Strong in new Arms, lo! Giant HANDEL ftands, 65
Like bold Briareus, with a hundred hands;

To ftir, to rouze, to shake the Soul he comes,
And Jove's own Thunders follow Mars's Drums.
Arrest him, Emprefs; or you fleep no more-
She heard, and drove him to th' Hibernian fhore. 70
And now had Fame's pofterior Trumpet blown,
And all the nations fummon'd to the Throne.
The young, the old, who feel her inward sway,
One instinct feizes, and tranfports away.

REMARKS,

Phoebus of French extraction, married to the Princefs Galimathia, one of the handmaids of Dulness, and an afsistant to Opera. Of whom fee Boubours, and other Critics of that nation. SCRIBL..

VER. 71. Fame's pofterior Trumpet] Pofterior, viz. her second or more certain Report; unless we imagine this word pofterior to relate to the pofition of one of her Trumpets, according to Hudibras:

She blows not both with the fame Wind,
But one before and one behind;

And therefore modern Authors name
One good, and t'other evil Fame.

VER. 73. The young, the old, who feel her inward fway, &c.] In this new world of Dulness each of these three claffes hath its appointed ftation, as beft fuits its nature, and concurs to the harmony of the Syftem. The firft, drawn only by the ftrong and fimple impulse of Attraction, are represented as falling directly down into her; as conglobed into her substance, and refting in her centre.

-all their centre found,

Hung to the Goddefs, and cober'd around.

The fecond, tho' within the sphere of her attraction, yet hav

None need a guide, by fure Attraction led,
And strong impulfive gravity of Head:
None want a place, for all their Centre found,
Hung to the Goddess, and coher'd around.
Not closer, orb in orb, conglob'd are feen
The buzzing Bees about their dusky Queen.
The gath'ring number, as it moves along,
Involves a vast involuntary throng,

Who gently drawn, and struggling lefs and lefs,
Roll in her Vortex, and her pow'r confess.

REMARK S.

ing at the fame time a projectile motion, are carried, by the compofition of these two, in planetary revolutions round her centre, fome nearer to it, fome further off:

Who gently drawn, and struggling less and less,

Roll in ber Vortex, and her pow'r confefs.

The third are properly excentrical, and no conftant members of her state or fyftem: fometimes at an immense distance from her influence, and fometimes again almoft on the furface of her · broad effulgence. Their ufe in their Perihelion, or neareft approach to Dulness, is the fame in the moral World, as that of Comets in the natural, namely to refresh and recreate the dry~nefs and decays of the fyftem; in the manner marked out from ver. 91 to 98.

VER. 75. None need a guide,—None want a place,] The fons of Dulness want no instructors in ftudy, nor guides in life: They are their own mafters in all Sciences, and their own Heralds and introducers into all places.

VER. 76 to 101. It ought to be obferved that here are three claffes in this affembly. The first of men absolutely and avowedly dull, who naturally adhere to the Goddess, and are imagined in the fimile of the Pees about their Queen. The fecond involuntarily drawn to her, tho' not caring to own her inAuence; from v. 81 to go. The third of fuch, as tho' not mem.

Not thofe alone who paffive own her laws,

But who, weak rebels, more advance her caufe.
Whate'er of dunce in College or in Town
Sneers at another, in toupee or gown;
Whate'er of mungril no one clafs admits,
A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.

RIMARKS.

bers of her ftate, yet advance her fervice by flattering Dulness, cultivating mistaken talents, patronizing vile feriblers, difcouraging living merit, or fetting up for wits, and Men of taste in arts they understand not; from ver. 91 to 101.

VER. 86. weak Rebels more advance ber caufe.] Such as thofe, who affect to oppofe her Government, by fetting up for patrons of Letters, without knowing how to judge of merit. The 'confequence of which is, that, as all true merit is modeft and referved; and the falfe, forward and prefuming; and the Judge eafily impofed upon; Fools get the rewards due to genius. For as the Poet faid of one of these Patrons.

Dryden, alone, (what wonder?) came not nigh,
Dryden alone efcap'd this judging eye.

And thus, as he rightly observes, these weak Rebels unwitting-ly advance the cause of her they would be thought most to oppofe.

For while no rewards are given for the Encouragement of Letters, Genius will support itself on the footing of that reputation, which men of wit will always win from the Dunces. But an undue distribution of the rewards of Learning will entirely depress or difguft all true genius; which now not only finds itself robbed of the honours it might claim from others, but defeated of that very reputation it would otherwise have won for itself. For, as the course of things is ordered, general reputation, when it comes into rivalship, is rather attendant on favour and high station, than on the fimple endowments of Wit and Learning. Hence we conclude that unless the Province of encouraging Let

Nor abfent they, no members of her state,
Who pay her homage in her fons, the Great;
Who falfe to Phœbus, bow the knee to Baal;
Or impious, preach his Word without a call,
Patrons, who fneak from living worth to dead,
With-hold the penfion, and set up the head;
Or veft dull Flatt'ry in the facred Gown;
Or give from fool to fool the Laurel crown.
And (laft and worse) with all the cant of wit,
Without the foul, the Mufe's Hypocrit.

95

100

There march'd the bard and blockhead fide by side, Who rhym'd for hire, and patroniz'd for pride. Narciffus, prais'd with all a Parfon's pow'r, Look'd a white lilly funk beneath a show'r.

REMARK S.

ters be wifely and faithfully adminiftred, it were better for them that there were no encouragements at all.

VER. 93. falfe to Phoebus] Spoken of the ancient and true Phoebus; not the French Phoebus, who hath no chosen Priests or Poets, but equally infpires any man that pleaseth to fing or preach. SCRIBL.

VER. 99. 100.

And (laft and worst) with all the cant of wit,
Without the foul, the Mufe's Hypocrit.]

In this divifion are reckoned up 1. The Idolizers of Dulness in the Great-2. Ill Judges, 3. Ill Writers,-4. Ill Patrons. But the last and worst, as he justly calls him, is the Mufe's Hypocrite, who is, as it were, the Epitome of them all. He who thinks the only end of poetry is to amufe, and the only business of the poet to be witty; and consequently who cultivates only such trifling talents in himself, and encourages only such in others.

There mov'd Montalto with superior air;

His ftretch'd-out arm display'd a Volume fair;
Courtiers and Patriots in two ranks divide,

105

Thro' both he pass'd, and bow'd from fide to fide:
But as in graceful act, with awful eye

Compos'd he stood, bold Benson thruft him by : 110
On two unequal crutches propt he came,
Milton's on this, on that one Johnston's name.
The decent Knight retir'd with sober rage,
Withdrew his hand, and clos'd the pompous page.
But (happy for him as the times went then)
Appear'd Apollo's May'r and Aldermen,

115

VARIATIONS.

VER. 114.

"What! no respect, he cry'd, for SHAKESPEAR's page ?”*

REMARKS.

VER. 108.-bow'd from fide to fide:] As being of no one party.

VER. 110. bold Benfon] This man endeavoured to raise him. felf to Fame by erecting monuments, ftriking coins, fetting up heads, and procuring translations, of Milton; and afterwards by as great paffion for Arthur Johnston, a Scotch phyfician's Verfion of the Pfalms, of which he printed many fine Editions. See more of him, Book iii. ver. 325.

VER. 113. The decent Knight] An eminent perfon, who was about to publish a very pompous Edition of a great Author at bis own expence.

VER. 115, &c. Thefe four lines were printed in a separate leaf by Mr. Pope in the laft Edition, which he himself gave, of the Dunciad, with directions to the printer, to put this leaf into its place as foon as Sir T. H.'s Shakespear fhould be published.