So also one who takes the name of

H. STANHOPE,

the maker of certain verses to Duncan Campbell, in that poem, which is wholly a satire on Mr. Pope, confesseth,

"Tis true, if finest notes alone could show

(Tuned justly high, or regularly low)

That we should fame to these mere vocals give;

Pope more than we can offer should receive:

For when some gliding river is his theme,

His lines run smoother than the smoothest stream," &c.

MIST'S JOURNAL, June 8, 1728.

Although he says, "The smooth numbers of the Dunciad are all that recommend it, nor has it any other merit;" yet that same paper hath these words: "The author is allowed to be a perfect master of an easy and elegant versification. In all his works we find the most happy turns, and natural similes, wonderfully short and thick sown."

The Essay on the Dunciad, p. 25, also owns, "It is very full of beautiful images? But the panegyric, which crowns all that can be said on this poem, is bestowed by our Laureate

MR. COLLEY CIBBER,

who "grants it to be a better poem of its kind than ever was writ;" but adds, "it was a victory over a parcel of poor wretches, whom it was almost cowardice to conquer. A man might as well triumph for having killed so many silly flies that offended him. Could he have let them alone, by this time, poor souls! they had all been buried in oblivion." Here we see our excellent Laureate allows the justice of the satire on every man in it, but himself; as the great Mr. Dennis did before him.

The said

1

MR. DENNIS, AND MR. GILDON,

in the most furious of all their works (the forecited character, p. 5,) do in concert confess, "That some men of good understanding value him for his rhymes." And (p. 17,) "That he has got, like Mr. Bayes in the Rehearsal, (that is, like Mr. Dryden) a notable knack at rhyming, and writing smooth verse.

Of his Essay on Man, numerous were the praises bestowed by his avowed enemies, in the imagination that the

same was not written by him, as it was printed anony、 mously.

Thus sung of it even

And

BEZALEEL MORRIS.

"Auspicious bard, while all admire thy strain,
All but the selfish, ignorant, and vain;

I, whom no bribe to servile flattery drew,

Must pay the tribute to thy merit due:

Thy muse, sublime, significant, and clear,
Alike informs the soul, and charms the ear,” &c.

MR. LEONARD WELSTED

thus wrote to the unknown author, on the first publication of the said Essay: "I must own, after the reception which the vilest and most immoral ribaldry hath lately met with, I was surprised to see what I had long despaired, a performance deserving the name of a poet. Such, sir, is your work. It is, indeed, above all commendation, and ought to have been published in an age and country more worthy of it. If my testimony be of weight anywhere, you are sure to have it in the amplest manner," &c. &c. &c. Thus we see every one of his works hath been extolled by one or other of his most inveterate enemies; and to the success of them all they do unanimously give testimony. But it is sufficient, instar omnium, to behold the great critic, Mr. Dennis, sorely lamenting it, even from the Essay on Criticism to this day of the Dunciad! "A most notorious instance," quoth he, "of the depravity of genius and taste, the approbation this essay meets with.—I can safely affirm, that I never attacked any of these writings, unless they had success infinitely beyond their merit. This, though an empty, has been a popular scribbler. The epidemic madness of the times has given him reputation. If, after the cruel treatment so many extraordinary men (Spenser, Lord Bacon, Ben Jonson, Milton, Butler, Otway, and others) have received from this country for these last hundred years, I should shift the scene, and show all that penury changed at once to riot and profuseness; and more squandered away upon one object, than would have satisfied the greater part of those extraordinary men; the reader, to whom this one creature should be unknown, would fancy him a prodigy of art and nature, would believe that all the great qualities of these persons

were centred in him alone.-But if I should venture to assure him, that the PEOPLE of ENGLAND had made such a choice-the reader would either believe me a malicious enemy, and slanderer; or that the reign of the last (queen Anne's) ministry was designed by fate to encourage fools." But it happens, that this our poet never had any place, pension, or gratuity, in any shape, from the said glorious queen, or any of her ministers. All he owed, in the whole course of his life, to any court, was a subscription for his Homer of 2007. from king George I., and 1007. from the prince and princess.

However, lest we imagine our author's success was constant and universal, hey acquaint us of certain works in a less degree of repute, whereof, although owned by others, yet do they assure us he is the writer. Of this sort Mr. DENNIS ascribes to him two farces, whose names he does not tell, but assures us that there is not one jest in them; and an imitation of Horace, whose title he does not mention, but assures us it is much more execrable than all his works. The DAILY JOURNAL, May 11, 1728, assures us, "He is below Tom Durfey in the drama, because (as that writer thinks) the Marriage Hater Matched, and the Boarding School are better than the What-d'ye-call-it;" which is not Mr. P.'s, but Mr. Gay's. Mr. GILDON assures us, in his new Rehearsal, p. 48, "That he was writing a play of the Lady Jane Grey;" but it afterwards proved to be Mr. Rowe's. We are assured by another, "He wrote a pamphlet, called Dr. Andrew Tripe;" which proved to be one Dr. Wagstaff's. Mr. THEOBALD assures us, in the Mist of the 27th of April, "That the treatise of the Profound is very dull, and that Mr. Pope is the author of it." The writer of Gulliveriana is of another opinion; and says, " the whole, or greatest part, of the merit of this treatise must and can only be ascribed to Gulliver." [Here, gentle reader, cannot Ï but smile at the strange blindness and positiveness of men knowing the said treatise to appertain to none other but to me, Martinus Scriblerus.]

We are assured, in Mist's Journal of June 8th, “that his own plays and farces would better have adorned the Dunciad than those of 'Mr. Theobald; for he had neither genius for tragedy nor comedy." Which whether true or not, is not easy to judge, inasmuch as he hath attempted neither; unless we will take it for granted, with Mr. Cibber, that his being once very angry at hearing a friend's

play abused, was an infallible proof the play was his own; the said Mr. Cibber thinking it impossible for a man to be much concerned for any but himself: "Now let any man judge," saith he, "by this concern, who was the true mother of the child."

But from all that hath been said, the discerning reader will collect, that it little availed our author to have any candour, since, when he declared he did not write for others, it was not credited; as little to have any modesty, since, when he declined writing in any way himself, the presumption of others was imputed to him. If he singly enterprised one great work, he was taxed of boldness and madness to a prodigy: if he took assistants in another, it was complained of, and represented as a great injury to the public. The loftiest heroics, the lowest ballads, treatises against the state or church, satires on lords and ladies, raillery on wits and authors, squabbles with booksellers, or even full and true accounts of monsters, poisons, and murders; of any hereof was there nothing so good, nothing so bad, which hath not at one or other season been to him ascribed. If it bore no author's name, then lay he concealed; if it did, he fathered it upon that author to be yet better concealed: if it resembled any of his styles, then was it evident; if it did not, then disguised he it on set purpose. Yea, even direct oppositions in religion, principles, and polítics, have equally been supposed in him inherent. Surely a most rare and singular character! of which let the reader make what he can.

Doubtless most commentators would hence take occasion to turn all to their author's advantage, and from the testimony of his very enemies would affirm, that his capacity was boundless, as well as his imagination; that he was a perfect master of all styles, and all arguments; and that there was in those times no other writer, in any kind, of any degree of excellence, save himself. But as this is not our own sentiment, we shall determine on nothing; but leave thee, gentle reader, to steer thy judgment equally between various opinions, and to choose whether thou wilt incline to the testimonies of authors avowed, or of authors concealed; of those who knew him, or of those who knew him not,

MARTINUS SCRIBLERUS,

OF THE POEM

THIS poem, as it celebrateth the most grave and ancient of things, Chaos, Night, and Dulness, so is it of the most grave and ancient kind. Homer, saith Aristotle, was the first who gave the form, and, saith Horace, who adapted the measure, to heroic poesy. But even before this, may be rationally presumed from what the ancients have left written, was a piece by Homer composed, of like nature and matter with this of our poet; for of epic sort it appeareth to have been, yet of matter surely not unpleasant, witness what is reported of it by the learned Archbishop Eustathius, in Odyss. x. And accordingly Aristotle, in his Poetic, chap. iv., doth further set forth, that as the Iliad and Odyssey gave examples to tragedy, so did this poem to comedy its first idea.

From these authors also it should seem that the hero, or chief personage of it, was no less obscure, and his understanding and sentiments no less quaint and strange (if indeed not more so) than any of the actors of our poem. MARGITES was the name of this personage, whom Antiquity recordeth to have been Dunce the first; and surely from what we hear of him, not unworthy to be the root of so spreading a tree, and so numerous a posterity. The poem therefore celebrating him, was properly and absolutely a Dunciad; which, though now unhappily lost, yet is its nature sufficiently known by the infallible tokens aforesaid. And thus it doth appear that the first Dunciad was the first epic poem, written by Homer himself, and anterior even to the Iliad or Odyssey.

Now, forasmuch as our poet had translated those two famous works of Homer which are yet left, he did conceive it in some sort his duty to imitate that also which was lost; and was therefore induced to bestow on it the same form which Homer's' is reported to have had, namely, that of epic poem, with a title also framed after the ancient Greek manner, to wit, that of Dunciad.

Wonderful it is that so few of the moderns have been stimulated to attempt some Dunciad! since, in the opinion of the multitude, it might cost less pain and oil than imitation of the greater epic. But possible it is also, that,