Happier thy fortunes! like a rolling stone, 295 But lick up ev'ry blockhead in the way. Thee shall the Patriot, thee the Courtier taste, Till rais'd from booths, to theatre, to court, Her seat imperial Dulness shall transport. 300 The sure forerunner of her gentle sway: Let her thy heart, next drabs and dice, engage, Teach thou the warling Polypheme to roar, 305 And scream thyself as none e'er scream'd before! 310 Hell thou shalt move; for Faustus is our friend; For new abortions, all ye pregnant fair! VARIATIONS. 315 v. 295. Safe in its heaviness, &c.] In the former edit. Too safe in inborn heaviness to stray, And lick up ev'ry blockhead in the way. Thy dragons, magistrates, and peers shall taste, This, this is he, foretold by ancient rhymes: REMARKS. 320 325 v. 325. On poets' tombs see Benson's titles writ! W---m Benson (Surveyor of the buildings to his Majesty King George I.) gave in a report to the Lords, that their house and the Painted-chamber adjoining were in immediate danger of falling; whereupon the Lords met in a committee to appoint some other place to sit in while the house should be taken down. "But it being proposed to cause some other builders first to inspect it, they found it in very good condition. The Lords upon this, were VARIATIONS. v. 323. See, see her own, &c.] In the former edit. And Pope's translating three whole years with IMITATIONS. v. 319, 320. This, this is he foretold by ancient rhymes, The Augustus, &c.] "Hic vir, hic est! tibi quem promitti saepius audis, "Augustus Cæsar, divum genus aurea condet "Secula qui rursus Latio, regnota per arva "Saturnio quondam”-- Virg. Æn. VI. Saturnian here relates to the age of Lead, mentioned, B. I. ver. 26. See under Ripley rise a new Whitehall, REMARKS. 330 going upon an address to the King against Benson for such a misrepresentation; but the Earl of Sunderland, then Secretary, gave them an assurance that his Majesty would remove him, which was done accordingly. Înfayour of this man, the famous Sir Christopher Wren, who had been architect to the crown for above fifty years, who built most of the churches in London, laid the first stone of St. Paul's, and lived to finish it, had been displaced from his employment at the age of near ninety years. v.326.---Ambrose Philips.] "He was (saith Mr.Jacob) "one ofthe wits at Button's, and a Justice of the Peace." But he hath since met with higher preferment in Ireland: and a much greater character we have of him in Mr. Gildon's Complete Art of Poetry, vol. I. p. 157. "Indeed, "he confesses, he dares not set him quite on the same "foot with Virgil, lest it should seem flattery, but he is "much mistaken if posterity does not afford him a 66 greater esteem than he at present enjoys." He endeavoured to create some misunderstanding between our Author and Mr. Addison, whom also soon after he abused as much. His constant cry was, that Mr. P. was an enemy to the government; and in particular he was the avowed author of a report very industriously spread, that he had a hand in a party-paper called The Examiner: A falsehood well known to those, yet living, who had the direction and publication of it. v.330. Gay dies unpension'd, &c.] See Mr. Gay's fable of the Hare and many Friends. This gentleman was early in the friendship of our Author, which continued to his death. He wrote several works of humour with great success; The Shepherd's Week, Trivia, the What-d'yecall it, Fables; and, lastly, the celebrated Beggar's Opera; a piece of satire which hit all tastes and degrees of men, from those of the highest quality to the very rabble. That verse of Horace, "Primores populi arripuit, populumque tributim." Hibernian politics, O Swift! thy fate; And Pope's, ten years to comment and translate. REMARKS. could never be so justly applied as to this. The vast suc cess ofit was unprecedented, and almost incredible: what is related of the wonderful effects of the ancient music or tragedy hardly came up to it: Sophocles and Euripides were less followed and famous. It was acted in London sixty-three days uninterrupted; and renewed the next season with equal applause. It spread into all the great towns of England, was played in many places to the thirtieth and fortieth time, and at Bath and Bristol fifty, &c. It made its progress into Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, where it was performed twenty-four day's together: it was last acted in Minorca. The fame of it was not confined to the author only; the ladies carried about with them the favourite songs of it in fans; and houses were furnished with it in screens. The person who acted Polly, till then obscure, became all at once the favourite of the Town; her pictures were engraved, and sold in great numbers; her life written, books of letters and verses to her published, and pamphlets made even of her sayings and jests. Furthermore, it drove out of England, for that season, the Italian opera, which had carried all before it for ten years. That idol of the nobility and people, which the great critic Mr. Dennis, by the labours and outeries of a whole life, could not overtirrow, was demolished by a single stroke of this gentleman's pen. This happened in the year 1728. Yet so great was his modesty, that he constantly prefixed to all the editions of it this motto, Nos hæc novimus esse nibil. VARIATIONS. v. 331. In the former edit. thus: O Swift! thy doom, And Pope's tranlating ten whole years with Broome. On which was the following note: "He concludes his irony with a stroke upon himself: for whoever ima"gines this a sarcasm on the other ingenious person is "surely mistaken. The opinion our Auther had of him was sufficiently shewn by his joining him in the un Proceed, great days! 'till Learning fly the shore, Enough! enough! the raptur'd Monarch cries! REMARKS. 335 340 v. 333. Proceed, great days! &c.---Till Birch shall blush, &c.] Another great prophet of Dulness, on this side Styx, promiseth those days to be near at hand. "The devil (saith he) licensed bishops to license masters of schools "to instruct youth in the knowledge of the Heathen gods, "their religion, &c. The schools and universities will "soon be tired and ashamed of classics, and such trum66 pery." Hutchinson's Use of Reason recovered. Scribl. 66 VARIATIONS. dertaking of the Odyssey: in which Mr. Broome hav"ing engaged without any previous agreement, discharged his part so much to Mr. Pope's satisfaction, "that he gratified him with the full some of five hundred "pounds, and a present of all those books for which his "own interest could procure him subscribers, to the va"lue of one hundred more. The Author only seems to "lament that he was employed in translation at all.” After v. 338, in the first edit. were the following lines: Then when these signs declare the mighty year, When the dull stars roll round, and re-appear; Let bere be darkness! (the dread Pow'r shall say) All shall be darkness, as it ne'er were day; To their first chaos Wit's vain works shall fall, And universal darkness cover all. IMITATIONS. v. 340. And through the iv'ry gate, &c.] "Sunt geminae somni portae; quarum altera fertur "Cornea, qua veris facilis datur exitus umbris; "Ultera candenti perfecta nitens elephanto, "Sed falsa ad coelum mittunt insomnia manes." Virg. Æn. VI. |