'oo far among the enemy during the animosity, bu now all was safe, and Mr. Pope, in his opinion, was escaped. When Mr. Jervas communicated this conversation to Mr. Pope, he made this reply: "Tho friendly office you endeavour to do between Mr Addison and me, deserves acknowledgments on my part. You thoroughly know my regard to his cha racter, and my readiness to testify it by all ways in my power; you also thoroughly know the meanness of that proceeding of Mr. Phillips, to make a man I so highly value, suspect my disposition to wards him. But as, after all, Mr. Addison must be judge in what regards himself, and as he has seemed not to be a very just one to me, so I must own to you I expect nothing but civility from him, how much soever I wish for his friendship; and, as for any offers of real kindness or service, which it is in his power to do me, I should be ashamed to receive them from a man who has no better opinion of my morals than to think me a party man, nor of my temper than to believe me capable of maligning or envying another's reputation as a poet. In a word, Mr. Addison is sure of my respect at all times, and of my real friendship whenever he shall think fit to know me for what I am. Some years after this conversation, at the desire of Sir Richard Steele, they met. At first, a very cold civility, and nothing else, appeared on either side: for Mr. Addison had a natural reserve and gloom at the beginning of an evening, which, by conversation and a glass, brightened into an easy cheerfulness Sir Richard Steele, who was a most social benevo lent man, begged of him to fulfil his promise in drop ping all animosity against Mr. Pope. Mr. Pope ther Jesired to be made sensible how he had offended, and observed, that the translation of Homer, if that was the great crime, was undertaken at the request, and almost at the command, of Sir Richard Steele He entreated Mr. Addison to speak candidly ane freely, though it might be with ever so much severity rather than, by keeping up forms of cor plaisance conceal any of his faults. This Mr. Pope spoke in such a manner as plainly indicated he thought Mr. Addison the aggressor, expected him to condescend, and own himself the cause of the breach between them. But he was disappointed; for Mr. Addison, without appearing to be angry, was quite overcome with it. He began with declaring that he always had wished him well, had often endeavoured to be his friend, and in that light advised him, if his nature was capable of it, to divest himself of part of his vanity, which was too great for his merit; that he had not arrived yet to that pitch of excellence he might imagine, or think his most partial readers imagined; that when he and Sir Richard Steele corrected his verses, they had a different air; reminding Mr Pope of the amendment, by Sir Richard, of a line in the poem called the Messiah; He wipes the tears for ever from our eyes. Which is taken from the prophet Isaiah:- From every face he wipes off every tear. "The And it stands so altered in the newer editions of Mr. Pope s works. He proceeded to lay before him the mistakes and inaccuracies hinted at by the writers who had attacked Mr. Pope, and added many things which he himself objected to. Speaking of his Translation in general, he said, that he was not to be blamed for endeavouring to get so large a sum of money, but that it was an ill-executed thing, and not equal to Tickell, which had all the spirit of Homer Mr. Addison concluded, in a low hollow voice of "eigned temper, that he was not solicitous about his own fame as a poet; that he had quitted the Muses o enter into the business of the public, and that all ne spoke was through friendship to Mr. Pope, whom he advised to have less exalted sense of his own merit. Mr. Pope could not well bear such repeated roproaches, but boldly told Mr. Addison, that he ap pealed from his judgment to the public, and that he had long known him too well to expect any friendship from him; upbraided him with being a pensioner from his youth, sacrificing the very learning purhased by the public money to a mean thirst of power; that he was sent abroad to encourage literature, in place of which he had always endeavoured to suppress merit. At last the contest grew so warm that they parted without any ceremony, and Mr. Pope, upon this, wrote the foregoing verses, which are esteemed too true a picture of Mr. Addison. In this account, and indeed in all other accounts which have been given concerning this quarrel, it does not appear that Mr. Pope was the aggressor. If Mr. Addison entertained suspicions of Mr. Pope's being carried too far among the enemy, the danger was certainly Mr. Pope's, and not Mr. Addison's It was his misfortune, and not his crime. If Mr Addison should think himself capable of becoming a rival to Mr. Pope, and, in consequence of this opinion, publish a translation of part of Homer at the same time with Mr. Pope's, and if the public should decide in favour of the latter, by reading his translation, and neglecting the other, can any fault be imputed to Mr. Pope? could he be blamed for exerting all his abilities in so arduous a province? And was it his fault that Mr. Addison (for the first Book of Homer was undoubtedly his) could not translate to please the public? Besides, was it not somewhat presump. tuous to insinuate to Mr. Pope that his verses bore another face when he corrected them, while, at the same time, the translation of Homer, which he had Lever seen in manuscript, bore away the palm from that very translation which he himself asserted was done in the true spirit of Homer? In matters of genius the public judgment seldom errs, and in this case posterity has confirmed the sentence of that age which gave the preference to Mr. Pope; or nis translation is in the hands of all readers of taste, while the other is seldom regarded but as a foil to Pope's. It would appear as if Mr. Addison were himself so immersed in party business as to contract his benevolence to the limits of a faction, which was infinitely beneath the views of a philosopher, and the rules which that excellent writer himself established. If this was the failing of Mr. Addison, it was not the error of Pope, for he kept the strictest correspond. ence with some persons whose affection to the Whig interest was suspected, yet was his name never called in question. While he was in favour with the Duke of Buckingham, the Lords Bolingbroke, Oxford, and Harcourt, Dr. Swift, and Mr. Prior, he did not drop his correspondence with the Lord Halifax, Mr. Craggs, and most of those who were at the head of the Whig interest. A professed Jacobite one day remonstrated to Mr. Pope, that the people of his party took it ill that he should write with Mr. Steel upon ever so indifferent a subject; at which he could not help smiling, and observed, that he hated narrow. ness of soul in any party; and that if he renounced his reason in religious matters, he should hardly do it on any other; and that he could pray not only for opposite parties, but even for opposite religions. Mr. Pope considered himself as a citizen of the world, and was therefore obliged to pray for the prosperity of mankind in gencral. As a son of Britain, he wished those councils might be suffered by Provi dence to prevail which were roost for the interest of n's native country; but as politics was not his study, be could not always determine, at least with any degree of certainty, whose councils were best: and had charity enough to believe that contending parties right mean well. As taste and science are confined to no country, so ought they not to be excluded from any party, and Mr. Pope had an unexceptionable right to live upon terms of the strictest friendship with every man of parts, to which party soever he might belong. Mr. Pope's uprightness in his conduct towards contending politicians, is demonstrated by his living independent of either faction: he accepted no place, and had too high a spirit to become a Lensioner. Many efforts, however, were made to proselyte him from the popish faith, which all proved ineffectual. His friends conceived hopes, from the moderation which he on all occasions expressed, that he was really a Protestant in his heart, and that upon the death of his mother he would not scruple to declare his sentiments, notwithstanding the reproaches he might incur from the popish party, and the public observation it would draw upon hin. The Bishop of Rochester strongly advised him to read the controverted points between the Protestant and the Caholic church, to suffer his unprejudiced reason to etermine for him, and he made no doubt but a sepa ration from the Romish communion would soon en sue. To this Mr. Pope very candidly answered. 'Whether the change would be to my spiritual advantage God only knows; this I know, that I mear as well in the religion I now profess, as ever I can de in any other. Can a man who thinks so, justify & change, even if he thought both equally good? te such an one the part of joining with any one body of Christians might perhaps be easy, but I think it woula not be so to renounce the other. 'Your Lordship has formerly advised me to read |