Fierce champion Fortitude, that knows no fears
Of hiffes, blows, or want, or lofs of ears:
Calm Temperance, whofe bleffings those partake
Who hunger, and who thirst, for scribling fake:
Prudence, whose glass presents th' approaching jayl:
Poetic Justice, with her lifted scale,

Where, in nice balance, truth with gold she weighs,
And folid pudding against empty praise.

Here the beholds the Chaos dark and deep,

Where nameless Somethings in their causes sleep,

REMARK S.

50

55

and is not fo much fupported by her own Virtues, as by the princely consciousness of having destroyed all other.

"This is an VER. 50. Who hunger, and who thirst, &c.] "allufion to a text in Scripture, which fhews, in Mr Pope, a delight in prophancnefs," faid Curll upon this place. But it is very familiar with Shakespear to allude to paffages of Scripture. Out of a great number I will select a few, in which he not only alludes to, but quotes the very Text from holy Writ. In All's well that ends well, I am no great Nebuchadnezzar, I have not much skill in grass. Ibid. They are for the flowery way that leads to the broad gate and the great fire. Matt. vii. 13. In Much ado about nothing. All, all, and moreover God faw him when he was hid in the garden. Gen. iii. 8. (in a very jocofe fcene.) In Love's labour loft, he talks of Samfon's carrying the gates on his back; In the Merry Wives of Windfor, of Goliah and the weaver's beam; and in Henry IV. Falstaff's foldiers are compared to Lazarus and the prodigal fon.

The first part of this note is Mr CURLL'S, the rest is Mr THEOBALD'S Appendix to Shakespear Restored, p. 144.

VER. 48.

IMITATIONS.

-that knows no fears

Of hiffes, blows, or want, or loss of ears:]

Quem neque pauperies, neque mors, neque vincula terrent. Hor.
VER. 55. Here he beholds the Chaos dark and deep,
Where nameless Somethings, &c.]

'Till genial Jacob or a warm Third day,
Call forth each mass, a Poem, or a Play :
How hints, like spawn, scarce quick in embryo lie,
How new-born nonsense first is taught to cry,
Maggots half-form'd in rhyme exactly meet,
And learn to crawl upon poetic feet.

Here one poor word an hundred clenches makes,
And ductile dulnefs new meanders takes ;
There motley Images her fancy strike,
Figures ill-pair'd, and 'Similies unlike.

REMARK S.

60

65

VER. 57. genial Jacob,] Tonson. The famous race of 'Bookfellers of that name.

VER. 63. Here one poor word an hundred clenches makes,] It may not be amifs to give an instance or two of thefe operations of Dulness out of the Works of her Sons, celebrated in the Poem. A great Critic formerly held thefe clenches in fuch abhorrence, that he declared, "he that would pun, would pick a pocket." Yet Mr Dennis's works afford us notable example's in this kind. Alexander Pope hath fent abroad into the world as many Bulls as his name fake Pope Alexander.- Let us take "the initial and final letters of his Name, viz. A. P-E, and * they give you the Idea of an Ape-Pope comes from the La

"

IMITATION.

That is to fay, unformed things, which are either made into
Poems or Plays, as the Bookfellers or the Players bid moft.
Thefe lines allude to the following in Garth's Difpenfary,
Cant. vi.

Within the chambers of the globe they spy
The beds where fleeping vegetables lie,
'Till the glad fummons of a genial ray

Unbinds the glebe, and calls them out to day.

VER. 64. And ductile Dulness, &c.] A parody on a verse in Garth, Cant. i.

How ductile matter new meanders takes.

She fees a Mob of Metaphors advance,

77༠

Pleas'd with the madness of the mazy dance;
How Tragedy and Comedy embrace;
How Farce and Epic get a jumbled race;
How Tine himself stands ftill at her command,
Realms fhift their Place, and Ocean turns to land.
Here gay Defcription Ægypt glads with fhow'rs,
Or gives to Zembla fruits, to Barca flow'rs;
Glitt'ring with ice here hoary hills are seen,
There painted vallies of eternal green,
In cold December fragrant chaplets blow,
And heavy harvests nod beneath the fnow.
All thefe, and more, the cloud-compelling Queen
Beholds thro' fogs, that magnify the scene.

REMARK S.

75

80

or from poppyf

"tin word Popa, which fignifies a little Wart; ma, because he was continually popping out fquibs of wit, or ra"ther Popyfmita, or Popyfms." DENNIS on Hom. and Daily Journal, June 11, 1728.

VER. 70. &c. How Farce and Epic-How Time himself, &c.] Allude to the tranfgreffions of the Unities in the Plays of fuch poets. For the miracles wrought upon Time and Place, and the mixture of Tragedy and Comedy, Farce and Epic, fee Pluto and Proferpine, Penelope, &c. if yet extant.

VER. 73 Egypt glads with fhow'rs,] In the lower Ægypt Rain is of no ufe, the overflowing of the Nile being fufficient to impregnate the foil-Thefe fix verfes reprefent the Inconfiftencies in the defcriptions of poets, who heap together all glittering and gawdy Images, though incompatible in one feason, or in one

fcene.

See the Guardian N° 40. parag. 6. works, if to be found. It would not

See alfo Eufden's whole have been unpleasant to

IMITATION S.

VER. 79. The cloud compelling Queen] From Homer's Epithet

of Jupiter, νεφεληγερέτα Ζεύς.

She, tinfel'd o'er in robes of varying hues,
With felf-applause her wild creation views;
Sees momentary monsters rife and fall,
And with her own fools-colours gilds them all.
'Twas on the Day, when ** rich and grave,
Like Cimon, triumph'd both on land and wave:
(Pomps without guilt, of bloodlefs fwords and maces,
Glad Chains, warm furs, broad banners, and broad

faces)

Now night descending, the proud scene was o'er,
But liv'd in Settle's numbers, one day more.

VER. 85 in the former Editions,

85.

90

'Twas on the day when Thorold rich and grave. Sir George Thorald, Lord Mayor of London in the year 1720. ́

REMARK s.

have given Examples of all those species of bad writing from thefe Authors, but that is already done in our Treatife of the Bathos.

VER. 83 Sees momentary monsters rife and fall, And with her own fools colours gilds them all. i. e. Sets off unnatural conceptions in falfe and tumid expreffion.

VER. 85, 86. 'Twas on the Day, when ** rich and grave, Like Cimon, triumph'd] Viz. a Lord Mayor's Day; his name the author had left in blanks, but most certainly could never be that which the Editor foifted in formerly, and which no way agrees with the chronology of the poem.

BENTL

The proceffion of a Lord Mayor is made partly by land and partly by water. Cimon the famous Athenian General, obtained a victory by fea, and another by land, on the fame day, over the Perfians and Barbarians

VER 88. Glad Chains,] The Ignorance of thefe Moderns! This was alter'd in one edition to Gold Chains, fhewing more regard to the metal of which the chains of Aldermen are made, than to the beauty of the Latinifm and Græcifm, nay of figurative fpeech itself: Latas fegetes, glad, for making glad,

&c.

SCRIBL.

VER. 90. But liv'd in Settle's numbers, one day more ] A beau tiful manner of speaking, ufual with pocts in praise of poetry,

Now Mayors and Shrieves all hush'd and fatiate lay,
Yet eat, in dreams, the custard of the day ;.
While penfive Poets painful vigils keep,
Sleepless themselves, to give their readers fleep.
Much to the mindful Queen the feast recalls
What City Swans once fung within the walls;
Much fhe revolves their arts, their ancient praise,
And fure fucceffion down from Haywood's days..
She faw, with joy, the line immortal run,
Each fire impreft and glaring in his fon :
So watchful. Bruin forms, with plastic care,
Each growing lump, and brings it to a Bear.
She faw old Pryn in restless Daniel shine,}
And Eulden eke out Blackmore's endless line;

REMARKS.

95.

100

in which kind nothing is finer than thofe lines of Mr Addison. Sometimes, mifguided by the tuneful throng,

I look for ftreams immortaliz❜d in song,

That loft in filence and oblivion lic,

Dumb are their fountains, and their channels dry:

Yet run for ever by the Mufes skill,

And in the fmooth defcription murmur ftill.

Ibid. But liv'd, in Settle's numbers, one day more.] Settle was poet to the city of London. His office was to compofe yearly

panegyrics upon the Lord Mayors, and verfes to be spoken in the Pageants: But that part of the fhows being at length frugally abolished, the employment of City poet ceased? fo that, upon Settles's demife there was no fucceffor to that place

VER. 98. John Haywood, whofe Interludes were printed in the time of Henry VIII.

it,

VER. 103. Old Pryn in restless Daniel] The first edition had

She faw in Norton all his father thine:

a great mistake! for Daniel De Foe had parts, but Norton De Foe was a wretched writer, and never attempted Poetry. Much more justly is Daniel himfelf made fucceffor to W. Pryn, both