Neque sermonibus vulgi dederis te, nec in præis spem posueris rerum tuarum;suiste oportet illecebris ipsa virtus trahat ad verum decus.
Quid de te alii loquantur, ipsi videant,sed loquentur tamen.(Cicero,
De Re Publica VI.23)["… you will not any longer attend to the vulgar mob's gossip nor put your trust in human rewards for your deeds; virtue, through her own charms, should lead you to true glory.
Let what others say about you be their concern; whatever it is, they will say it anyway." Shut, shut the door, good John! fatigu'd,
I said, Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick,
I'm dead. The dog-star rages! nay 'tis past a doubt, All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out: Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand, They rave, recite, and madden round the land. What walls can guard me, or what shades can hide? They pierce my thickets, through my grot they glide; By land, by water, they renew the charge; They stop the chariot, and they board the barge. No place is sacred, not the church is free; Ev'n Sunday shines no Sabbath-day to me: Then from the Mint walks forth the man of rhyme, Happy! to catch me just at dinner-time. Is there a parson, much bemus'd in beer, A maudlin poetess, a rhyming peer, A clerk, foredoom'd his father's soul to cross, Who pens a stanza, when he should engross? Is there, who, lock'd from ink and paper, scrawls With desp'rate charcoal round his darken'd walls? All fly to Twit'nam, and in humble strain Apply to me, to keep them mad or vain. Arthur, whose giddy son neglects the laws, Imputes to me and my damn'd works the cause: Poor Cornus sees his frantic wife elope, And curses wit, and poetry, and Pope. Friend to my life! (which did not you prolong, The world had wanted many an idle song) What drop or nostrum can this plague remove? Or which must end me, a fool's wrath or love? A dire dilemma! either way I'm sped, If foes, they write, if friends, they read me dead. Seiz'd and tied down to judge, how wretched I! Who can't be silent, and who will not lie; To laugh, were want of goodness and of grace, And to be grave, exceeds all pow'r of face. I sit with sad civility,
I read With honest anguish, and an aching head; And drop at last, but in unwilling ears, This saving counsel, "Keep your piece nine years." "Nine years!" cries he, who high in Drury-lane Lull'd by soft zephyrs through the broken pane, Rhymes ere he wakes, and prints before Term ends, Oblig'd by hunger, and request of friends: "The piece, you think, is incorrect: why, take it, I'm all submission, what you'd have it, make it." Three things another's modest wishes bound, My friendship, and a prologue, and ten pound. Pitholeon sends to me: "You know his Grace, I want a patron; ask him for a place." Pitholeon libell'd me—"but here's a letter Informs you, sir, 'twas when he knew no better. Dare you refuse him?
Curll invites to dine, He'll write a Journal, or he'll turn Divine." Bless me! a packet—"'Tis a stranger sues, A virgin tragedy, an orphan muse." If I dislike it, "Furies, death and rage!" If I approve, "Commend it to the stage." There (thank my stars) my whole commission ends, The play'rs and I are, luckily, no friends. Fir'd that the house reject him, "'Sdeath I'll print it, And shame the fools—your int'rest, sir, with Lintot!" "Lintot, dull rogue! will think your price too much." "Not, sir, if you revise it, and retouch." All my demurs but double his attacks; At last he whispers, "Do; and we go snacks." Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the door, "Sir, let me see your works and you no more." 'Tis sung, when Midas' ears began to spring, (Midas, a sacred person and a king) His very minister who spied them first, (Some say his queen) was forc'd to speak, or burst. And is not mine, my friend, a sorer case, When ev'ry coxcomb perks them in my face? "Good friend, forbear! you deal in dang'rous things. I'd never name queens, ministers, or kings; Keep close to ears, and those let asses prick; 'Tis nothing"—Nothing? if they bite and kick? Out with it, Dunciad! let the secret pass, That secret to each fool, that he's an ass: The truth once told (and wherefore should we lie?) The queen of Midas slept, and so may I. You think this cruel? take it for a rule, No creature smarts so little as a fool. Let peals of laughter,
Codrus! round thee break, Thou unconcern'd canst hear the mighty crack: Pit, box, and gall'ry in convulsions hurl'd, Thou stand'st unshook amidst a bursting world. Who shames a scribbler? break one cobweb through, He spins the slight, self-pleasing thread anew; Destroy his fib or sophistry, in vain, The creature's at his dirty work again; Thron'd in the centre of his thin designs; Proud of a vast extent of flimsy lines! Whom have I hurt? has poet yet, or peer, Lost the arch'd eye-brow, or Parnassian sneer? And has not Colley still his lord, and whore? His butchers Henley, his Free-masons Moore? Does not one table Bavius still admit? Still to one bishop Philips seem a wit? Still Sappho— "Hold! for God-sake—you'll offend: No names!—be calm!—learn prudence of a friend! I too could write, and I am twice as tall; But foes like these!" One flatt'rer's worse than all. Of all mad creatures, if the learn'd are right, It is the slaver kills, and not the bite. A fool quite angry is quite innocent; Alas! 'tis ten times worse when they repent. One dedicates in high heroic prose, And ridicules beyond a hundred foes; One from all Grub Street will my fame defend, And, more abusive, calls himself my friend. This prints my Letters, that expects a bribe, And others roar aloud, "Subscribe, subscribe." There are, who to my person pay their court: I cough like Horace, and, though lean, am short, Ammon's great son one shoulder had too high, Such Ovid's nose, and "Sir! you have an eye"— Go on, obliging creatures, make me see All that disgrac'd my betters, met in me: Say for my comfort, languishing in bed, "Just so immortal Maro held his head:" And when I die, be sure you let me know Great Homer died three thousand years ago. Why did I write? what sin to me unknown Dipp'd me in ink, my parents', or my own? As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame, I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came. I left no calling for this idle trade, No duty broke, no father disobey'd. The Muse but serv'd to ease some friend, not wife, To help me through this long disease, my life, To second,
Arbuthnot! thy art and care, And teach the being you preserv'd, to bear. But why then publish?
Granville the polite, And knowing Walsh, would tell me I could write; Well-natur'd Garth inflamed with early praise, And Congreve lov'd, and Swift endur'd my lays; The courtly Talbot,
Somers,
Sheffield read, Ev'n mitred Rochester would nod the head, And St.
John's self (great Dryden's friends before) With open arms receiv'd one poet more. Happy my studies, when by these approv'd! Happier their author, when by these belov'd! From these the world will judge of men and books, Not from the Burnets,
Oldmixons, and Cookes. Soft were my numbers; who could take offence, While pure description held the place of sense? Like gentle Fanny's was my flow'ry theme, A painted mistress, or a purling stream. Yet then did Gildon draw his venal quill; I wish'd the man a dinner, and sat still. Yet then did Dennis rave in furious fret; I never answer'd,
I was not in debt. If want provok'd, or madness made them print, I wag'd no war with Bedlam or the Mint. Did some more sober critic come abroad? If wrong,
I smil'd; if right,
I kiss'd the rod. Pains, reading, study, are their just pretence, And all they want is spirit, taste, and sense. Commas and points they set exactly right, And 'twere a sin to rob them of their mite. Yet ne'er one sprig of laurel grac'd these ribalds, From slashing Bentley down to pidling Tibbalds. Each wight who reads not, and but scans and spells, Each word-catcher that lives on syllables, Ev'n such small critics some regard may claim, Preserv'd in Milton's or in Shakespeare's name. Pretty! in amber to observe the forms Of hairs, or straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms; The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare, But wonder how the devil they got there? Were others angry?
I excus'd them too; Well might they rage;
I gave them but their due. A man's true merit 'tis not hard to find, But each man's secret standard in his mind, That casting weight pride adds to emptiness, This, who can gratify? for who can guess? The bard whom pilfer'd pastorals renown, Who turns a Persian tale for half a crown, Just writes to make his barrenness appear, And strains, from hard-bound brains, eight lines a year: He, who still wanting, though he lives on theft, Steals much, spends little, yet has nothing left: And he, who now to sense, now nonsense leaning, Means not, but blunders round about a meaning: And he, whose fustian's so sublimely bad, It is not poetry, but prose run mad: All these, my modest satire bade translate, And own'd, that nine such poets made a Tate. How did they fume, and stamp, and roar, and chafe? And swear, not Addison himself was safe. Peace to all such! but were there one whose fires True genius kindles, and fair fame inspires, Blest with each talent and each art to please, And born to write, converse, and live with ease: Should such a man, too fond to rule alone, Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne, View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes, And hate for arts that caus'd himself to rise; Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer; Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike; Alike reserv'd to blame, or to commend, A tim'rous foe, and a suspicious friend; Dreading ev'n fools, by flatterers besieg'd, And so obliging, that he ne'er oblig'd; Like Cato, give his little senate laws, And sit attentive to his own applause; While wits and templars ev'ry sentence raise, And wonder with a foolish face of praise. Who but must laugh, if such a man there be? Who would not weep, if Atticus were he? What though my name stood rubric on the walls, Or plaister'd posts, with claps, in capitals? Or smoking forth, a hundred hawkers' load, On wings of winds came flying all abroad? I sought no homage from the race that write; I kept, like Asian monarchs, from their sight: Poems I heeded (now berhym'd so long) No more than thou, great George! a birthday song. I ne'er with wits or witlings pass'd my days, To spread about the itch of verse and praise; Nor like a puppy, daggled through the town, To fetch and carry sing-song up and down; Nor at rehearsals sweat, and mouth'd, and cried, With handkerchief and orange at my side; But sick of fops, and poetry, and prate, To Bufo left the whole Castalian state. Proud as Apollo on his forked hill, Sat full-blown Bufo, puff'd by every quill; Fed with soft dedication all day long, Horace and he went hand in hand in song. His library (where busts of poets dead And a true Pindar stood without a head,) Receiv'd of wits an undistinguish'd race, Who first his judgment ask'd, and then a place: Much they extoll'd his pictures, much his seat, And flatter'd ev'ry day, and some days eat: Till grown more frugal in his riper days, He paid some bards with port, and some with praise, To some a dry rehearsal was assign'd, And others (harder still) he paid in kind. Dryden alone (what wonder?) came not nigh, Dryden alone escap'd this judging eye: But still the great have kindness in reserve, He help'd to bury whom he help'd to starve. May some choice patron bless each grey goose quill! May ev'ry Bavius have his Bufo still! So, when a statesman wants a day's defence, Or envy holds a whole week's war with sense, Or simple pride for flatt'ry makes demands, May dunce by dunce be whistled off my hands! Blest be the great! for those they take away, And those they left me—for they left me Gay; Left me to see neglected genius bloom, Neglected die! and tell it on his tomb; Of all thy blameless life the sole return My verse, and Queensb'ry weeping o'er thy urn! Oh let me live my own! and die so too! ("To live and die is all I have to do:") Maintain a poet's dignity and ease, And see what friends, and read what books I please. Above a patron, though I condescend Sometimes to call a minister my friend: I was not born for courts or great affairs; I pay my debts, believe, and say my pray'rs; Can sleep without a poem in my head, Nor know, if Dennis be alive or dead. Why am I ask'd what next shall see the light? Heav'ns! was I born for nothing but to write? Has life no joys for me? or (to be grave) Have I no friend to serve, no soul to save? "I found him close with Swift"—"Indeed? no doubt", (Cries prating Balbus) "something will come out". 'Tis all in vain, deny it as I will. "No, such a genius never can lie still," And then for mine obligingly mistakes The first lampoon Sir Will. or Bubo makes. Poor guiltless I! and can I choose but smile, When ev'ry coxcomb knows me by my style? Curs'd be the verse, how well soe'er it flow, That tends to make one worthy man my foe, Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear, Or from the soft-ey'd virgin steal a tear! But he, who hurts a harmless neighbour's peace, Insults fall'n worth, or beauty in distress, Who loves a lie, lame slander helps about, Who writes a libel, or who copies out: That fop, whose pride affects a patron's name, Yet absent, wounds an author's honest fame; Who can your merit selfishly approve, And show the sense of it without the love; Who has the vanity to call you friend, Yet wants the honour, injur'd, to defend; Who tells what'er you think, whate'er you say, And, if he lie not, must at least betray: Who to the Dean, and silver bell can swear, And sees at Cannons what was never there; Who reads, but with a lust to misapply, Make satire a lampoon, and fiction, lie. A lash like mine no honest man shall dread, But all such babbling blockheads in his stead. Let Sporus tremble—"What? that thing of silk, Sporus, that mere white curd of ass's milk? Satire or sense, alas! can Sporus feel? Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?" Yet let me flap this bug with gilded wings, This painted child of dirt that stinks and stings; Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys, Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'r enjoys, So well-bred spaniels civilly delight In mumbling of the game they dare not bite. Eternal smiles his emptiness betray, As shallow streams run dimpling all the way. Whether in florid impotence he speaks, And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks; Or at the ear of Eve, familiar toad, Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad, In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies, Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies. His wit all see-saw, between that and this , Now high, now low, now Master up, now Miss, And he himself one vile antithesis. Amphibious thing! that acting either part, The trifling head, or the corrupted heart, Fop at the toilet, flatt'rer at the board, Now trips a lady, and now struts a lord. Eve's tempter thus the rabbins have express'd, A cherub's face, a reptile all the rest; Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust, Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust. Not fortune's worshipper, nor fashion's fool, Not lucre's madman, nor ambition's tool, Not proud, nor servile, be one poet's praise, That, if he pleas'd, he pleas'd by manly ways; That flatt'ry, even to kings, he held a shame, And thought a lie in verse or prose the same: That not in fancy's maze he wander'd long, But stoop'd to truth, and moraliz'd his song: That not for fame, but virtue's better end, He stood the furious foe, the timid friend, The damning critic, half-approving wit, The coxcomb hit, or fearing to be hit; Laugh'd at the loss of friends he never had, The dull, the proud, the wicked, and the mad; The distant threats of vengeance on his head, The blow unfelt, the tear he never shed; The tale reviv'd, the lie so oft o'erthrown; Th' imputed trash, and dulness not his own; The morals blacken'd when the writings 'scape; The libell'd person, and the pictur'd shape; Abuse, on all he lov'd, or lov'd him, spread, A friend in exile, or a father, dead; The whisper, that to greatness still too near, Perhaps, yet vibrates on his sovereign's ear:— Welcome for thee, fair Virtue! all the past: For thee, fair Virtue! welcome ev'n the last! "But why insult the poor? affront the great?" A knave's a knave, to me, in ev'ry state: Alike my scorn, if he succeed or fail, Sporus at court, or Japhet in a jail, A hireling scribbler, or a hireling peer, Knight of the post corrupt, or of the shire; If on a pillory, or near a throne, He gain his prince's ear, or lose his own. Yet soft by nature, more a dupe than wit, Sappho can tell you how this man was bit: This dreaded sat'rist Dennis will confess Foe to his pride, but friend to his distress: So humble, he has knock'd at Tibbald's door, Has drunk with Cibber, nay, has rhym'd for Moore. Full ten years slander'd, did he once reply? Three thousand suns went down on Welsted's lie. To please a mistress one aspers'd his life; He lash'd him not, but let her be his wife. Let Budgell charge low Grub Street on his quill, And write whate'er he pleas'd, except his will; Let the two Curlls of town and court, abuse His father, mother, body, soul, and muse. Yet why? that father held it for a rule, It was a sin to call our neighbour fool: That harmless mother thought no wife a whore,— Hear this! and spare his family,
James Moore! Unspotted names! and memorable long, If there be force in virtue, or in song. Of gentle blood (part shed in honour's cause, While yet in Britain honour had applause) Each parent sprung—"What fortune, pray?"—Their own, And better got, than Bestia's from the throne. Born to no pride, inheriting no strife, Nor marrying discord in a noble wife, Stranger to civil and religious rage, The good man walk'd innoxious through his age. No courts he saw, no suits would ever try, Nor dar'd an oath, nor hazarded a lie: Un-learn'd, he knew no schoolman's subtle art, No language, but the language of the heart. By nature honest, by experience wise, Healthy by temp'rance and by exercise; His life, though long, to sickness past unknown; His death was instant, and without a groan. O grant me, thus to live, and thus to die! Who sprung from kings shall know less joy than I. O friend! may each domestic bliss be thine! Be no unpleasing melancholy mine: Me, let the tender office long engage To rock the cradle of reposing age, With lenient arts extend a mother's breath, Make langour smile, and smooth the bed of death, Explore the thought, explain the asking eye, And keep a while one parent from the sky! On cares like these if length of days attend, May Heav'n, to bless those days, preserve my friend, Preserve him social, cheerful, and serene, And just as rich as when he serv'd a queen. Whether that blessing be denied or giv'n, Thus far was right, the rest belongs to Heav'n.
Form:
Composition Date:17341.
Published in January 1735.
This "Epistle" is the result of a correspondence between Pope and his personal physician and lifelong friend,
Dr.
John Arbuthnot.
In the summer of 1734 Arbuthnot, realizing that he was dying, wrote to the poet cautioning him about his satiric attacks on powerful individuals; on August 25 Pope replied: "I determine to address to you one of my Epistles, written by piecemeal many years, and which I have now made haste to put together: wherein the question is stated, what were and are my Motives of writing, the objections to them and my answers." As Pope's letter would suggest, some of the passages were written earlier and some of them--e.g., the Atticus portrait--published earlier.
This portion, originally sketched out in 1715, was finally published in 1722 in the St.
James Journal and in an expanded form in 1727.
Arbuthnot, to whom the poem is addressed, had been one of the Scriblerus group, a prose satirist in his own right, and physician to Queen Anne during her reign.
Pope's summary of the Epistle to Dr.
Arbuthnot is as follows: "This paper is a sort of bill of complaint, begun many years since, and drawn up by snatches, as the several occasions offered.
I had no thoughts of publishing it, till it pleased some persons of rank and fortune (the authors of Verses to the Imitator of Horace, and of an Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a Nobleman at Hampton Court) to attack, in a very extraordinary manner, not only my writings (of which, being public, the Public is judge) but my Person,
Morals, and Family, whereof, to those who know me not, a truer information may be requisite.
Being divided between the necessity to say some thing of myself, and my own laziness to undertake so awkward a task,
I thought it the shortest way to put the last hand to this Epistle.
If it have anything pleasing, it will be that by which I am most desirous to please, the Truth and the Sentiment; and if anything offensive, it will be only to those I am least sorry to offend, the vicious or the ungenerous.
Many will know their own pictures in it, there being not a circumstance but what is true; but I have, for the most part, spared their Names, and they may escape being laughed at, if they please.
I would have some of them know, it was owing to the request of the learned and candid Friend to whom it is inscribed that I make not as free use of theirs as they have done of mine.
However,
I shall have this advantage, and honour, on my side, that whereas, by their proceeding, any abuse may be directed at any man, no injury can possibly be done by mine, since a nameless character can never be found out, but by its Truth and Likeness.
The "Authors" referred to above:
Lord Hervey and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.
Lord Hervey:
John Hervey (1696-1743),
Vice-Chancellor and confidant of Queen Caroline.
He was well known for his trifling verses, effeminacy, profligacy, and gossip.
Hervey was one of Pope's bitterest enemies.
Lady Mary:
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), a leading figure in eighteenth-century society noted for her wit and extensive travels.
As wife of Edward Wortley Montagu, she spent 1716 to 1718 traveling in the east.
Pope, who had met her in 1715, wrote many letters while she was away, but after her return in 1720, their friendship cooled, and by 1728, when Pope and Swift first attacked her, the rupture was complete.
The main reason for Pope's violent opposition to Hervey was his union with Lady Mary in writing the Verses addressed to the Imitator of Horace.
Neque sermonibus vulgi . . .: "... you will not any longer attend to the vulgar mob's gossip nor put your trust in human rewards for your deeds; virtue, through her own charms, should lead you to true glory.
Let what others say about you be their concern; whatever it is, they will say it anyway" (Cicero,
De Re Publica,
VI, 23). good John:
Pope's servant John Serle.3.
Dog-star:
Sirius.
The rising of this constellation in August associates it with maddening heat and with the August rehearsals of poetry in Juvenal's Rome.
See Horace,
Odes,
II, xiii, 9, and Juvenal,
Sat., iii, 15. 4.
Bellam: an insane asylum in London.
Parnassus: mountain sacred to the Muses and Apollo. 8. my grot:
Pope's grotto.10. the barge.
Pope employed a waterman to take him up and down the Thames and to deliver messages. 13. the Mint: a sanctuary for insolvent debtors (so called because Henry
II's mint had been there).
On Sundays the debtors could "walk forth" because they were not liable to arrest. 21.
Twit'nam:
Pope's home at Twickenham. 23.
Arthur:
Arthur Moore (1666?-1730) was a politician, whose son James Moore Smythe (1702-1734), a writer, had gotten into trouble with Pope for using some of Pope's verses in a play,
The Rival Ladies (1727).
Later, he collaborated in a poem attacking Pope (cf. line 385).
Smythe is also said to have been a leader of English freemasonry (cf. line 98), which Pope attacked in the Dunciad (1742 version). 25.
Cornus: from Latin cornu, a horn.
Thus it refers to any cuckold.
Some identified the reference with Sir Robert Walpole, whose wife left him in 1734. 29. drop: "medicine to be taken in drops . . ."
ED). 31. spel: brought to an evil plight or awkward situation. 40.
Keep ... nine years:
Horace's advice in his Ars Poetica, 386-89. 41. high: i.e., living in a garret.
Drury lane: the abode of harlots and other disreputable types. 43. before Term ends: the end of the summer law court terms, which coincided with the close of the London publishing season. 44. request of friends: an apology frequently set forth in the prefaces of works by bad writers. 49.
Pitholeon: "[Pope] The name taken from a foolish poet at Rhodes, who pretended much to Greek.
Schol. in Horat. lib. i.
Dr.
Bentley pretends that this Pitholeon libelled Caesar also.
See notes on Hor.
Sat.
X. 1.
I [v.22]." 53.
Curll:
Edmund Curll (1675-1747), an unsavory publisher and enemy of Pope's.
He specialized in scandal, sedition, and pornography.
Pope had been involved in attacking Curll as early as 1714.
See also lines 113, 380. 54.
Journal: abuse Pope in the newspapers.
Probably a specific reference to the Whig newspaper, the London Journal. 62.
Lintot:
Barnaby Bernard Lintot (1675-1736), a bookseller, who published most of Pope's earlier works, including the Rape of the Lock,
The Iliad, and The Odyssey. 66. go snacks: "to divide profits"
ED). 69.
Milas: semi-legendary king of Phyrgia (the one who wished for and obtained the golden touch), to whom Apollo gave ass's ears for having awarded the prize in a musical contest between Apollo and Pan to Pan. 72. his Queen. "[Pope] The story is told by some [Ovid,
Metamorphoses, xi, 146] of his Barber, but by Chaucer of his queen.
See the Wife of Bath's Tale in Dryden's Fables [157-200]." 79-80.
Ass: appeared as the symbol on the title page to the 1729 Dunciad Variorum. 85.
Codrus: a traditional name for a bad poet, borrowed from Juvenal. 87-88.
Cf.
Essay on Man,
I. 96.
Parnassian sneer: refers to the 1729 Dunciad Variorum: "Great Tibbald nods:
The proud Parnassian sneer . . ." (II, 5). 97.
Colley:
Colley Cibber; see Dunciad Book IV below. 98.
Henley:
John Henley (1692-1756), an eccentric preacher, who delivered a sermon celebrating the trade of the butcher at Newport Market on Easter Day 1729, taking for his text: "Thou has put all things in subjection under his feet; all sheep and oxen, yea and the beasts of the field." Moore: see note on line 23. 99.
Bavius: a Roman poetaster who owed his immortality to the enmity which he held towards Horace and Virgil, and who was attacked by them.
See Virgil,
Eclogues,
II.100.
Philips:
Ambrose Philips (1675-1749), a pastoral poet, secretary for some years to Hugh Boulter,
Archbishop of Armagh.
Philip's Pastorals had been attacked by Pope in The Spectator, 40. 101.
Sappho:
Lesbian poetess of the seventh century B.
C.
The name is applied to Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. 111.
Grub Street: section of eighteenth-century London inhabited by hack writers. 113. my Letters.
Curll had published without permission some of Pope's letters to his friends. 114.
Subscribe.
Books were frequently published by subscription.
Pope's Iliad had been published in this manner. 117.
Ammon's great son:
Alexander the Great. 122.
Maro:
Virgil.125-26. what sin ... my own: cf.
John 9:2. 134. bear: (1) endure, (2) result in creative fruition. 135.
Granville:
George Granville,
Baron Lansdowne (1667-1735), poet and statesman.
Pope submitted some of his early works to Granville, who had been friendly with Dryden. 136.
Walsh: see Essay on Criticism, line 729. 137.
Garth:
Sir Samuel Garth (1661-1719), poet and physician to George I.
One of Pope's earliest literary friends, he had encouraged the writing of the Pastorals.
His Dispensary (1699) was one of the poetical predecessors of the Rape of the Lock. 139.
Talbot:
Charles Talbot, twelfth Earl and only Duke of Shrewsbury (1660-1718), statesman, noted for his personal charm and taste.
Somers:
John Somers,
Baron Somers (1651-1716) Whig statesman, who encouraged Pope in writing of the Pastorals.
Sheffield:
John Sheffield, third Earl of Mulgrave.
See Essay on Criticism, note on line 724. 140.
Rochester:
Francis Atterbury,
Bishop of Rochester (1662-1732), a Jacobite sympathizer, who was banished in 1732.
He was a close friend of Pope's, a member of the Scriblerus Club, and a literary confidant and personal critic for Pope. 141.
St.
John: see Essay on Man, introductory notes.
Dryden's friends.
All these were patrons or admirers of Mr.
Dryden. 146. "[Pope] Authors of secret and scandalous history." Burnets:
Thomas Burnet (1694-1753), a follower of Addison, who had attacked Pope.
In 1719 he left the English literary scene to become a consul.
Oldmixons:
John Oldmixon (1673-1742), a miscellaneous writer engaged with Whig interests.
His "secret and scandalous" histories are the Secret History of Europe and the History of England during the Reigns of the Royal House of Stuart.
Cooke:
Thomas Cooke (1703-1756), poet, pamphleteer, and translator.
He attacked Pope in 1726, but tried unsuccessfully to apologize. 149.
Fanny:
Lord Hervey.
See line 305. 151.
Gillon:
Charles Gildon (1665-1724), a critic who had attacked some of Pope's earlier works.
Pope did not attack Gildon except here and in the later version of the Dunciad. 153.
Dennis:
John Dennis (1657-1734), a critic and dramatist who had been offended by line 585 of the Essay of Criticism.
Dennis's reply began a long period of hostility between himself and Pope. 164.
Bentley:
Richard Bentley (1662-1742), famous English classical scholar, whom Pope and Swift viewed as the stock type of verbal critic, a reputation confirmed by his edition of Horace (1711) and Milton (1732).
Cf.
The Dunciad,
IV.
Tibbalds:
Louis Theobold (1688-1744), scholar and dramatist who edited Shakespeare (1734).
He attacked Pope's edition of Shakespeare in 1726 and Pope retaliated by making him king of the Dunces in the earlier version of the Dunciad (1728-29). 177.casting weight: the added weight that turns the scale.180. a Persian tale. "[Pope] Ambrose Philips translated a book called the Persian Tales." See note on line 100.
Philips received a half a crown for each section of this book. 183.
He.
The reference is general here as well as in lines 185 and 187. 189.translate: (1) become translators, (2) transform themselves into writers of genuine talent. 190.
Tate:
Nahum Tate (1652-1715), minor versifier who was known chiefly for a translation of the psalms and a happy ending which he provided for King Lear. 193 ff.
This satire on Addison was originally written in 1716 and was said to have been sent to Addison himself.
Addison and Pope had quarrelled over Pope's Iliad, but they also were representatives of opposing intellectual and political points of view.207-8.
The rhyme besieg'd-oblig'd was a perfect rhyme in Pope's day. 209-10.
Cato:
Addison's tragedy Cato (1713) for which Pope had written the prologue. 211. templars: lawyers, from those who had their chambers in the Inner or Middle Temple.214.
Atticus: the name of Cicero's cultivated friend, chosen both to suggest Addison and indicate some of his qualities. "[Pope] It was a great falsehood which some of the libels reported, that this character was written after the gentleman's [Addison's] death, which see refuted in the testimonies prefix'd to the Dunciad...." 215. rubric.
Lintot often displayed titles of books in red letters. 216. claps: posters. 222.
A double thrust at Colley Cibber, the Laureate, who composed royal birthday odes of poor quality, and at the King, whose disdain for poetry was notorious [cf.
To Augustus, 404]. 225.daggled: to drag or trail about (through the mire)
ED]. 230.
Bufo: a composite portrait of a literary patron. Castalian state.
Castalia is the name of a spring on Mount Parnassus; hence this refers to the poetic state. 231.forked hill:
Parnassus, sacred to Apollo and the Muses. 236.
Pindar: "[Pope] ridicules the affectation of antiquaries, who frequently exhibit the headless trunks and terms of statues for Plato,
Homer,
Pindar, etc...." 247-48.reserve: rhymed with starve. 248. help'd to bury. " [Pope] Mr.
Dryden after having lived in exigencies, had a magnificent funeral bestowed upon him by the contributions of several persons of quality."250.
Bavius: see note to line 99. 255-6.
Blest be ...
Gay: ironically echoing Job 1:21: "The Lord gives, and the Lord hath taken away; blest be the name of the Lord." 256.
Gay:
John Gay (1685-1732), poet and dramatist, associated with Pope and Swift in the Scriblerus Club.
A close personal friend of Pope's, he collaborated with Pope and Arbuthnot on a play,
Three Hours After Marriage (1717). 260.
Queensb'ry.
Charles Douglas (1698-1778), third Duke of Queensbury, erected a monument for Gay in Westminster Abbey with an epitaph written by Pope. 262.
Pope quotes Denham's Of Prudence: "Learn to live well, that thou may'st die so too;/To live and die is all we have to do" (93-94). 276.
Balbus:
George Hay, seventh Earl of Kinnoul (d. 1758), an acquaintance of Pope's who proved to be unscrupulous. 280.
Sir Will:
Sir William Yonge (d. 1755), a prominent Whig politician, widely held to represent "everything pitiful, corrupt and contemptible." Bubo:
George Bubb Dodington,
Baron Melcombe (1691-1762), a minor Whig politician who fancied himself a patron of the arts, but was noted for his ostentation, tastelessness, and affectation.
Bubo owl, with suggestion of booby. 299.
Dean: "[Pope] See the Epistle to the Earl of Burlington" (Moral Essay IV, 141-50).
Pope's enemies had charged that Timon's Villa was the Duke of Chandos' estate,
Cannons (line 300).
The "dean" and "silver bel" are both mentioned in the description in Moral Essay IV. 305.
Sporus: a homosexual favourite of the Emperor Nero.
Pope applies the name to Lord Hervey (see above).thing of silk: refers to the spinning of the silk worm.
The same image is used a number of times in the Dunciad to describe the activity of the bad poets. 306. ass's milk: commonly prescribed as a tonic in the eighteenth century, and part of a diet adopted by Hervey. 310.paintel.
Hervey used rouge to conceal his intense pallor. 319. "[Pope] See Milton [Paradise Lost Bk.
IV [800]." Eve is Queen Caroline. 330. rabbins: rabbis; here Hebrew commentators on the Old Testament. 341. stoop'd. "[W.] The term is from falconry; and the allusion to one of those untamed birds of spirit, which sometimes wantons in airy circles before it regards, or stoops to, its prey." 343.stood: endured. 349.
Alluding to a lampoon which stated that Pope had been publicly beaten, attributed by Pope to Hervey and Lady Mary. 350. "[Pope] that he set his name to Mr.
Broome's verses, etc., that he received subscriptions for Shakespeare, which, though publicly disproved, were nevertheless shamelessly repeated in the Libels, and even in that called The Nobleman's Epistle." 351. "[Pope] Profane Psalms,
Court Poems, and other scandalous things, printed by Curll etc." 353.
Pope's deformity was often a subject of caricature by Hogarth and others. 354."[Pope] Namely on the Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Burlington,
Lord Bathurst,
Lord Bolingbroke,
Bishop Atterbury,
Dr.
Swift,
Mr.
Gay,
Dr.
Arbuthnot, his Friends, his Parents, and his very Nurse, aspersed in printed papers, by James Moore,
G.
Ducket,
Esquires,
L.
Welsted,
Tho.
Bentley, and other obscure persons." 355.friend in exile:
Atterbury had died in 1732,
Pope's father in 1717. 357.
Cf. line 319. 363.
Japhet:
Japhet Crook (1662-1734), a forger who used the alias Sir Peter Stranger, and who was convicted in 1731, sentenced to stand in pillary, have his ears cut off, his nose slit, forfeit his possessions, and be imprisoned for life. 365.
Knight of the Post: "one who got his living by giving false evidence"
ED). lose his own: see line 363. 369.
Sappho: cf. line 101.372.
Pope had tried to promote a subscription edition of some of Dennis's works in 1731.
He also contributed a prologue to a play given for Dennis's benefit in 1733. 373. rhym'd for Moore: see note on line 23. 374. ten years. "[Pope] It was so long after many libels before the Author of the Dunciad published that poem, till when, he never writ a word in answer to the many scurrilities and falsehoods concerning him." 375.
Welstel's lie. "[Pope] This man had the impudence to tell in print that Mr.
P. had occasioned a Lady's death, and to name a person he never heard of.
He also published that he had libelled the Duke of Chandos; with whom (it was added) that he had lived in familiarity, and received from him a present of five hundred pounds; the false-hood of both which is known to his Grace.
Mr.
P. never received any present farther than the subscription for Homer, from him, or from Any great Man whatsoever." 376-77.
Pope probably alludes to William Wyndham, co-author (with Lady Mary and Lord Hervey) of an attack.
Wyndham had recently married Lady Deloraine, the most likely original for Pope's portrait of Delia.
See Moral Epistle II. 378.
Budgel. "[Pope] Budgel, in a weekly pamphlet called the Bee, bestowed much abuse on him, in the imagination that he writ some things about the Last Will of Dr.
Tindal, in the Grubstreet Journal, a Paper wherein he never had the least hand, direction, or supervisal, nor the least knowledge of its Author."380. the two Curlls: the publisher (see note on June 53) and Lord Hervey. 381. "[Pope] In some of Curll's and other pamphlets,
Mr.
Pope's father was said to be a mechanic, a hatter, a farmer, nay a bankrupt.
But, what is stranger, a Nobleman (if such a Reflection can be thought to come from a nobleman) has dropped an allusion to that pitiful untruth, in a paper called an Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity: and the following line,
Hard as thy Heart, and as thy Birth obscure, had fallen from a like Courtly pen, in certain Verses to the Imitator of Horace.
Mr.
Pope's father was of a gentleman's family in Oxfordshire, the head of which was the Earl of Downe, whose sole heiress married the Earl of Lindsey.-- His mother was the daughter of William Turner,
Esq. of York:
She had three brothers, one of whom was killed, another died in the service of King Charles; the eldest following his fortunes, and becoming a general officer in Spain, left her what estate remained after the sequestrations and forfeitures of her family--Mr.
Pope died in 1717, aged 75;
She in 1733, aged 93, a very few weeks after this poem was finished.
The following inscription was placed by their son on their monument in the parish of Twickenham, in Middlesex.
D.
O.
M.
RO .
PE .
RO .
VO .
BO .
IO .
VI .
IT .
OS .
XV .
OB .
II . /ET .
AE .
GI .
LI .
AE .
AE .
IT .
OS .
II .
OB .
II . ,
VX .
VS .
VS .
IT . /ET .
BI . 385.
Moore: cf. note to line 23. 391.
Bestia: a Roman consul bribed into a dishonourable peace.
Probably refers to the Duke of Marlborough. 397.
English Roman Catholics were still required to take certain oaths which they could not take without a lie, or be deprived of most of their civil right.
Pope's father and himself chose deprivation. 410. lenient: softening, soothing. 417.
Arbuthnot, being a Tory, lost hls place as court physician on Queen Anne's death.
