Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys,
Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'er 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 seesaw 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, flatterer at the board,
Now trips a lady, and now struts a lord.
Eve's tempter thus the rabbins have exprest,
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 flattery, 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 ;1 1
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 even the last!

A. But why insult the poor? affront the great?
P. A knave's a knave to me in every 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,

1 Buckingham, Burlington, Bathurst, Bolingbroke, Atterbury, Swift, Arbuthnot, Gay, Pope's parents, and even his nurse, were abused in the publications of Moore, Ducket, Welsted, &c.

Sappho can tell you how this man was bit:
This dreaded satirist 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; 3
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 5 (part shed in honour's cause,

2 Welsted asserted in print that Pope had caused a lady's death, and that he had libelled the Duke of Chandos (in the character of Timon), from whom, it was added, he had received five hundred pounds.

3 Budgell was suspected of having forged the will of Dr. Tindal, by which he acquired almost the whole fortune of a man not at all related to him.

The" Curll of court" means Lord Hervey.

66

5" Mr. Pope's father," says our author in a note on this passage, was of a gentleman's family in Oxfordshire, the head of which was the Earl of Downe, whose sole heiress married the Earl of Lindsay. His mother was the daughter

While yet in Britain honour had applause)

Each parent sprung-A. What fortune, pray?—
P. 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,6 nor hazarded a lie.
Unlearn'd, he knew no schoolman's subtle art,
No language but the language of the heart.
By nature honest, by experience wise,
Healthy by temperance 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 languor smile, and smooth the bed of death;

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."

6 Pope's father was a non-juror.

VOL. III.

C

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 Heaven, to bless those days, preserve my
friend!

Preserve him social, cheerful, and serene,
And just as rich as when he serv'd a queen.

A. Whether that blessing be denied or given, Thus far was right;-the rest belongs to heaven.

« ZurückWeiter »