct in themselves, as

the sentiments they convey appear sincere, and worthy an ingenuous,

cultivated, and liberal mind. There is a small inaccuracy in one or two

expressions, and perhaps it would have been better if Virgil's speech,

which forms the conclusion, had been compressed.--BOWLES.]

TRANSLATIONS.

ADVERTISEMENT.

The following Translations were selected from many others done by the

author in his youth; for the most part indeed but a sort of exercises,

while he was improving himself in the languages, and carried by his

early bent to poetry to perform them rather in verse than prose. Mr.

Dryden's Fables came out about that time,[1] which occasioned the

translations from Chaucer. They were first separately printed in

Miscellanies by J. Tonson and B. Lintot, and afterwards collected in the

quarto edition of 1717. The Imitations of English Authors, which are

added at the end, were done as early; some of them at fourteen or

fifteen years old; but having also got into Miscellanies, we have put

them here together to complete this juvenile volume.[2]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: In the year 1700. They were the most popular of Dryden's

works, and were in the hands of every reader when Pope was learning his

art.]

[Footnote 2: This advertisement was first prefixed by Pope to vol. iii.

of his works, 8vo, 1736. The contents of the "juvenile volume" were The

Temple of Fame, Sappho to Phaon, Vertumnus and Pomona, The Fable of

Dryope, The first book of Statius's Thebais, January and May, The Wife

of Bath's Prologue, and the Imitations of English Poets. Pope apologises

for printing the Imitations by saying that they had got into

Miscellanies, which is an insinuation that the pieces had found their

way to the press without his consent. It was he himself who published

them. They are inserted in the present edition among the minor poems.]

THE

FIRST BOOK OF STATIUS:

HIS

THEBAIS.

TRANSLATED IN THE YEAR 1703.

The translator hopes he need not apologise for his choice of this piece,

which was made almost in his childhood. But finding the version better

upon review than he expected from those years, he was easily prevailed

on to give it some correction, the rather because no part of this author

(at least that he knows of) has been tolerably turned into our

language.[1]--POPE.

It was in his childhood only that Pope could make choice of so

injudicious a writer as Statius to translate. It were to be wished that

no youth of genius were suffered ever to look into Statius, Lucan,

Claudian, or Seneca the tragedian,--authors who, by their forced

conceits, by their violent metaphors, by their swelling epithets, by

their want of a just decorum, have a strong tendency to dazzle, and to

mislead inexperienced minds, and tastes unformed, from the true relish

of possibility, propriety, simplicity, and nature. Statius had

undoubtedly invention, ability, and spirit; but his images are gigantic

and outrageous, and his sentiments tortured and hyperbolical. One cannot

forbear reflecting on the short duration of a true taste in poetry among

the Romans. From the time of Lucretius to that of Statius was no more

than about one hundred and forty-seven years; and if I might venture to

pronounce so rigorous a sentence, I would say, that the Romans can boast

of but eight poets who are unexceptionably excellent,--namely, Terence,

Lucretius, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, Phaedrus.

These only can be called legitimate models of just thinking and writing.

Succeeding authors, as it happens in all countries, resolving to be

original and new, and to avoid the imputation of copying, become

distorted and unnatural. By endeavouring to open an unbeaten path, they

deserted simplicity and truth; weary of common and obvious beauties,

they must needs hunt for remote and artificial decorations.

It is plain that Pope was not blind to the faults of Statius, many of

which he points out with judgment and truth, in a letter to Mr.

Cromwell, written in 1708{9}. After this censure of Statius's manner, it

is but justice to add, that in the Thebais there are many strokes of a

strong imagination; and, indeed, the picture of Amphiaraus, swallowed up

suddenly by a chasm that opened in the ground, is truly

sublime.--WARTON.

Statius was a favourite writer with the poets of the middle ages. His

bloated magnificence of description, gigantic images, and pompous

diction suited their taste, and were somewhat of a piece with the

romances they so much admired. They neglected the gentler and genuine

graces of Virgil, which they could not relish. His pictures were too

correctly and chastely drawn to take their fancies; and truth of design,

elegance of expression, and the arts of composition, were not their

object.--T. WARTON.

In this translation there are some excellent passages, particularly

those pointed out by Dr. Warton--"O father Phoebus," v. 829, and the

exquisite lines descriptive of evening, "'Twas now the time," &c., 474;

but some of the most striking images are omitted, some added, and some

misunderstood. Let us however confess, that the versification is truly

wonderful, considering the age of the author. It would be endless to

point out more particularly occasional errors and inaccuracies, in a

composition which can be considered no otherwise than as an

extraordinary specimen of versification, before the writer's judgment

and taste were matured.--BOWLES.

According to the information which Pope gave to Spence, he commenced an

epic poem at thirteen, and wrote four books of about a thousand verses

each.[2] As his taste and judgment improved, he discovered the crudeness

of his early flights, and for a while he almost relinquished his

attempts at original composition, "My first taking to imitating," he

said, "was not out of vanity, but humility. I saw how defective my own

things were; and I endeavoured to mend my manner by copying good strokes

from others."[3] "In my rambles through the poets," he said again, "when

I met with a passage or story that pleased me more than ordinary, I used

to endeavour to imitate it, or translate it into English; and this gave

rise to my imitations published so long after."[4] In speaking of Pope's

youthful efforts, Spence uses the word "imitation" as synonymous with

"translation." "Some of his first exercises," he says, "were

_imitations_ of the stories that pleased him most in Ovid, or any other

poet that he was reading. I have one of these original exercises now by

me in his own hand. It is the story of Acis and Galatea, from Ovid; and

was _translated_ when he was but fourteen years old."[5] Pope appears to

have sometimes employed the term imitation with the same latitude, and

probably meant by it that he endeavoured to imitate, in the English turn

of expression, the distinctive beauties of the original Latin or Greek.

"In the scattered lessons I used to set myself," he said, "I translated

above a quarter of the Metamorphoses, and that part of Statius which was

afterwards printed with the corrections of Walsh."[6] The notion, in

which Bowles and others acquiesced, that the published translations are

a true index of Pope's skill at fourteen, will not bear investigation.

Of the Metamorphoses he brought out only two little fragments, which

appeared many years later, when they had undergone a thorough revision.

The rest of the manuscript would not have been sacrificed if the version

had been fit for the public eye without the toil of recasting it.

Spence, who possessed the Acis and Galatea, did not think it worth

printing as a specimen of Pope's boyish abilities, even when the

curiosity respecting his works was at its height. The suppression of all

his early pieces, which had not been submitted to a subsequent

renovation, is a plain proof of their inferiority. The first translation

which he gave to the world was the "Episode of Sarpedon, from the

twelfth and sixteenth books of Homer's Iliads." This, and his Pastorals,

appeared together, in May, 1709, in Tonson's Sixth Miscellany, and Pope

was then twenty-one.

The fragment from Homer included the speech of Sarpedon to Glaucus. "It

has," said the poet, "been rendered in English by Sir John Denham, after

whom the translator had not the vanity to attempt it for any other

reason, than that the episode must have been very imperfect without so

noble a part of it." Denham at that period had a much more brilliant

reputation than he afterwards retained, and though Pope adopted the

language of humility, he must have felt an inward pride in the

consciousness that he had distanced so famous a name. His great

superiority did not admit of a question, and he must have been well

aware that it was his interest to invite a comparison. The specimen was

shown in manuscript to Trumbull, who, in his admiration, urged Pope to

give a complete translation of the Iliad. The exhortations of Trumbull

did not bear fruit till 1713. "I cannot," Pope wrote to him in the

November of that year, "deny myself the pleasure of acquainting you how

great a proof I have given of my deference to your opinion and judgment,

which has at last moved me to undertake the translation of Homer. I can

honestly say Sir William Trumbull was not only the first that put this

into my thoughts, but the principal encourager I had in it, and though

now almost all the distinguished names of quality or learning in the

nation have subscribed to it, there is not one of which I am so proud as

of yours." When the first volume of the translation appeared in 1715,

Pope paid his acknowledgments in the Preface to the eminent men who had

specially patronised the work. Not only does he make no mention of

Trumbull, but he professes to have yielded to the counsel of a greater

authority, and says, "Mr. Addison was the first whose advice determined

me to undertake the task." Either the statement in the Preface, or the

statement in the letter must be inaccurate, though both Addison and

Trumbull may have recommended the scheme.

The "Episode of Sarpedon" is now incorporated in the complete

translation to which it led the way. It was not till three years after

he had published the fragment from Homer that Pope brought out his

translations from the Latin, of which the most ambitious is his version

of the first book of the Thebais. He told Spence that in his boyhood "he

liked extremely a translation of a part of Statius by some very bad

hand." This work bore the title of "An Essay upon Statius, or the five

first books of P. P. Statius his Thebais. Done into English verse by

T[homas] S[tephens], London, 1648." The verse into which Stephens did

his author was for the most part rugged and prosaic, but a few passages

are happily turned, and his successor did not disdain to borrow some

lines and phrases from him. The principal advantage, however, to Pope of

Stephens's attempt was that it enabled him to interpret the original;

for his classical education had been defective, and it is clear from his

own account, that he could not, without assistance, have construed the

Thebais correctly. At eight years of age he was taught his accidence by

a priest.[7] He afterwards went to a couple of small schools, where "he

lost what he had gained" from his first instructor.[8] "When I came," he

said, "from the last of them, all the acquisition I had made was to be

able to construe a little of Tully's Offices."[9] For a few months he

had another priest for his tutor, and was then left, between twelve and

thirteen, to his own resources.[10] The foundation was slight, and he

proceeded to raise upon it a hasty superstructure. "I did not," he said,

"follow the grammar, but rather hunted in the authors for a syntax of my

own; and then began translating any parts that pleased me, particularly

in the best Greek and Latin poets. I got the languages by hunting after

the stories in the several poets I read, rather than read the books to

get the language."[11] He, on another occasion, told Spence that he

thought himself the better in some respects for not having had a regular

education, since it caused him to read for the sense, whereas schoolboys

were taught to read for words.[12] The process was fatal to scholarship.

Ignorant, in a great degree, of the rules and idioms of the Latin

tongue, it was impossible he should translate with ease or accuracy. But

his peculiar training doubtless favoured the early development of his

poetic powers. He devoted his boyish years, when the mind was most

pliable, to the cultivation of his art, and this incessant practice of

versification from childhood was the cause of his precocious

excellence.

Pope's admiration for Statius continued throughout his later boyhood,

and he preferred him to "all the Latin poets, by much, next to

Virgil."[13] He soon began to turn the Thebais into English, and he

affirms that his version of the first book was made in 1703. In a note

to his letter to Cromwell of Jan. 22, 1709, he placed it earlier still,

and declares that it was "done when the author was but fourteen years

old." These statements convey an erroneous impression. It appears from

the correspondence with Cromwell that more than one-third of the

translation was not in existence by January, 1709, when Pope was in his

twenty-first year. The piece was not published till 1712, when it came

out in Lintot's Miscellany, and the poet at that period was twenty-four.

The portions which were not recently translated, were newly corrected,

and the whole represents the powers of the man who completed the task,

and not of the boy who commenced it.

The translation of the first book of the Thebais must be more highly

estimated as a specimen of versification than as an adequate

representation of the original. The harmony and phraseology of

particular passages are delicious, and verse and language throughout are

polished in a high degree. There is one pervading exception to Pope's

metrical skill. He has recourse incessantly to an unnatural order of

words, and especially he produces his rhymes by placing the verb after

the noun it ought to precede. Of this license Dryden says, "We were

whipped at Westminster if we used it twice together. I should judge him

to have little command of English whom the necessity of a rhyme should

force upon this rock, though sometimes it cannot easily be avoided."

Pope availed himself of the false construction with a freedom which

seriously deforms and enfeebles much of his poetry. He fell into the

error before he had discrimination to perceive the blemish, and when his

judgment was more mature habit had reconciled him to the distortion.

Warton has not exaggerated the defects of Statius, but he has underrated

his merits. The descriptions in the Thebais are vivid, and abound in

picturesque circumstances, and natural traits of character. Pope's

translation is more vague. His narrative is less perspicuous, less

dramatic, less spirited, and less life-like than the original. "There

are numberless particulars blameworthy in our author," Pope wrote to

Cromwell, "which I have tried to soften in the version."[14] He was not

successful in this attempt. Where he departs from his text he seldom

tempers an extravagance, and has more often rejected a beauty, or

smoothed it down into insipidity. His juvenile taste was for polished

generalities, and he shunned circumstantial nature. He had still less

relish for primitive simplicity, and he thought that some of the

incidents in the Thebais were too humble to be endured.

"When Statius," he says, "comes to the scene of his poem, and the prize

in dispute between the brothers, he gives us a very mean opinion of

it,--_pugna est de paupere regno_--very different from the conduct of

his master, Virgil, who at the entrance of his poem informs the reader

of the greatness of his subject."[15] Pope was led astray by the

equivocal meaning of a word. There is no connection between the

greatness of a kingdom, and the greatness of a theme for poetic

purposes. The poverty of Scotland did not detract from the tragic

grandeur of Macbeth. When the fugitive princes in the Thebais quarrel in

the vestibule, where they have taken shelter from the storm, and fight

with their fists, Pope confused the narrative by omitting the whole

account as inconsistent with epic dignity, and sacrificed the

characteristics of the original to assimilate the manners to modern

usages. If his criticisms had been well founded he should yet have kept

to his text. "The sense of an author," says Dryden, "is, generally

speaking, to be sacred and inviolable. If the fancy of Ovid be

luxuriant, it is his character to be so; and, if I retrench it, he is no

longer Ovid. It will be replied that he receives advantage by this

lopping of his superfluous branches; but I rejoin that a translator has

no such right. When a painter copies from the life, I suppose he has no

privilege to alter features and lineaments, under pretence that his

picture will look better; perhaps the face which he has drawn would be

more exact if the eyes or nose were altered; but it is his business to

make it resemble the original." Pope has rendered a few passages with

equal beauty and truth, but on the whole the antique colouring, the

dramatic traits, and picturesque details are very imperfectly preserved.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: This brief introduction is from Lintot's Miscellany. In the

edition of his works in 1736 Pope omitted the final clause which follows

the word "correction."]

[Footnote 2: Singer's Spence, p. 209, 211.]

[Footnote 3: Spence, p. 211.]

[Footnote 4: Spence, p. 146.]

[Footnote 5: Spence, p. 214.]

[Footnote 6: Spence, p. 210.]

[Footnote 7: Spence, p. 214.]

[Footnote 8: Spence, p. 146.]

[Footnote 9: Spence, p. 204.]

[Footnote 10: Spence, p. 146.]

[Footnote 11: Spence, p. 146, 196.]

[Footnote 12: Spence, p. 211.]

[Footnote 13: Spence, p. 209, 211.]

[Footnote 14: Pope to Cromwell, June 10, 1709.]

[Footnote 15: Pope to Cromwell, Jan. 22, 1709.]

ARGUMENT

Oedipus, King of Thebes, having by mistake slain his father Laius, and

married his mother Jocasta, put out his own eyes, and resigned the realm

to his sons, Eteocles and Polynices. Being neglected by them, he makes

his prayer to the Fury Tisiphone, to sow debate betwixt the brothers.

They agree at last to reign singly, each a year by turns, and the first

lot is obtained by Eteocles. Jupiter, in a council of the gods, declares

his resolution of punishing the Thebans, and Argives also, by means of a

marriage betwixt Polynices and one of the daughters of Adrastus, king of

Argos. Juno opposes, but to no effect, and Mercury is sent on a message

to the shades, to the ghost of Laius, who is to appear to Eteocles, and

provoke him to break the agreement. Polynices in the meantime departs

from Thebes by night, is overtaken by a storm, and arrives at Argos,

where he meets with Tydeus, who had fled from Calydon, having killed his

brother. Adrastus entertains them, having received an oracle from Apollo

that his daughters should be married to a boar and a lion, which he

understands to be meant of these strangers, by whom the hides of those

beasts were worn, and who arrived at the time when he kept an annual

feast in honour of that god. The rise of this solemnity he relates to

his guests, the loves of Phoebus and Psamathe, and the story of

Choroebus. He inquires, and is made acquainted with their descent and

quality. The sacrifice is renewed, and the book concludes with a hymn to

Apollo.

THE FIRST BOOK

OF

STATIUS'S THEBAIS.

Fraternal rage, the guilty Thebes' alarms,

Th' alternate reign destroyed by impious arms,

Demand our song; a sacred fury fires

My ravished breast, and all the muse inspires.

O goddess, say, shall I deduce my rhymes 5

From the dire[1] nation in its early times,

Europa's rape, Agenor's stern decree,

And Cadmus searching round the spacious sea?

How with the serpent's teeth he sowed the soil,

And reaped an iron harvest of his toil?[2] 10

Or how from joining stones the city sprung,

While to his harp divine Amphion sung?[3]

Or shall I Juno's hate to Thebes resound,

Whose fatal rage th' unhappy monarch found?[4]

The sire against the son his arrows drew, 15

O'er the wide fields the furious mother flew,

And while her arms a second hope contain,

Sprung from the rocks and plunged into the main.

But waive whate'er to Cadmus may belong,

And fix, O muse! the barrier of thy song 20

At Oedipus: from his disasters trace

The long confusions of his guilty race:

Nor yet attempt to stretch thy bolder wing,

And mighty Caesar's[5] conqu'ring eagles sing;

How twice he tamed proud Ister's rapid flood, 25

While Dacian mountains streamed with barb'rous blood;

Twice taught the Rhine beneath his laws to roll,

And stretched his empire to the frozen pole;

Or long before, with early valour, strove,

In youthful arms, t' assert the cause of Jove.[6] 30

And thou, great heir of all thy father's fame,

Increase of glory to the Latian name,

Oh! bless thy Rome with an eternal reign,

Nor let desiring worlds entreat in vain.

What though the stars contract their heav'nly space, 35

And crowd their shining ranks to yield thee place;

Though all the skies, ambitious of thy sway,

Conspire to court thee from our world away;

Though Phoebus longs to mix his rays with thine,

And in thy glories more serenely shine; 40

Though Jove himself no less content would be

To part his throne and share his heaven with thee;

Yet stay, great Caesar! and vouchsafe to reign

O'er the wide earth, and o'er the wat'ry main;

Resign to Jove his empire of the skies, 45

And people heav'n with Roman deities.[7]

The time will come, when a diviner flame[8]

Shall warm my breast to sing of Caesar's fame:

Meanwhile permit, that my preluding muse

In Theban wars an humbler theme may chuse: 50

Of furious hate surviving death, she sings,

A fatal throne to two contending kings,

And fun'ral flames that, parting wide in air,

Express the discord of the souls they bear:[9]

Of towns dispeopled, and the wand'ring ghosts 55

Of kings unburied in the wasted coasts;

When Dirce's fountain blushed with Grecian blood,[10]

And Thetis, near Ismenos'[11] swelling flood,

With dread beheld the rolling surges sweep,

In heaps, his slaughtered sons into the deep.[12] 60

What hero, Clio! wilt thou first relate?[13]

The rage of Tydeus,[14] or the prophet's fate?[15]

Or how, with hills of slain on ev'ry side,

Hippomedon repelled the hostile tide?[16]

Or how the youth[17] with ev'ry grace adorned 65

Untimely fell, to be for ever mourned?

Then to fierce Capaneus thy verse extend,

And sing with horror his prodigious end.[18]

Now wretched Oedipus, deprived of sight,

Led a long death in everlasting night; 70

But while he dwells where not a cheerful ray

Can pierce the darkness, and abhors the day,

The clear reflecting mind presents his sin

In frightful views, and makes it day within;

Returning thoughts in endless circles roll, 75

And thousand furies haunt his guilty soul:

The wretch then lifted to th' unpitying skies

Those empty orbs from whence he tore his eyes,

Whose wounds, yet fresh, with bloody hands he strook,[19]

While from his breast these dreadful accents broke. 80

"Ye gods! that o'er the gloomy regions reign,

Where guilty spirits feel eternal pain;

Thou, sable Styx! whose livid streams are rolled

Through dreary coasts, which I though blind behold:

Tisiphone,[20] that oft hast heard my pray'r, 85

Assist, if Oedipus deserve thy care!

If you received me from Jocasta's womb,[21]

And nursed the hope of mischiefs yet to come:

If leaving Polybus, I took my way,[22]

To Cirrha's temple[23] on that fatal day, 90

When by the son the trembling father died,

Where the three roads the Phocian fields divide:

If I the Sphinx's riddles durst explain,

Taught by thyself to win the promised reign:[24]

If wretched I, by baleful furies led, 95

With monstrous mixture stained my mother's bed,

For hell and thee begot an impious brood,

And with full lust those horrid joys renewed;

Then self-condemned to shades of endless night,

Forced from these orbs the bleeding balls of sight: 100

Oh hear! and aid the vengeance I require,

If worthy thee, and what thou mightst inspire.

My sons their old, unhappy sire despise,

Spoiled of his kingdom, and deprived of eyes;

Guideless I wander, unregarded mourn, 105

Whilst these exalt their sceptres o'er my urn;

These sons, ye gods! who with flagitious pride

Insult my darkness, and my groans deride.

Art thou a father, unregarding Jove![25]

And sleeps thy thunder in the realms above? 110

Thou fury, then some lasting curse entail,

Which o'er their children's children shall prevail:[26]

Place on their heads that crown distained with gore,

Which these dire hands from my slain father tore;[27]

Go! and a parent's heavy curses bear; } 115

Break all the bonds of nature, and prepare[28] }

Their kindred souls to mutual hate and war. }

Give them to dare, what I might wish to see

Blind as I am, some glorious villainy!

Soon shalt thou find, if thou but arm their hands, 120

Their ready guilt preventing[29] thy commands:

Couldst thou some great, proportioned mischief frame,

They'd prove the father from whose loins they came."

The fury heard, while on Cocytus'[30] brink

Her snakes untied, sulphureous waters drink; 125

But at the summons rolled her eyes around,

And snatched the starting serpents from the ground.

Not half so swiftly shoots along in air

The gliding lightning, or descending star.

Through crowds of airy shades she winged her flight, 130

And dark dominions of the silent night;

Swift as she passed the flitting ghosts withdrew,[31]

And the pale spectres trembled at her view:

To th' iron gates of Taenarus[32] she flies,

There spreads her dusky pinions to the skies. 135

The day beheld, and sick'ning at the sight,

Veiled her fair glories in the shades of night.

Affrighted Atlas, on the distant shore,

Trembled, and shook the heav'ns and gods he bore.[33]

Now from beneath Malea's[34] airy height 140

Aloft she sprung, and steered to Thebes her flight;

With eager speed the well-known journey[35] took,

Nor here regrets the hell she late forsook.

A hundred snakes her gloomy visage shade,

A hundred serpents guard her horrid head, 145

In her sunk eye-balls dreadful meteors glow:[36]

Such rays from Phoebe's bloody circle flow,

When lab'ring with strong charms, she shoots from high

A fiery gleam, and reddens all the sky.

Blood stained her cheeks, and from her mouth there came 150

Blue steaming poisons, and a length of flame:

From ev'ry blast of her contagious breath

Famine and drought proceed, and plagues, and death.

A robe obscene was o'er her shoulders thrown,

A dress by fates and furies worn alone. 155

She tossed her meagre arms; her better hand[37]

In waving circles whirled a fun'ral brand:

A serpent from her left was seen to rear

His flaming crest, and lash the yielding air.[38]

But when the fury took her stand on high, 160

Where vast Cithaeron's top salutes the sky,

A hiss from all the snaky tire went round: }

The dreadful signal all the rocks rebound, }

And through th' Achaian cities send the sound. }

Oete, with high Parnassus, heard the voice; 165

Eurotas' banks remurmured to the noise;

Again Leucothea shook at these alarms,

And pressed Palaemon closer in her arms.[39]

Headlong from thence the glowing fury springs,

And o'er the Theban palace spreads her wings,[40] 170

Once more invades the guilty dome, and shrouds

Its bright pavilions in a veil of clouds.

Straight with the rage of all their race possessed, }

Stung to the soul, the brothers start from rest, }

And all their furies wake within their breast. } 175

Their tortured minds repining envy tears,

And hate, engendered by suspicious fears;

And sacred thirst of sway; and all the ties

Of nature broke;[41] and royal perjuries;

And impotent desire to reign alone, 180

That scorns the dull reversion of a throne;[42]

Each would the sweets of sov'reign rule devour,

While discord waits upon divided power.

As stubborn steers by brawny plowmen broke,

And joined reluctant to the galling yoke, 185

Alike disdain with servile necks to bear

Th' unwonted weight, or drag the crooked share,

But rend the reins, and bound[43] a diff'rent way,

And all the furrows in confusion lay:

Such was the discord of the royal pair, 190

Whom fury drove precipitate to war.

In vain the chiefs contrived a specious way,

To govern Thebes by their alternate sway:

Unjust decree! while this enjoys the state,

That mourns in exile his unequal fate, 195

And the short monarch of a hasty year

Foresees with anguish his returning heir.

Thus did the league their impious arms restrain,

But scarce subsisted to the second reign.

Yet then, no proud aspiring piles were raised, 200

No fretted roofs with polished metals blazed;

No laboured columns in long order placed,

No Grecian stone the pompous arches graced;

No nightly bands in glitt'ring armour wait[44]

Before the sleepless tyrant's guarded gate; 205

No chargers[45] then were wrought in burnished gold,

Nor silver vases took the forming mold;

Nor gems on bowls embossed were seen to shine,

Blaze on the brims, and sparkle in the wine.[46]

Say, wretched rivals! what provokes your rage? 210

Say, to what end your impious arms engage?

Not all bright Phoebus views in early morn,

Or when his ev'ning beams the west adorn,

When the south glows with his meridian ray,

And the cold north receives a fainter day; 215

For crimes like these, not all those realms suffice,[47]

Were all those realms the guilty victor's prize!

But fortune now (the lots of empire thrown)

Decrees to proud Eteocles the crown:

What joys, oh tyrant! swelled thy soul that day, 220

When all were slaves thou couldst around survey,[48]

Pleased to behold unbounded power thy own,

And singly fill a feared and envied throne!

But the vile vulgar, ever discontent,[49]

Their growing fears in secret murmurs vent; 225

Still prone to change, though still the slaves of state,

And sure the monarch whom they have, to hate;

New lords they madly make, then tamely bear,

And softly curse the tyrants whom they fear.[50]

And one of those who groan beneath the sway 230

Of kings imposed, and grudgingly obey,

(Whom envy to the great, and vulgar spite

With scandal armed, th' ignoble mind's delight,)

Exclaimed--"O Thebes! for thee what fates remain,

What woes attend this inauspicious reign? 235

Must we, alas! our doubtful necks prepare, }

Each haughty master's yoke by turns to bear, }

And still to change whom changed we still must fear? }

These now control a wretched people's fate,

These can divide, and these reverse the state: 240

Ev'n fortune rules no more!--O servile land,

Where exiled[51] tyrants still by turns command.

Thou sire of gods and men, imperial Jove!

Is this th' eternal doom decreed above?

On thy own offspring hast thou fixed this fate, 245

From the first birth of our unhappy state;

When banished Cadmus, wand'ring o'er the main,

For lost Europa searched the world in vain,

And fated in Boeotian fields to found

A rising empire on a foreign ground, 250

First raised our walls on that ill-omened plain,

Where earth-born brothers were by brothers slain?[52]

What lofty looks th' unrivalled[53] monarch bears!

How all the tyrant in his face appears!

What sullen fury clouds his scornful brow! 255

Gods! how his eyes with threat'ning ardour glow!

Can this imperious lord forget to reign,

Quit all his state, descend, and serve again?

Yet, who, before, more popularly bowed?

Who more propitious to the suppliant crowd? 260

Patient of right, familiar in the throne?

What wonder then? he was not then alone.

O wretched we, a vile, submissive train,

Fortune's tame fools, and slaves in ev'ry reign!

As when two winds with rival force contend, 265

This way and that, the wav'ring sails they bend,

While freezing Boreas, and black Euros blow,

Now here, now there, the reeling vessel throw:

Thus on each side, alas! our tott'ring state

Feels all the fury of resistless fate, 270

And doubtful still, and still distracted stands,

While that prince threatens, and while this commands."

And now th' almighty father of the gods

Convenes a council in the blest abodes:

Far in the bright recesses of the skies, 275

High o'er the rolling heav'ns, a mansion lies,

Whence, far below, the gods at once survey }

The realms of rising and declining day, }

And all th' extended space of earth, and air, and sea. }

Full in the midst, and on a starry throne, 280

The majesty of heav'n superior shone;

Serene he looked, and gave an awful nod,[54]

And all the trembling spheres confessed the god.

At Jove's assent the deities around

In solemn state the consistory crowned.[55] 285

Next a long order of inferior pow'rs

Ascend from hills, and plains, and shady bow'rs;

Those from whose urns the rolling rivers flow;

And those that give the wand'ring winds to blow:

Here all their rage, and ev'n their murmurs cease,[56] 290

And sacred silence reigns, and universal peace.

A shining synod of majestic gods

Gilds with new lustre the divine abodes;

Heav'n seems improved with a superior ray,

And the bright arch reflects a double day. 295

The monarch then his solemn silence broke,

The still creation listened while he spoke,

Each sacred accent bears eternal weight,

And each irrevocable word is fate.

"How long shall man the wrath of heav'n defy, 300

And force unwilling vengeance from the sky!

Oh race confed'rate into crimes, that prove

Triumphant o'er th' eluded rage of Jove![57]

This wearied arm can scarce the bolt sustain,

And unregarded thunder rolls in vain: 305

Th' o'erlaboured Cyclops from his task retires,

Th' AEolian forge exhausted of its fires.[58]

For this, I suffered Phoebus' steeds to stray,

And the mad ruler to misguide the day;

When the wide earth to heaps of ashes turned, 310

And heaven itself the wand'ring chariot burned.

For this, my brother of the wat'ry reign }

Released th' impetuous sluices of the main: }

But flames consumed, and billows raged in vain. }

Two races now, allied to Jove, offend; 315

To punish these, see Jove himself descend.

The Theban kings their line from Cadmus trace,

From godlike Perseus those of Argive race.

Unhappy Cadmus' fate who does not know,

And the long series of succeeding woe? 320

How oft the furies, from the deeps of night,

Arose, and mixed with men in mortal fight:

Th' exulting mother, stained with filial blood;[59]

The savage hunter and the haunted wood;

The direful banquet why should I proclaim,[60] 325

And crimes that grieve the trembling gods to name?

Ere I recount the sins of these profane, }

The sun would sink into the western main, }

And rising, gild the radiant east again. }

Have we not seen (the blood of Laius shed) 330

The murd'ring son ascend his parent's bed,

Through violated nature force his way,

And stain the sacred womb where once he lay?

Yet now in darkness and despair he groans,

And for the crimes of guilty fate atones. 335

His sons with scorn their eyeless father view,

Insult his wounds, and make them bleed anew.

Thy curse, oh Oedipus, just heav'n alarms,

And sets th' avenging thunderer in arms.

I from the root thy guilty race will tear, 340

And give the nations to the waste of war.

Adrastus[61] soon, with gods averse, shall join

In dire alliance with the Theban line;

Hence strife shall rise, and mortal war succeed;

The guilty realms of Tantalus shall bleed; 345

Fixed is their doom; this all-rememb'ring breast

Yet harbours vengeance for the tyrant's feast."[62]

He said; and thus the queen of heav'n returned;

(With sudden grief her lab'ring bosom burned)

"Must I, whose cares Phoroneus'[63] tow'rs defend, 350

Must I, oh Jove, in bloody wars contend?

Thou know'st those regions my protection claim,

Glorious in arms, in riches, and in fame:

Though there the fair Egyptian heifer fed,

And there deluded Argus slept, and bled;[64] 355

Though there the brazen tower was stormed of old,[65]

When Jove[66] descended in almighty gold:

Yet I can pardon those obscurer rapes,

Those bashful crimes disguised in borrowed shapes;

But Thebes, where shining in celestial charms 360

Thou cam'st triumphant to a mortal's arms,

When all my glories o'er her limbs were spread,

And blazing light'nings danced around her bed;[67]

Cursed Thebes the vengeance it deserves, may prove:

Ah why should Argos feel the rage of Jove? 365

Yet since thou wilt thy sister-queen control,

Since still the lust of discord fires thy soul,

Go, raze my Samos, let Mycene fall,

And level with the dust the Spartan wall;[68]

No more let mortals Juno's pow'r invoke, } 370

Her fanes no more with eastern incense smoke, }

Nor victims sink beneath the sacred stroke; }

But to your Isis all my rites transfer,

Let altars blaze and temples smoke for her;

For her, through Egypt's fruitful clime renowned 375

Let weeping Nilus hear the timbrel sound.

But if thou must reform the stubborn times,

Avenging on the sons the father's crimes,

And from the long records of distant age

Derive incitements to renew thy rage; 380

Say, from what period then has Jove designed

To date his vengeance; to what bounds confined?

Begin from thence, where first Alpheus hides }

His wand'ring stream, and through the briny tides }

Unmixed to his Sicilian river glides.[69] } 385

Thy own Arcadians there the thunder claim,

Whose impious rites disgrace thy mighty name;[70]

Who raise thy temples where the chariot stood

Of fierce Oenomaus, defiled with blood:[71]

Where once his steeds their savage banquet found, 390

And human bones yet whiten all the ground.

Say, can those honours please; and canst thou love

Presumptuous Crete that boasts the tomb of Jove?[72]

And shall not Tantalus's kingdoms share

Thy wife and sister's tutelary care? 395

Reverse, O Jove, thy too severe decree,

Nor doom to war a race derived from, thee;[73]

On impious realms and barb'rous kings impose

Thy plagues, and curse 'em with such sons[74] as those."

Thus, in reproach and pray'r, the queen expressed 400

The rage and grief contending in her breast;

Unmoved remained the ruler of the sky,

And from his throne returned this stern reply:

"'Twas thus I deemed thy haughty soul would bear }

The dire, though just, revenge which I prepare } 405

Against a nation thy peculiar care: }

No less Dione might for Thebes contend,

Nor Bacchus less his native town defend;

Yet these in silence see the fates fulfil

Their work, and rev'rence our superior will. 410

For by the black infernal Styx I swear,

(That dreadful oath which binds the thunderer)

'Tis fixed; th' irrevocable doom of Jove;

No force can bend me, no persuasion move.

Haste then, Cyllenius,[75] through the liquid air; 415

Go, mount the winds, and to the shades repair;

Bid hell's black monarch my commands obey,

And give up Laius to the realms of day,

Whose ghost yet shiv'ring on Cocytus' sand,

Expects its passage to the further strand: 420

Let the pale sire revisit Thebes, and bear

These pleasing orders to the tyrant's ear;[76]

That from his exiled brother, swelled with pride

Of foreign forces, and his Argive bride,

Almighty Jove commands him to detain 425

The promised empire, and alternate reign:

Be this the cause of more than mortal hate:

The rest, succeeding times shall ripen into fate."

The god obeys, and to his feet applies

Those golden wings that cut the yielding skies. 430

His ample hat his beamy locks o'erspread,

And veiled the starry glories of his head.

He seized the wand that causes sleep to fly,

Or in soft slumbers seals the wakeful eye;

That drives the dead to dark Tartarean coasts, 435

Or back to life compels the wand'ring ghosts.

Thus, through the parting clouds, the son of May

Wings on the whistling winds his rapid way;

Now smoothly steers through air his equal flight,

Now springs aloft, and tow'rs th' ethereal height; 440

Then wheeling down the steep of heav'n he flies,

And draws a radiant circle o'er the skies.

Meantime the banished Polynices roves

(His Thebes abandoned) through th' Aonian groves,

While future realms his wand'ring thoughts delight, 445

His daily vision and his dream by night;

Forbidden Thebes appears before his eye,

From whence he sees his absent brother fly,

With transport views the airy rule his own,

And swells on an imaginary throne. 450

Fain would he cast a tedious age away,

And live out all in one triumphant day.[77]

He chides the lazy progress of the sun,

And bids the year with swifter motion run.

With anxious hopes his craving mind is tost, 455

And all his joys in length of wishes lost.

The hero then resolves his course to bend }

Where ancient Danaus' fruitful fields extend,[78] }

And famed Mycene's lofty towers ascend, }

(Where late the sun did Atreus' crimes detest, 460

And disappeared in horror of the feast.)[79]

And now by chance, by fate, or furies led,

From Bacchus' consecrated caves he fled,

Where the shrill cries of frantic matrons sound,

And Pentheus' blood enriched the rising ground.[80] 465

Then sees Cithaeron tow'ring o'er the plain,

And thence declining gently to the main.

Next to the bounds of Nisus' realm repairs,

Where treach'rous Scylla cut the purple hairs:[81]

The hanging cliffs of Sciron's rock explores, 470

And hears the murmurs of the diff'rent shores:[82]

Passes the strait that parts the foaming seas,

And stately Corinth's pleasing site surveys.

'Twas now the time when Phoebus yields to night,[83]

And rising Cynthia sheds her silver light, 475

Wide o'er the world in solemn pomp she drew

Her airy chariot hung with pearly dew;[84]

All birds and beasts lie hushed; sleep steals away

The wild desires of men, and toils of day,

And brings, descending through the silent air, 480

A sweet forgetfulness of human care.[85]

Yet no red clouds, with golden borders gay,

Promise the skies the bright return of day;

No faint reflections of the distant light

Streak with long gleams the scatt'ring shades of night: 485

From the damp earth impervious vapours rise,

Encrease the darkness, and involve the skies.

At once the rushing winds with roaring sound

Burst from th' AEolian caves, and rend the ground,

With equal rage their airy quarrel[86] try, 490

And win by turns the kingdom of the sky:

But with a thicker night black Auster shrouds

The heav'ns, and drives on heaps the rolling clouds,

From whose dark womb a rattling tempest pours,

Which the cold north congeals to haily show'rs. 495

From pole to pole the thunder roars aloud,

And broken lightnings flash from ev'ry cloud.

Now smoaks with show'rs[87] the misty mountain-ground,

And floated fields lie undistinguished round.

Th' Inachian streams with headlong fury run, 500

And Erasinus[88] rolls a deluge on:

The foaming Lerna swells above its bounds,

And spreads its ancient poisons[89] o'er the grounds:

Where late was dust, now rapid torrents play,

Rush through the mounds, and bear the dams away: 505

Old limbs of trees from crackling forests torn,

Are whirled in air, and on the winds are borne:

The storm the dark Lycaean groves displayed,

And first to light exposed the sacred shade.[90]

Th' intrepid Theban hears the bursting sky, 510

Sees yawning rocks in massy fragments fly,[91]

And views astonished, from the hills afar,

The floods descending, and the wat'ry war,[92]

That, driv'n by storms, and pouring o'er the plain,

Swept herds, and hinds, and houses to the main.[93] 515

Through the brown horrors of the night he fled,

Nor knows, amazed, what doubtful path to tread;

His brother's image to his mind appears,

Inflames his heart with rage, and wings his feet with fears.[94]

So fares a sailor on the stormy main, 520

When clouds conceal Booetes' golden wain,

When not a star its friendly lustre keeps,

Nor trembling Cynthia glimmers on the deeps;

He dreads the rocks, and shoals, and seas, and skies,

While thunder roars, and lightning round him flies. 525

Thus strove the chief, on every side distressed,

Thus still his courage, with his toils increased;

With his broad shield opposed, he forced his way

Through thickest woods, and roused the beasts of prey,

Till he beheld, where from Larissa's[95] height 530

The shelving walls reflect a glancing light:

Thither with haste the Theban hero flies; }

On this side Lerna's pois'nous water lies, }

On that Prosymna's grove and temple rise:[96] }

He passed the gates, which then unguarded lay, 535

And to the regal palace bent his way;

On the cold marble, spent with toil, he lies,

And waits till pleasing slumbers seal his eyes.

Adrastus here his happy people sways,

Blest with calm peace in his declining days; 540

By both his parents of descent divine,

Great Jove and Phoebus graced his noble line:

Heaven had not crowned his wishes with a son,

But two fair daughters heired[97] his state and throne.

To him Apollo (wondrous to relate! 545

But who can pierce into the depths of fate?)

Had sung--"Expect thy sons[98] on Argos' shore,

A yellow lion and a bristly boar."

This long revolved in his paternal breast,

Sate heavy on his heart, and broke his rest; 550

This, great Amphiaraus, lay hid from thee,

Though skilled in fate, and dark futurity.

The father's care and prophet's art were vain,

For thus did the predicting god ordain.[99]

Lo hapless Tydeus, whose ill-fated hand 555

Had slain his brother, leaves his native land,[100]

And seized with horror in the shades of night,

Through the thick deserts headlong urged his flight:

Now by the fury of the tempest driv'n,

He seeks a shelter from th' inclement heav'n, 560

Till, led by fate, the Theban's steps he treads,

And to fair Argos' open court succeeds.[101]

When thus the chiefs from diff'rent lands resort

T' Adrastus' realms, and hospitable court;

The king surveys his guests with curious eyes, 565

And views their arms and habit with surprise.

A lion's yellow skin the Theban wears,

Horrid his mane, and rough with curling hairs;

Such once employed Alcides' youthful toils,

Ere yet adorned with Nemea's dreadful spoils.[102] 570

A boar's stiff hide, of Calydonian breed,

Oenides' manly shoulders overspread.

Oblique his tusks, erect his bristles stood,

Alive, the pride and terror of the wood.

Struck with the sight, and fixed in deep amaze, 575

The King th' accomplished oracle surveys,

Reveres Apollo's vocal caves, and owns

The guiding godhead, and his future sons

O'er all his bosom secret transports reign,

And a glad horror[103] shoots through ev'ry vein. 580

To heav'n he lifts his hands, erects his sight,

And thus invokes the silent queen of night.

"Goddess of shades, beneath whose gloomy reign

Yon spangled arch glows with the starry train:

You who the cares of heav'n and earth allay, } 585

Till nature quickened by th' inspiring ray }

Wakes to new vigour with the rising day: }

Oh thou who freest me from my doubtful state,

Long lost and wildered in the maze of fate!

Be present still, oh goddess! in our aid; 590

Proceed, and firm[104] those omens thou hast made.

We to thy name our annual rites will pay,

And on thy altars sacrifices lay;

The sable flock shall fall beneath the stroke,

And fill thy temples with a grateful smoke. 595

Hail, faithful Tripos! hail, ye dark abodes

Of awful Phoebus: I confess the gods!"

Thus, seized with sacred fear, the monarch prayed;

Then to his inner court the guests conveyed;

Where yet thin fumes from dying sparks arise, } 600

And dust yet white upon each altar lies, }

The relics of a former sacrifice. }

The king once more the solemn rites requires,

And bids renew the feasts, and wake the fires.[105]

His train obey, while all the courts around 605

With noisy care and various tumult sound.

Embroidered purple clothes the golden beds;

This slave the floor, and that the table spreads;

A third dispels the darkness of the night,

And fills depending lamps with beams of light. 610

Here loaves in canisters are piled on high,

And there in flames the slaughtered victims fry.[106]

Sublime in regal state Adrastus shone,

Stretched on rich carpets on his iv'ry throne;

A lofty couch receives each princely guest; 615

Around, at awful distance, wait the rest.

And now the king, his royal feast to grace,

Acestis calls, the guardian[107] of his race,

Who first their youth in arts of virtue trained,

And their ripe years in modest grace maintained; 620

Then softly whispered in her faithful ear,

And bade his daughters at the rites appear.

When from the close apartments of the night,

The royal nymphs approach divinely bright;

Such was Diana's, such Minerva's face; 625

Nor shine their beauties with superior grace,

But that in these a milder charm endears,

And less of terror in their looks appears.

As on the heroes first they cast their eyes,

O'er their fair cheeks the glowing blushes rise, 630

Their downcast looks a decent shame confessed,

Then on their father's rev'rend features rest.

The banquet done, the monarch gives the sign

To fill the goblet high with sparkling wine,

Which Danaus used in sacred rites of old, 635

With sculpture graced, and rough with rising gold.

Here to the clouds victorious Perseus flies, }

Medusa seems to move her languid eyes, }

And, ev'n in gold, turns paler as she dies.[108] }

There from the chace Jove's tow'ring eagle bears, 640

On golden wings, the Phrygian to the stars:[109]

Still as he rises in th' ethereal height,

His native mountains lessen to his sight;

While all his sad companions upward gaze,

Fixed on the glorious scene in wild amaze; 645

And the swift hounds, affrighted as he flies,

Run to the shade, and bark against the skies.

This golden bowl with gen'rous juice was crowned,

The first libations sprinkled on the ground,

By turns on each celestial pow'r they call; 650

With Phoebus' name resounds the vaulted hall.

The courtly train, the strangers, and the rest,

Crowned with chaste laurel, and with garlands dressed,

While with rich gums the fuming altars blaze,

Salute the god in num'rous hymns of praise. 655

Then thus the king: "Perhaps, my noble guests,

These honoured altars, and these annual feasts

To bright Apollo's awful name designed,

Unknown, with wonder may perplex your mind.

Great was the cause; our old solemnities 660

From no blind zeal, or fond tradition rise;

But saved from death, our Argives yearly pay

These grateful honours to the god of day.

"When by a thousand darts the Python slain

With orbs unrolled lay cov'ring all the plain,[110] 665

(Transfixed as o'er Castalia's streams he hung,

And sucked new poisons with his triple tongue)[111]

To Argos' realms the victor god resorts,

And enters old Crotopus' humble courts.

This rural prince one only daughter blest, 670

That all the charms of blooming youth possessed;

Fair was her face, and spotless was her mind,

Where filial love with virgin sweetness joined.

Happy! and happy still she might have proved,

Were she less beautiful, or less beloved! 675

But Phoebus loved, and on the flow'ry side

Of Nemea's stream, the yielding fair enjoyed:

Now, ere ten moons their orb with light adorn,

Th' illustrious offspring of the god was born;

The nymph, her father's anger to evade, 680

Retires from Argos to the sylvan shade;

To woods and wilds the pleasing burden bears,

And trusts her infant to a shepherd's cares.

"How mean a fate, unhappy child! is thine?

Ah how unworthy those of race divine? 685

On flow'ry herbs in some green covert laid,

His bed the ground, his canopy the shade,[112]

He mixes with the bleating lambs his cries, }

While the rude swain his rural music tries }

To call soft slumbers on his infant eyes. } 690

Yet ev'n in those obscure abodes to live,

Was more, alas! than cruel fate would give,

For on the grassy verdure as he lay,

And breathed the freshness of the early day,

Devouring dogs the helpless infant tore, 695

Fed on his trembling limbs, and lapped the gore.

Th' astonished mother, when the rumour came,

Forgets her father, and neglects her fame;

With loud complaints she fills the yielding air,

And beats her breast, and rends her flowing hair; 700

Then wild with anguish to her sire she flies:

Demands the sentence, and contented dies.

"But touched with sorrow for the dead too late,

The raging god prepares t' avenge her fate.

He sends a monster, horrible and fell,[113] 705

Begot by furies in the depths of hell.[114]

The pest a virgin's face and bosom bears; }

High on a crown a rising snake appears, }

Guards her black front, and hisses in her hairs: }

About the realm she walks her dreadful round, 710

When night with sable wings o'erspreads the ground,

Devours young babes before their parents' eyes,

And feeds and thrives on public miseries.[115]

"But gen'rous rage the bold Choroebus warms,

Choroebus, famed for virtue, as for arms; 715

Some few like him, inspired with martial flame,

Thought a short life well lost for endless fame.

These, where two ways in equal parts divide, }

The direful monster from afar descried; }

Two bleeding babes depending at her side; } 720

Whose panting vitals, warm with life, she draws,

And in their hearts embrues her cruel claws.

The youths surround her with extended spears;

But brave Choroebus in the front appears,

Deep in her breast he plunged his shining sword, 725

And hell's dire monster back to hell restored.

Th' Inachians[116] view the slain with vast surprize,

Her twisting volumes and her rolling eyes,

Her spotted breast, and gaping womb embrued

With livid poison, and our children's blood. 730

The crowd in stupid wonder fixed appear,

Pale ev'n in joy, nor yet forget to fear.

Some with vast beams the squalid corpse engage,

And weary all the wild efforts of rage.

The birds obscene, that nightly flocked to taste, 735

With hollow screeches fled the dire repast;

And rav'nous dogs, allured by scented blood,

And starving wolves ran howling to the wood.

"But fired with rage, from cleft Parnassus' brow }

Avenging Phoebus bent his deadly bow, } 740

And hissing flew the feathered fates below: }

A night of sultry clouds involved around

The tow'rs, the fields, and the devoted ground:

And now a thousand lives together fled, }

Death with his scythe cut off the fatal thread,[117] } 745

And a whole province in his triumph led. }

"But Phoebus, asked why noxious fires appear,

And raging Sirius blasts the sickly year,

Demands their lives by whom his monster fell,

And dooms a dreadful sacrifice to hell. 750

"Blest be thy dust, and let eternal fame

Attend thy manes, and preserve thy name,

Undaunted hero![118] who divinely brave,

In such a cause disdained thy life to save;

But viewed the shrine with a superior look, 755

And its upbraided godhead thus bespoke:

"With piety, the soul's securest guard,

And conscious virtue, still its own reward,

Willing I come, unknowing how to fear;

Nor shalt thou, Phoebus, find a suppliant here. 760

Thy monster's death to me was owed alone,

And 'tis a deed too glorious to disown.

Behold him here, for whom, so many days,

Impervious clouds concealed thy sullen rays;

For whom, as man no longer claimed thy care, 765

Such numbers fell by pestilential air!

But if th' abandoned race of human kind

From gods above no more compassion find;

If such inclemency in heav'n can dwell, }

Yet why must unoffending Argos feel } 770

The vengeance due to this unlucky steel? }

On me, on me, let all thy fury fall,

Nor err from me, since I deserve it all:

Unless our desert cities please thy sight,

Or fun'ral flames reflect a grateful light. 775

Discharge thy shafts, this ready bosom rend,

And to the shades a ghost triumphant send;

But for my country let my fate atone,

Be mine the vengeance, as the crime my own.

"Merit distressed, impartial heav'n relieves: 780

Unwelcome life relenting Phoebus gives;

For not the vengeful pow'r, that glowed with rage,

With such amazing virtue durst engage.

The clouds dispersed, Apollo's wrath expired,

And from the wond'ring god th' unwilling[119] youth retired. 785

Thence we these altars in his temple raise,

And offer annual honours, feasts, and praise;

These solemn feasts propitious Phoebus please;

These honours, still renewed, his ancient wrath appease."

"But say, illustrious guest," adjoined the king, 790

"What name you bear, from what high race you spring?

The noble Tydeus stands confessed, and known

Our neighbour prince, and heir of Calydon.

Relate your fortunes, while the friendly night

And silent hours to various talk invite." 795

The Theban bends on earth his gloomy eyes,

Confused, and sadly thus at length replies:

"Before these altars how shall I proclaim,

O gen'rous prince! my nation, or my name,

Or through what ancient veins our blood has rolled? 800

Let the sad tale for ever rest untold!

Yet if propitious to a wretch unknown,

You seek to share in sorrows not your own;

Know, then, from Cadmus I derive my race,

Jocasta's son, and Thebes my native place." 805

To whom the king (who felt his gen'rous breast

Touched with concern for his unhappy guest)

Replies: "Ah! why forbears the son to name

His wretched father, known too well by fame?

Fame, that delights around the world to stray, 810

Scorns not to take our Argos in her way.

Ev'n those who dwell where suns at distance roll,

In northern wilds, and freeze beneath the pole;

And those who tread the burning Lybian lands,

The faithless Syrtes and the moving sands; 815

Who view the western sea's extremest bounds,

Or drink of Ganges in their eastern grounds;

All these the woes of Oedipus have known,

Your fates, your furies, and your haunted town.

If on the sons the parents' crimes descend, 820

What prince from those his lineage can defend?

Be this thy comfort, that 'tis thine t' efface, }

With virtuous acts, thy ancestor's disgrace, }

And be thyself the honour of thy race. }

But see! the stars begin to steal away, 825

And shine more faintly at approaching day;

Now pour the wine; and in your tuneful lays

Once more resound the great Apollo's praise."

"O father Phoebus![120] whether Lycia's coast[121]

And snowy mountain, thy bright presence boast; 830

Whether to sweet Castalia[122] thou repair,

And bathe in silver dews thy yellow hair;

Or pleased to find fair Delos float no more,

Delight in Cynthus,[123] and the shady shore;

Or choose thy seat in Ilion's proud abodes, 835

The shining structures raised by lab'ring gods;[124]

By thee the bow and mortal shafts are borne;

Eternal charms thy blooming youth adorn:

Skilled in the laws of secret fate above,

And the dark counsels of almighty Jove, 840

'Tis thine the seeds of future war to know,[125]

The change of sceptres, and impending woe,

When direful meteors spread, through glowing air,

Long trails of light, and shake their blazing hair.

Thy rage the Phrygian felt, who durst aspire 845

T' excel the music of thy heav'nly lyre;[126]

Thy shafts avenged lewd Tityus' guilty flame,

Th' immortal victim of thy mother's fame;[127]

Thy hand slew Python, and the dame who lost

Her num'rous offspring for a fatal boast.[128] 850

In Phlegyas' doom thy just revenge appears,

Condemned to furies and eternal fears;

He views his food, but dreads, with lifted eye,

The mould'ring rock that trembles from on high.[129]

"Propitious hear our prayer, O pow'r divine! 855

And on thy hospitable Argos shine;

Whether the style of Titan[130] please thee more,

Whose purple rays th' Achaemenes adore;

Or great Osiris,[131] who first taught the swain

In Pharian fields to sow the golden grain; 860

Or Mitra, to whose beams the Persian bows,

And pays, in hollow rocks, his awful vows;

Mitra, whose head the blaze of light adorns,

Who grasps the struggling heifer's lunar horns."[132]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: "Dire," in the Latin sense of ill-omened.]

[Footnote 2: When Jupiter had carried off Europa, her father, Agenor,

sent her brother Cadmus to seek her, and commanded him not to return

without his sister. Unable to find her he settled at Thebes, and built

the city. He slew the dragon, which guarded a neighbouring well, and a

portion of the armed men, who sprung up from its teeth, were reputed to

be the ancestors of the Thebans.]

[Footnote 3: A second legend ascribed the building of the city to the

wonder-working music of Amphion, which caused the stones to pile

themselves together. Both legends were subsequently blended, and Cadmus

had the credit of the upper part of the city, and Amphion of the lower.]

[Footnote 4: Juno visited Athamas, king of Thebes, with madness, and in

his frenzy he shot his own son, Learchus, whom he took for a young lion.

Upon this his wife, Ino, who was a daughter of Cadmus, fled with her

second son, Melicertes, and threw herself and her boy into the sea.]

[Footnote 5: Domitian. The panegyric on this timid and cruel tyrant was

disgraceful flattery. The boasted victories over the Dacian's were in

reality defeats. They compelled the emperor to sue for an inglorious

peace which was only purchased by the promise of an immediate ransom and

an annual tribute. Most of his pretended triumphs were of a similar

character, and led Pliny the younger to remark, that they were always

the token of some advantage obtained by the enemies of Rome.]

[Footnote 6: During the contest between Vespasian and Vitellius for the

empire, Domitian, at the age of eighteen, took refuge in the temple of

the Capitol to escape from the fury of the soldiers opposed to his

father. It was self-preservation and not daring which impelled him, and

when the temple of Jupiter was set on fire he again fled, and hid

himself until the party of Vespasian prevailed.]

[Footnote 7: This line is very obscure. There is nothing corresponding

to it in the Latin.]

[Footnote 8: From the translation of Stephens:

The time may come when a divinor rage.]

[Footnote 9: Pope is closer to Stephens than to the original:

funeral flames

Divided, like the souls they carry.

The rival brothers ultimately engaged in single combat, and both fell.

The body of Polynices was placed by mistake upon the funeral pile of

Eteocles, and the flames rose upwards in diverging currents.]

[Footnote 10: Stephens's translation:

When Dirce blushed, being stained with Grecian blood.]

[Footnote 11: The dirce ran on one side of Thebes, the Ismenus on the

other, and they afterwards united in a common stream. Both were mere

watercourses, which were only filled by the rains of winter.]

[Footnote 12: The Thebans are subsequently represented by Statius as

driven into the Ismenus by the Greeks, and the hosts which were killed

or drowned were carried by the river into the sea.]

[Footnote 13: What hero, that is, of the famous seven who went up

against Thebes to dispossess Eteocles for violating the compact to reign

alternately with Polynices. The five persons whom Statius enumerates as

joining with Polynices and Adrastus, king of Argos, are Tydeus,

Amphiaraus, Hippomedon, Parthenopaeus, and Capaneus.]

[Footnote 14: When Tydeus had received his death-wound from a javelin

hurled by Menalippus, he gathered up his failing strength, and flung a

dart by which he mortally wounded Menalippus in turn. Full of revengeful

spite Tydeus begged that the head of Menalippus might be brought to him.

He grasped it with his dying hand, gazed at it with malignant joy,

gnawed it in his frenzy, and refused to relinquish his hold. This was

"the rage of Tydeus," which Statius says the Greeks themselves condemned

as exceeding the recognised latitude of hate.]

[Footnote 15: The prophet was Amphiaraus, who predicted that all who

took part in the expedition, except Adrastus, would be destroyed. The

earth opened while Amphiaraus was fighting, and swallowed up him and his

chariot. Statius paints him sinking calmly into the yawning gulf,

without dropping his weapons or the reins, and with his eyes fixed on

the heavens.]

[Footnote 16: Hippomedon is made by Statius the hero of the conflict in

the river Ismenus, where he at last succumbs to the god of the river.

The piles of dead formed a dike, which turned back the waters.]

[Footnote 17: Parthenopaeus.--POPE.]

[Footnote 18: He declared that Jupiter himself should not keep him from

ascending the walls of Thebes. Jupiter punished his defiance by setting

him on fire with lightning on the scaling ladder, and he was burnt to

death.]

[Footnote 19: Oedipus did not strike his wounds. He struck the ground,

which was the usage in invoking the infernal deities, since their

kingdom was in the bowels of the earth.]

[Footnote 20: One of the three principal furies or avengers of crime,

who inhabited the world of condemned spirits.]

[Footnote 21: The great difference between raising horror and terror is

perceived and felt from the reserved manner in which Sophocles speaks of

the dreadful incest of Oedipus, and from the manner in which Statius

has enlarged and dwelt upon it, in which he has been very unnaturally

and injudiciously imitated by Dryden and Lee, who introduce this most

unfortunate prince not only describing but arguing on the dreadful crime

he had committed.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 22: Laius, king of Thebes, warned by the oracle that he would

be killed by his own offspring, exposed his son Oedipus on Mount

Cithaeron. The infant was found by a shepherd, and carried to Polybus,

king of Corinth, who adopted him. Arrived at man's estate, he too was

informed by the oracle that he would take the life of his father, and

commit incest with his mother. Believing that the king and queen who

brought him up were his parents, he determined not to go back to

Corinth, and in attempting to avert his destiny, he fulfilled it. As he

journeyed towards Thebes he met his real father, Laius, and slew him in

a conflict which grew out of a dispute with his charioteer.]

[Footnote 23: Or the temple at Delphi, where Oedipus went to consult

the oracle.]

[Footnote 24: The Sphinx sat upon a rock near Thebes propounding a

riddle to every one who passed by, and destroying all who were unable to

explain it. The Thebans proclaimed that whoever would rid the kingdom of

this scourge should marry the widow of Laius, and succeed to the vacant

throne. Oedipus, by solving the riddle, drove the Sphinx to commit

suicide, and in accepting the reward, he unconsciously verified the

remainder of the oracle.]

[Footnote 25: Oedipus behaves with the fury of a blustering bully,

instead of that patient submission and pathetic remorse which are so

suited to his condition.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 26: In the first edition he had written

Which shall o'er long posterity prevail.

The more forcible phrase which he substituted for "long posterity," was

from Dryden's Virg. AEn. iii. 132:

And children's children shall the crown sustain.]

[Footnote 27: This couplet follows closely the translation of Stephens:

Put on that diadem besmeared with gore

Which from my father's head these fingers tore.]

[Footnote 28: Dryden's Virg. AEn. iii. 78:

Broke ev'ry bond of nature and of truth]

[Footnote 29: Pope uses "preventing" in the then common but now obsolete

sense of "anticipating."]

[Footnote 30: A river in the lower world.]

[Footnote 31: Great is the force and the spirit of these lines down to

verse 183; and indeed they are a surprising effort in a writer so young

as when he translated them. See particularly lines 150 to 160.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 32: The entrance to the infernal regions was said to be

through a cave in the Taenarian promontory, which formed the southern

extremity of Greece.]

[Footnote 33: Pope has judiciously tamed the bombast image "caligantes

animarum examine campos," "the plains darkened with a swarm of ghosts."

"Lucentes equos," he translates, "fair glories," omitting the image

entirely. To mount Atlas he has added an idea which makes the passage

more ridiculous than sublime. It is poorly expressed in the original; in

the translation it is ludicrous; "and shook the heavens _and gods he

bore_." There are many images which if indistinctly seen are sublime; if

particularised they become quite the contrary. However, the translation

is certainly wonderful, when the age of the author is considered. It

shows his powers of metrical language, at so early a period of his

poetical studies, though it is very unfaithful in particular

passages.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 34: Pope's acquaintance with Latin prosody, from his confined

education, was probably very small, or he would not have used Mal[=e]a,

instead of Mal[)e]a, with the line of Statius before him.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 35: "Well-known," because the Fury had before visited the

Theban palace to instigate the crimes and passions of which it had been

the scene. The haste with which she goes, and her preference for the

terrestrial journey, even over the haunts of her own Tartarus, indicate

the signal malevolence of the mission. Hence the delight she takes in

it.]

[Footnote 36: The original is more forcible and less extravagant. The

sunken eyes of the Fury glared with a light like that of red-hot

iron--_ferrea lux_.]

[Footnote 37: This expression, which is not in Statius, is common with

Dryden, as in his Virg. AEn. x. 582:

And from Strymonius hewed his better hand.]

[Footnote 38: Statius depicts the frenzied virulence of the Fury, by

saying that she lashed the air with the serpent. Pope has marred the

description by representing the lashing of the air as the act of the

serpent itself.]

[Footnote 39: After Ino had drowned herself and her son Melicertes, they

became marine divinities, and their names were changed to Leucothea and

Palaemon. Statius is more picturesque than Pope. When the apparition of

the Fury announced terrible evils to come, the sea was stirred to its

depths. On the outburst of the tempest, Palaemon was sailing about on the

back of a dolphin, and it was then that his mother snatched him up in

her alarm, and pressed him to her bosom. To convey an idea of the

tremendous nature of the storm, Statius says that the Corinthian isthmus

could hardly resist the violence of the waves which dashed against each

of its shores. This circumstance is justly styled by Pope "most

extravagantly hyperbolical," but a translator should not have omitted

it.]

[Footnote 40: A great image, and highly improved from the original,

"assueta nube."--WARTON.

The first edition had a feeble prosaic line in place of the image which

Warton admired:

Headlong from thence the fury urged her flight,

And at the Theban palace did alight.]

[Footnote 41: "Ruptaeque vices" in the original, which Pope translates,

"and all the ties of nature broke," but by _vices_ is indicated the

alternate reign of the two brothers, as ratified by mutual oaths, and

subsequently violated by Eteocles.--DE QUINCEY.]

[Footnote 42: The felicities of this translation are at times perfectly

astonishing, and it would be scarcely possible to express more nervously

or amply the words,--

jurisque secundi

Ambitus impatiens, et summo dulcius unum

Stare loco,--

than by Pope's couplet, which most judiciously, by reversing the two

clauses, gains the power of fusing them into connection.--DE QUINCEY.]

[Footnote 43: "Bound" is an improper verb as applied to "steers";

besides the simile is not exactly understood. There is nothing about

"reins" or "bounding" in the original. What is meant is that the steers

do not draw even. Pope confounded the image of the young bullocks with

that of a horse, and he therefore introduces "reins" and

"bounding."--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 44: For "armour wait," the first edition had "arms did wait."]

[Footnote 45: "Charger" is used in its old sense of a dish.]

[Footnote 46: Statius, to point the folly of the criminal ambition, goes

on to represent, that the contest was only for naked unadorned dominion

in a poverty-stricken kingdom,--a battle for which should cultivate the

barren territory on the banks of a petty stream,--and for this empty

privilege the brothers sacrificed everything which was of good report in

life or death. Pope weakened the moral of Statius, and the lines which

follow to the end of the paragraph are also very inferior in force to

the original.]

[Footnote 47: In the first edition,

Not all those realms could for such crimes suffice.

Pope might have done more to improve this prosaic couplet.]

[Footnote 48: Pope borrowed from the translation of Stephens:

How wast thou lost

In thine own joys, proud tyrant then, when all

About thee were thy slaves.]

[Footnote 49: It should be "discontented."--WARTON.]

[Footnote 50: This couplet was interpolated by Pope and seems to have

been suggested by his hostility to the revolution of 1688. Nor does

Statius call the populace "vile," or say that they are always

"discontented," or that they are "still prone to change, though still

the slaves of state." Neither does he say that they "are sure to hate

the monarch, they have," but he says that their custom is to love his

successor, which is a sentiment more in accordance with experience.]

[Footnote 51: "Exiled" because the king who was not reigning had to

leave the country during his brother's year of power.]

[Footnote 52: The warriors who were the produce of the dragon's teeth

sown by Cadmus fought among themselves till only five were left.]

[Footnote 53: "Unrivalled," as the context shows, is not here a term of

commendation, but merely signifies that the monarch had no equal in rank

or power.]

[Footnote 54: "Placido quatiens tamen omnia vultu," is the common

reading. I believe it should be "nutu," with reference to the word

"quatiens."--POPE.]

[Footnote 55: Pope was manifestly unable to extract any sense from the

original. It is there said that Jupiter at his first entrance seats

himself upon his starry throne, but that the other gods did not presume

to sit down "protinus," that is, in immediate succession to Jupiter, and

interpreting his example as a tacit license to do so, until, by a gentle

wave of his hand, the supreme father signifies his express permission to

take their seats. In Pope's translation, the whole picturesque solemnity

of the celestial ritual melts into the vaguest generalities.--DE

QUINCEY.

De Quincey was mistaken in his inference that Pope was unable to

understand the passage, for he had the assistance of the translation of

Stephens, which gives the meaning correctly:

Anon

He sets him down on his bespangled throne.

The rest stand and expect: not one presumed

To sit till leave was beckoned.]

[Footnote 56: The winds would have been inconvenient members of a

deliberative assembly if they had taken to howling, whistling, and

sighing. Nevertheless their propensity to blow was so inveterate that,

in Statius, they are only kept quiet by their fear of Jove.]

[Footnote 57: Our author is perpetually grasping at the wonderful and

the vast, but most frequently falls gradually from the terrible to the

contemptible.--WARTON.

By "our author" Warton meant Statius, and the expression, he criticised

as hyberbolical was the "eluded rage of Jove,"--an exaggeration for

which Pope alone was responsible.]

[Footnote 58: Hiera, one of the AEolian islands in the neighbourhood of

Sicily, was supposed to be the workshop of Vulcan. The island was

volcanic, and the underground noises were ascribed to Vulcan, and his

assistants, the Cyclopes, as they plied their trade. The circumstance

that the fires of the AEolian forge were exhausted was doubtless

introduced by Statius because in his day the eruptions had ceased in

Hiera.]

[Footnote 59: Agave, the daughter of Cadmus. Her son Pentheus appeared

among the women who were celebrating the Bacchic revelries on Mount

Cithaeron, and his mother, mistaking him in her frenzy for a wild beast,

like a wild beast tore him to pieces.]

[Footnote 60: There is no mention of "the direful banquet" in the

original. "The savage hunter" alludes to Athamas chasing and slaying his

son under the delusion that he was a lion.]

[Footnote 61: The king of Argos.]

[Footnote 62: Tantalus, king of Argos, invited the gods to a banquet,

and served up the boiled flesh of his own son, Pelops.]

[Footnote 63: Phoroneus was commonly reputed to have been the founder of

the city of Argos.]

[Footnote 64: Juno employed Argus to keep guard over Io, transformed by

Jupiter into a cow. Mercury, being sent by Jupiter to rescue Io, lulled

Argus to sleep by melodious airs on the flute, and then cut off his

head.]

[Footnote 65: An oracle announced to Acrisius, king of Argos, that he

would die by the hands of his grandson. The king endeavoured to escape

his fate by imprisoning his daughter, Danae, in a brazen tower, but

Jupiter obtained access to her in the shape of a shower of gold, and she

became the mother of Perseus, who fulfilled the prediction, according to

the established legendary usage.]

[Footnote 66: The force of this taunt is weakened in Pope's translation

by the change from the second person to the third, as though the

invectives of Juno had not been addressed to Jupiter himself.]

[Footnote 67: Jupiter visited Semele, the daughter of Cadmus, in all the

majesty of the thunderer, and she was consumed by the lightning.]

[Footnote 68: Homer makes Juno say that there are three cities

pre-eminently dear to her--Argos, Sparta, and Mycenae. Samos had no less

title to the distinction. It was one of the localities which contended

for the renown of having given her birth, and was, with Argos, the

principal seat of her worship. Virgil ranks Samos second among the

places she delighted to honour.]

[Footnote 69: The river Alpheus, which takes its rise in Arcadia, loses

itself underground in parts of its course, and again reappears. This

suggested the fiction that it ran in a subterranean channel, below the

bottom of the sea, to the fountain of Arethusa in Sicily, where it once

more emerged to day. Pope had less regard to the text of Statius than to

Dryden's translation of Virgil's lines on the same legend in Ecl. x. 5:

So may thy silver streams beneath the tide,

Unmixed with briny seas, securely glide.]

[Footnote 70: The Arcadians celebrated the worship of Jupiter with human

sacrifices.]

[Footnote 71: He was king of Pisa in Elis, where was the celebrated

Olympia, with its temple of Jupiter. Oenomaus had ascertained from an

oracle that he would perish by the agency of his son-in-law, and he was

anxious, in self-defence, to keep his daughter, Hippodamia, from

marrying. As he possessed the swiftest horses in the world he required

her suitors to contend with him in a chariot-race, which allowed them no

chance of success. The prize of victory was to be his daughter; the

penalty of defeat was death, and the bones which laid unburied in the

neighbourhood of Jupiter's temple were those of the lovers of

Hippodamia.]

[Footnote 72: The Cretans claimed to possess both the birth-place and

burial-place of Jupiter.]

[Footnote 73: "Derived from Jove," inasmuch as Perseus, one of the kings

of Argos, was the son of Jupiter and Danae.]

[Footnote 74: Eteocles and Polynices.--POPE.]

[Footnote 75: Mercury, so called because he was born upon Mount

Cyllene.]

[Footnote 76: Eteocles.]

[Footnote 77: Stephens's translation:

This were such a day

He'd spend an age to see 't.]

[Footnote 78: To Argos, of which Danaus had been king, whence the

Argives were also called Danai.]

[Footnote 79: Atreus, king of Mycenae, murdered the two sons of his

brother Thyestes, and feasted their father with dishes made of their

flesh.]

[Footnote 80: Bacchus forced the Theban women to assemble, and give

loose to the wild rites by which he was celebrated. It was on this

occasion that Pentheus was massacred by his mother.]

[Footnote 81: Nisus was king of Megara when it was besieged by Minos.

The king's daughter, Scylla, conceived a passion for Minos, and to

ensure him the victory she plucked from her father's head a purple hair

upon which depended the preservation of himself and the city.]

[Footnote 82: Statius says that when Polynices was in the middle of the

isthmus of Corinth he could hear the waves beat against both its shores.

"This," remarked Pope, "could hardly be; for the isthmus of Corinth is

full five miles over," and he calls the introduction of the circumstance

"a geographical error." It was his own geography that was at fault. The

width of the isthmus is only three miles and a half. Pope spoilt the

incident when he transferred it to the Scironian rock. Sciron was a

robber and murderer, who compelled his victims to wash his feet upon the

cliff, and while they were engaged in the operation he kicked them over

into the sea.]

[Footnote 83: "We have scarcely in our language eight more beautiful

lines than these, down to human care," ver. 481.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 84: Pope owed some happy expressions to the translation of

Stephens:

The silent world does view

Her airy chariot pearled with drops of dew.]

[Footnote 85: He again borrowed from Stephens:

And nodding through the air brings down in haste

A sweet forgetfulness of labour passed.]

[Footnote 86: A very faulty expression; as also below, verse

501,--"rolls a deluge on."--WARTON.

He copied Dryden's Virg. AEn. iv. 638:

As when the winds their airy quarrel try.

He was indebted to a second couplet in the same translation, AEn. ii.

565:

Thus, when the rival winds their quarrel try,

Contending for the kingdom of the sky.]

[Footnote 87: "Showers" is an inappropriate word to denote the deluge of

rain which flooded the earth, and "swept herds, and hinds, and houses to

the main."]

[Footnote 88: The Inachus, and the Erasinus were rivers in the plain of

Argos.]

[Footnote 89: The waters of the Lerna were infected by the venom from

the serpent Hydra, which Hercules slew.]

[Footnote 90: The storm, by blowing down trees or branches, made an

opening in the dense foliage through which the sun had never

penetrated.]

[Footnote 91: In the first edition:

The prince with wonder did the waste behold,

While from torn rocks the massy fragments rolled.]

[Footnote 92: Dryden's Virg. AEn. ii. 413:

The shepherd climbs the cliff, and sees from far

The wasteful ravage of the wat'ry war.]

[Footnote 93: Dryden's Virg. Geor. i. 652:

Bore houses, herds, and lab'ring hinds away.]

[Footnote 94: Statius represents Polynices as terrified by the tempest.

Pope appears to have thought that this was derogatory to the character

of the fugitive king, and he calls him, when gazing on the ravages

caused by the storm, "the intrepid Theban," which conveys the impression

that he was undaunted by the spectacle. In the same spirit Pope at ver.

527, has the line, "Thus still his _courage_ with his toils increased,"

where the original says that the stimulus which urged him on was fear.

But while Pope has obliterated the alarm which was generated by the

tempest he has introduced in its place an alarm which had no existence.

In the midst of the havoc worked by the elements the recollection of his

brother "wings the feet" of the intrepid Theban "with fears," though he

is beyond his brother's reach, and has no suspicion at present that he

designs to break the compact to reign alternately. The influence which

the remembrance of Eteocles exercised over the mind of the wanderer is

expressly distinguished by Statius from the fear, and means no more than

that since Polynices was an exile from Thebes, he was compelled to

proceed onwards till he could find an asylum in another state.]

[Footnote 95: A mountain on which stood the citadel of Argos.]

[Footnote 96: The temple at Prosymna was dedicated to Juno.]

[Footnote 97: Pope took the expression from Dryden, Virg. AEn. vii. 79:

One only daughter heired the royal state.

And ver. 367:

Only one daughter heirs my crown and state.]

[Footnote 98: Strictly his sons-in-law.]

[Footnote 99: That is, he ordained that the oracles should be incapable

of interpretation before it was fulfilled.]

[Footnote 100: Calydon, of which his father Oeneus was king.]

[Footnote 101: The mode in which the two fugitives became known to the

king and gained admission to the palace, is not told by Pope, who has

left upwards of seventy lines untranslated, and by the mutilation

rendered the incidents improbable. Polynices reaches the palace first

and lies down, worn out, on the pavement of the vestibule. Tydeus

arrives at the same spot, and Polynices is unwilling that he should

share the shelter. A quarrel ensues, and from words they proceed to

blows. The king is disturbed by the uproar; he issues forth from the

palace with attendants and torches to ascertain the cause; explanations

follow, and these result in Tydeus and Polynices becoming the guests of

Adrastus. "There is an odd account," Pope says to Cromwell, "of an

unmannerly battle at fisty-cuffs between the two Princes on a very

slight occasion, and at a time when, one would think, the fatigue of

their journey, in so tempestuous a night, might have rendered them very

unfit for such a scuffle. This I had actually translated, but was very

ill satisfied with it, even in my own words, to which an author cannot

but be partial enough of conscience."]

[Footnote 102: Before the victory of Hercules over the Nemean lion, he

is said by Statius to have worn the skin of a lion which he slew in the

neighbourhood of Mount Temessus.]

[Footnote 103: "Horror" at the thought of the dreadful forebodings which

had been suggested by the literal language of the oracle; "glad" because

of the manner in which the prediction was verified. Jortin, in a note on

another passage of the Thebais, says, "Statius could not help falling

into his beloved fault of joining contraries together. He is too apt to

seek this opposition in his words. He never indeed misses this favourite

figure when he can bring it in."]

[Footnote 104: "Firm" for confirm was sanctioned by the frequent example

of Dryden, from whose translation of Virg. AEn. viii. 107, Pope has

borrowed the entire couplet:

But oh! be present to thy people's aid,

And firm the gracious promise thou hast made.]

[Footnote 105: In the first edition this verse was an Alexandrine,

ending with "and wake the sleeping fires," which Pope took from Dryden,

Virg. AEn. viii, 720:

And on his altars waked the sleeping fires.]

[Footnote 106: "Fry" was the reading of all the editions till that of

1736, when "fly" was substituted by an evident error of the press, and

has been retained ever since.]

[Footnote 107: "Tutress" in the first edition. Acestis had been the

nurse, and was now the duenna of the two daughters of Adrastus.]

[Footnote 108: The gorgon, Medusa, changed every one who saw her to

stone. Perseus avoided the penalty by only looking at her reflection in

a mirror as he cut off her head while she slept. Being the grandson of a

king of Argos he was an Argive hero, whence his triumph was engraved

upon the royal goblet. The artist had selected the moment when Perseus

is darting into the air with the head of the gorgon, which, newly

separated from the body, still retained the traces of expiring life.]

[Footnote 109: On account of the beauty of Ganymede, Jove sent an eagle

to convey him from the earth to the habitations of the gods. There he

was appointed cup-bearer, which rendered the incident appropriate to a

drinking-vessel.]

[Footnote 110: He has omitted some forcible expressions of the original:

Septem--atris--terentem--nigro--centum per jugera,--all of them

picturesque epithets.--WARTON.

Statius says, that the huge serpent while alive encircled Delphi seven

times with its dark coils, and that when dead and barely unrolled, its

body spread over a hundred acres.]

[Footnote 111: The water was not itself poisonous, but it turned to

venom in the serpent.]

[Footnote 112: Stephens is more literal, and at the same time more

poetical:

earth prepares thy room

Garnished with flow'ry beds, and thatched above

With oaken leaves close woven; whilst the grove

Lends bark to make thy garments.]

[Footnote 113: Much superior to the original.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 114: Sandy's translation of Ovid's Met. bk. vi.

And calls the furies from the depth of hell.]

[Footnote 115: Pope copied Stephens:

devouring some

With rav'nous jaws before their parents' eyes,

And fats herself with public miseries.]

[Footnote 116: Inachus, according to one tradition, built the city of

Argos. After his descendants had reigned for some generations, the

throne was seized by Danaus.]

[Footnote 117: Death cutting off the fatal thread with a scythe, is not

a very sublime or congruous image. Pope has blended modern ideas with

classical: in the original it is "ense metit;"--"_mows_ with his

_sword_." Pope has introduced a "_scythe_," to preserve more accurately

the metaphor, but it has a bad effect.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 118: Choroebus.]

[Footnote 119: Statius states that Choroebus withdrew, having obtained

his end, and says nothing of his being "unwilling," by which Pope seems

to mean that he was unwilling to accept his life. This deviation from

the original destroys the generous heroism of Choroebus, for if he was

weary of his existence there was no merit in his braving death. Statius,

indeed, had previously said that Apollo granted Choroebus the "sad

boon of life" out of admiration for his magnanimity; but this phrase

only signifies that life is sorrowful, and not that Choroebus would

have preferred to die.]

[Footnote 120: Some of the most finished lines he has ever written, down

to verse 854.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 121: Apollo was specially worshipped by the Lycians.]

[Footnote 122: The celebrated fountain sacred to Apollo on Parnassus.]

[Footnote 123: Apollo was surnamed the Cynthian, from Mount Cynthus in

the island of Delos, which was the place of his birth, and the most

revered of all the localities set apart for his worship. The island,

which had previously floated over the ocean, was, according to one

version of the legend, rendered stationary by Jupiter when Apollo was

born; according to another version, it was subsequently fixed by Apollo

himself.]

[Footnote 124: The walls of Troy were the work of Apollo and Neptune.]

[Footnote 125: In the first edition it was

Thou dost the seeds of future wars foreknow.]

[Footnote 126: The Phrygian was Marsyas, who contended on the flute

against Apollo with his lyre. When the umpires decided in favour of the

god, he flayed Marsyas for his presumption.]

[Footnote 127: Tityus assaulted the mother of Apollo, and her son shot

the offender.]

[Footnote 128: Niobe, because she had seven sons and seven daughters,

thought herself superior to Latona, who had only one son, and one

daughter,--Apollo and Diana. These divinities, in revenge, destroyed the

fourteen children of Niobe.]

[Footnote 129: In the first edition:

He views his food, would taste, yet dares not try,

But dreads the mould'ring rock that trembles from on high.

Apollo intrigued with Coronis, the daughter of Phlegyas. Her enraged

father retaliated by firing the temple of Apollo, and was consigned for

his rebellion to perpetual torture in the infernal regions. His terror

lest the impending rock should crush him is a circumstance interpolated

by Pope from Virgil's description of the punishment of Pirithous and

Ixion, and the expression "mould'ring rock" is taken from Dryden's

translation of the passage, AEn. vi. 816:

High o'er their heads a mould'ring rock is placed

That promises a fall, and shakes at ev'ry blast.

The revolting nature of the food itself is the reason assigned by

Statius why Phlegyas forebore to partake of it, and preferred to endure

the pangs of hunger.]

[Footnote 130: After Apollo, in the later mythology, had been identified

with the sun, all the names personifying the sun, of which Titan was

one, became applicable to Apollo.]

[Footnote 131: Diodorus maintained that the Osiris of the Egyptians was

their god of the sun, and Statius has adopted this erroneous view.

According to the statement of Herodotus, Osiris answered to the Grecian

Bacchus, and there is little doubt that the old historian was right.]

[Footnote 132: Mithras was the Persian god of the sun. He was worshipped

in caves, or, as Pope has it, in "hollow rocks," because the spherical

form of the cave symbolised the universe, of which Mithras was the

maker. The "blaze of light which adorns his head" in Pope's version,

makes no part of the description in the original. The final line is

explained by several ancient works of art, in which a man, wearing a

Phrygian cap, is depicted cutting the throat of a bull he has flung to

the ground. The man is said by an old scholiast on Statius to typify the

sun, the bull the moon, and the intention, he states, is to represent

the superiority of the sun over the moon. Statius speaks of the bull as

indignant at being compelled to follow Mithras,--an idea which suits ill

with the tranquil aspect of the moon as it floats through the heavens.]

TRANSLATIONS

FROM

OVID.

Great is the change in passing from Statius to Ovid; from force to

facility of style; from thoughts and images which are too much studied

and unnatural to such as are obvious, careless, and familiar. Ovid seems

to have had the merit of inventing this beautiful species of writing

epistles under feigned names. It is a high improvement on the Greek

elegy, to which its dramatic form renders it much superior. The judgment

of the writer must chiefly appear by opening the complaint of the person

introduced, just at such a period of time, as will give occasion for the

most tender sentiments, and the most sudden, and violent turns of

passion to be displayed. Ovid may perhaps be blamed for a sameness of

subjects in these epistles of his heroines; and his epistles are

likewise too long, which circumstance has forced him into a repetition

and languor in the sentiments. On the whole the epistle before us is

translated by Pope with faithfulness and with elegance, and much excels

any Dryden translated in the volume he published, several of which were

done by some "of the mob of gentlemen that wrote with ease,"--that is,

Sir C. Scrope, Caryll, Pooly, Wright, Tate, Buckingham, Cooper, and

other careless rhymers. Lord Somers translated Dido to AEneas, and

Ariadne to Theseus. Though I regret the hours our poet spent in

translating Ovid and Statius, yet it has given us an opportunity of

admiring his good sense and judgment, in not suffering his taste and

style, in his succeeding works, to be infected with the faults of these

two writers.--WARTON.

Warton says, "The judgment of the writer must chiefly appear by opening

the complaint of the person introduced at such a period of time as will

give occasion for the most tender sentiments." How beautifully is this

displayed in Pope's Epistle to Abelard, a poem that has another most

interesting circumstance, which Ovid appears, as well as our Drayton, to

have neglected,--I mean the introduction of appropriate and descriptive

imagery, which relieves and recreates the fancy by the pictures, and by

the landscapes which accompany the characters. Ovid, in this Epistle,

seems not insensible to the effect of the introduction of such scenes;

and the Leucadian rock, the _antra nemusque_, the aquatic lotus, the

sacred pellucid fountain, and particularly the genius of the place, the

Naiad, addressing the despairing Sappho (which circumstance Pope has

beautifully imitated and improved in Eloisa), are in the genuine spirit

of poetical taste. Dr. Warton observes that this translation is superior

to any of Dryden's. If, indeed, we compare Pope's translations with

those of any other writer, their superiority must be strikingly

apparent. There is a finish in them, a correctness, a natural flow, and

a tone of originality, added to a wonderful propriety and beauty of

expression and language. If he ever fails, it is where he generalises

too much. This is particularly objectionable, where in the original

there is any marked, distinct, and beautiful picture. So, ver. 253, Pope

only says,

Cupid for thee shall spread the swelling sail;

whereas in Ovid, Cupid appears before us in the very act of guiding the

vessel, seated as the pilot, and with his _tender_ hand (_tenera manu_)

contracting, or letting flow the sail. I need not point out another

beauty in the original,--the repetition of the word _Ipse_.--BOWLES.

Richardson has appended this note to the Epistle of Sappho to Phaon in

his copy of the quarto of 1717: "Corrected by the first copy, written

out elegantly (as all his MSS.) to show friends, with their remarks in

the margin; the present reading for the most part the effect of them."

The remarks in the margin are mere exclamations, such as "pulchre,"

"bene," "optime," "recte," "bella paraphrasis," "longe praestas Scrope

meo judicio," "minus placet," &c. They are doubtless from the pen of

Cromwell, since it appeals from Pope's letter to him on June 10, 1709,

that he had jotted down the same phrases on the margin of the

translation of Statius. Bowles having quoted the observation of Warton,

"that he had seen compositions of youths of sixteen years old far beyond

the Pastorals in point of genius and imagination," adds, "I fear not to

assert that he never could have seen any compositions of boys of that

age so perfect in versification, so copious, yet so nice in expression,

so correct, so spirited, and so finished," as the translation of the

Epistle of Sappho to Phaon. The remark was made by Bowles in the belief

that the version was the production of the poet's fourteenth year. Pope

himself records on his manuscript that it was "written first 1707." He

was then nineteen, and when the Epistle was published in 1712, in

Tonson's Ovid, he was twenty-four.

"Ovid," says Dryden, "often writ too pointedly for his subject, and made

his persons speak more eloquently than the violence of their passions

would admit." Passion is sometimes highly eloquent; feeling strongly it

expresses itself forcibly, and Dryden meant that the characters in Ovid,

by their numerous strokes of studied brilliancy, seemed to be carried

away less by their emotions than by the ambition to shine. These

glittering artifices were formerly called wit, and Dryden complains that

Ovid "is frequently witty out of season," but they are not wit in our

present sense of the word. Occasionally they are the far-fetched or

affected prettinesses which are properly called conceits; and more

commonly they consist in terse antithesis, and a sparkle of words

produced by the balanced repetition of a phrase. They are often as

appropriate as they are showy, and if they are among the blemishes they

are conspicuous among the beauties of Ovid. His writings are marked by

opposite qualities. He is sometimes too artificial in his expression of

the passions, and sometimes he is natural, glowing, and pathetic. He

abounds in pointed sentences, and is not less distinguished for the

easy, spontaneous flow of his language. He is at once prolix and

concise, indulging in a single vein of thought till the monotony becomes

tedious, and yet enunciating his ideas with sententious brevity. The

condensation of the Latin in many places cannot be preserved in the

diffuser idioms of our English tongue, but, if we overlook a few weak

couplets, Pope has translated the Epistle of Sappho to Phaon with rare

felicity, and notwithstanding the inevitable loss of some happy turns of

expression, he has managed to retain both the passion and the poetry.

Effusions of sentiment were better adapted to his genius than the heroic

narrative of the Thebais; and his limpid measure, which neither

resembled the numerous and robuster verse of Statius, nor was suited to

an epic theme, accorded with the sweetness and uniformity of Ovid's

verse, and with the outpourings of grief and tenderness which are the

staple of these epistolary strains. There is no ground for the regret of

Warton that Pope should have spent a little time in translating portions

of Ovid and Statius. It would be as reasonable to lament that he stooped

to the preliminary discipline which made him a poet. He has related that

he did not take to translation till he found himself unequal to original

composition, and, like all who excel in any department, he learnt, by

copying his predecessors, to rival them.

SAPPHO TO PHAON.[1]

Say, lovely youth,[2] that dost my heart command,

Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?

Must then her name the wretched writer prove,

To thy remembrance lost, as to thy love?

Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose, 5

The lute neglected, and the lyric muse;[3]

Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow.

And tuned my heart to elegies of woe.

I burn, I burn, as when through ripened corn

By driving winds the spreading flames are borne![4] 10

Phaon to AEtna's scorching fields retires,

While I consume with more than AEtna's fires![5]

No more my soul a charm in music finds;

Music has charms alone for peaceful minds.[6]

Soft scenes of solitude no more can please, 15

Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.

No more the Lesbian dames my passion move,

Once the dear objects of my guilty love;

All other loves are lost in only thine,

Ah youth ungrateful to a flame like mine! 20

Whom would not all those blooming charms surprise,

Those heav'nly looks, and dear deluding eyes?

The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear,

A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear;

Would you with ivy wreathe your flowing hair, 25

Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare:

Yet Phoebus loved, and Bacchus felt the flame,

One Daphne warmed, and one the Cretan dame;[7]

Nymphs that in verse no more could rival me,

Than ev'n those gods contend in charms with thee.[8] 30

The muses teach me all their softest lays,

And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise.

Though great Alcaeus more sublimely sings,

And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings,

No less renown attends the moving lyre, 35

Which Venus tunes, and all her loves inspire;

To me what nature has in charms denied,

Is well by wit's more lasting flames supplied.

Though short my stature, yet my name extends

To heav'n itself, and earth's remotest ends. 40

Brown as I am, an Ethiopian dame[9]

Inspired young Perseus with a gen'rous flame;

Turtles and doves of diff'ring hues unite,

And glossy jet is paired with shining white.

If to no charms thou wilt thy heart resign, 45

But such as merit, such as equal thine,

By none, alas! by none thou can'st be moved,

Phaon alone by Phaon must be loved!

Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ,

Once in her arms you centered all your joy: 50

No time the dear remembrance can remove,

For oh! how vast a memory has love?[10]

My music, then, you could for ever hear,

And all my words were music to your ear.

You stopped with kisses my enchanting tongue, 55

And found my kisses sweeter than my song.[11]

In all I pleased, but most in what was best;

And the last joy was dearer than the rest.[12]

Then with each word, each glance, each motion fired,

You still enjoyed, and yet you still desired, 60

Till all dissolving in the trance we lay,

And in tumultuous raptures died away.

The fair Sicilians now thy soul inflame;

Why was I born, ye gods, a Lesbian dame?

But ah! beware, Sicilian nymphs! nor boast 65

That wand'ring heart which I so lately lost;

Nor be with all those tempting words abused,

Those tempting words were all to Sappho used.

And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains,

Have pity, Venus,[13] on your poet's pains! 70

Shall fortune still in one sad tenor run,

And still increase the woes so soon begun?

Inured to sorrow from my tender years,

My parent's ashes drank my early tears;

My brother next, neglecting wealth and fame, 75

Ignobly burned in a destructive flame:[14]

An infant daughter late my griefs increased,

And all a mother's cares distract my breast.[15]

Alas! what more could fate itself impose,

But thee, the last and greatest of my woes? 80

No more my robes in waving purple flow,

Nor on my hand the sparkling diamonds glow;

No more my locks in ringlets curled diffuse

The costly sweetness of Arabian dews,

Nor braids of gold the varied tresses bind, 85

That fly disordered with the wanton wind:

For whom should Sappho use such arts as these?

He's gone, whom only she desired to please!

Cupid's light darts my tender bosom move,

Still is there cause for Sappho still to love: 90

So from my birth the sisters fixed my doom,

And gave to Venus all my life to come;

Or, while my muse in melting notes complains,

My yielding heart keeps measure to my strains.

By charms like thine which all my soul have won, 95

Who might not--ah! who would not be undone?

For those Aurora Cephalus[16] might scorn,

And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn.

For those might Cynthia lengthen Phaon's sleep,

And bid Endymion[17] nightly tend his sheep. 100

Venus for those had rapt thee to the skies,

But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes.

O scarce a youth, yet scarce a tender boy!

O useful time for lovers to employ!

Pride of thy age, and glory of thy race, 105

Come to these arms, and melt in this embrace!

The vows you never will return, receive;

And take at least the love you will not give.[18]

See, while I write, my words are lost in tears![19]

The less my sense, the more my love appears. 110

Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu,

(At least to feign was never hard to you,)[20]

Farewell, my Lesbian love, you might have said;

Or coldly thus, "Farewell, O Lesbian maid!"

No tear did you, no parting kiss receive, 115

Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve.

No lover's gift your Sappho could confer,[21]

And wrongs and woes were all you left with her.

No charge I gave you, and no charge could give,

But this, "Be mindful of our loves, and live." 120

Now by the Nine, those pow'rs adored by me,

And Love, the god that ever waits on thee,

When first I heard (from whom I hardly knew)

That you were fled, and all my joys with you,

Like some sad statue[22], speechless, pale I stood, 125

Grief chilled my breast, and stopped my freezing blood;

No sigh to rise, no tear had pow'r to flow,

Fixed in a stupid lethargy of woe:

But when its way th' impetuous passion found,

I rend my tresses, and my breast I wound; 130

I rave, then weep; I curse, and then complain;

Now swell to rage, now melt in tears again.

Not fiercer pangs distract the mournful dame,

Whose first-born infant feeds the fun'ral flame.

My scornful brother with a smile appears, 135

Insults my woes, and triumphs in my tears;

His hated image ever haunts my eyes;

"And why this grief? thy daughter lives," he cries.

Stung with my love, and furious with despair,[23]

All torn my garments, and my bosom bare, 140

My woes, thy crimes, I to the world proclaim;

Such inconsistent things are love and shame!

'Tis thou art all my care and my delight,

My daily longing, and my dream by night:[24]

Oh night more pleasing than the brightest day, 145

When fancy gives what absence takes away,

And, dressed in all its visionary charms,

Restores my fair deserter to my arms!

Then round your neck in wanton wreaths I twine,

Then you, methinks, as fondly circle mine: 150

A thousand tender words I hear and speak;

A thousand melting kisses give, and take:[25]

Then fiercer joys, I blush to mention these,

Yet, while I blush, confess how much they please.

But when, with day, the sweet delusions fly, 155

And all things wake to life and joy, but I,

As if once more forsaken, I complain,

And close my eyes to dream of you again:[26]

Then frantic rise, and like some fury rove

Through lonely plains,[27] and through the silent grove, 160

As if the silent grove, and lonely plains,

That knew my pleasures, could relieve my pains.

I view the grotto, once the scene of love,

The rocks around, the hanging roofs above,

That charmed me more, with native moss o'ergrown, 165

Than Phrygian marble, or the Parian stone;

I find the shades that veiled our joys before;

But, Phaon gone, those shades delight no more.[28]

Here the pressed herbs with bending tops betray

Where oft entwined in am'rous folds we lay; 170

I kiss that earth which once was pressed by you,

And all with tears the with'ring herbs bedew.

For thee the fading trees appear to mourn,

And birds defer their songs till thy return:

Night shades the groves, and all in silence lie, 175

All but the mournful Philomel and I:

With mournful Philomel I join my strain,

Of Tereus she, of Phaon I complain.[29]

A spring there is, whose silver waters show,

Clear as a glass, the shining sands below: 180

A flow'ry lotos spreads its arms above,

Shades all the banks, and seems itself a grove;

Eternal greens the mossy margin grace,

Watched by the sylvan genius of the place:

Here as I lay, and swelled with tears the flood,[30] 185

Before my sight a wat'ry virgin stood:

She stood and cried, "O you that love in vain!

Fly hence, and seek the fair Leucadian main;

There stands a rock, from whose impending steep

Apollo's fane surveys the rolling deep; 190

There injured lovers, leaping from above,

Their flames extinguish, and forget to love.[31]

Deucalion once with hopeless fury burned,

In vain he loved, relentless Pyrrha scorned:

But when from hence he plunged into the main, 195

Deucalion scorned, and Pyrrha loved in vain.

Haste, Sappho, haste, from high Leucadia throw

Thy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below!"[32]

She spoke, and vanished with the voice--I rise,

And silent tears fall trickling from my eyes. 200

I go, ye nymphs! those rocks and seas to prove;

How much I fear, but ah, how much I love!

I go, ye nymphs, where furious love inspires;

Let female fears submit to female fires.

To rocks and seas I fly from Phaon's hate, 205

And hope from seas and rocks a milder fate.

Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow,

And softly lay me on the waves below![33]

And thou, kind Love, my sinking limbs sustain, }

Spread thy soft wings, and waft me o'er the main, } 210

Nor let a lover's death the guiltless flood profane! }

On Phoebus' shrine my harp I'll then bestow,

And this inscription shall be placed below,

"Here she who sung, to him that did inspire,

Sappho to Phoebus consecrates her lyre; 215

What suits with Sappho, Phoebus, suits with thee;

The gift, the giver, and the god agree."

But why, alas, relentless youth, ah! why

To distant seas must tender Sappho fly?[34]

Thy charms than those may far more pow'rful be, 220

And Phoebus' self is less a god to me.[35]

Ah! canst thou doom me to the rocks and sea,

Oh! far more faithless and more hard than they?

Ah! canst thou rather see this tender breast

Dashed on these rocks, than to thy bosom pressed? 225

This breast which once, in vain! you liked so well;[36]

Where the loves played, and where the muses dwell.

Alas! the muses now no more inspire,

Untuned my lute, and silent is my lyre.

My languid numbers have forgot to flow, 230

And fancy sinks beneath a weight of woe.

Ye Lesbian virgins, and ye Lesbian dames,

Themes of my verse, and objects of my flames,

No more your groves with my glad songs shall ring,

No more these hands shall touch the trembling string: 235

My Phaon's fled, and I those arts resign:

(Wretch that I am, to call that Phaon mine!)[37]

Return, fair youth, return, and bring along

Joy to my soul, and vigour to my song:

Absent from thee, the poet's flame expires; 240

But ah! how fiercely burn the lover's fires!

Gods! can no prayers, no sighs, no numbers move

One savage heart, or teach it how to love?

The winds my prayers, my sighs, my numbers bear,[38]

The flying winds have lost them all in air! 245

Oh when, alas! shall more auspicious gales

To these fond eyes restore thy welcome sails![39]

If you return--ah why these long delays?

Poor Sappho dies, while careless Phaon stays.

O launch the bark, nor fear the wat'ry plain; 250

Venus for thee shall smooth her native main.

O launch thy bark, secure of prosp'rous gales;

Cupid for thee shall spread the swelling sails.[40]

If you will fly--(yet ah! what cause can be,

Too cruel youth, that you should fly from me?) 255

If not from Phaon I must hope for ease,

Ah let me seek it from the raging seas:

To raging seas unpitied I'll remove,

And either cease to live or cease to love!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: The ancients have left us little further account of Phaon

than that he was an old mariner, whom Venus transformed into a very

beautiful youth, whom Sappho and several other Lesbian ladies, fell

passionately in love with.--FENTON.]

[Footnote 2: Mrs. Behn's translation:

Say, lovely youth, why would'st thou thus betray.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 3: In the MS.:

These mournful numbers suit a mournful muse.]

[Footnote 4: Our poet has not varied much here from the couplet of his

predecessor, Sir Carr Scrope:

I burn, I burn, like kindled fields of corn,

When by the driving winds the flames are borne.--WAKEFIELD.

The first version in Pope's manuscript, though not so closely copied

from Scrope, is decidedly inferior to the text:

I burn, I burn, as when fierce whirlwinds raise

The spreading flames, and crackling harvests blaze.]

[Footnote 5: A childish, false thought.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 6: Scrope's couplet exceeds this in simplicity, and to my

taste, on the whole, is preferable:

My muse, and lute can now no longer please;

These are th' employments of a mind at ease.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 7: As Ovid tells the story in his Metamorphoses, Apollo fell

in love with Daphne and pursued her. When he was gaining upon her in the

race she was transformed, at her own request, into a laurel. The Cretan

dame was Ariadne. Bacchus was smitten with her extraordinary beauty, and

married her.]

[Footnote 8: This happy line, which is not too extravagant for a lover,

belongs to Pope.]

[Footnote 9: Andromeda, the daughter of Cepheus, an AEthiopian king. Her

mother thought herself superior in beauty to the Nereids, which excited

their jealousy, and through their influence a sea-monster was sent to

prey upon man and beast in the dominions of Cepheus. To atone for her

mother's vanity, and rid the land of the scourge, Cepheus agreed to

offer up Andromeda to the monster. She was chained to a rock on the

coast, where Perseus saw her at the critical moment when she was about

to be devoured. Captivated by her charms he engaged and slew the

monster, and made Andromeda his wife.]

[Footnote 10: This is very inferior to the conciseness, and simplicity

of the original, "memini (meminerunt omnia amantes)." Sir Carr Scrope's

translation is nearer the original, and more natural as well as elegant:

For they who truly love remember all.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 11: This line is another of the embellishments which Pope

engrafted on the original.]

[Footnote 12: The first line of this couplet is faulty in point of

versification, and, to use our bard's own remark, ten low words creep in

one dull line. As to the last line, it is wholly redundant, and has no

place in the original.--RUFFHEAD.]

[Footnote 13: In the original, Erycina, which was a surname of Venus

from Mount Eryx, in Sicily, where a celebrated temple was dedicated to

her.]

[Footnote 14: He has here left four lines untranslated, which are thus

rendered in the MS.:

My ruined brother trades from shore to shore,

And gains as basely as he lost before:

Me too he hates, advised by me in vain,

So fatal 'tis to be sincere and plain.

Of the last couplet the MS. contains a second version:

He hates his sister for a sister's care,

So unsuccessful 'tis to be sincere.]

[Footnote 15: In the MS.:

An infant now my hapless fortunes shares,

And this sad breast feels all a mother's cares.]

[Footnote 16: Cephalus tells the story poetically in Sandys' translation

of Ovid's Met. vii. 701. He was a hunter, who was setting his nets in

early dawn,

When grey Aurora, having vanquished night,

Beheld me on the ever-fragrant hill

Of steep Hymettus, and against my will,

As I my toils extended, bare me thence.]

[Footnote 17: Cynthia prolonged the sleep of Endymion, a shepherd of

singular beauty, that she might kiss him without his knowledge.]

[Footnote 18: Scrope is pleasing here:

Oh! let me once more see those eyes of thine!

Thy love I ask not; do but suffer mine.--WAKEFIELD.

Pope's couplet was as follows in the MS.:

Thy love I ask not to forsaken me,

All that I ask is but to doat on thee.

"Scrope melius hic," wrote Cromwell, and though Pope altered the lines

the remark of Cromwell remains true.]

[Footnote 19: Ruffhead observes, that this line is superior to the

original,

Aspice, quam sit in hoc multa litura loco;

which he thinks flat and languid: but the simplicity of the appeal to

the blot on her paper is admirable, and should be only mentioned as a

fact. The imitator has destroyed the whole beauty of the line, by a

quaint antithesis, and a laboured arrangement of words, which are not

natural in affliction. Scrope's translation again excels Pope's:

My constant falling tears the paper stain,

And my weak hand, etc.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 20: "The parenthesis is an interpolation," says a note

transcribed by Richardson from Pope's manuscript, and the remark is

equally applicable to the next line.]

[Footnote 21: In the first edition,

No gift on thee thy Sappho could confer.

The original couplet in the MS. was

No pledge you left me, faithless and unkind!

Nothing with me but wrongs was left behind.

"Jejune, flat, and ill expressed," is written against the last line in

the manuscript, and Pope profited by the criticism.]

[Footnote 22: This image is not in the original, but it is very

pleasingly introduced.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 23: The ten next verses are much superior to the

original.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 24: From Dryden's Ovid, Epist. vii.:

Their daily longing, and their nightly dream.

It was at first thus in Pope's MS.:

Thou art at once my anguish and delight,

Care of my day, and phantom of my night.

[Footnote 25: In the MS.:

Thy kisses then, thy words my soul endear.

Glow on my lips, and murmur in my ear.

[Footnote 26: Of this couplet there are two other versions in the MS.:

The charming phantom flies, and I complain,

As if thyself forsook me once again.

And,

I dread the light of cruel heav'n to view,

And close my eyes once more to dream of you.

[Footnote 27: "Antra nemusque" are not well rendered by "through lonely

plains." Ovid is concise and specific, Pope general. Better rendered by

Scrope:

Soon as I rise I haunt the caves and groves.--BOWLES.

[Footnote 28: In the first edition:

I find the shades that did our joys conceal,

Not him who made me love those shades so well.]

[Footnote 29: Scrope's translation:

Of Tereus she complains, and I of thee.--WAKEFIELD.

Tereus married Progne, and afterwards fell in love with her sister

Philomela. Both sisters conspired to revenge themselves upon him. They

killed Itys, his son by Progne, gave him some of the flesh to eat. When,

with savage exultation, they revealed the truth to him, and he was about

to slay them, Progne was changed into a swallow, and Philomela into a

nightingale.]

[Footnote 30: The Sappho of Ovid only says that she laid down upon the

bank worn out with weeping. Pope is answerable for the extravagant

conceit of "her swelling the flood with her tears." In the next verse

Pope calls the Naiad "a watery virgin,"--an expression which borders on

the ludicrous.]

[Footnote 31: There was a promontory in Acarnania called Leucate, on the

top of which was a little temple dedicated to Apollo. In this temple it

was usual for despairing lovers to make their vows in secret, and

afterwards to fling themselves from the top of the precipice into the

sea; for it was an established opinion that all those who were taken up

alive would be cured of their former passion. Sappho tried the remedy,

but perished in the experiment.--FAWKES.]

[Footnote 32: Aleaeus arrived at the promontory of Leucate that very

evening, in order to take the leap on her account; but hearing that her

body could not be found, he very generously lamented her fall, and is

said to have written his 215th ode on that occasion.--WARTON.

The entire story was probably a legend.]

[Footnote 33: These two lines have been quoted as the most smooth and

mellifluous in our language; and they are supposed to derive their

sweetness and harmony from the mixture of so many iambics. Pope himself

preferred the following line to all he had written, with respect to

harmony:

Lo, where Maeotis sleeps, and hardly flows.--WARTON.

Dryden in his Annus Mirabilis:

A constant trade-wind will securely blow,

And gently lay us on the spicy shore.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 34: In the MS.:

To those steep cliffs, that ocean must I fly.]

[Footnote 35: In the place of this couplet, there were four lines in the

MS.:

If thou return thy Sappho too shall stay,

Not all the gods shall force me then away;

Nor Love, nor Phoebus, then invoked shall be,

For thou alone art all the gods to me.

Another version ran thus:

Wouldst thou return, oh more than Phoebus, fair

No god like thee could ease thy Sappho's care.]

[Footnote 36: "Liked" seems a very unsuitable expression in the present

day. It was a word, however, among our early writers of greater force

and significance:

What I that loved, and you that _liked_,

Shall we begin to wrangle?

No, no, no; my heart is fixed,

And cannot disentangle.

_Old Ballad._--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 37: In the MS.:

Phaon--_my_ Phaon I almost had said--

Is fled, with Phaon your delights are fled.

Cromwell wrote against the last line "recte, non pulchre," and Pope

tried three variations of it before he cast them aside for the version

in the text:

Is gone, and with him all your pleasures fled.

Is gone, and all that's pleasing with him fled.

Is gone, and with him your delights are fled.]

[Footnote 38: Of ver. 242 and v. 244, Pope says in the MS., "So at first

as printed, but objected [against] as tautological. _Sic recte_ as [in

the] margin, but carried afterwards as at first." "Sighs" was thought to

be too nearly synonymous with "prayers," and Pope altered the lines by

erasing the expressions "no sighs" and "my sighs," and affixing the

epithet "tender" in both verses to numbers.]

[Footnote 39: In the MS.:

Oh, when shall kinder, more auspicious gales,

Waft to these eyes thy long-expected sails.

"Pleonasm," says a note on the manuscript. "_Kinder_, and _more

auspicious_, too much."]

[Footnote 40: This image is very inferior to the original, as it is more

vague and general: the picture in the original is strikingly beautiful.

The circumstances which make it so, are omitted by Pope:

Ipse gubernabit residens in puppe Cupido,

Ipse dabit tenera vela legetque manu.--BOWLES.

The objection of Bowles would not have applied to the manuscript, where

this admirable couplet, which Pope unwisely omitted, follows the lines

in the text:

Shall take the rudder in his tender hand,

And steer thee safe to this forsaken land.

There is a second, but inferior rendering:

Shall sit presiding on the painted prore,

And steer thy ship to this forsaken shore.

Cromwell applied the words of Horace, "quae desperat nitescere posse,

relinquit," which seems intended to intimate that it was impossible to

give a poetical translation of the original. Pope deferred to the

mistaken criticism.]

THE FABLE OF DRYOPE.[1]

FROM THE NINTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.

She[2] said, and for her lost Galanthis sighs,

When the fair consort of her son[3] replies:

Since you a servant's ravished form bemoan,[4]

And kindly sigh for sorrows not your own,

Let me (if tears and grief permit) relate 5

A nearer woe, a sister's stranger fate.

No nymph of all Oechalia could compare

For beauteous form with Dryope the fair,[5]

Her tender mother's only hope and pride,

(Myself the offspring of a second bride.) 10

This nymph compressed by him who rules the day,

Whom Delphi and the Delian isle obey,

Andraemon loved; and, blessed in all those charms

That pleased a god, succeeded to her arms.[6]

A lake there was, with shelving banks around, 15

Whose verdant summit fragrant myrtles crowned.

These shades, unknowing of the fates, she sought,

And to the naiads flow'ry garlands brought;

Her smiling babe (a pleasing charge) she pressed

Within her arms, and nourished at her breast. 20

Nor distant far a wat'ry lotos grows,

The spring was new, and all the verdant boughs,

Adorned with blossoms, promised fruits that vie

In glowing colours with the Tyrian dye:

Of these she cropped to please her infant son, 25

And I myself the same rash act had done:

But lo! I saw (as near her side I stood,)

The violated blossoms[7] drop with blood;

Upon the tree I cast a frightful look;

The trembling tree with sudden horror shook. 30

Lotis the nymph (if rural tales be true)

As from Priapus' lawless lust she flew,

Forsook her form; and fixing here, became

A flow'ry plant, which still preserves her name.

This change unknown, astonished at the sight, 35

My trembling sister strove to urge her flight:

And first the pardon of the nymphs implored,

And those offended sylvan pow'rs adored:

But when she backward would have fled, she found

Her stiff'ning feet were rooted in the ground: 40

In vain to free her fastened feet she strove,

And, as she struggles, only moves above;

She feels th' encroaching bark around her grow

By quick degrees, and cover all below:

Surprized at this, her trembling hand she heaves 45

To rend her hair; her hand is filled with leaves:

Where late was hair the shooting leaves are seen

To rise, and shade her with a sudden green.

The child Amphissus, to her bosom pressed,

Perceived a colder and a harder breast, 50

And found the springs, that ne'er till then denied

Their milky moisture, on a sudden dried.

I saw, unhappy! what I now relate,

And stood the helpless witness of thy fate,

Embraced thy boughs, thy rising bark delayed, 55

There wished to grow, and mingle shade with shade.

Behold Andraemon and th' unhappy sire

Appear, and for their Dryope inquire:

A springing tree for Dryope they find,

And print warm kisses on the panting rind; 60

Prostrate, with tears their kindred plant bedew,

And close embrace, as[8] to the roots they grew.

The face was all that now remained of thee,

No more a woman, nor yet quite a tree;[9]

Thy branches hung with humid pearls appear,[10] 65

From ev'ry leaf distils a trickling tear,

And straight a voice, while yet a voice remains,

Thus through the trembling boughs in sighs complains.

If to the wretched any faith be giv'n,

I swear by all th' unpitying pow'rs of heav'n,[11] 70

No wilful crime this heavy vengeance bred;

In mutual innocence[12] our lives we led:

If this be false, let these new greens decay, }

Let sounding axes lop my limbs away, }

And crackling flames on all my honours prey.[13] } 75

But from my branching arms this infant bear,

Let some kind nurse supply a mother's care:

And to his mother let him oft be led,

Sport in her shades, and in her shades be fed;

Teach him, when first his infant voice shall frame 80

Imperfect words, and lisp his mother's name,

To hail this tree, and say with weeping eyes,

Within this plant my helpless parent lies;

And when in youth he seeks the shady woods,

Oh! let him fly the crystal lakes and floods, 85

Nor touch the fatal flow'rs; but, warned by me,

Believe a goddess shrined in ev'ry tree.

My sire, my sister, and my spouse, farewell![14]

If in your breasts or love or pity dwell,

Protect your plant, nor let my branches feel 90

The browzing cattle or the piercing steel.

Farewell! and since I cannot bend to join

My lips to yours, advance at least to mine.

My son, thy mother's parting kiss receive,

While yet thy mother has a kiss to give. 95

I can no more; the creeping rind invades

My closing lips,[15] and hides my head in shades;

Remove your hands, the bark shall soon suffice

Without their aid to seal these dying eyes.

She ceased at once to speak, and ceased to be; 100

And all the nymph was lost within the tree;

Yet latent life through her new branches reigned,

And long the plant a human heat retained.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Upon occasion of the death of Hercules, his mother Alcmena

recounts her misfortunes to Iole, who answers with a relation of those

of her own family, in particular the transformation of her sister

Dryope, which is the subject of the ensuing fable.--POPE.]

[Footnote 2: Alcmena. Galanthis was one of her female servants.]

[Footnote 3: Iole was not the consort of Alcmena's son, Hercules, but of

her grandson, Hyllus.]

[Footnote 4: Out of jealousy that Alcmena should bear a child to

Jupiter, Juno employed Lucina to hinder the birth of Hercules. The

malevolence of the goddess was defeated through the ingenuity of

Galanthis, who was straightway turned into a weasel by the baffled and

irritated Lucina.]

[Footnote 5: Sandys' translation:

Of all the Oechalides

For form few might with Dryope compare.]

[Footnote 6: This flowing couplet he has transferred into more places

than one of his version of Homer.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 7: Dryden, AEn. iii. 54:

The violated myrtle ran with gore.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 8: "As" is put for "as though."]

[Footnote 9: Cowley's transformation of Lot's wife, Davideis, iii. 254:

No more a woman, nor yet quite a stone.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 10: Dryden's Virg. Ecl. x. 20:

And hung with humid pearls the lowly shrub appears.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 11: Sandys' translation:

If credit to the wretched may be giv'n,

I swear by all the pow'rs embowered in heav'n.]

[Footnote 12: This translation is faulty. "Patior sine crimine, et

viximus innocuae," is but one and the same person,--a testimony of her

own innocence, but not of the mutual concord between her

relations.--BOWYER.]

[Footnote 13: "New greens," from its equivocal meaning, is a burlesque

expression. "Sounding" is a feeble epithet to be applied to the axe by

Dryope, who was thinking of the wounds it would inflict upon her; and it

is still more inappropriate to make her call her transformation, "my

honours," when she regarded the metamorphose with dismay. How superior

to Pope's diluted version is the brief and simple language of the

original,--"et caesa securibus urar." Sandys is better than Pope in the

same proportion that he is more literal:

Or if I lie, may my green branches fade;

And felled with axes on the fire be laid.]

[Footnote 14: It is worth quoting the parallel line of Sandys, to show

how much more touching are the household words "husband" and "father"

than the "sire" and "spouse" substituted by Pope:

Dear husband, sister, father, all farewell.]

[Footnote 15: Dryden's version of Ovid, Met. viii.:

At once th' encroaching rinds their closing lips

invade.--WAKEFIELD.]

VERTUMNUS AND POMONA.[1]

FROM THE FOURTEENTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.

The fair Pomona flourished in his reign;[2]

Of all the virgins of the sylvan train,

None taught the trees a nobler race to bear,

Or more improved the vegetable care.[3]

To her the shady grove, the flow'ry field, 5

The streams and fountains no delights could yield;

'Twas all her joy the ripening fruits to tend,

And see the boughs with happy burthens bend.

The hook she bore instead of Cynthia's spear,

To lop the growth of the luxuriant year, 10

To decent form the lawless shoots to bring,

And teach th' obedient branches where to spring.

Now the cleft rind inserted graffs receives,

And yields an offspring more than nature gives;

Now sliding streams[4] the thirsty plants renew, 15

And feed their fibres with reviving dew.

These cares alone her virgin breast employ,

Averse from Venus and the nuptial joy.

Her private orchards, walled on ev'ry side,

To lawless sylvans all access denied. 20

How oft the satyrs and the wanton fauns,

Who haunt the forests, or frequent the lawns,

The god[5] whose ensign scares the birds of prey,

And old Silenus, youthful in decay,

Employed their wiles, and unavailing care, 25

To pass the fences, and surprise the fair?

Like these, Vertumnus owned his faithful flame,

Like these, rejected by the scornful dame.

To gain her sight a thousand forms he wears;

And first a reaper from the field appears; 30

Sweating he walks, while loads of golden grain

O'ercharge the shoulders of the seeming swain.

Oft o'er his back a crooked scythe is laid,

And wreaths of hay his sun-burnt temples shade:

Oft in his hardened hand a goad he bears, 35

Like one who late unyoked the sweating steers.

Sometimes his pruning-hook corrects the vines,

And the loose stragglers to their ranks confines.

Now gath'ring what the bounteous year allows,

He pulls ripe apples from the bending boughs. 40

A soldier now, he with his sword appears;

A fisher next, his trembling angle bears;

Each shape he varies, and each art he tries,

On her bright charms to feast his longing eyes.

A female form at last Vertumnus wears, } 45

With all the marks of rev'rend age appears, }

His temples thinly spread with silver hairs; }

Propped on his staff, and stooping as he goes,

A painted mitre[6] shades his furrowed brows.

The god in this decrepid form arrayed, } 50

The gardens entered, and the fruit surveyed; }

And "Happy you!" (he thus addressed the maid) }

"Whose charms as far all other nymphs outshine,

As other gardens are excelled by thine!"

Then kissed the fair; (his kisses warmer grow 55

Than such as women on their sex bestow[7]);

Then placed beside her on the flow'ry ground,

Beheld the trees with autumn's bounty crowned.

An elm was near, to whose embraces led,

The curling vine her swelling clusters spread: 60

He viewed her twining branches with delight,

And praised the beauty of the pleasing sight.

Yet this tall elm, but for his vine (he said)

Had stood neglected, and a barren shade;

And this fair vine, but that her arms surround 65

Her married elm, had crept along the ground.

Ah! beauteous maid, let this example move

Your mind, averse from all the joys of love.

Deign to be loved, and ev'ry heart subdue!

What nymph could e'er attract such crowds as you? 70

Not she whose beauty urged the Centaur's arms,[8]

Ulysses' queen, nor Helen's fatal charms.

Ev'n now, when silent scorn is all they gain,

A thousand court you, though they court in vain,

A thousand sylvans, demigods, and gods, 75

That haunt our mountains and our Alban woods.

But if you'll prosper, mark what I advise,

Whom age and long experience render wise,

And one whose tender care is far above

All that these lovers ever felt of love, 80

(Far more than e'er can by yourself be guessed)

Fix on Vertumnus, and reject the rest.

For his firm faith I dare engage my own;

Scarce to himself, himself is better known.

To distant lands Vertumnus never roves; 85

Like you, contented with his native groves:

Nor at first sight, like most, admires the fair; }

For you he lives; and you alone shall share }

His last affection, as his early care. }

Besides, he's lovely far above the rest, 90

With youth immortal, and with beauty blest.

Add, that he varies ev'ry shape with ease,

And tries all forms that may Pomona please.

But what should most excite a mutual flame,

Your rural cares and pleasures are the same: 95

To him your orchards' early fruits are due,

(A pleasing off'ring when 'tis made by you;)

He values these; but yet, alas! complains,

That still the best and dearest gift remains.

Not the fair fruit that on yon branches glows 100

With that ripe red th' autumnal sun bestows;

Nor tasteful herbs that in these gardens rise,

Which the kind soil with milky sap supplies;

You, only you, can move the god's desire:

Oh crown so constant and so pure a fire! 105

Let soft compassion touch your gentle mind;

Think, 'tis Vertumnus begs you to be kind!

So may no frost, when early buds appear,

Destroy the promise of the youthful year;

Nor winds, when first your florid orchard blows, 110

Shake the light blossoms from their blasted boughs!

This, when the various god had urged in vain,

He straight assumed his native form again;

Such, and so bright an aspect now he bears,

As when through clouds th' emerging sun appears, 115

And thence exerting his refulgent ray,

Dispels the darkness and reveals the day.

Force he prepared, but checked the rash design;

For when, appearing in a form divine,

The nymph surveys him, and beholds the grace 120

Of charming features, and a youthful face,

In her soft breast consenting passions move,

And the warm maid confessed a mutual love.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: This fragment was first published in 1712, in Lintot's

Miscellany.]

[Footnote 2: The reign of Procas, one of the fabulous kings of Alba

Longa.]

[Footnote 3: Pope, in his youth, was not averse to affected phrases; but

it is surprising that he could bring himself to call a garden "the

vegetable care."]

[Footnote 4: "Sliding" is a very happy expression.--BOWLES.

Pope borrowed it from the corresponding passage of Sandys--"Soft-sliding

springs."]

[Footnote 5: Priapus.]

[Footnote 6: A broad band of cloth worn by women round the head.]

[Footnote 7: Sandys' Ovid, book ii.:

--his kisses too intemperate grow,

Not such as maids on maidens do bestow.]

[Footnote 8: Hippodameia. According to the fable, a Centaur carried her

off at her marriage feast. This occasioned the battle between the

Lapithae, over whom her husband ruled, and the Centaurs.]

JANUARY AND MAY:

OR,

THE MERCHANT'S TALE.

FROM CHAUCER.

This translation was done at sixteen or seventeen years of age.--POPE.

The story of January and May now before us is of the comic kind; and the

character of a fond old dotard betrayed into disgrace by an unsuitable

match is supported in a lively manner. Pope has nowhere copied the free

and easy versification, and the narrative style of Dryden's Fables, so

happily as in this pleasant tale. He has endeavoured suitably to

familiarise the stateliness of our heroic measure; but, after all his

pains, this measure is not adapted to such subjects so well as the lines

of four feet, or the French numbers of Fontaine. Fontaine is, in truth,

the capital and unrivalled writer of comic tales. He generally took his

subjects from Boccacio, Poggius, and Ariosto; but adorned them with so

many natural strokes, with such quaintness in his reflections, and such

a dryness and archness of humour, as cannot fail to excite laughter. Our

Prior has happily caught his manner in many of his lighter tales,

particularly in Hans Carvel. Of the tale before us, Mr. Tyrwhitt gives

the following account:--"The scene of the Merchant's Tale is laid in

Italy; but none of the names, except Damian and Justin, seem to be

Italian, but rather made at pleasure; so that I doubt whether the story

be really of Italian growth. The adventure of the pear-tree I find in a

small collection of Latin fables, written by one Adolphus, in elegiac

verses of his fashion, in the year 1315. This fable has never been

printed but once, and in a book not commonly to be met with. Whatever

was the real original of this tale, the machinery of the fairies, which

Chaucer has used so happily, was probably added by himself; and indeed I

cannot help thinking that his Pluto and Proserpine were the true

progenitors of Oberon and Titania, or rather that they themselves have,

once at least, deigned to revisit our poetical system under the latter

names. In the History of English Poetry, this is said to be an old

Lombard story. But many passages in it are evidently taken from the

Polycraticon of John of Salisbury: De molestiis et oneribus conjugiorum

secundum Hieronymum et alios philosophos--Et de pernicie libidinis--Et

de mulieris Ephesinae et similium fide. And, by the way, about forty

verses belonging to this argument are translated from the same chapter

of the Polycraticon, in the Wife of Bath's prologue. In the meantime, it

is not improbable that this tale might have originally been oriental. A

Persian tale is just published which it extremely resembles; and it has

much of the allegory of an eastern apologue."--WARTON.

In the art of telling a story in verse, Pope is peculiarly happy; we

almost forget the grossness of the subject of this tale, while we are

struck by the uncommon ease and readiness of the verse, the suitableness

of the expressions, and the spirit and happiness of the whole. I think

Dr. Warton injudiciously censures the verse, which appears to me to be

very suitably employed. Pope has introduced triplets in many places, no

doubt for greater effect, which they certainly have. There is generally

two together, ended with an Alexandrine. This is common in Dryden's

fables, on which Pope evidently formed his style in these narrative

pieces. When I say that Dr. Warton injudiciously objects to the verse,

it should be remembered that there is a mock-elevation in the speeches,

descriptions, &c., of this story, and even poetry in the fairy revels,

for which the versification Pope has chosen is more proper, than it

would be for Prior's burlesque, and less poetical, ribaldry. The mixture

of classical and gothic imagery, such as Chaucer uses, in making Pluto

and Proserpine, instead of spirits, like Oberon and Titania, the king

and queen of the "yellow-skirted fays," is very common in our early

poets, who derived the combination from the old romances, and

Ovid.--BOWLES.

When Dryden published his version of some of Chaucer's Tales he gave, in

his preface, an excellent account of the characteristics of the

original. "As Chaucer," he said, "is the father of English poetry, so I

hold him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, or

the Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense,--learned in

all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects. He must

have been a man of a most wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it

has been truly observed of him, he has taken into the compass of his

Canterbury Tales the various manners, and humours, as we now call them,

of the whole English nation in his age. Not a single character has

escaped him. All his pilgrims are severally distinguished from each

other, and not only in their inclinations, but in their very

physiognomies and persons. I see them as perfectly before me,--their

humours, their features, and their very dress--as distinctly as if I had

supped with them at the Tabard in Southwark. The matter and manner of

their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different

educations, humours, and callings, that each of them would be improper

in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are

distinguished by their several sorts of gravity. Their discourses are

such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding,--such as

are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are vicious,

and some virtuous; some are unlearned, or, as Chaucer calls them, lewd,

and some are learned. Even the ribaldry of the low characters is

different. The reeve, the miller, and the cook are several men, and

distinguished from each other as much as the mincing lady prioress, and

the broad-speaking, gap-toothed wife of Bath. We have our forefathers,

and great grand-dames all before us, as they were in Chaucer's days.

Their general characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in

England, though they are called by other names than those of monks and

friars, and canons, and lady abesses, and nuns: for mankind is ever the

same, and nothing lost out of nature, though everything is altered."

There were two classes of readers who exclaimed against the attempt to

renovate the original,--those who held that it was too bad to be

reproduced, and those who considered it too excellent to be remodelled

without being spoiled. "I find," writes Dryden, "some people are

offended that I have turned these tales into modern English, because

they think them unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry,

old-fashioned wit, not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl

of Leicester say that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion, who having

read him over at my lord's request, declared he had no taste of him.

Being shocked perhaps with his old style, he never examined into the

depth of his good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and

must first be polished ere he shines. But there are other judges who

think I ought not to have translated him into English out of a quite

contrary notion. They suppose there is a certain veneration due to his

old language, and that it is little less than profanation and sacrilege

to alter it. They are further of opinion that somewhat of his good sense

will suffer in the transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts

will infallibly be lost, which appear with more grace in their old

habit. Of this opinion was the Earl of Leicester, who valued Chaucer as

much as Mr. Cowley despised him." Dryden replied that his version was

only intended for those to whom the original was unintelligible, and

while allowing that the original was superior to the copy, he contended

that the copy was to be preferred to a blank. If he had confined himself

simply to modernising his author there would have been little force in

his plea. The phraseology of Chaucer is readily mastered, and any

departure from his words destroys a large part of the charm. There is a

native simplicity in the mediaeval works of genius which pleases like the

artless manners of children, but which would be as ridiculous in a

modern dress as the manners of the child in a grown-up person. Nor must

we overlook the superior interest which attaches to the notions, usages,

and characters of our ancestors when the picture is painted by

themselves. A copy in which costumes and colouring have been completely

changed is but an adulterate representation. The antique peculiarities

and primitive freshness are gone. The real justification of Dryden's

undertaking was not that his version was a substitute for the original,

but that it was a glorious supplement. Little as he scrupled to assert

his own merits he could not press this argument to its full extent,

though he was evidently conscious of the truth. He states that as the

old poet was occasionally diffuse, and more often undignified, he had

curtailed the redundancies, and rejected the trivialities. He did not

stop at the easy office of omission. "I dare," he says, "to add that

what beauties I lose in some places I give to others which had them not

originally. If I have altered Chaucer anywhere for the better I must at

the same time acknowledge that I could have done nothing without him.

_Facile est inventis addere_, is no great commendation, and I am not so

vain to think I have deserved a greater." In dramatic power and pathos,

which are Chaucer's strongest points, Dryden has not improved upon him;

but upon the whole he has narrated the tales in a higher strain of

poetry, in richer and more felicitous language, and with the addition of

many new and happy ideas. A few short examples will show the nature of

the changes he introduced into numerous passages in the process of

recasting them. The Wife of Bath's Tale commences with these lines:

In olde dayes of the King Arthour

Of which that Britains speken great honour,

All was this land fulfilled of fairie;

The elf-queen with her jolly company,

Danced full oft in many a greene mead;

This was the old opinion, as I read;

I speak of many hundred year ago;

But now can no man see none elves mo.

For now the greate charity and prayers

Of limitours, and other holy freres,

That seeken every land, and every stream,

As thick as motes in the sunne-beam,

Blessing halls, chambers, kitchenes, and bowers,

Cities, and boroughs, castles high, and towers,

Thorpes and barnes, sheepnes, and daieries,

That maketh that there be no faieries.

This is one of the prettiest pieces of verse in the Canterbury Tales.

Dryden has expanded and excelled it.

In days of old when Arthur filled the throne,

Whose acts and fame to foreign lands were blown,

The king of elfs, and little fairy queen,

Gambolled on heaths, and danced on every green,

And where the jolly troop had led the round

The grass unbidden rose, and marked the ground:

Nor darkling did they dance; the silver light }

Of Phoebe served to guide their steps aright, }

And, with their tripping pleased, prolonged the night. }

Her beams they followed where at full she played, }

Nor longer than she shed her horns they stayed, }

From thence with airy flight to foreign lands conveyed. }

Above the rest our Britain held they dear, }

More solemnly they kept their sabbaths here, }

And made more spacious rings, and revelled half the year. }

I speak of ancient times, for now the swain, }

Returning late, may pass the woods in vain, }

And never hope to see the nightly train. }

* * * * * * * * * *

For priests with prayers and other godly gear,

Have made the merry goblins disappear;

And where they played their merry pranks before

Have sprinkled holy water on the floor;

And friars that through the wealthy regions run

Thick as the motes that twinkle in the sun,

Resort to farmers rich, and bless their halls,

And exorcise the beds, and cross the walls:

This makes the fairy choirs forsake the place

When once 'tis hallowed with the rites of grace.

He sometimes carries his innovations further, and the splendour of his

paraphrase entirely eclipses the primitive idea. Chaucer says, in the

tale of the Nun's Priest, that

Swevens be but vanities and japes.

Men dream all day of owles and of apes,

And eke of many a mase therewithall;

Men dream of thinges that never be shall.

Chaucer's hint, which is scarcely more than if the speaker had said in

plain prose, "I have no faith in dreams, for they are wild visions which

never come true," is transformed by Dryden into this exquisite passage:

Dreams are but interludes, which fancy makes;

When monarch-reason sleeps this mimic wakes;

Compounds a medley of disjointed things,

A mob of cobblers, and a court of kings:

Light fumes are merry, grosser fumes are sad;

Both are the reasonable soul run mad;

And many monstrous forms in sleep we see,

That neither were, nor are, nor e'er can be.

Sometimes forgotten things long cast behind

Rush forward in the brain, and come to mind;

The nurse's legends are for truths received,

And the man dreams but what the boy believed.

Sometimes we but rehearse a former play; }

The night restores our actions done by day, }

As hounds in sleep will open for their prey. }

Among the characteristics of the "poor parson" Chaucer mentions that

He was a shepherd, and no mercenary,

which is the only warrant the text afforded for these beautiful lines in

the paraphrase of Dryden:

The prelate for his holy life he prized;

The worldly pomp of prelacy despised.

His Saviour came not with a gaudy show,

Nor was his kingdom of the world below.

Patience in want, and poverty of mind, }

These marks of church and churchmen he designed, }

And living taught, and dying left behind. }

The crown he wore was of the pointed thorn;

In purple he was crucified, not born.

They who contend for place and high degree,

Are not his sons, but those of Zebedee.

Having gained so much from the masculine and buoyant genius of Dryden,

the newly fashioned tales took their rank as independent works, and were

rather valued for their want of resemblance to Chaucer than because they

were a true reflection of him. There are defects in the modern version.

The language is sometimes too colloquial, and there are many careless

lines; but in the main the verse bounds and dances along with equal

strength, facility, and grace, exhibiting one of the most wonderful

specimens in literature of the power, spirit, and abundance of the

simplest English when moulded by a master. The Flower and the Leaf,

which might have been written in the fairy land it describes, is

pre-eminent above the rest for its bright unceasing flow of delicious

poetry, for its chaste yet luxuriant diction, for its sustained and

various melody, for its lovely pictures both earthly and ethereal, for

its pure, refined, and elevating sentiment.

"By Dryden's Fables," says Johnson, "which had then been not long

published, and were much in the hands of poetical readers, Pope was

tempted to try his own skill in giving Chaucer a more fashionable

appearance, and put January and May, and the Prologue of the Wife of

Bath into modern English." January and May, which the poet says was

translated when he was sixteen or seventeen, was not published till he

was nearly twenty-one, having first appeared on May 2, 1709, in the

sixth volume of Tonson's Miscellany. He imitated Dryden in abridging

Chaucer, but his only addition of any moment to the Merchant's Tale is

in the description of the fairies, which was borrowed from Dryden

himself. His attempt was substantially limited to epitomising the

original in refined language, and musical numbers. In this he succeeded,

and more could not be expected of a youth. If he had aspired higher he

could not at twenty have competed with his mighty predecessor. Dryden's

tales are the productions of a great poetic genius. The January of Pope

is the production of a clever versifier. The relative position which

their respective translations of Chaucer occupy in their works accords

with the difference in their execution. The adaptations of Dryden are

commonly numbered among his choicest effusions. The versions of Pope

hold a subordinate place among his writings, and are hardly taken into

account in the estimate of his powers. The result vindicates the opinion

of Lord Leicester, that in the conversion of Chaucer into modern

English the loss exceeds the gain. Pope was not insensible to the

dramatic qualities of his author. "I read him still," he said to Spence,

"with as much pleasure as almost any of our poets. He is a master of

manners, of description, and the first tale-teller in the true enlivened

natural way." But in polishing him, something of the nature and

liveliness was inevitably obliterated. He was, in many of his stories,

an admirable novelist in verse, and he adopted a familiar style which

permitted him to relate in rhyme, with the freedom of prose, the common

talk of common men. His traits are in the highest degree colloquial,

individual, and life-like, and his strong strokes are weakened, and his

dramatic vivacity tamed down, when he is turned into smooth, harmonious,

elegant poetry. The refinement in the form is not a compensation for the

sacrifices in the substance, especially when the antique form is itself

essential to teach us how our forefathers spoke, thought, and acted five

hundred years ago. Every touch which renders the picture more modern,

makes it less true. The translation of Pope is skilfully executed, but

it is inferior in raciness and interest to an original which can be read

by any educated Englishman. A few gratuitous defects have been imported

into the modernised January and May. "Chaucer," says Dryden, "followed

nature everywhere, but was never so bold to go beyond her." Pope has

sometimes overstepped the limits. He has here and there exaggerated his

original, and the truth and keeping of the characters are invariably

injured by the change.

"I have confined my choice," said Dryden, "to such tales of Chaucer as

savour nothing of immodesty. If I had desired more to please than to

instruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchant, the Sumner,

and above all the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, would have

procured me as many friends and readers, as there are beaus and ladies

of pleasure in town. But I will no more offend against good manners. I

am sensible as I ought to be of the scandal I have given by my loose

writings, and make what reparation I am able by this public

acknowledgment." Both the pieces which Pope selected were among the

number which Dryden put under a ban, and the younger poet, perhaps,

considered that when he had purified them from part of their coarseness,

the objection would no longer apply. The apology which Chaucer urged for

his plain speaking was that in telling a tale he must repeat it

correctly, and not surrender truth to delicacy. "Yet if a man," replies

Dryden, "should have enquired of him what need he had of introducing

such characters where obscene words were proper in their mouths, but

very indecent to be heard, I know not what answer he could have made."

None was possible. The offence, nevertheless, was not what Dryden

assumes. The same Chaucer who, in his carefulness to keep to nature,

will have all his _dramatis personae_ talk according to their rank and

callings, assuredly did not violate nature when he represented the

religious and refined prioress, together with the other high-bred and

decorous members of the party, as willing auditors of the broad and

uncompromising language of their ruder companions. The presence of

ladies and ecclesiastics was not the slightest check upon the tongues of

the pilgrims, and it is evident that in ordinary social life, there was

hardly any limit to the freedom of expression. But in every age a

latitude is allowed in conversation which would be condemned in books,

and Chaucer merely excused himself for recording in poetry the common

colloquial terms of his day. Usage had rendered them inoffensive, and in

themselves they argued no more impurity of thought than the equivalent

circumlocutions of our own generation. The greater or less plainness of

speech which has prevailed at different eras is often rather a question

of manners than of morality. If Pope or Dryden had retained, in this

particular, the phraseology of Chaucer, the adherence to the letter of

the original would have completely falsified its spirit, just as words

which are uttered with innocence by rustics in a cottage would be an

evidence of the utmost depravity when spoken by a man of education in a

drawing-room. The intention influences the effect, and the grossness of

our early writers has not the taint to a reader of the present day which

would attach to similar language when employed by corrupt minds in

civilized times. All the expurgations of Pope were insufficient to make

his version as little exceptionable in the eighteenth century as was the

original of Chaucer to the world of the fourteenth century. A merchant

in the reign of Queen Anne would not have ventured to recite the

modernised story in a mixed company, where ladies like the prioress and

the nuns were present. The tone of the work is even lowered in places.

In the looser literature of Pope's youth, and especially in comedies,

adultery in a wife only furnished food for laughter against the husband.

This is the aspect which is imparted to the translation of January and

May, and it cannot be denied that Chaucer himself in some of his other

stories, is open to the charge of treating vice as a jest. But he did

not fall into the error in the Merchant's Tale, where the supposed

narrator, in accordance with his character, reprobates the criminal

conduct of the treacherous squire and the faithless wife, at the same

time that he exposes the doating folly of the amorous knight.

JANUARY AND MAY:

OR, THE

MERCHANT'S TALE.

There lived in Lombardy, as authors write,

In days of old, a wise and worthy knight;

Of gentle manners, as of gen'rous race,

Blest with much sense,[1] more riches, and some grace.

Yet led astray by Venus' soft delights 5

He scarce could rule some idle appetites:

For long ago, let priests say what they could,

Weak sinful laymen were but flesh and blood.

But in due time, when sixty years were o'er,

He vowed to lead this vicious life no more; 10

Whether pure holiness inspired his mind,

Or dotage turned his brain, is hard to find;

But his high courage[2] pricked him forth to wed,

And try the pleasures of a lawful bed.

This was his nightly dream, his daily care, 15

And to the heav'nly pow'rs his constant prayer,

Once, ere he died, to taste the blissful life

Of a kind husband and a loving wife.[3]

These thoughts he fortified with reasons still,

For none want reasons to confirm their will. 20

Grave authors say, and witty poets sing,

That honest wedlock is a glorious thing:

But depth of judgment most in him appears,

Who wisely weds in his maturer years.[4]

Then let him chuse a damsel young and fair, 25

To bless his age, and bring a worthy heir;

To sooth his cares, and free from noise and strife,

Conduct him gently to the verge of life.

Let sinful bachelors their woes deplore,

Full well they merit all they feel, and more: 30

Unawed by precepts, human or divine,

Like birds and beasts, promiscuously they join:

Nor know to make the present blessing last,

To hope the future, or esteem the past:

But vainly boast the joys they never tried, 35

And find divulged the secrets they would hide.

The married man may bear his yoke with ease,

Secure at once himself and heav'n to please;

And pass his inoffensive hours away,

In bliss all night, and innocence all day: 40

Though fortune change, his constant spouse remains,

Augments his joys, or mitigates his pains.

But what so pure, which envious tongues will spare?

Some wicked wits have libelled all the fair.

With matchless impudence they style a wife 45

The dear-bought curse, and lawful plague of life;

A bosom serpent, a domestic evil,

A night invasion, and a mid-day devil.

Let not the wise these sland'rous words regard,

But curse the bones of ev'ry lying bard.[5] 50

All other goods by fortune's hand are giv'n,

A wife is the peculiar gift of heav'n.

Vain fortune's favours, never at a stay,

Like empty shadows, pass, and glide away;

One solid comfort, our eternal wife, 55

Abundantly supplies us all our life;

This blessing lasts, if those who try, say true,

As long as heart can wish--and longer too.

Our grandsire Adam, ere of Eve possessed,

Alone, and ev'n in Paradise unblessed, 60

With mournful looks the blissful scenes surveyed,

And wandered in the solitary shade.

The Maker saw, took pity, and bestowed

Woman, the last, the best reserve of God.

A wife! ah gentle deities,[6] can he, 65

That has a wife, e'er feel adversity?

Would men but follow what the sex advise,

All things would prosper, all the world grow wise.

'Twas by Rebecca's aid that Jacob won

His father's blessing from an elder son:[7] 70

Abusive Nabal owed his forfeit life

To the wise conduct of a prudent wife:

Heroic Judith, as old Hebrews show,

Preserved the Jews, and slew th' Assyrian foe:[8]

At Hester's suit, the persecuting sword 75

Was sheathed, and Israel lived to bless the Lord.

These weighty motives, January the sage

Maturely pondered in his riper age;

And charmed with virtuous joys, and sober life,

Would try that christian comfort, called a wife. 80

His friends were summoned on a point so nice,[9]

To pass their judgment, and to give advice;

But fixed before, and well resolved was he,

As men that ask advice are wont to be.

My friends, he cried (and cast a mournful look 85

Around the room, and sighed before he spoke):

Beneath the weight of threescore years I bend,

And, worn with cares, am hast'ning to my end;

How I have lived, alas! you know too well,

In worldly follies, which I blush to tell; 90

But gracious heav'n has ope'd my eyes at last,

With due regret I view my vices past,

And, as the precept of the church decrees,

Will take a wife, and live in holy ease.

But since by counsel all things should be done, 95

And many heads are wiser still than one,

Chuse you for me,[10] who best shall be content

When my desire's approved by your consent.

One caution yet is needful to be told,

To guide your choice; this wife must not be old:[11] 100

There goes a saying, and 'twas shrewdly said,

Old fish at table, but young flesh in bed.

My soul abhors the tasteless, dry embrace

Of a stale virgin with a winter face:

In that cold season love but treats his guest 105

With bean-straw, and tough forage at the best

No crafty widows shall approach my bed;

Those are too wise for bachelors to wed.

As subtle clerks by many schools are made,

Twice married dames are mistresses o' th' trade: 110

But young and tender virgins ruled with ease,

We form like wax, and mould them as we please.

Conceive me, sirs, nor take my sense amiss;

'Tis what concerns my soul's eternal bliss;

Since if I found no pleasure in my spouse, 115

As flesh is frail, and who, God help me, knows?

Then should I live in lewd adultery,

And sink downright to Satan when I die.

Or were I cursed with an unfruitful bed,

The righteous end were lost for which I wed; 120

To raise up seed to bless the pow'rs above,

And not for pleasure only, or for love.[12]

Think not I doat; 'tis time to take a wife,

When vig'rous blood forbids a chaster life:

Those that are blest with store of grace divine, 125

May live like saints, by heav'n's consent, and mine.[13]

And since I speak of wedlock, let me say,

(As, thank my stars, in modest truth I may,)

My limbs are active, still I'm sound at heart,

And a new vigour springs in ev'ry part. 130

Think not my virtue lost, though time has shed

These rev'rend honours on my hoary head:

Thus trees are crowned with blossoms white as snow,

The vital sap then rising from below.[14]

Old as I am, my lusty limbs appear 135

Like winter greens, that flourish all the year.

Now, sirs, you know, to what I stand inclined,

Let ev'ry friend with freedom speak his mind.[15]

He said; the rest in diff'rent parts divide;

The knotty point was urged on either side: 140

Marriage, the theme on which they all declaimed,

Some praised with wit, and some with reason blamed,

Till, what with proofs, objections, and replies,

Each wond'rous positive, and wond'rous wise,

There fell between his brothers a debate, 145

Placebo this was called, and Justin that.

First to the knight Placebo thus begun,

(Mild were his looks, and pleasing was his tone,)

Such prudence, sir, in all your words appears,

As plainly proves, experience dwells with years; 150

Yet you pursue sage Solomon's advice,

To work by counsel when affairs are nice:

But, with the wise man's leave, I must protest, }

So may my soul arrive at ease and rest, }

As still I hold your own advice the best. } 155

Sir, I have lived a courtier all my days,

And studied men, their manners, and their ways;

And have observed this useful maxim still,

To let my betters always have their will.

Nay, if my lord affirmed that black was white, 160

My word was this, "Your honour's in the right."

Th' assuming wit, who deems himself so wise,

As his mistaken patron to advise,

Let Tirm not dare to vent his dang'rous thought,

A noble fool was never in a fault.[16] 165

This, sir, affects not you, whose ev'ry word

Is weighed with judgment, and befits a lord:

Your will is mine; and is, I will maintain,

Pleasing to God, and should be so to man;

At least your courage all the world must praise, 170

Who dare to wed in your declining days.

Indulge the vigour of your mounting blood,

And let grey fools be indolently good,

Who, past all pleasure, damn the joys of sense,

With rev'rend dulness and grave impotence.[17] 175

Justin, who silent sat, and heard the man,

Thus, with a philosophic frown, began:

A heathen author,[18] of the first degree,

Who, though not faith, had sense as well as we,

Bids us be certain our concerns to trust 180

To those of gen'rous principles, and just.

The venture's greater, I'll presume to say,

To give your person, than your goods away:

And therefore, sir, as you regard your rest,

First learn your lady's qualities at least: 185

Whether she's chaste or rampant, proud or civil;

Meek as a saint, or haughty as the devil;

Whether an easy, fond, familiar fool,

Or such a wit as no man e'er can rule.[19]

'Tis true, perfection none must hope to find 190

In all this world, much less in woman-kind;

But if her virtues prove the larger share,

Bless the kind fates, and think your fortune rare.

Ah, gentle sir, take warning of a friend,

Who knows too well the state you thus commend; 195

And spite of all its praises must declare,

All he can find is bondage, cost, and care.

Heav'n knows, I shed full many a private tear,

And sigh in silence, lest the world should hear:

While all my friends applaud my blissful life, 200

And swear no mortal's happier in a wife;

Demure and chaste as any vestal nun,

The meekest creature that beholds the sun!

But, by th' immortal powers, I feel the pain,

And he that smarts has reason to complain. 205

Do what you list, for me; you must be sage,

And cautious sure; for wisdom is in age:

But at these years to venture on the fair![20]

By him, who made the ocean, earth, and air,

To please a wife, when her occasions call, 210

Would busy the most vig'rous of us all.

And trust me, sir, the chastest you can chuse

Will ask observance, and exact her dues.

If what I speak my noble lord offend,

My tedious sermon here is at an end.[21] 215

'Tis well, 'tis wond'rous well, the knight replies,

Most worthy kinsman, faith you're mighty wise!

We, sirs, are fools; and must resign the cause

To heath'nish authors, proverbs, and old saws.

He spoke with scorn, and turned another way:-- 220

What does my friend, my dear Placebo, say?

I say, quoth he, by heav'n the man's to blame,

To slander wives, and wedlock's holy name.

At this the council rose, without delay;

Each, in his own opinion, went his way; 225

With full consent, that, all disputes appeased,

The knight should marry, when and where he pleased.

Who now but January exults with joy?

The charms of wedlock all his soul employ:

Each nymph by turns his wav'ring mind possessed, 230

And reigned the short-lived tyrant of his breast;

Whilst fancy pictured ev'ry lively part,

And each bright image wandered o'er his heart.

Thus, in some public forum fixed on high,

A mirror shows the figures moving by; 235

Still one by one, in swift succession, pass

The gliding shadows o'er the polished glass.

This lady's charms the nicest could not blame,

But vile suspicions had aspersed her fame;

That was with sense, but not with virtue, blest: 240

And one had grace, that wanted all the rest.

Thus doubting long what nymph he should obey,

He fixed at last upon the youthful May.

Her faults he knew not, love is always blind,

But ev'ry charm revolved within his mind: 245

Her tender age, her form divinely fair,

Her easy motion, her attractive air,

Her sweet behaviour, her enchanting face,

Her moving softness, and majestic grace.[22]

Much in his prudence did our knight rejoice, 250

And thought no mortal could dispute his choice:[23]

Once more in haste he summoned ev'ry friend,

And told them all, their pains were at an end.[24]

Heav'n, that (said he) inspired me first to wed,

Provides a consort worthy of my bed: 255

Let none oppose th' election, since on this

Depends my quiet, and my future bliss.[25]

A dame there is, the darling of my eyes,

Young, beauteous, artless, innocent, and wise;

Chaste, though not rich; and though not nobly born, 260

Of honest parents, and may serve my turn.[26]

Her will I wed, if gracious heav'n so please;

To pass my age in sanctity and ease;

And thank the pow'rs, I may possess alone

The lovely prize, and share my bliss with none! 265

If you, my friends, this virgin can procure,

My joys are full, my happiness is sure.

One only doubt remains: Full oft, I've heard,

By casuists grave, and deep divines averred;

That 'tis too much for human race to know 270

The bliss of heav'n above, and earth below.

Now should the nuptial pleasures prove so great,

To match the blessings of the future state,

Those endless joys were ill exchanged for these;

Then clear this doubt, and set my mind at ease.[27] 275

This Justin heard, nor could his spleen controul,

Touched to the quick, and tickled at the soul.

Sir knight, he cried, if this be all your dread,

Heav'n put it past your doubt, whene'er you wed;

And to my fervent prayers so far consent, 280

That ere the rites are o'er, you may repent!

Good heav'n, no doubt, the nuptial state approves,

Since it chastises still what best it loves.

Then be not, sir, abandoned to despair; }

Seek, and perhaps you'll find among the fair, } 285

One, that may do your business to a hair; }

Not ev'n in wish, your happiness delay,

But prove the scourge to lash you on your way:

Then to the skies your mounting soul shall go,

Swift as an arrow soaring from the bow! 290

Provided still, you moderate your joy,

Nor in your pleasures all your might employ;

Let reason's rule your strong desires abate,

Nor please too lavishly your gentle mate.

Old wives there are, of judgment most acute, 295

Who solve these questions beyond all dispute;

Consult with those, and be of better cheer;

Marry, do penance, and dismiss your fear.

So said, they rose, no more the work delayed;[28]

The match was offered, the proposals made 300

The parents, you may think, would soon comply;

The old have int'rest ever in their eye.

Nor was it hard to move the lady's mind;

When fortune favours, still the fair are kind.[29]

I pass each previous settlement and deed, 305

Too long for me to write, or you to read;

Nor will with quaint impertinence display

The pomp, the pageantry, the proud array.[30]

The time approached, to church the parties went,

At once with carnal and devout intent:[31] 310

Forth came the priest, and bade th' obedient wife

Like Sarah or Rebecca lead her life:

Then prayed the pow'rs the fruitful bed to bless,

And made all sure enough with holiness.

And now the palace-gates are opened wide, } 315

The guests appear in order, side by side, }

And placed in state, the bridegroom and the bride.[32] }

The breathing flute's soft notes are heard around,

And the shrill trumpets mix their silver sound;

The vaulted roofs with echoing music ring, 320

These touch the vocal stops, and those the trembling string.

Not thus Amphion tuned the warbling lyre,

Nor Joab the sounding clarion could inspire,

Nor fierce Theodomas,[33] whose sprightly strain

Could swell the soul to rage, and fire the martial train. 325

Bacchus himself, the nuptial feast to grace,

(So poets sing) was present on the place:

And lovely Venus, goddess of delight, }

Shook high her flaming torch in open sight, }

And danced around, and smiled on ev'ry knight: } 330

Pleased her best servant would his courage try,

No less in wedlock, than in liberty.

Full many an age old Hymen had not spied

So kind a bridegroom, or so bright a bride.

Ye bards! renowned among the tuneful throng 335

For gentle lays, and joyous nuptial song,

Think not your softest numbers can display

The matchless glories of this blissful day;

The joys are such, as far transcend your rage,

When tender youth has wedded stooping age. 340

The beauteous dame sate smiling at the board,

And darted am'rous glances at her lord.

Not Hester's self, whose charms the Hebrews sing,

E'er looked so lovely on her Persian king:

Bright as the rising sun, in summer's day, 345

And fresh and blooming as the month of May!

The joyful knight surveyed her by his side,

Nor envied Paris with his Spartan bride;

Still as his mind revolved with vast delight

Th' entrancing raptures of th' approaching night, 350

Restless he sate, invoking ev'ry pow'r

To speed his bliss, and haste the happy hour.

Mean time the vig'rous dancers beat the ground,

And songs were sung, and flowing bowls went round.

With od'rous spices they perfumed the place, 355

And mirth and pleasure shone in ev'ry face.

Damian alone, of all the menial train,

Sad in the midst of triumphs, sighed for pain;

Damian alone, the knight's obsequious squire,

Consumed at heart, and fed a secret fire. 360

His lovely mistress all his soul possest,

He looked, he languished, and could take no rest:

His task performed, he sadly went his way,

Fell on his bed, and loathed the light of day.

There let him lie; till his relenting dame 365

Weep in her turn, and waste in equal flame.

The weary sun, as learned poets write,

Forsook th' horizon, and rolled down the light;

While glitt'ring stars his absent beams supply,

And night's dark mantle overspread the sky. 370

Then rose the guests; and as the time required,

Each paid his thanks, and decently retired.

The foe once gone, our knight prepared t' undress,

So keen he was, and eager to possess:

But first thought fit th' assistance to receive, 375

Which grave physicians scruple not to give;

Satyrion near, with hot eringos stood,

Cantharides, to fire the lazy blood,

Whose use old bards describe in luscious rhymes,

And critics learn'd explain to modern times. 380

By this the sheets were spread, the bride undressed,

The room was sprinkled, and the bed was blessed.[34]

What next ensued beseems not me to say;[35]

'Tis sung, he laboured till the dawning day,

Then briskly sprung from bed, with heart so light, } 385

As all were nothing he had done by night; }

And sipped his cordial as he sat upright. }

He kissed his balmy spouse with wanton play,

And feebly sung a lusty roundelay;[36]

Then on the couch his weary limbs he cast; 390

For ev'ry labour must have rest at last.

But anxious cares the pensive squire oppressed,

Sleep fled his eyes, and peace forsook his breast;

The raging flames that in his bosom dwell,

He wanted art to hide, and means to tell. 395

Yet hoping time th' occasion might betray,

Composed a sonnet to the lovely May;

Which writ and folded with the nicest art,

He wrapped in silk, and laid upon his heart.

When now the fourth revolving day was run, 400

('Twas June, and Cancer had received the sun)

Forth from her chamber came the beauteous bride,

The good old knight moved slowly by her side.

High mass was sung; they feasted in the hall;[37]

The servants round stood ready at their call. 405

The squire alone was absent from the board,

And much his sickness grieved his worthy lord,

Who prayed his spouse, attended with her train,

To visit Damian, and divert his pain.[38]

Th' obliging dames obeyed with one consent; 410

They left the hall, and to his lodging went.

The female tribe surround him as he lay,

And close beside him sat the gentle May:

Where, as she tried his pulse, he softly drew

A heaving sigh,[39] and cast a mournful view! 415

Then gave his bill, and bribed the pow'rs divine,

With secret vows, to favour his design.[40]

Who studies now but discontented May?

On her soft couch uneasily she lay:

The lumpish husband snored away the night, 420

Till coughs awaked him near the morning light.

What then he did, I'll not presume to tell,

Nor if she thought herself in heav'n or hell:

Honest and dull in nuptial bed they lay,

Till the bell tolled, and all arose to pray. 425

Were it by forceful destiny decreed,

Or did from chance, or nature's power proceed;

Or that some star, with aspect kind to love,

Shed its selectest influence from above;

Whatever was the cause, the tender dame 430

Felt the first motions of an infant flame;

Received th' impressions of the love-sick squire,

And wasted in the soft infectious fire.

Ye fair, draw near, let May's example move

Your gentle minds to pity those who love! 435

Had some fierce tyrant in her stead been found,

The poor adorer sure had hanged, or drowned:

But she, your sex's mirrour, free from pride,

Was much too meek to prove a homicide.[41]

But to my tale: Some sages[42] have defined 440

Pleasure the sov'reign bliss of human-kind:

Our knight (who studied much, we may suppose)

Derived his high philosophy from those;

For, like a prince, he bore the vast expense

Of lavish pomp, and proud magnificence: 445

His house was stately, his retinue gay,

Large was his train, and gorgeous his array.

His spacious garden made to yield to none,

Was compassed round with walls of solid stone;

Priapus could not half describe the grace 450

(Though god of gardens) of this charming place:

A place to tire the rambling wits of France

In long descriptions, and exceed romance:

Enough to shame the gentlest bard that sings

Of painted meadows, and of purling springs.[43] 455

Full in the centre of the flow'ry ground, }

A crystal fountain spread its streams around, }

The fruitful banks with verdant laurels crowned: }

About this spring, if ancient fame say true,

The dapper elves their moonlight sports pursue: 460

Their pigmy king, and little fairy queen,[44]

In circling dances gambolled on the green,

While tuneful sprites a merry concert made,

And airy music warbled through the shade.

Hither the noble knight would oft repair, 465

(His scene of pleasure, and peculiar care)

For this he held it dear, and always bore

The silver key that locked the garden door.

To this sweet place in summer's sultry heat,

He used from noise and bus'ness to retreat; 470

And here in dalliance spend the live-long day,

_Solus cum sola_, with his sprightly May.

For whate'er work was undischarged a-bed,

The duteous knight in this fair garden sped.

[45]But ah! what mortal lives of bliss secure, 475

How short a space our worldly joys endure!

O Fortune, fair, like all thy treach'rous kind,

But faithless still, and way'ring as the wind!

O painted monster, formed mankind to cheat,

With pleasing poison, and with soft deceit! 480

This rich, this am'rous, venerable knight,

Amidst his ease, his solace, and delight,

Struck blind by thee, resigns his days to grief,

And calls on death, the wretch's last relief.[46]

The rage of jealousy then seized his mind, 485

For much he feared the faith of woman-kind.[47]

His wife, not suffered from his side to stray, }

Was captive kept, he watched her night and day, }

Abridged her pleasures, and confined her sway. }

Full oft in tears did hapless May complain, 490

And sighed full oft; but sighed and wept in vain;

She looked on Damian with a lover's eye;

For oh, 'twas fixed, she must possess or die!

Nor less impatience vexed her am'rous squire,

Wild with delay, and burning with desire. 495

Watched as she was, yet could he not refrain

By secret writing to disclose his pain;

The dame by signs revealed her kind intent,

Till both were conscious what each other meant.

Ah, gentle knight, what would thy eyes avail, 500

Though they could see as far as ships can sail?

'Tis better, sure, when blind, deceived to be,

Than be deluded when a man can see![48]

Argus himself, so cautious and so wise,

Was over-watched, for all his hundred eyes: 505

So many an honest husband may, 'tis known,

Who, wisely, never thinks the case his own.

The dame at last, by diligence and care,

Procured the key her knight was wont to bear;

She took the wards in wax before the fire, 510

And gave th' impression to the trusty squire.

By means of this, some wonder shall appear,

Which, in due place and season, you may hear.

Well sung sweet Ovid, in the days of yore,

What sleight is that, which love will not explore? 515

And Pyramus and Thisbe plainly show

The feats true lovers, when they list, can do:

Though watched and captive, yet in spite of all,

They found the art of kissing[49] through a wall.

But now no longer from our tale to stray; } 520

It happed that once upon a summer's day, }

Our rev'rend knight was urged to am'rous play: }

He raised his spouse ere matin-bell was rung,

And thus his morning canticle he sung.

Awake, my love, disclose thy radiant eyes; 525

Arise, my wife, my beauteous lady, rise!

Hear how the doves with pensive notes complain,

And in soft murmurs tell the trees their pain:[50]

The winter's past; the clouds and tempests fly;

The sun adorns the fields, and brightens all the sky. 530

Fair without spot, whose ev'ry charming part

My bosom wounds, and captivates my heart;

Come, and in mutual pleasures let's engage,

Joy of my life, and comfort of my age.

This heard, to Damian straight a sign she made, 535

To haste before; the gentle squire obeyed:

Secret and undescried he took his way,

And, ambushed close, behind an arbour lay,

It was not long ere January came,

And, hand in hand with him his lovely dame; 540

Blind as he was, not doubting all was sure,

He turned the key, and made the gate secure.

Here let us walk, he said, observed by none,

Conscious of pleasures to the world unknown:

So may my soul have joy, as thou my wife 545

Art far the dearest solace of my life;

And rather would I chuse, by heav'n above,

To die this instant, than to lose thy love.[51]

Reflect what truth was in my passion shown, }

When, unendowed, I took thee for my own, } 550

And sought no treasure but thy heart alone. }

Old as I am, and now deprived of sight, }

Whilst thou art faithful to thy own true knight, }

Nor age, nor blindness, rob me of delight. }

Each other loss with patience I can bear, 555

The loss of thee is what I only fear.

Consider then, my lady and my wife,

The solid comforts of a virtuous life.

As first, the love of Christ himself you gain;

Next, your own honour undefiled maintain; 560

And lastly, that which sure your mind must move,[52]

My whole estate shall gratify your love:

Make your own terms, and ere to-morrow's sun

Displays his light, by heav'n it shall be done.

I seal the contract with a holy kiss, 565

And will perform, by this--my dear, and this.[53]

Have comfort, spouse, nor think thy lord unkind;

'Tis love, not jealousy, that fires my mind.

For when thy charms my sober thoughts engage,

And joined to them my own unequal age,[54] 570

From thy dear side I have no pow'r to part,

Such secret transports warm my melting heart.

For who that once possessed those heav'nly charms,

Could live one moment absent from thy arms?

He ceased, and May with modest grace replied; 575

(Weak was her voice, as while she spoke she cried;)

Heav'n knows (with that a tender sigh she drew)

I have a soul to save as well as you;

And, what no less you to my charge commend,

My dearest honour, will to death defend. 580

To you in holy church I gave my hand,

And joined my heart in wedlock's sacred band:

Yet, after this, if you distrust my care,

Then hear, my lord, and witness what I swear:

First may the yawning earth her bosom rend, 585

And let me hence to hell alive descend;[55]

Or die the death I dread no less than hell,

Sewed in a sack, and plunged into a well,[56]

Ere I my fame by one lewd act disgrace,

Or once renounce the honour of my race. 590

For know, sir knight, of gentle blood I came,

I loath a whore, and startle at the name.

But jealous men on their own crimes reflect,

And learn from thence their ladies to suspect:

Else why these needless cautions, sir, to me? 595

These doubts and fears of female constancy!

This chime still rings in ev'ry lady's ear,

The only strain a wife must hope to hear.

Thus while she spoke, a sidelong glance she cast

Where Damian, kneeling, worshipped as she passed:[57] 600

She saw him watch the motions of her eye,

And singled out a pear-tree planted nigh:[58]

'Twas charged with fruit that made a goodly show,

And hung with dangling pears was ev'ry bough.

Thither th' obsequious squire addressed his pace, 605

And climbing, in the summit took his place;

The knight and lady walked beneath in view,

Where let us leave them, and our tale pursue.

'Twas now the season when the glorious sun

His heav'nly progress through the Twins had run; 610

And Jove, exalted, his mild influence yields,

To glad the glebe, and paint the flow'ry fields:

Clear was the day, and Phoebus rising bright,

Had streaked the azure firmament with light;

He pierced the glitt'ring clouds with golden streams, 615

And warmed the womb of earth with genial beams.

It so befel, in that fair morning tide, }

The fairies sported on the garden side, }

And in the midst their monarch and his bride. }

So featly tripped the light-foot ladies round, } 620

The knights so nimbly o'er the green-sward bound, }

That scarce they bent the flow'rs, or touched the ground.[59] }

The dances ended, all the fairy train

For pinks and daisies searched the flow'ry plain;

While on a bank reclined of rising green, 625

Thus, with a frown, the king bespoke his queen:

'Tis too apparent, argue what you can,

The treachery you women use to man:

A thousand authors have this truth made out,

And sad experience leaves no room for doubt. 630

Heav'n rest thy spirit, noble Solomon,

A wiser monarch never saw the sun:

All wealth, all honours, the supreme degree

Of earthly bliss, was well bestowed on thee!

For sagely hast thou said: Of all mankind, 635

One only just, and righteous, hope to find:

But should'st thou search the spacious world around,

Yet one good woman is not to be found.

Thus says the king who knew your wickedness;

The son of Sirach[60] testifies no less. 640

So may some wildfire on your bodies fall,

Or some devouring plague consume you all;

As well you view the lecher in the tree,

And well this honourable knight you see:

But since he's blind and old (a helpless case) 645

His squire shall cuckold him before your face.

Now by my own dread majesty I swear,

And by this awful sceptre which I bear,

No impious wretch shall 'scape unpunished long,

That in my presence offers such a wrong. 650

I will this instant undeceive the knight,

And, in the very act, restore his sight:

And set the strumpet here in open view, }

A warning to these ladies,[61] and to you, }

And all the faithless sex, for ever to be true. } 655

And will you so, replied the queen, indeed? }

Now, by my mother's soul it is decreed, }

She shall not want an answer at her need. }

For her, and for her daughters, I'll engage,

And all the sex in each succeeding age; 660

Art shall be theirs to varnish an offence,

And fortify their crimes with confidence.

Nay, were they taken in a strict embrace,

Seen with both eyes, and pinioned on the place;

All they shall need is to protest and swear, 665

Breathe a soft sigh, and drop a tender tear;[62]

Till their wise husbands, gulled by arts like these,

Grow gentle, tractable, and tame as geese.

What though this sland'rous Jew, this Solomon,

Called women fools, and knew full many a one; 670

The wiser wits of later times declare,

How constant, chaste, and virtuous women are:

Witness the martyrs, who resigned their breath,

Serene in torments, unconcerned in death;[63]

And witness next what Roman authors tell, 675

How Arria, Portia, and Lucretia fell.

But since the sacred leaves to all are free,

And men interpret texts, why should not we?

By this no more was meant, than to have shown, }

That sov'reign goodness dwells in him alone } 680

Who only Is, and is but only One.[64] }

But grant the worst; shall women then be weighed

By ev'ry word that Solomon has said?

What though this king (as ancient story boasts)

Built a fair temple to the Lord of Hosts; 685

He ceased at last his Maker to adore,

And did as much for idol gods, or more.

Beware what lavish praises you confer

On a rank lecher and idolater;

Whose reign indulgent God, says Holy Writ, 690

Did but for David's righteous sake permit;

David, the monarch after heav'n's own mind,

Who loved our sex, and honoured all our kind.

Well, I'm a woman, and as such must speak;

Silence would swell me, and my heart would break. 695

Know then, I scorn your dull authorities,

Your idle wits, and all their learned lies.

By heav'n, those authors are our sex's foes,

Whom, in our right, I must and will oppose.

Nay, quoth the king, dear madam, be not wroth: 700

I yield it up; but since I gave my oath,

That this much injured knight again should see,

It must be done--I am a king, said he,

And one whose faith has ever sacred been.

And so has mine, she said, I am a queen: 705

Her answer she shall have, I undertake;

And thus an end of all dispute I make.

Try when you list; and you shall find, my lord,

It is not in our sex to break our word.[65]

We leave them here in this heroic strain, 710

And to the knight our story turns again;

Who in the garden, with his lovely May,

Sung merrier than the cuckoo or the jay:

This was his song; "Oh kind and constant be,

Constant and kind I'll ever prove to thee." 715

Thus singing as he went, at last he drew

By easy steps, to where the pear-tree grew:

The longing dame looked up, and spied her love,

Full fairly perched among the boughs above.

She stopped, and sighing: Oh, good gods, she cried, 720

What pangs, what sudden shoots distend my side?

Oh for that tempting fruit, so fresh, so green;

Help, for the love of heav'n's immortal queen;

Help, dearest lord, and save at once the life

Of thy poor infant, and thy longing wife![66] 725

Sore sighed the knight to hear his lady's cry,

But could not climb, and had no servant nigh:

Old as he was, and void of eye-sight too,

What could, alas! a helpless husband do?

And must I languish then, she said, and die, 730

Yet view the lovely fruit before my eye?

At least, kind sir, for charity's sweet sake,

Vouchsafe the trunk between your arms to take;

Then from your back I might ascend the tree;

Do you but stoop, and leave the rest to me. 735

With all my soul, he thus replied again,

I'd spend my dearest blood to ease thy pain.

With that, his back against the trunk he bent,

She seized a twig, and up the tree she went.

Now prove your patience, gentle ladies all! 740

Nor let on me your heavy anger fall:

'Tis truth I tell, though not in phrase refined,

Though blunt my tale, yet honest is my mind.

What feats the lady in the tree might do,

I pass as gambols never known to you; 745

But sure it was a merrier fit, she swore,

Than in her life she ever felt before.

In that nice moment, lo! the wond'ring knight

Looked out, and stood restored to sudden sight.

Straight on the tree his eager eyes he bent, 750

As one whose thoughts were on his spouse intent;

But when he saw his bosom-wife so dressed,

His rage was such as cannot be expressed:

Not frantic mothers when their infants die,

With louder clamours rend the vaulted sky: 755

He cried, he roared, he stormed, he tore his hair;

Death! hell! and furies! what dost thou do there!

What ails my lord? the trembling dame replied;

I thought your patience had been better tried;

Is this your love, ungrateful, and unkind, 760

This my reward for having cured the blind?

Why was I taught to make my husband see,

By struggling with a man upon a tree?

Did I for this the pow'r of magic prove?

Unhappy wife, whose crime was too much love! 765

If this be struggling, by this holy light,

'Tis struggling with a vengeance, quoth the knight;

So heav'n preserve the sight it has restored,

As with these eyes I plainly saw thee whored;

Whored by my slave--perfidious wretch! may hell 770

As surely seize thee, as I saw too well.

Guard me, good angels! cried the gentle May,

Pray heav'n this magic work the proper way!

Alas, my love! 'tis certain, could you see,

You ne'er had used these killing words to me: 775

So help me, fates, as 'tis no perfect sight,

But some faint glimm'ring of a doubtful light.

What I have said, quoth he, I must maintain,

For by th' immortal pow'rs it seemed too plain.

By all those pow'rs, some frenzy seized your mind, } 780

Replied the dame, are these the thanks I find? }

Wretch that I am, that e'er I was so kind! }

She said; a rising sigh expressed her woe,

The ready tears apace began to flow,

And as they fell she wiped from either eye 785

The drops; for women, when they list, can cry.

The knight was touched; and in his looks appeared

Signs of remorse, while thus his spouse he cheered:

Madam, 'tis past, and my short anger o'er!

Come down, and vex your tender heart no more; 790

Excuse me, dear, if aught amiss was said,

For, on my soul, amends shall soon be made:

Let my repentance your forgiveness draw,

By heav'n, I swore but what I thought I saw.

Ah, my loved lord! 'twas much unkind, she cried, 795

On bare suspicion thus to treat your bride.

But till your sight's established, for awhile,

Imperfect objects may your sense beguile.

Thus when from sleep we first our eyes display, }

The balls are wounded with the piercing ray, } 800

And dusky vapours rise, and intercept the day: }

So just recov'ring from the shades of night, }

Your swimming eyes are drunk with sudden light, }

Strange phantoms dance around, and skim before your sight. }

Then, sir, be cautious, nor too rashly deem; 805

Heav'n knows how seldom things are what they seem!

Consult your reason, and you soon shall find

'Twas you were jealous, not your wife unkind:

Jove ne'er spoke oracle more true than this,

None judge so wrong as those who think amiss. 810

With that she leaped into her lord's embrace

With well-dissembled virtue in her face.

He hugged her close, and kissed her o'er and o'er,

Disturbed with doubts and jealousies no more:

Both, pleased and blessed, renewed their mutual vows, 815

A fruitful wife and a believing spouse.

Thus ends our tale, whose moral next to make,

Let all wise husbands hence example take;

And pray, to crown the pleasure of their lives,

To be so well deluded by their wives.[67] 820

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Pope in this particular has not followed Chaucer. The story

is told by the merchant, who announces in the prologue, that he has been

two months married, and that in this brief space he has endured more

misery from the fiendishness of his wife than a bachelor could undergo

in an entire lifetime from the enmity of the world. He lays it down for

a general maxim, that

We wedded men live in sorwe and care;

Assay it whoso will, and he shall find

That I say sooth, by Saint Thomas of Inde,

As for the more part; I say not all;

God shielde that it shoulde so befall.

The host begs that since the merchant knows so much of the trials of

matrimony, he will instruct the company in some of them.

Gladly, quoth he, but of mine owne sore

For sorry heart I telle may no more.

He accordingly relates the adventures of January and May in illustration

of the misfortunes of the wedded state, and commences with the panegyric

of January upon its unmixed blessings. The merchant then adds,

Thus said this olde knight that was so wise,

which is an ironical comment on what the narrator of the tale considers

a delusive dream, and a proof of the credulous folly of the speaker. The

idea of ascribing genuine sense and wisdom to the knight,

notwithstanding that he was weak enough, at the age of sixty, to marry a

girl, is confined to the version of Pope, and is not in itself

unnatural; but the character, upon the whole, is better preserved in

Chaucer, since the entire talk and conduct of January indicate a feeble

mind.]

[Footnote 2: "Courage" in the original is not used in the modern sense,

but signifies a hearty desire.]

[Footnote 3:

And when that he was passed sixty year,

Were it for holiness or for dotage,

I cannot say, but such a great courage

Hadde this knight to be a wedded man,

That day and night he doth all that he can

Taspye where that he might wedded be;

Praying our Lord to grante him that he

Might ones knowen of that blissful life,

That is betwixt a husband and his wife.]

[Footnote 4: In the original,

And certainly, as sooth as God is king,

To take a wife it is a glorious thing;

And namely when a man is old and hoar,

Then is a wife the fruit of his tresor.

This is another instance that the merchant's remarks are sarcastic; for

no rational person would gravely assert that to wed was especially wise

in old age, when a man was married for his money alone. The whole

purport of the tale was to prove that such an alliance ended in

discomfiture. The vein of satire is continued through the subsequent

reflections. The merchant represents January as imagining wives to be

models of obedience and fidelity, who will cleave to a husband through

weal and woe, and will never be weary of loving and serving him, though

he is bed-ridden all his days. The example of May, to which the

description is a preface, shows that the praises are meant to be

interpreted in an adverse sense.]

[Footnote 5: In the original the merchant is quoting an invective

against wives from the Liber Aureolus of Theophrastus, who had long been

dead. Hence the narrator calls down a curse upon his _bones_ in the name

of the advocates of matrimony:

This entent and an hundred sithe worse

Writeth this man; there God his bones curse.

"Sithe" signifies "times." Pope has generalised the imprecation, and

extended it to all bards, living or deceased, whereby the fitness of

invoking a curse upon their bones is destroyed.]

[Footnote 6: Chaucer would have thought it an anomaly for a Christian

knight to invoke the heathen deities. The original is,

A wife! ah! Sainte Mary, _benedicite_,

How might a man have any adversite

That hath a wife? certes I cannot say.

The requirements of the metre in this and other passages of Chaucer,

show that _benedicite_ was sometimes contracted, in the pronunciation,

to _ben'cite_.]

[Footnote 7: The merchant, in his account of the motives which actuated

the knight, dilates more largely in the original, and in more

enthusiastic language, upon the felicity of marriage. A wife helps her

husband in his work, is the careful guardian of his property, and is

perfect in her submission.

She saith nought ones nay when he saith ye;

Do this, saith he; all ready, sir, saith she.

Consequently the married man

Upon his bare knees ought all his life

Thanken his God that him hath sent a wife;

and if he is not yet possessed of the treasure, he ought to pray without

ceasing that it may be vouchsafed him, for then he is established in

safety, and

May not be deceived as I guess.

From the praise of wives, the merchant, speaking the views of the

knight, proceeds to extol the trustworthy advice of women in general,

and his first instance is Rebecca, who instructed Jacob how to supplant

Esau. The reasoning is purposely rendered inconsistent, and the

assertion that a married man was secured against deception is

immediately followed by an example in which the husband was deluded by

the stratagem of the wife.]

[Footnote 8:

Lo Judith, as the story telle can,

By wise counsel she Goddes people kept

And slew him Holofernes while he slept.

Lo Abigail by good counsel how she

Saved her husband Nabal, when that he

Should have been slain.

The respite that Abigail obtained for Nabal was very short. He died by a

judgment from heaven in about ten days from the time that she went forth

to meet David, and with presents and persuasions diverted him from his

purpose, as he was advancing to take vengeance on her husband. The

striking narrative in the apocryphal book of Judith is undoubtedly

fabulous. The pretended Judith was a widow. The deceptions by which she

is said to have got the captain of the Assyrian army into her power are

abhorrent to our purer morality, but they would have been considered

legitimate stratagems of war in the East.]

[Footnote 9: Dryden, Juvenal, vi. 640.

The rest are summoned on a point so nice.

[Footnote 10: In Chaucer the knight does not ask his friends to choose

for him because many heads are wiser than one, but because with several

people on the look out there is more likelihood that a suitable wife

will be found quickly than if he was unassisted in the search.]

[Footnote 11: In the original,

But one thing warn I you, my friendes dear,

I will none old wife have in no manere.

Marriages seem to have taken place in those days at a very early age.

The wife of Bath married at twelve, and the knight's notion of an "old

wife" it appears, five lines further on, was a woman of twenty. He

insists that he will marry nobody that is above sixteen:

She shall not passe sixteene year certain.

Old fish, and young flesh, that would I have full fain.

Bet is, quoth he, a pike than a pikerel,

And bet than old beef is the tender veal.

"Bet" is for "better."]

[Footnote 12: Chaucer's knight assigns it as a motive to wedlock that he

may have

Children to thonour of God above,

And not only for paramour, and for love.

But a little before he had given a more worldly reason for his desire to

have a son and heir, and said that he would rather be eaten by dogs than

that his inheritance should go to a stranger.]

[Footnote 13: The flippancy of this couplet, which departs from the

original, is at variance with the tone of the knight, whose speech

commenced with the words,

Friendes I am hoar and old,

And almost, God wot, at my pittes brink

Upon my soule somewhat must I think.

I have my body folily dispended

Blessed be God that it shall be amended.

In the passage, for which Pope's lines are the substitute, the knight is

enumerating the causes why men should marry, and one reason, he says, is

that each person ought to

Helpen other

In meschief, as a sister shall the brother,

And live in chastity full holily.

But, sires, by your leave that am not I,

For, God be thanked, I dare make avaunt,

I feel my limbes stark and suffisaunt.

The meaning is, that when a husband is "in meschief," or, in other

words, in a state of helpless decrepitude, his wife ought to live in

holy chastity, and nurse him as a sister would a brother. But, adds the

knight, thank God I am not decrepit myself, and feel my limbs to be

still stout; which is a very different sentiment from sneering at the

saintly life he had just commended.]

[Footnote 14: This verse, which has no counterpart in the original, is

altered from a line in Dryden's Flower and Leaf:

Ev'n when the vital sap retreats below,

Ev'n when the hoary head is hid in snow.]

[Footnote 15: The infatuation of the knight is more strongly marked in

the original. He summons his friends to hear his fixed resolution, and

to beg their assistance. He wants no advice, and instead of inviting

them to speak their minds with freedom, he concludes his address with

the words

And synnes ye have heard all mine intent,

I pray you to my wille ye assent.

They do, indeed, offer him counsel where he solicited help, which is a

true stroke of nature on both sides.]

[Footnote 16: Pope gives the real character of Placebo, but sets

probability at defiance in making him parade with boastful effrontery

his own systematic fawning and flattery. Chaucer has not committed the

extravagance. With him Placebo justifies his assentation on the ground

that lords are better informed than their inferiors.

A full great fool is any counsellor

That serveth any lord of high honour,

That dare presume, or once thinken it,

That his counsel should pass his lordes wit.

Nay lordes be no fooles by my fay.

Ye have yourself y-spoken here to-day

So high sentence, so holy, and so well,

That I consent, and confirm every dole

Your wordes all, and your opinion.]

[Footnote 17: The last four lines are interpolated by Pope, and are

again inconsistant with the tenor of Chaucer's narrative. The knight had

notoriously been a dissolute man, and the coarse reflection would be out

of place when the avowed object of his projected marriage was that he

might live more soberly than he had hitherto done.]

[Footnote 18: Seneca.]

[Footnote 19: The qualities specified by Chaucer are whether she is

wise, sober or given to drink, proud or in any other respect unamiable,

a scold or wasteful, rich or poor. "And all this," says Justinus,

"asketh leisure to enquire," which he urges in reply to the announcement

of January that he was determined not to wait.]

[Footnote 20: In Chaucer Justinus does not pronounce decisively against

marriage, but recommends January to consider well before he enters upon

it, and especially before he marries "a young wife and a fair."]

[Footnote 21: This couplet is an addition by Pope. The manly Justinus

says nothing in the original about "offending his noble lord."]

[Footnote 22: Chaucer is more particular in his description:

He portrayed in his heart, and in his thought

Her fresche beauty, and her age tender,

Her middle small, her armes long and slender,

Her wise governance, her gentilnesse

Her womanly bearing, and her sadnesse.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 23:

For when that he himself concluded had,

He thought each other mannes wit so bad,

That impossible it were to replie

Against his choice; this was his fantasie.]

[Footnote 24: In seeking a wife for him.]

[Footnote 25:

Placebo came, and eke his friendes soon,

And althirfirst he bad them all a boon,

That none of them no argumentes make

Against the purpose which that he had take;

Which purpose was pleasaunt to God said he,

And very ground of his prosperite.]

[Footnote 26: "And may serve my turn" is one of Dryden's familiar

colloquial terms, happily used. Dryden among other excellencies of a

varied style was happy in the use of such terms.--WARTON.

The phrase fails to convey the conception of Chaucer, that the knight

too much smitten by the charms of May to consider anything else of the

slightest importance.

All were it so she were of small degree,

Sufficeth him her youth and her beaute.]

[Footnote 27: The humour is brought out by Chaucer with increased force

from his dwelling with greater detail on the fond conviction of January

that the only risk he runs in marriage is from the excess of the

felicity. He says he stands aghast when he contemplates passing his life

in that perfect peace, and blessedness,

As alle wedded men do with their wives,

and trembles to think that he shall have his heaven upon earth.

This is my dread, and ye my brethren twey

Assoileth me this question I you pray.]

[Footnote 28:

And when they saw that it must needis be,

They wroughten so by sleight and wise treate,

That she, this maiden, which that Maybus hight,

As hastily as ever that she might,

Shall wedded be unto this January.]

[Footnote 29: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

For women to the brave an easy prey,

Still follow fortune where she leads the way.]

[Footnote 30: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

I pass their warlike pomp, their proud array.]

[Footnote 31: This line has no warrant from Chaucer.]

[Footnote 32: Here followed a bad couplet, which Pope afterwards

omitted:

Expensive dainties load the plenteous boards,

The best luxurious Italy affords.]

[Footnote 33: Joab, the leader of the Israelites in battle, blew the

trumpet, as is recorded in the Bible, to gather them together. Theodomas

is thought by Tyrwhitt to be a character in some fictitious history

which was popular in the days of Chaucer.]

[Footnote 34: Chaucer says that the bed was blessed by the priest, and

the form used on these occasions may be seen in the old Latin service

books.]

[Footnote 35: Dryden's Sigismonda and Guiscardo:

What thoughts he had beseems me not to say.]

[Footnote 36: A circumstance is added by Chaucer which brings vividly

before the reader the advanced age of the knight:

The slacke skin about his necke shaketh

While that he sung.]

[Footnote 37: Chaucer had previously mentioned that it was the usage for

newly married wives to keep their chambers till the fourth day, and he

repeats the fact here:

As custom is unto these nobles all,

A bride shall not eaten in the hall,

Till dayes four, or three days atte least

I-passed be; then let her go to the feast.

The fourthe day complete from noon to noon,

When that the highe masse was i-doon,

In halle sit this January and May,

As fresh as is the brighte summer's day.]

[Footnote 38: In the original January passes a warm panegyric upon the

excellent qualities of Damian, which is meant to display in broader

contrast the treachery and infamy of the squire. The merchant in his own

person denounces the villany of Damian's conduct, and prays that all

persons may be protected from the machinations of those deceitful

vipers, who, when fostered in a family, employ their opportunities to

injure their benefactors. Pope has omitted every allusion of the kind,

and has treated the baseness of the squire as if he regarded it in the

light of a joke.]

[Footnote 39: It was at first "speaking sigh," which was distinctive.

"Heaving" is the accompaniment of all sighs, and, as the sigh of Damian

was soft, did not mark his in an especial degree.]

[Footnote 40: There is not a word, as may be supposed, in Chaucer of the

squire asking for divine assistance in his wicked schemes.]

[Footnote 41: May, on her return from the visit which, at her husband's

desire, she paid to Damian in his chamber, that she might cheer him in

his illness, read the billet that he had given her covertly, and the

result is thus told by Chaucer in a passage which has not been versified

by Pope:

This gentle May fulfilled of pite,

Right of her hand a letter maked she;

In which she granteth him her very grace;

There lacked nought but only day and place.

And when she saw her time upon a day

To visite this Damian goeth May,

And subtilely this letter down she thrust

Under his pillow; read it if him lust.

She taketh him by the hand, and hard him twist

So secretly, that no wight of it wist,

And bade him be all whole; and forth she went

To January, when that he for her sent.

Up riseth Damian the nexte morrow;

All passed was his sickness and his sorrow.]

[Footnote 42: The Epicurean philosophers.]

[Footnote 43: Addison's Letter from Italy:

My humbler verse demands a softer theme,

A painted meadow, or a purling stream.]

[Footnote 44: Pope has here shown his judgment in adopting the lighter

fairy race of Shakespeare and Milton. Chaucer has king Pluto and his

queen Proserpina.--BOWLES.

There was not much judgment required. They are fairies in Chaucer, but,

as was not unusual in his day, he called them by names taken from the

heathen mythology. Pope merely dropped the classical appellations, which

would have been an incongruity when he wrote. In the details of his

description he did not copy Shakespeare or Milton, but Dryden's version

of Chaucer's Wife of Bath:

The king of elfs, and little fairy queen

Gambolled on heaths, and danced on ev'ry green.]

[Footnote 45: Another couplet preceded this in the first edition:

Thus many a day with ease and plenty blessed

Our gen'rous knight his gentle dame possessed.]

[Footnote 46: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

Nor art, nor nature's band can ease my grief,

Nothing but death, the wretch's last relief.]

[Footnote 47: There is a natural trait in the original which is not

preserved by Pope. The knight weeps piteously at his sudden calamity:

But atte last, after a month or tweye,

His sorrow gan assuage sooth to say;

For when he wist it may not other be

He patiently took his adversitie.

This is one of the deeper and more solemn touches which Pope

systematically rejected. Although the old man gets reconciled to the

loss of his sight, his jealousy remains unabated.]

[Footnote 48:

Oh! January, what might it thee avail

If thou might see as far as shippes sail?

For as good is blind deceived be,

As to be deceived when a man may see.]

[Footnote 49: Chaucer only says that they whispered through the crevice

they discovered in the wall which divided the houses of their parents.

All their kisses were bestowed upon the wall itself, or as Sandys puts

it in his translation of Ovid,

Their kisses greet

The senseless stones, with lips that could not meet.]

[Footnote 50: This couplet, which is not in the original, is in the

style of the pastorals which were common in Pope's youth.]

[Footnote 51:

Thou art the creature that I best love;

For by the Lord that sit in heaven above,

Lever I had to dyen on a knife.

Than thee offende, deare, trewe wife.]

[Footnote 52: By the injudicious interpolation of this parenthesis Pope

makes the knight express his belief to May that she is more likely to be

kept faithful by her love of money than by her sense of honour and

religion. It is undeniable that covetousness would be the predominant

motive with a depraved woman, such as was poor old January's wife, but

this is not his settled conviction, and he would have shrunk from openly

admitting the idea.]

[Footnote 53: The knight's promise was to be performed the next morning.

His doubt was whether May, on her side, would fulfil the pledge of

perpetual fidelity. The ceremony is, therefore, reversed in the

original, and January asks _her_ to kiss _him_ in token of her adhesion

to the covenant.]

[Footnote 54: In the original the knight avows the jealousy, which in

Pope's version he denies, and excuses his misgivings on the ground of

May's beauty, and his own age. Having disclaimed all jealousy, there is

no longer any meaning in representing him as pleading the inequality of

his years to justify his conduct.]

[Footnote 55: May in the original is the same wicked, shameless woman

that she is described by Pope, but Chaucer is content to put into her

mouth the wish that she may die a foul death if she breaks her marriage

vows. There is not a hint of the more frightful imprecation she invokes

on herself in expressing the hope that she may descend alive into hell

when she commits the crime she is meditating at the moment.]

[Footnote 56: "Infidelity in women is a subject of the severest

crimination among the Turks. When any of these miserable girls are

apprehended, for the first time they are put to hard labor, &c.; but for

the second, they are recommitted, and many at a time tied up in sacks,

and taken in a boat to the Seraglio-Point, where they are thrown into

the tide." Dallaway's Constantinople.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 57: The squire kneeling to worship May as she passed by is an

exaggerated trait supplied by Pope.]

[Footnote 58: At the conclusion of the hypocritical rejoinder of May, in

which she speaks the language of indignant innocence, the narrative goes

on thus in the original:

And with that word she saw where Damyan

Sat in the bush, and coughing, she began;

And with her fingers signes made she,

That Damyan should climb upon a tree,

That charged was with fruit, and up he went,

For verily he knew all her intent;

For in a letter she had told him all

Of this mattier, how he worke shall.]

[Footnote 59: These lines, which have no counterpart in Chaucer, owe

their beauty to Dryden's Wife of Bath's Tale:

He saw a choir of ladies in a round,

That featly footing seemed to skim the ground:

Thus dancing hand in hand, so light they were,

He knew not where they trod, on earth or air.]

[Footnote 60: The author of the apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus.

Chaucer says that he seldom speaks of women with reverence, which is

correct. The statement of Pope that the son of Sirach asserted, like

Solomon, that there was no such thing as a good woman, is in direct

contradiction to various passages among his precepts.]

[Footnote 61: There is no specification of "these ladies" in Chaucer.]

[Footnote 62:

Now by my mother Ceres' soul, I swear

That I shall give her suffisaunt answere,

And alle women after for her sake;

That though they be in any guilt i-take,

With face bold they shall themselves excuse,

And bear them down that woulde them accuse.

For lack of answer none of them shall dyen.

All had ye seen a thing with both your eyen,

Yet shall we women visage it hardily,

And weep, and swear, and chide subtilely.]

[Footnote 63:

I wot well that this Jew, this Solomon,

Found of us women fooles many one;

But though he be founde no good woman,

Yet hath there founde many another man

Women full true, full good, and vertuous;

Witness on them that dwell in Christes house;

With martyrdom they proved their constaunce.]

[Footnote 64: Pluto and Proserpine each select that portion of the

meaning which is convenient. Both senses are included in the words of

Solomon, who at once asserts the general wickedness of mankind, and the

comparative worthlessness of women.]

[Footnote 65: The queen has just been boasting that she will endow the

sex with the art of ingenious lying to cover the violation of their most

solemn vows, and now she tauntingly tells her husband that it is not in

woman to break her word. This contradiction is imported into the story

by Pope. The original is as follows:--

Dame, quoth this Pluto, be no longer wroth,

I give it up; but since I swore mine oath,

That I will grante him his sight again,

My word shall stand, I warne you certain;

I am a king it sit me not to lie.

And I, quoth she, am queen of faierie.

Her answer shall she have I undertake,

Let us no more wordes hereof make.]

[Footnote 66: The allusion is to the common longing of pregnant women

for particular articles of diet. May cries out that she shall expire

unless she has some of the "small green pears" to eat, and then exclaims

anew,

I tell you well, a woman in my plight

May have to fruit so great an appetite,

That she may dyen, but she it have.]

[Footnote 67: The moral is Pope's own, and is in the dissolute spirit

which had descended from the reign of Charles II. The comment on the

story, in Chaucer, is put into the mouth of the host, who begs that he

may be preserved from such a wife, and inveighs against the craft and

misdoings of women.]

THE WIFE OF BATH.

HER PROLOGUE.

FROM CHAUCER.

The Wife of Bath is the other piece of Chaucer which Pope selected to

imitate. One cannot but wonder at his choice, which perhaps nothing but

his youth could excuse. Dryden, who is known not to be nicely

scrupulous, informs us, that he would not versify it on account of its

indecency. Pope, however, has omitted or softened the grosser and more

offensive passages. Chaucer afforded him many subjects of a more sublime

and serious species; and it were to be wished Pope had exercised his

pencil on the pathetic story of the patience of Griselda, or Troilus and

Cressida, or the complaint of the Black Knight; or, above all, on

Cambuscan and Canace. From the accidental circumstance of Dryden and

Pope having copied the gay and ludicrous parts of Chaucer, the common

notion seems to have arisen, that Chaucer's vein of poetry was chiefly

turned to the light and the ridiculous. But they who look into Chaucer

will soon be convinced of this prevailing prejudice, and will find his

comic vein, like that of Shakespeare, to be only like one of mercury,

imperceptibly mingled with a mine of gold. Mr. Hughes withdrew his

contributions to a volume of Miscellaneous Poems, published by Steele,

because this Prologue was to be inserted in it, which he thought too

obscene for the gravity of his character. "The extraordinary length,"

says Mr. Tyrwhitt, "of the Wife of Bath's Prologue, as well as the vein

of pleasantry that runs through it, is very suitable to the character of

the speaker. The greatest part must have been of Chaucer's own

invention, though one may plainly see that he had been reading the

popular invectives against marriage, and women in general, such as the

Roman de la Rose, Valerius ad Rufinum de non ducenda uxore, and

particularly Hieronymus contra Jovinianum. The holy Father, by way of

recommending celibacy, has exerted all his learning and eloquence, and

he certainly was not deficient in either, to collect together and

aggravate whatever he could find to the prejudice of the female sex.

Among other things he has inserted his own translation (probably) of a

long extract from what he calls, Liber Aureolus Theophrasti de Nuptiis.

Next to him in order of time was the treatise entitled, Epistola Valerii

ad Rufinum de non ducenda uxore. It has been printed, for the similarity

of its sentiments I suppose, among the works of St. Jerome, though it is

evidently of a much later date. Tanner, from Wood's MSS. Collection,

attributes it to Walter Mapes. I should not believe it to be older; as

John of Salisbury, who has treated of the same subject in his Polycrat.

l. viii. c. xl. does not appear to have seen it. To these two books Jean

de Meun has been obliged for some of the severest strokes in his Roman

de la Rose; and Chaucer has transfused the quintessence of all the three

works upon the subject of matrimony, into his Wife of Bath's Prologue

and Merchant's Tale."

The lines of Pope in the piece before us are spirited and easy and have,

properly enough, a free colloquial air. The tale, to which this is the

prologue, has been versified by Dryden, and is supposed to have been of

Chaucer's own invention; as is the exquisite vision of the Flower and

the Leaf, which has received a thousand new graces from the spirited and

harmonious Dryden. It is to his Fables, (next to his Music Ode,) written

when he was above seventy years old, that Dryden will chiefly owe his

immortality; and among these, particularly to the well-conducted tale of

Palamon and Arcite, the pathetic picture of Sigismunda, the wild and

terrible graces of Theodore and Honoria, and the sportive pleasantry of

Cymon and Iphigenia. The warmth and melody of these pieces has never

been excelled in our language; I mean in rhyme. It is mortifying and

surprising to see the cold and contemptuous manner in which Dr. Johnson

speaks of these capital pieces, which he says "require little criticism,

and seem hardly worth the rejuvenescence, as he affectedly calls it,

which Dryden has bestowed upon them." It is remarkable, that in his

criticisms he has not even mentioned the Flower and Leaf.

These pieces of Chaucer were not the only ones that were versified by

Pope. Mr. Harte assured me, that he was convinced by some circumstances

which Fenton, his friend, communicated to him, that Pope wrote the

characters, that make the introduction to the Canterbury Tales,

published under the name of Betterton.--WARTON.

Dr. Warton thinks, "one cannot but wonder at Pope's choice from Chaucer

of these stories, when so many more are to be found in him more

poetical." His observation on Chaucer's poems is very just, but the fact

is, Pope by this very selection showed the bent of his mind,--that it

was rather turned to satire and ridicule, than to the more elevated

strains of poetry.--BOWLES.

The imitations of Chaucer's January and May, and Wife of Bath's

Prologue, are executed with a degree of freedom, ease, and spirit, and

at the same time with a judgment and delicacy which not only far exceeds

what might have been expected from so young a writer, but which leave

nothing to be wished for in the mind of the reader. The humour of

Chaucer is translated into the lines of Pope, almost without suffering

any evaporation.--ROSCOE.

Pope's version of the Prologue of the Wife of Bath first appeared in a

volume of Poetical Miscellanies, published by Steele, in 1714. The

portrait of this repulsive woman is drawn by Chaucer with a vigorous

hand. She is a wealthy cloth manufacturer, with a bold countenance, and

more than masculine freedom of speech. She dresses ostentatiously, rides

with spurs, and, glorying in her shame, openly boasts of the vices which

less impudent women would carefully conceal. Her two predominant

characteristics are an inordinate self-will which makes her resolve to

rule her husbands with an absolute despotism, and an inordinate

sensuality which has completely absorbed every finer sentiment. She not

only avows her propensities, but exults in the deceit, the tricks, and

the violence which she has employed to gratify them as so many

testimonies to her cleverness and power. She has no compunctious

visitings for the frauds she has practised, and the misery she has

inflicted upon her deceased husbands. She speaks of the dead as of the

living with brutal insensibility, and would think it a weakness to be

swayed by a human feeling. The impersonation of domineering, heartless

selfishness, her pride is to prevail by tyranny instead of by the gentle

graces of feminine tenderness, and her pleasure is to indulge in worldly

gaiety, and the gross gratifications of sense. Even her jovial good

humour is hardly a redeeming feature in her character, for it mainly

proceeds from her keen relish for physical enjoyments, and turns to

temper the instant she is thwarted. It is difficult to conceive that

anybody could be injured by reading her confessions, which have nothing

alluring, but with Warton, we must condemn the taste which could select

the story as a ground-work for the embellishments of modern verse. The

character may exist in every generation. The unblushing candour with

which it displays itself belonged to more outspoken times than our own.

Chaucer painted from the life, and this portrait of a coarse,

voluptuous, defiant woman of the citizen class, finds a place in his

gallery, because she had a prominent place in the society of the middle

ages. There was no rational motive for tricking her out in the newest

fashion of a period to which she did not belong, and she might with

advantage have been allowed to remain in her primitive place and garb.

The indelicacy of the pieces he translated from Chaucer was, however,

one of their recommendations to Pope, and they may have had a further

attraction for him from the fact, that they held wives up to odium. His

deformed and insignificant person was an antidote to love, and the court

he paid to women met with a cold return. He retaliated with his pen for

the mortification to which they exposed him, and he almost always

represented them in a frivolous or degrading light. He may not

improbably have had a pleasure in reproducing from Chaucer the caustic

sentiments which were congenial to his own, and may have found some

satisfaction for his wounded spirit in revenging indifference by

satire.

Warton says that Pope has softened the more offensive passages in the

Wife of Bath's Prologue, but his version, on the other hand, is often

less decorous than the original. He has not justified his choice of the

subject by his skill in the treatment of it. The adaptation is much

inferior to the companion piece of January and May, and appears to have

been thrown off in haste. There are a few, a very few, happy lines and

expressions, but the bulk of the versification is not much above

mediocrity, and is frequently below it. He has failed in the substance

still more than in the form. Roscoe was of opinion that the humour of

Chaucer had hardly suffered any evaporation. The admirers of the

original have arrived at a different conclusion, and have contended,

with almost one voice, that hardly any of the humour has been preserved.

The genuine Prologue is alive with manners, passions, idiomatic

conversations, and natural incidents. The copy is by comparison a dead,

insipid dissertation. The mode in which Pope has abridged the narrative

is one of many proofs that he only cared for characters in their broad

outline, and had either no perception of the subtler workings of the

mind, or no appreciation of them. If ever a reader masters the full

sense of an author it must be when he translates him, and yet Pope has

overlooked or rejected many of the happiest traits in Chaucer, and has

falsified others, to the invariable injury of the story, and sometimes

with a total disregard to consistency. Particular deficiencies are of

little moment in the midst of general excellence, but in the present

instance there is nothing to redeem the blots, and the narrative from

first to last is a pale and feeble reflection of the original.

Warton asserts, on the authority of Harte, that Fenton believed that the

version of the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, which appeared in

Lintot's Miscellany under the name of Betterton, was the work of Pope,

and Johnson adds that "Fenton made Pope a gay offer of five pounds if he

would show the characters in Betterton's hand." The celebrated actor

certainly left some literary papers behind him, if we may assume that a

letter from Caryll to Pope, and which was published by the poet himself,

is a genuine production. "I am very glad," Caryll writes, May 23, 1712,

"for the sake of the widow, and for the credit of the deceased, that

Betterton's remains are fallen into such hands, as may render them

reputable to the one, and beneficial to the other." In a note Pope

states that the remains were the modernised portions of Chaucer

contained in the Miscellany of Lintot. There was no apparent motive for

deception on the subject, and the internal evidence supports the

conclusion that Betterton composed the translation, and that Pope merely

revised it. It is a bald, worthless production, with a few lines or

couplets which seem to have proceeded from a more practised versifier

than the novice who put together the bulk of the work. The choicest

parts are very little better than bad; for Pope was a provident poet,

and he did not decorate Betterton with feathers which would have shone

with lustre in his own plumage. The great actor, on his side, has

signally failed in the point where his art might have been expected to

teach him better. He who had such a deep insight into the characters he

personated, and who gave voice, action, and gesture to all the passions

with such fidelity and power, has pared away the dramatic vivacity of

Chaucer and left only a vapid, hybrid compound which is neither modern

nor mediaeval. The sketch of the good parson is omitted altogether,

doubtless because Dryden had already tried his hand upon it, and it was

thought imprudent to provoke a comparison with his masterly paraphrase.

THE WIFE OF BATH.

HER PROLOGUE.

Behold the woes of matrimonial life,

And hear with rev'rence an experienced wife;

To dear-bought wisdom[1] give the credit due,

And think for once, a woman tells you true.

In all these trials I have borne a part, 5

I was myself the scourge that caused the smart;

For, since fifteen,[2] in triumph have I led

Five captive husbands from the church to bed.

Christ saw a wedding once, the Scripture says,

And saw but one, 'tis thought, in all his days; 10

Whence some infer, whose conscience is too nice,

No pious Christian ought to marry twice.

But let them read, and solve me, if they can,

The words addressed to the Samaritan:[3]

Five times in lawful wedlock she was joined; 15

And sure the certain stint was ne'er defined.

"Encrease and multiply," was heav'n's command,

And that's a text I clearly understand.

This too, "Let men their sires and mothers leave,

And to their dearer wives for ever cleave." 20

More wives than one by Solomon were tried,

Or else the wisest of mankind's belied.

I've had myself full many a merry fit;

And trust in heav'n I may have many yet.

For when my transitory spouse, unkind, } 25

Shall die, and leave his woeful wife behind, }

I'll take the next good Christian I can find. }

Paul, knowing one could never serve our turn,

Declared 'twas better far to wed than burn.

There's danger in assembling fire and tow; 30

I grant 'em that, and what it means you know.

The same apostle too has elsewhere owned,

No precept for virginity he found:

'Tis but a counsel, and we women still

Take which we like, the counsel, or our will. 35

I envy not their bliss, if he or she

Think fit to live in perfect chastity;

Pure let them be, and free from taint or vice;

I, for a few slight spots, am not so nice.

Heav'n calls us diff'rent ways, on these bestows 40

One proper gift, another grants to those:

Not ev'ry man's obliged to sell his store,

And give up all his substance to the poor;

Such as are perfect, may, I can't deny;

But, by your leaves, divines, so am not I. 45

Full many a saint, since first the world began,

Lived an unspotted maid, in spite of man:

Let such (a God's name) with fine wheat be fed,

And let us honest wives eat barley bread.

For me, I'll keep the post assigned by heav'n, 50

And use the copious talent it has giv'n:

Let my good spouse pay tribute, do me right,

And keep an equal reck'ning ev'ry night:

His proper body is not his, but mine;

For so said Paul, and Paul's a sound divine.[4] 55

Know then, of those five husbands I have had,

Three were just tolerable, two were bad.[5]

The three were old, but rich and fond beside,

And toiled most piteously to please their bride:

But since their wealth, the best they had, was mine, 60

The rest, without much loss, I could resign.

Sure to be loved, I took no pains to please,[6]

Yet had more pleasure far than they had ease.

Presents flowed in apace: with show'rs of gold,

They made their court, like Jupiter of old. 65

If I but smiled, a sudden youth they found,

And a new palsy seized them when I frowned.

Ye sov'reign wives! give ear, and understand,

Thus shall ye speak, and exercise command.[7]

For never was it giv'n to mortal man, 70

To lie so boldly as we women can:

Forswear the fact, though seen with both his eyes,

And call your maids to witness how he lies.

Hark, old Sir Paul, 'twas thus I us'd to say,

Whence is our neighbour's wife so rich and gay? 75

Treated, caressed, where'er she's pleased to roam--

I sit in tatters, and immured at home.

Why to her house dost thou so oft repair?

Art thou so am'rous? and is she so fair?

If I but see a cousin or a friend, 80

Lord! how you swell, and rage like any fiend!

But you reel home, a drunken beastly bear,

Then preach till midnight in your easy chair;

Cry, wives are false, and ev'ry woman evil,

And give up all that's female to the devil. 85

If poor, you say she drains her husband's purse;

If rich, she keeps her priest, or something worse;

If highly born, intolerably vain,

Vapours and pride by turns possess her brain,

Now gayly mad, now sourly splenetic, 90

Freakish when well, and fretful when she's sick.

If fair, then chaste she cannot long abide,

By pressing youth attacked on ev'ry side:

If foul, her wealth the lusty lover lures,

Or else her wit some fool-gallant procures, 95

Or else she dances with becoming grace,

Or shape excuses the defects of face.

There swims no goose so grey, but soon or late,

She finds some honest gander for her mate.

Horses, thou say'st, and asses men may try, 100

And ring suspected vessels ere they buy:

But wives, a random choice, untried they take,

They dream in courtship, but in wedlock wake;

Then, nor till then, the veil's removed away,

And all the woman glares in open day. 105

You tell me, to preserve your wife's good grace,

Your eyes must always languish on my face,

Your tongue with constant flatt'ries feed my ear,

And tag each sentence with, My life! my dear!

If, by strange chance, a modest blush be raised, 110

Be sure my fine complexion must be praised.

My garments always must be new and gay,

And feasts still kept upon my wedding-day.

Then must my nurse be pleased, and fav'rite maid:

And endless treats, and endless visits paid, 115

To a long train of kindred, friends, allies;

All this thou say'st, and all thou say'st, are lies.

On Jenkin too you cast a squinting eye:

What! can your 'prentice raise your jealousy?

Fresh are his ruddy cheeks, his forehead fair; 120

And like the burnished gold his curling hair.

But clear thy wrinkled brow, and quit thy sorrow,

I'd scorn your 'prentice, should you die to-morrow.

Why are thy chests all locked? on what design?

Are not thy worldly goods and treasures mine? 125

Sir, I'm no fool; nor shall you, by St. John,

Have goods and body to yourself alone.

One you shall quit, in spite of both your eyes;

I heed not, I, the bolts, the locks, the spies.

If you had wit, you'd say, "Go where you will, 130

Dear spouse, I credit not the tales they tell;

Take all the freedoms of a married life;

I know thee for a virtuous, faithful wife."

Lord! when you have enough, what need you care

How merrily soever others fare? 135

Though all the day I give and take delight,

Doubt not, sufficient will be left at night.

'Tis but a just and rational desire,

To light a taper at a neighbour's fire.

There's danger too, you think, in rich array, 140

And none can long be modest that are gay:

The cat, if you but singe her tabby skin,

The chimney keeps, and sits content within;

But once grown sleek, will from her corner run,

Sport with her tail, and wanton in the sun; 145

She licks her fair round face, and frisks abroad,

To show her fur, and to be catterwawed.[8]

Lo thus, my friends, I wrought to my desires

These three right ancient venerable sires.

I told 'em, Thus you say, and thus you do, 150

And told 'em false, but Jenkin swore 'twas true.

I, like a dog, could bite as well as whine,

And first complained, whene'er the guilt was mine.[9]

I taxed them oft with wenching and amours,

When their weak legs scarce dragged 'em out of doors; 155

And swore the rambles that I took by night,

Were all to spy what damsels they bedight.

That colour brought me many hours of mirth;[10]

For all this wit is given us from our birth;

Heav'n gave to woman the peculiar grace, 160

To spin, to weep, and cully human race.

By this nice conduct, and this prudent course,

By murm'ring, wheedling, stratagem, and force,

I still prevailed, and would be in the right,

Or curtain lectures made a restless night. 165

If once my husband's arm was o'er my side,

What! so familiar with your spouse? I cried:

I levied first a tax upon his need:

Then let him--'twas a nicety indeed!

Let all mankind this certain maxim hold, 170

Marry who will, our sex is to be sold.

With empty hands no tassels you can lure,[11]

But fulsome love for gain we can endure;

For gold we love the impotent and old,

And heave, and pant, and kiss, and cling, for gold. 175

Yet with embraces, curses oft I've mixed,

Then kissed again, and chid, and railed betwixt.

Well, I may make my will in peace, and die,

For not one word in man's arrears am I.

To drop a dear dispute I was unable, 180

Ev'n though the Pope himself had sat at table.[12]

But when my point was gained, then thus I spoke,

"Billy, my dear, how sheepishly you look?

Approach, my spouse, and let me kiss thy cheek;

Thou should'st be always thus resigned and meek! 185

Of Job's great patience since so oft you preach,

Well should you practise, who so well can teach.

'Tis difficult to do, I must allow,

But I, my dearest, will instruct you how.

Great is the blessing of a prudent wife, 190

Who puts a period to domestic strife.

One of us two must rule, and one obey; }

And since in man right reason bears the sway, }

Let that frail thing, weak woman, have her way. }

The wives of all my family have ruled 195

Their tender husbands, and their passions cooled.

Fye, 'tis unmanly thus to sigh and groan;

What! would you have me to yourself alone?

Why take me, love! take all and ev'ry part!

Here's your revenge! you love it at your heart. 200

Would I vouchsafe to sell what nature gave,

You little think what custom I could have.

But see! I'm all your own--nay hold--for shame!

What means my dear--indeed--you are to blame."

Thus with my first three lords I passed my life; 205

A very woman, and a very wife.

What sums from these old spouses I could raise,

Procured young husbands in my riper days.

Though past my bloom,[13] not yet decayed was I,

Wanton and wild, and chattered like a pye. 210

In country dances still I bore the bell.

And sung as sweet as ev'ning Philomel.

To clear my quail-pipe, and refresh my soul,

Full oft I drained the spicy nut-brown bowl;

Rich luscious wines, that youthful blood improve, 215

And warm the swelling veins to feats of love:

For 'tis as sure as cold ingenders hail,

A liqu'rish mouth must have a lech'rous tail;

Wine lets no lover unrewarded go,

As all true gamesters by experience know. 220

But oh, good gods! whene'er a thought I cast

On all the joys of youth and beauty past,

To find in pleasures I have had my part,

Still warms me to the bottom of my heart.

This wicked world was once my dear delight; 225

Now all my conquests, all my charms, good night!

The flour consumed, the best that now I can,

Is e'en to make my market of the bran.[14]

My fourth dear spouse was not exceeding true!

He kept, 'twas thought, a private miss or two: 230

But all that score I paid--as how? you'll say,

Not with my body, in a filthy way:

But I so dressed, and danced, and drank, and dined;

And viewed a friend, with eyes so very kind,

As stung his heart, and made his marrow fry,[15] 235

With burning rage, and frantic jealousy.

His soul, I hope, enjoys eternal glory,

For here on earth I was his purgatory.

Oft, when his shoe the most severely wrung,

He put on careless airs, and sat and sung. 240

How sore I galled him, only heav'n could know,

And he that felt, and I that caused the woe.

He died, when last from pilgrimage I came,

With other gossips, from Jerusalem;[16]

And now lies buried underneath a rood,[17] 245

Fair to be seen, and reared of honest wood.

A tomb indeed, with fewer sculptures graced,

Than that Mausolus' pious widow placed,[18]

Or where inshrined the great Darius lay;

But cost on graves is merely thrown away. 250

The pit filled up, with turf we covered o'er;

So bless the good man's soul, I say no more.

Now for my fifth loved lord, the last and best;

(Kind heav'n afford him everlasting rest)

Full hearty was his love, and I can shew 255

The tokens on my ribs in black and blue;

Yet, with a knack, my heart he could have won,

While yet the smart was shooting in the bone.

How quaint an appetite in woman reigns!

Free gifts we scorn, and love what costs us pains: 260

Let men avoid us, and on them we leap;

A glutted market makes provision cheap.[19]

In pure good will I took this jovial spark,

Of Oxford he, a most egregious clerk.

He boarded with a widow in the town,[20] 265

A trusty gossip, one dame Alison.

Full well the secrets of my soul she knew,

Better than e'er our parish priest could do.

To her I told whatever could befall:

Had but my husband pissed against a wall, 270

Or done a thing that might have cost his life,

She, and my niece, and one more worthy wife,

Had known it all: what most he would conceal,

To these I made no scruple to reveal.

Oft has he blushed from ear to ear for shame, 275

That e'er he told a secret to his dame.

It so befel, in holy time of Lent,

That oft a day I to this gossip went;

(My husband, thank my stars, was out of town)

From house to house we rambled up and down, 280

This clerk, myself, and my good neighbour Alse,

To see, be seen, to tell, and gather tales.[21]

Visits to ev'ry church we daily paid,

And marched in every holy masquerade,

The stations duly,[22] and the vigils kept; 285

Not much we fasted, but scarce ever slept.

At sermons too I shone in scarlet gay, }

The wasting moth ne'er spoiled my best array; }

The cause was this, I wore it ev'ry day. }

'Twas when fresh May her early blossoms yields, 290

This clerk and I were walking in the fields.

We grew so intimate, I can't tell how,[23]

I pawned my honour, and engaged my vow,

If e'er I laid my husband in his urn,[24]

That he, and only he, should serve my turn. 295

We straight struck hands, the bargain was agreed;

I still have shifts against a time of need:

The mouse that always trusts to one poor hole,

Can never be a mouse of any soul.

I vowed, I scarce could sleep since first I knew him, 300

And durst be sworn he had bewitched me to him;

If e'er I slept, I dreamed of him alone, }

And dreams foretell, as learned men have shown: }

All this I said; but dreams, sirs, I had none: }

I followed but my crafty crony's lore, 305

Who bid me tell this lie, and twenty more.[25]

Thus day by day, and month by month we passed;

It pleased the Lord to take my spouse at last.

I tore my gown, I soiled my locks with dust,

And beat my breasts, as wretched widows must.[26] 310

Before my face my handkerchief I spread,

To hide the flood of tears I did not shed.

The good man's coffin to the church was borne;

Around, the neighbours, and my clerk too, mourn.

But as he marched, good gods! he showed a pair 315

Of legs and feet, so clean, so strong, so fair!

Of twenty winters' age he seemed to be;

I, to say truth, was twenty more than he;

But vig'rous still, a lively buxom dame;

And had a wond'rous gift to quench a flame. 320

A conj'ror once, that deeply could divine,

Assured me, Mars in Taurus was my sign.

As the stars ordered, such my life has been:

Alas, alas, that ever love was sin!

Fair Venus gave me fire, and sprightly grace, 325

And Mars assurance, and a dauntless face.

By virtue of this pow'rful constellation,

I followed, always, my own inclination.

But to my tale: A month scarce passed away,

With dance and song, we kept the nuptial day. 330

All I possessed I gave to his command,

My goods and chattels, money, house, and land:

But oft repented, and repent it still;[27]

He proved a rebel to my sov'reign will:

Nay, once, by heav'n! he struck me on the face; 335

Hear but the fact, and judge, yourselves, the case.

Stubborn as any lioness was I,

And knew full well to raise my voice on high;

As true a rambler as I was before,

And would be so, in spite of all he swore. 340

He, against this, right sagely would advise,

And old examples set before my eyes;

Tell, how the Roman matrons led their life,

Of Gracchus' mother, and Duilius' wife;

And close the sermon, as beseemed his wit, 345

With some grave sentence out of Holy Writ.[28]

Oft would he say, who builds his house on sands,

Pricks his blind horse across the fallow lands,

Or lets his wife abroad with pilgrims roam,

Deserves a fool's-cap, and long ears at home. 350

All this availed not; for, whoe'er he be

That tells my faults, I hate him mortally:

And so do numbers more, I'll boldly say,

Men, women, clergy, regular and lay.

My spouse, who was, you know, to learning bred, 355

A certain treatise, oft, at evening,[29] read,

Where divers authors, whom the devil confound

For all their lies, were in one volume bound.

Valerius, whole; and of St. Jerome, part;[30]

Chrysippus and Tertullian; Ovid's Art, 360

Solomon's Proverbs, Eloisa's loves,[31]

And many more than sure the church approves.[32]

More legends were there, here, of wicked wives,

Than good,[33] in all the Bible and saints' lives.

Who drew the lion vanquished? 'Twas a man.[34] 365

But could we women write as scholars can,

Men should stand marked with far more wickedness

Than all the sons of Adam could redress.

Love seldom haunts the breast where learning lies,

And Venus sets, ere Mercury can rise.[35] 370

Those play the scholars who can't play the men,

And use that weapon which they have, their pen;

When old and past the relish of delight,

Then down they sit, and in their dotage write,

That not one woman keeps her marriage vow. 375

This by the way, but to my purpose now.

It chanced my husband, on a winter's night,

Read in this book, aloud, with strange delight,

How the first female, as the Scriptures show,

Brought her own spouse and all his race to woe:[36] 380

How Sampson fell; and he, whom Dejanire

Wrapp'd in th' envenomed shirt, and set on fire:

How cursed Eryphile her lord betrayed,

And the dire ambush Clytemnestra laid:[37]

But what most pleased him was the Cretan dame, 385

And husband-bull--oh monstrous! fie for shame!

He had by heart, the whole detail of woe,

Xantippe made her good man undergo;

How oft she scolded in a day, he knew,

How many piss-pots on the sage she threw; 390

Who took it patiently, and wiped his head;

"Rain follows thunder," that was all he said.

He read how Arius to his friend complained,

A fatal tree was growing in his land,

On which three wives successively had twined 395

A sliding noose, and wavered in the wind.

Where grows this plant, replied the friend, oh! where?

For better fruit did never orchard bear;

Give me some slip of this most blissful tree,

And, in my garden, planted shall it be. 400

Then, how two wives their lords' destruction prove,

Through hatred one, and one through too much love;

That for her husband mixed a pois'nous draught,

And this, for lust, an am'rous philtre bought:

The nimble juice soon seized his giddy head, 405

Frantic at night, and in the morning dead.[38]

How some, with swords, their sleeping lords have slain,

And some have hammered nails into their brain,

And some have drenched them with a deadly potion;

All this he read, and read with great devotion. 410

Long time I heard, and swelled, and blushed,[39] and frowned;

But when no end of these vile tales I found,

When still he read, and laughed, and read again,

And half the night was thus consumed in vain;

Provoked to vengeance, three large leaves I tore, 415

And, with one buffet, felled him on the floor.

With that, my husband in a fury rose,

And down he settled me, with hearty blows.

I groaned, and lay extended on my side;

Oh! thou hast slain me for my wealth, I cried,[40] 420

Yet I forgive thee--take my last embrace--

He wept, kind soul! and stooped to kiss my face;

I took him such a box as turned him blue,

Then sighed and cried, Adieu, my dear, adieu![41]

But, after many a hearty struggle past, 425

I condescended to be pleased at last.

Soon as he said, My mistress and my wife,

Do what you list, the term of all your life,

I took to heart the merits of the cause,

And stood content to rule by wholesome laws; 430

Received the reins of absolute command, }

With all the government of house and land, }

And empire o'er his tongue, and o'er his hand. }

As for the volume that reviled the dames,

'Twas torn to fragments, and condemned to flames. 435

Now heav'n, on all my husbands gone, bestow

Pleasures above, for tortures felt below:

That rest they wished for, grant them in the grave,

And bless those souls my conduct helped to save!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Pope has departed at the outset from the conception of

Chaucer. The purpose of the tale which the wife of Bath tells is to show

that women love, above all things, to govern; and her personal history,

which she relates in the prologue, is an account of the means by which

she reduced her husbands to submission. It was not her own matrimonial

woes, which had been slight enough, that she was about to set forth, but

the miseries of those whom it is her boast to have worried into

obedience to her will. As Pope correctly renders the original, she

states that the pains referred to the smart she had inflicted on her

husbands; and, far from alleging that "dear-bought wisdom" had taught

her that matrimony to a woman was a life of suffering, she thanks God

that she has been married five times already, and declares that directly

her fifth mate is dead, she will marry a sixth.

When my husband is from the world i-gone,

Some Christian man shall wedde me anon.]

[Footnote 2: "Twelve" in the original.]

[Footnote 3:

Beside a welle Jesus, God and man,

Spake in reproof of the Samaritan:

"Thou hast i-had five husbandes," quoth he,

"And that ilk-man, which that now hath thee

Is not thine husband." Thus he said certain;

What that he meant thereby I cannot sayn,

But that I axe why the fithe man

Was not husband to the Samaritan?

The question is addressed to those who deny the validity of second

marriages, and she asks them to explain upon their theory why the fifth

man was not properly the husband of the Samaritan woman, when there is

the authoritative declaration of Scripture that he was.]

[Footnote 4: Pope alone is responsible for the second half of this line,

which in its present application has an unbecoming levity. There was a

pardoner in the company, a person who got his living by selling

indulgences, and by displaying the pretended relics of saints, who says

that he was about to marry, but that he shall abandon his intention now

that he learns what despotic authority wives exercise over husbands. The

wife of Bath, unabashed, informs him that what she has told is nothing

in comparison with that which is to follow:

Abide, quoth she, my tale is not begun.

Nay, thou shalt drinke of another tun

Ere that I go, shall savour worse than ale.

And when that I have told thee forth my tale

Of tribulation in marriage,

Of which I am expert in all my age,

That is to say, myself hath been the whip,

Then might thou choose whether thou wilt sip

Of thilke tunne that I shall abroach:

Beware of it ere thou too nigh approach.

These dramatic touches omitted by Pope give life to the piece, and

individuality to the characters.]

[Footnote 5: In the original,

I shall say sooth of husbands that I had,

As three of them were good, and two were bad.

She meant that the two were rebellious in comparison with the three who

were her slaves; for in speaking of the entire five, at the commencement

of the prologue, she added,

And all were worthy men in their degree.

Pope has fallen into an inconsistency. He states that the three old

husbands were those who "were just tolerable." Yet when he comes to

describe the youngest of the two, whom he here calls "bad," he makes the

wife of Bath exclaim,

Now for my fifth loved lord, the last and _best_,

In Chaucer she distinctly denies that he was the best, but says she

_loved_ him best, and proceeds to explain the reason, which is that

women always value those most who treat them with harshness or

indifference.]

[Footnote 6: This trait in the wife of Bath's character is brought out

more distinctly by Chaucer:

Me needeth not no longer doon diligence

To win their love, or do them reverence.

They loved me so well, high God above!

That I tolde no deynte of their love.

A wise woman will busy her ever in one

To gete her love, there she hath none.

But synnes I had them wholly in my hand

And synnes they had me given all their land,

What should I take keep them for to please

But it were for my profit or mine ease?

"I tolde no deynte of their love," means I set no store by it; "ever in

one" is always; and "take keep" is take care.]

[Footnote 7: The wife of Bath's first lesson in the art of domestic

government is a panegyric upon the advantages of sturdy lying, in which

Pope has not gone beyond the original:

Ye wise wives that can understand

Thus should ye speak, and bear them wrong in hand;

For half so boldely can there no man

Swere and lie as a woman can.

"To bear them wrong in hand" is to affirm wrongfully or falsely. The

phrase "to bear in hand" for "to asseverate," was still frequently used

in the reign of Charles II.]

[Footnote 8: The wife of Bath accuses her old husbands to their faces of

having delivered this kind of railing lecture to her when they had come

home at night "as drunk as mice." The drunkenness and the railing are

alike inventions of her own, but she appeals to her niece, and Jenkin,

the apprentice, to bear witness to the truth of her assertions. The

version of Pope is not so vivid, so lively, or so close to nature as the

original, and he has nearly passed over one of the most prominent

characteristics of the speech. When the wife of Bath taunts her husband

with the reproaches she pretended he had heaped upon her, she

intersperses her repetition of his objurgations with abusive and

disdainful names by way of comment upon his monstrous sentiments. Old

caynard or villain, Sir old lecher, thou very knave, lorel or worthless

fellow, old dotard schrewe or sinner, old barrel full of lies, Sir old

fool, are some of the appellations by which she marks her opinion of the

doctrines she fathers upon him. After reciting his alleged complaint,

that women concealed their vices till they were married, she adds that

the maxim is worthy of "a schrewe," or scoundrel. When she imputes to

him the declaration that no man would wed who was wise, or who desired

to go to heaven, she follows it up with the wish that thunder and

lightning would break his wicked neck. When he is charged with having

said that there were three things that troubled earth, and that a wife

was one of them, she hopes that the life of such a villain will be cut

short. When she taxes him with quoting the proverb that a house not

water-tight, a smoky chimney, and a scolding wife drove men from home,

she retorts upon him that he is himself a scold, and intimates that his

years are an aggravation of the vice. This is not only natural as the

sort of scurrilous language which the wife of Bath would have used if

the drunken invectives had been real, but was part of her plan for

bringing her husbands into subjection. Her indignant recriminations were

intended to browbeat them into meekness.]