to face, your many excellencies and perfections? I am perfuaded you can reproach me truly with no great Faults, except my natural ones, which I am as ready to own, as to do all juftice to the contrary Beauties in you. It is true, my Lord, I am fhort, not well fhap'd, generally ill-drefs'd, if not fometimes dirty: Your Lordship and Ladyship are still in bloom; your Figures fuch, as rival the Apollo of Belvedere, and the Venus of Medicis; and your faces fo finish'd, that neither fickness or paffion can deprive them of Colour; I will allow your own in particular to be the finest that ever Man was bleft with: preserve it, my Lord, and reflect, that to be a Critic, would coft it too many frowns, and to be a Statesman, too many wrinkles! I further confefs, I am now fomewhat old; but fo your Lordship and this excellent Lady, with all your beauty will (I hope) one day be. I know your Genius and hers fo perfectly tally, that you cannot but join in admiring each other, and by confequence in the contempt of all fuch as myfelf. You have both, in my regard, been alike - (your Lordship, I know, loves a Simile, and it will be one fuitable to your Quality) you have been like Two Princes, and I like a poor Animal facrificed between them to cement a lafting League: I hope I have not bled in vain; but that fuch an amity may endure for ever! For tho? it be what common understandings would hardly conceive, Two Wits however may be perfuaded, that it is in Friendship as in Enmity, The more danger, the more honour.

Give me the liberty, my Lord, to tell you, why I never replied to thofe Veres on the Imitator of Ho race? They regarded nothing but my Figure, which I fet no value upon; and my Morals, which, I knew, needed no defence: Any honest man has the pleasure to be conscious, that it is out of the power of the Wittieft, nay the Greatest Person in the king

dom,

dom, to leffen him that way, but at the expence of his own Truth, Honour, or Justice.

But tho' I declin'd to explain myself just at the time when I was fillily threaten'd, I fhall now give your Lordship a frank account of the offence you imagined to be meant to you. Fanny (my Lord) is the plain English of Fannius, a real perfon, who was a foolish Critic, and an enemy of Horace: perhaps a Noble one, for so (if your Latin be gone in earneft *) I must acquaint you, the word Beatus may be conftrued.

Beatus Fannius! ultro

Delatis capfis et imagine.

This Fannius was, it feems, extremely fond both of his Poetry and his Perfon, which appears by the pictures and Statues he caused to be made of himself, and by his great diligence to propagate bad Verfes at Court, and get them admitted into the library of Auguftus. He was moreover of a delicate or effeminate complexion, and conftant at the affemblies and Opera's of those days, where he took it into his head to flander poor Horace.

Ineptus

Fannius, Hermogenis lædat conviva Tigelli.

till it provoked him at last just to name him, give him a lafh, and fend him whimpering to the Ladies.

Discipularum inter jubeo plorare cathedras.

So much for Fanny, my Lord. The word fpins (as Dr. Freind or even Dr. Sherwin could affure you) was the literal tranflation of deduci; a metaphor taken from a Silk-worm, my Lord, to fignify any

* all I learn'd from Dr. Freind at school, Has quite deferted this poor John Trot head, And left plain native English in its flead. Epift. p. 2.

flight, filken, or (as your Lordship and the Ladies call it) fiimzy piece of work. I presume your Lordship has enough of this, to convince you there was nothing perfonal but to that Fannius, who (with all his fine accomplishments) had never been heard of, but for that Horace he injur'd.

In regard to the right honourable Lady, your Lordship's friend, I was far from designing a perfon of her condition by a name so derogatory to her, as that of Sappho a name proftituted to every infamous Creature that ever wrote Verfes or Novels. I proteft I never apply'd that name to her in any verfe of mine, public or private; and (I firmly believe) not in any Letter or Converfation. Whoever could invent a Falfehood to fupport an accufation, I pity; and whoever can believe fuch a Character to be theirs, I pity ftill more. God forbid the Court or Town fhould have the complaifance to join in that opinion! Certainly I meant it only of fuch modern Sappho's, as imitate much more the Lewdness than the Genius of the ancient one; and upon whom their wretched brethren frequently beftow both the Name and the Qualification there mentioned †.

There was another reafon why I was filent as to that paper-I took it for a Lady's (on the printer's word in the title page) and thought it too prefuming, as well as indecent, to contend with one of that Sex in altercation: For I never was fo mean a creature as to commit my Anger against a Lady to paper, tho but in a private Letter. But foon after, her denial of it was brought to me by a Noble perfon of real Honour and Truth. Your Lordship indeed faid you had it from a Lady, and the Lady faid it was your Lordship's; fome thought the beautiful by-blow had * Weak texture of his flimzy brain. p. 6. + From furious Sappho scarce a milder fate, Pox'd by her love, or libell'd by her hate.

I Sat. B. ii. HOR.

Twe

Two Fathers, or (if one of them will hardly be allow'd a man) Two Mothers; indeed I think bath Sexes had a fhare in it, but which was uppermoft, I know not: I pretend not to determine the exact method of this Witty Fornication: and, if I call it Yours, my Lord, 'tis only becaufe, whoever got it, you brought it forth.

Here, my Lord, allow me to obferve the different proceeding of the Ignoble poet, and his Noble Enemies. What he has written of Fanny, Adonis, Sappho, or who you will, he own'd he publish'd, he fet his name to What they have publish'd of him, they have deny'd to have written; and what they have written of him, they have deny'd to have publish'd. One of these was the cafe in the paft Libel, and the other in the prefent. For tho' the parent has own'd it to a few choice friends, it is fuch as he has been obliged to deny in the most particular terms, to the great Person whose opinion concern'd him most.

Yet, my Lord, this Epiftle was a piece not writ. ten in hafte, or in a passion, but many months after all pretended provocation; when you was at full leifure at Hampton-Court, and I the object fingled, like a Deer out of Seafon, for fo ill-timed, and illplaced a diverfion. It was a deliberate work, directed to a Reverend Perfon*, of the most serious and facred character, with whom you are known to cultivate a frict correfpondence, and to whom it will not be doubted, but you open your fecret Sentiments, and deliver your real Judgment of men and things. This, I fay, my Lord, with fubmiffion, could not but awaken all my Reflection and Attention. Your Lordship's opinion of me as a Poet, I cannot help; it is yours, my Lord, and that were enough to mortify a poor man; but it is not yours alone, you must be content to fhare it with the Gentlemen of the

* Dr. S.

O 3

Dunciad,

Dunciad, and (it may be) with many more innocent and ingenious men. If your Lordship deftroys my poetical character, they will claim their part in the glory; but, give me leave to fay, if my moral character be ruin'd, it must be wholly the work of your Lordfbip; and will be hard even for you to do, unless I myself co-operate.

How can you talk (my most worthy Lord) of all Pope's Works as fo many Libels, affirm, that he has no invention but in Defamation *, and charge him with felling another man's labours printed with his own name +? Fye, my Lord, you forget yourfelf. He printed not his name before a line of the perfon's you mention; that perfon himself has told you and all the world in the book itself, what part he had in it, as may be feen at the conclufion of his notes to the Odyffey. I can only fuppofe your Lordship (not having at that time forgot your Greek) defpis'd to look upon the Tranflation; and ever fince entertain❜d too mean an Opinion of the Tranflator to caft an eye upon it. Befides, my Lord, when you faid he fold another man's works, you ought in juftice to have added that he bought them, which very much alters the Cafe. What he gave him was five hundred pounds: his receipt can be produced to your Lordfhip. I dare not affirm he was as well paid as fome Writers (much his inferiors) have been fince; but your Lordship will reflect that I am no man of Quality, either to buy or fell fcribling fo high and that I have neither Place, Penfion, nor Power to reward for fecret Services. It cannot be, that one of your rank can have the leaft Envy tọ fuch an author as I but were that poffible, it were

*

to his eternal frame, Prov'd be can ne'er invent but to defame. And fold Broom's labours printed with Pope's Name,

P. 7.

much