reader will collect, that it little availed our author to of our poem. Margites was the name of this person have any candour, since, when he declared he did age, whom antiquity recordeth to have been Dunce not write for others, it was not credited; as little to the first; and surely from what we hear of him, not have any modesty, since, when he declined writing in junworthy to be the root of so spreading a tree, and any way himself, the presumption of others was im- so numerous a posterity. The poem, therefore, celeputed to him. If he singly enterprised one great brating him was properly and absolutely a Dunciad; work, he was taxed of boldness and madness to a which, though now unhappily lost, yet is its nature prodigy: if he took assistants in another, it was com- sufficiently known by the infallible tokens aforesaid. plained of, and represented as a great injury to the And thus it doth appear, that the first Dunciad was public. The loftiest heroics, the lowest ballads, the first epic poem, written by Homer himself, and treatises against the state or church, satires on lords anterior even to the Iliad or Odyssey. and ladies, raillery on wits and authors, squabbles Now, forasmuch as our poet hath translated those with booksellers, or even full and true accounts of two famous works of Homer which are yet left, he monsters, poisons, and murders; of any hereof was did conceive it in some sort his duty to imitate that there nothing so good, nothing so bad, which hath not also which was lost and was therefore induced to at one or other season been to him ascribed. If it bestow on it the same form which Homer's is reportbore no author's name, then lay he concealed; if it ed to have had, namely, that of epic poem; with a did, he fathered it upon that author to be yet better title also framed after the ancient Greek manner, to concealed: if it resembled any of his styles, then was wit, that of Dunciad. it evident; if it did not, then disguised he it on set Wonderful it is, that so few of the moderns have purpose. Yea, even direct oppositions in religion, been stimulated to attempt some Dunciad! since in principles, and politics, have equally been supposed the opinion of the multitude, it might cost less pain in him inherent. Surely a most rare and singular and toil than an imitation of the greater epic. But character: of which let the reader make what he can. possible it is also, that, on due reflection, the maker Doubtless most commentators would hence take might find it easier to paint a Charlemagne, a Brute, occasion to turn all to their author's advantage, and or a Godfrey with just pomp and dignity heroic, than from the testimony of his very enemies would affirm, a Margites, a Codrus, or a Fleckno. that his capacity was boundless, as well as his imagi- We shall next declare the occasion and the cause nation; that he was a perfect master of all styles, and which moved our poet to this particular work. He all arguments; and that there was in those times, no lived in those days, when (after providence had perother writer, in any kind, of any degree of excellence, mitted the invention of printing as a scourge for the save he himself. But as this is not our own senti- sins of the learned) paper also became so cheap, and ment, we shall determine on nothing; but leave thee, printers so numerous, that a deluge of authors covergentle reader, to steer thy judgment equally between ed the land; whereby not only the peace of the hovarious opinions, and to choose whether thou wilt nest unwriting subject was daily molested, but unmer. incline to the testimony of authors avowed, or of au- ciful demands were made of his applause, yea, of his thors concealed; of those who knew him, or of those who knew him not. MARTINUS SCRIBLERUS OF THE POEM. P. money, by such as would neither earn the one por deserve the other. At the same time, the licence of the press was such, that it grew dangerous to refuse them either: for they would forthwith publish slanders unpunished, the authors being anonymous, and skulking under the wings of publishers, a set of men who neither scrupled to vend either calumny or blasphemy, as long as the town would call for it. Now our author, living in those times, did conceive it an endeavour well worthy an honest satirist, to dissuade the dull, and punish the wicked, the only 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 way that was left. In that public-spirited view he Aristotle) was the first who gave the form, and (saith laid the plan of this poem, as the greatest service he Horace) who adapted the measure to heroic poesy. was capable (without much hurt, or being slain) to But even before this, may be rationally presumed, render his dear country. First, taking things from from what the ancients have left written, was a piece their original, he considereth the causes creative of by Homer, composed of like nature and matter with such authors, namely, dulness and poverty; the one this of our poet. For of epic sort it appeareth to have born with them, the other contracted by neglect of been, yet of matter surely not unpleasant, witness their proper talents, through self-conceit of greater what is reported of it by the learned archbishop abilities. This truth he wrappeth in an allegory? (as Eustathius, in Odyss. x. And accordingly Aristotle, the construction of epic poesy requireth,) and feigns in his Poetics, chap. iv doth further set forth, that as that one of these goddesses had taken up her abode the Iliad and Odyssey gave example to tragedy, so did with the other, and that they jointly inspired all such this poem to comedy its first idea. writers and such works. He proceedeth to show From these authors also it should seem, that the the qualities they bestow on these authors, and the hero, or chief personage of it was no less obscure, and effects they produce:4 then the materials or stock, his understanding and sentiments no less quaint and with which they furnish them; and, above all, that strange (if indeed no more so) than any of the actors self-opinion which causeth it to seem to themselves 1 Burnet's Homerides, p. 1, of his translation of the Iliad. 2 The London and Mist's Journals, on his undertaking tho Odyssey. 1 Vide Bossu, Du Poeme Epique, chap. viii. 2 Bossu, chap vii. 4 Ver. 45 to 54. 3 Book I. ver. 32. &c. 5 Ver. 57 to 77. 6 Ver. 80 vastly greater than it is, and is the prime motive of of those good times, not so curiously wrapped up,) their setting up in this sad and sorry merchandise. yea, and commented upon by the most grave doctors, The great power of these goddesses acting in alli- and approved critics. ance (whereof as the one is the mother of industry, As it beareth the name of epic, it is thereby subso is the other of plodding) was to be exemplified in jected to such severe indispensable rules as are laid some one great and remarkable action; and none could on all neoterics, a strict imitation of the ancients; inbe more so than that which our poet hath chosen, viz. somuch that any deviation, accompanied with whatthe restoration of the reign of Chaos and Night, by ever poetic beauties, hath always been censured by the ministry of Dulness, their daughter, in the removal the sound critic. How exact that limitation hath of her imperial seat from the city to the polite world, been in this piece, appeareth not only by its general as the action of the Eneid is the restoration of the structure, but by particular allusions infinite, many empire of Troy, by the removal of the race from whereof have escaped both the commentator and thence to Latium. But as Homer singeth only the poet himself, yea, divers by his exceeding diligence wrath of Achilles, yet includes in his poem the whole are so altered and interwoven with the rest, that sehistory of the Trojan war, in like manner our author veral have already been, and more will be, by the ig hath drawn into this single action the whole history norant abused, as altogether and originally his own. of Dulness and her children. In a word, the whole poem proveth itself to be the A person must next be fixed upon to support this work of our author, when his faculties were in full action. This phantom in the poet's mind must have vigour and perfection; at that exact time when years a name, he finds it to be ; and he becomes have ripened the judgment, without diminishing the of course the hero of the poem. imagination: which, by good critics, is held to be The fable being thus, according to the best exam- punctually at forty. For at that season it was that ple, one and entire, as contained in the proposition; Virgil finished his Georgies; and sir Richard Blackthe machinery is a continued chain of allegories, more, at the like age, composing his Arthurs, declared setting forth the whole power, ministry, and empire, the same to be the very acme and pitch of life for of Dulness, extended through her subordinate instru- epic poesy: though since he hath altered it to sixty, ments, in all her various operations. the year in which he published his Alfred. True it This is branched into episodes, each of which hath is, that the talents for criticism, namely, smartness, its moral apart, though all conducive to the main end. quick censure, vivacity of remark, certainty of asseveThe crowd assembled in the second book, demon- ration, indeed all but acerbity, seem rather the gifts strates the design to be more extensive than to bad of youth than of riper age: but it is far otherwise in poets only, and that we may expect other episodes poetry; witness the works of Mr. Rymer and Mr. of the patrons, encouragers, or paymasters of such Dennis, who, beginning with criticism, became afterauthors, as occasion shall bring them forth. And the wards such poets as no age hath paralleled. With third book, if well considered, seemeth to embrace good reason, therefore, did our author choose to write the whole world. Each of the games relateth to his essay on that subject at twenty, and reserve for some or other vile class of writers: the first concern- his maturer years this great and wonderful work of eth the plagiary, to whom he giveth the name of the Dunciad. Moore; the second, the libellous novelist, whom he styleth Eliza; the third, the flattering dictator; the fourth, the brawling critic, or noisy poet; the fifth, the dark and dirty party writer: and so of the rest: assigning to each some proper name or other, such| as he could find. RICARDUS ARISTARCHUS. Of the Hero of the Poem. As for the characters, the public hath already ac- Or the nature of Dunciad in general, whence deknowledged how justly they are drawn ; the manners rived, and on what authority founded, as well as of are so depicted, and the sentiment so peculiar to the art and conduct of this our poem in particular, those to whom applied, that surely to transfer them the learned and laborious Scriblerus hath, according to any other or wiser personages, would be exceed-to his manner, and with tolerable share of judgment, ing difficult: and certain it is, that every person con- dissertated. But when he cometh to speak of the cerned, being consulted apart, hath readily owned person of the hero fitted for such poem, in truth he the resemblance of every portrait, his own excepted. miserably halts and hallucinates: for, misled by one So Mr. Cibber calls them a parcel of poor wretches, Monsieur Bossu, a Gallic critic, he prateth of I canso many silly flies :'3 but adds, 'our author's wit is not tell what phantom of a hero, only raised up to remarkably more bare and barren, whenever it would support the fable. A putid conceit! as if Homer fall foul on Cibber, than upon any other person what- and Virgil, like modern undertakers, who first build ever.' their house, and then seek out for a tenant, had conThe descriptions are singular, the comparisons very trived the story of a war and a wandering, before quaint, the narration various, yet of one colour; the they once thought either of Achilles or Æneas. We purity and chastity of diction is so preserved, that, in shall therefore set our good brother and the world the places most suspicious, not the words but only also right in this particular, by assuring them, that, in the images have been censured, and yet are those the greater epic, the prime intention of the muse is to images no other than have been sanctified by ancient exalt heroic virtue, in order to propagate the love of and classical authority (though, as was the manner it among the children of men; and consequently that the poet's first thought must needs be turned upon a real subject meet for laud and celebration; not one 1 See his Essays. whom he is to make, but one whom he may find, But then it is not every knave, nor (let me add) truly illustrious. This is the primum mobile of his every fool, that is a fit subject for a Dunciad. There poetic world, whence every thing is to receive life must still exist some analogy, if not resemblance of and motion. For, this subject being found, he is im-qualities, between the heroes of the two poems; and mediately ordained, or rather acknowledged, a hero, this, in order to admit what neoteric critics call and put upon such action as befitteth the dignity of the parody, one of the liveliest graces of the little his character. epic. Thus being agreed that the constituent But the muse ceaseth not here her eagle-flight. qualities of the great epic hero, are wisdom, bravery, For sometimes, satiated with the contemplation of and love, from whence springeth heroic virtue; it these suns of glory, she turneth downward on her followeth, that those of the lesser epic hero should wing, and darts with Jove's lightning on the goose be vanity, assurance, and debauchery, from which and serpent kind. For we may apply to the muse in happy assemblage resulteth heroic dulness, the neverher various moods what an ancient master of wisdom dying subject of this our poem. affirmeth of the gods in general: Si Di non iras- This being settled, come we now to particulars. It cuntur impiis et injustis, nec pios utique justosque dili- is the character of true wisdom to seek its chief sup gunt. In rebus enim diversis, aut in utramque partem port and confidence within itself; and to place that moveri necesse est, aut in neutram. Itaque qui bonos support in the resources which proceed from a condiligit, et malos odit; et qui malos non odit, nec bonos scious rectitude of will.-And are the advantages of diligit. Quia et diligere bonos ex odio malorum venit; vanity, when arising to the heroic standard, at all et malos odisse er bonorum caritate descendit. Which short of this self-complacence? nay, are they not, in in our vernacular idiom may be thus interpreted: If the opinion of the enamoured owner, far beyond it? the gods be not provoked at evil men, neither are they 'Let the world,' will such an one say, 'impute to me delighted with the good and just. For contrary ob- what folly or weakness they please: but till wisdom jects must either excite contrary affections, or no af- can give me something that will make me more fections at all. So that he who loveth good men, heartily happy, I am content to be gazed at." This, must, at the same time, hate the bad; and he who we see, is vanity according to the heroic gage or hateth not bad men, cannot love the good: because measure; not that low and ignoble species which to love good proceedeth from an aversion to evil, and pretendeth to virtues we have not; but the laudable to hate evil men from a tenderness to the good.' ambition of being gazed at for glorying in those vices From this delicacy of the muse arose the little epic, which every body knows we have. "The world (more lively and choleric than her elder sister, whose may ask,' says he, 'why I make my follies public? bulk and complexion incline her to the phlegmatic :) Why not? I have passed my life very pleasantly with and for this, some notorious vehicle of vice and folly them.'2 In short, there is no sort of vanity such a was sought out, to make thereof an example. An hero would scruple, but that which might go near to early instance of which (nor could it escape the ac- degrade him from his bigh station in this our Duncuracy of Scriblerus) the father of epic poem him- ciad; namely, 'whether it would not be vanity in him, self affordeth us. From him the practice descended to take shame to himself, for not being a wise man?" to the Greek dramatic poets, his offspring; who, in Bravery, the second attribute of the true hero, is the composition of their tetralogy, or set of four courage manifesting itself in every limb; while its pieces, were wont to make the last a satiric tragedy. correspondent virtue, in the mock hero, is that same Happily, one of these ancient Dunciads (as we may courage all collected into the face. And as power, well term it) is come down unto us, amongst the tra- when drawn together, must needs have more force gedies of the poet Euripides. And what doth the and spirit than when dispersed, we generally find this reader suppose may be the subject thereof? Why, kind of courage in so high and heroic a degree, that in truth, and is worthy observation, the unequal it insults not only men, but gods. Mezentius is, contest of an old, dull, debauched buffoon Cyclops, without doubt, the bravest character in all the Æneis: with the heaven-directed favourite of Minerva; who, but how? His bravery, we know, was a high couafter having quietly borne all the monster's obscene rage of blasphemy. And can we say less of this and impious ribaldry, endeth the farce in punishing brave man's? who, having told us that he placed his him with the mark of an indelible brand in his fore-summum bonum in those follies which he was not head. May we not then be excused, if, for the future, content barely to possess, but would likewise glory we consider the epics of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, in,' adds, 'if I am misguided, 'tis nature's fault, and I together with this our poem, as a complete tetralogy; follow her.'4 Nor can we be mistaken in making in which the last worthily holdeth the place or sta- this happy quality a species of courage, when we tion of the satiric piece? consider those illustrious marks of it, which made his in the kingdom;' and his language to consist of what we must allow to be the most daring figure of speech, that which is taken from the name of God. Proceed we, therefore, in our subject. It hath face 'more known (as he justly boasteth) than most been long, and, alas for pity! still remaineth a question, whether the hero of the greater epic should be an honest man; or, as the French critics express it, un honnete homme: but it never admitted of a doubt, but that the hero of the little epic should be just the contrary. Hence, to the advantage of our Dunciad, we may observe, how much juster the moral of that poem must needs be where so important a question is previously decided. 1 Si un heros poëtique doit être un honnête homme. Bossu, du Poëme Epique, liv. v. ch. 5. Gentle love, the next ingredient of the true hero's composition, is a mere bird of passage, or (as Shakspeare calls it) 'summer-teeming lust,' and evaporates in the heat of youth; doubtless by that refinement it suffers in passing through those certain strainers which our poet somewhere speaketh of. But when 1 Ded. to the Life of C. C. it is let alone to work upon the lees, it acquireth (ance of the gods; for the subversion and erection of strength by old age; and becometh a lasting orna-empires have never been adjudged the work of man. ment to the little epic. It is true, indeed, there is How greatly soever then we may esteem of his high one objection to its fitness for such a use for not talents, we can hardly conceive his personal prowess only the ignorant may think it common, but it is ad-alone sufficient to restore the decayed empire of dulmitted to be so, even by him who best knoweth its ness. So weighty an achievement must require the value. Don't you think,' argueth he, 'to say only particular favour and protection of the great; who a man has his whore, ought to go for little or being the natural patrons and supporters of letters, as nothing? because defendit numerus. Take the first the ancient gods were of Troy, must first be drawn ten thousand men you meet, and, I believe, you would off and engaged in another interest, before the total be no loser if you betted ten to-one that every single subversion of them can be accomplished. To sursinner of them, one with another, had been guilty of mount, therefore, this last and greatest difficulty, we the same frailty."2 But here he seemeth not to have have, in this excellent man, a professed favourite and done justice to himself: the man is sure enough a intimado of the great. And look, of what force anhero who hath his lady at fourscore. How doth his cient piety was to draw the gods into the party of modesty herein lessen the merit of a whole well-Eneas, that, and much stronger, is modern incense, spent life! not taking to himself the commendation to engage the great in the party of dulness. (which Horace accounted the greatest in a theatrical character) of continuing to the very dregs the sam he was from the beginning, Servetur ad imum Qualis ab incepto processerat their concubines! Thus have we essayed to portray or shadow out this noble imp of fame. But not the impatient reader will be apt to say, 'If so many and various graces go to the making up a hero, what mortal shall suffice to bear his character?' Ill hath he read who seeth not, But here, in justice both to the poet and the hero, in every trace of this picture, that individual, all-aclet us farther remark, that the calling her his whore, complished person, in whom these rare virtues and implied she was his own, and not his neighbour's. lucky circumstances have agreed to meet and con Truly a commendable continence! and such as Scipio centre with the strongest lustre and fullest harmony. himself must have applauded. For how much self- The good Scriblerus indeed, nay, the world itself, denial was necessary not to covet his neighbour's might be imposed on, in the late spurious editions, by whore! and what disorders must the coveting her I can't tell what sham-hero or phantom; but it was have occasioned in that society, where (according to not so easy to impose on him whom this egregious this political calculator) nine in ten of all ages have error most of all concerned. For no sooner had the fourth book laid open the high and swelling scene, We have now, as briefly as we could devise, gone| but he recognized his own heroic acts: and when he through the three constituent qualities of either hero. came to the words, But it is not in any, or in all of these, that heroism properly or essentially resideth. It is a lucky result (though laureat imply no more than one crowned rather from the collision of these lively qualities with laurel, as befitteth any associate or consort in against one another. Thus, as from wisdom, bravery, empire,) he loudly resented this indignity to violated and love, ariseth magnanimity, the object of admira- Majesty. Indeed, not without cause, he being there tion, which is the aim of the greater epic; so from represented as fast asleep; so misbeseeming the eye vanity, assurance, and debauchery, springeth buf- of empire, which, like that of Providence, should foonery, the source of ridicule, that 'laughing orna- never doze nor slumber. 'Hah!' saith he, fast asleep, ment,' as he well termeth it,3 of the little epic. it seems! that's a little too strong. Pert and dull at 'Soft on her lap her laureat son reclines,' He is not ashamed (God forbid he ever should be least you might have allowed me, but as seldom ashamed!) of this character, who deemeth that not asleep as any fool." However, the injured hero may reason but risibility distinguisheth the human species comfort himself with this reflection, that though it be from the brutal. As nature,' saith this profound phi-a sleep, yet it is not the sleep of death, but of immorlosopher, 'distinguished our species from the mute tality. Here he will live at least, though not awake; creation by our risibility, her design must have been and in no worse condition than many an enchanted by that faculty as evidently to raise our happiness, as warrior before him. The famous Durandante, for inby our os sublime (our erected faces) to lift the dig-stance, was, like him, cast into a long slumber by nity of our form above them."4 All this considered, Merlin the British bard and necromancer; and his how complete a hero must he be, as well as how example for submitting to it with a good grace, might happy a man, whose risibility lieth not barely in his be of use to our hero. For that disastrous knight bemuscles, as in the common sort, but (as himself in- ing sorely pressed or driven to make his answer by formeth us) in his very spirits? and whose os sublime several persons of quality, only replied with a sigh, is not simply an erect face, but a brazen head; as Patience, and shuffle the cards.'s should seem by his preferring it to one of iron, said to belong to the late king of Sweden ?5 But now, as nothing in this world, no not the most sacred and perfect things, either of religion or goBut whatever personal qualities a hero may have, vernment, can escape the sting of envy, methinks I the examples of Achilles and Æneas show us, that all already hear these carpers objecting to the clearness those are of small avail, without the constant assist-of our hero's title. 'It would never,' say they, 'have been esteemed 1 Alluding to these lines in the epistle to Dr. Arbuth-sufficient to make a hero for the Iliad or Æneis; that not: or Æneas pious enough to raise another, had they not in an artful gamester. And who fitter than the offbeen goddess born, and princes bred. What then spring of Chance, to assist in restoring the empire of did this author mean, by erecting a player instead of Night and Chaos ? one of his patrons (a person, "never a hero even on There is, in truth, another objection of greater the stage,"1) to this dignity of colleague in the empire weight, namely, That this hero still existeth, and of dulness, and achiever of a work that neither old hath not yet finished his earthly course. For if SoOmar, Attila, nor John of Leyden could entirely lon said well, bring to pass?' 'ultima semper To all this we have, as we conceive, a sufficient Expectanda dies homini: dicique beatus answer from the Roman historian, fabrum esse suæ Ante obitum nemo supremaque funera debet! quemque fortuna: 'that every man is the smith of his if no man be called happy till his death, surely much own fortune,' The politic Florentine, Nicholas less can any one, till then, be pronounced a hero: this Machiavel, goeth still further, and affirmeth that a species of men being far more subject than others to man needeth but to believe himself a hero to be one the caprices of fortune and humour.' But to this also of the worthiest. 'Let him,' saith he, 'but fancy we have an answer, that will (we hope) be deemed himself capable of the highest things, and he will of decisive. It cometh from himself; who, to cut this course be able to achieve them.' From this principle it follows, that nothing can exceed our hero's prow-never change or amend. matter short, hath solemnly protested that he will ess, as nothing ever equalled the greatness of his con- With regard to his vanity, he declareth that nothing ceptions. Hear how he constantly paragons himself, shall ever part them. Nature,' said he, hath amply at one time to Alexander the Great and Charles XII. supplied me in vanity; a pleasure which neither the of Sweden, for the excess and delicacy of his ampertness of wit, nor the gravity of wisdom, will ever bition;2 to Henry IV. of France, for honest policy;3 persuade me to part with. Our poet had charitably to the first Brutus, for love of liberty and to sir endeavoured to administer a cure to it: but he telleth Robert Walpole, for good government while in pow-us plainly, My superiors perhaps may be mended by er: at another time, to the godlike Socrates, for his him; but for my part I own myself incorrigible. diversions and amusements; to Horace, Montaigne, look upon my follies as the best part of my fortune. and sir William Temple, for an elegant vanity that And with good reason; we see to what they have maketh them for ever read and admired:7 to two lord brought him! chancellors, for law, from whom, when confederate against him, at the bar, he carried away the prize of eloquence; and, to say all in a word, to the right reverend the lord bishop of London himself, in the art of writing pastoral letters.9 Secondly; as to buffoonery. Is it,' saith he, 'a time of day for me to leave off these fooleries, and set up a new character? I can no more put off my follies than my skin; I have often tried, but they stick too close to me: nor am I sure my friends are disNor did his actions fall short of the sublimity of his pleased with them, for in this light I afford them freconceit. In his early youth he met the Revolution10 quent matter of mirth, &c. &c.'s Having then so face to face in Nottingham, at a time when his bet-publicly declared himself incorrigible, he is become ters contented themselves with following her. It dead in law (I mean the law epopeian) and devolv was here he got acquainted with Old Battle-array, of eth upon the poet as his property; who may take whom he hath made so honourable mention in one him, and deal with him as if he had been dead as long of his immortal odes. But he shone in courts as well as in camps; he was called up when the nation fell embalm him for posterity. as an old Egyptian hero: that is to say, embowel and in labour of this Revolution ;" and was a gossip at her christening, with the bishop and the ladies.12 Nothing, therefore (we conceive) remaineth to hinder his own prophecy of himself from taking immeAs to his birth, it is true he pretendeth no relation diate effect. A rare felicity! and what few prophets either to heathen god or goddess; but, what is as have had the satisfaction to see, alive! Nor can we good, he was descended from a maker of both.13 And conclude better than with that extraordinary one of that he did not pass himself on the world for a hero, his, which is conceived in these oraculous words, as well by birth as education, was his own fault: for 6 his lineage he bringeth into his life as an anecdote, and is sensible he had it in his power to be thought nobody's son at all:14 and what is that but coming into the world a hero? But be it (the punctilious laws of epic poesy so requiring) that a hero of more than mortal birth must my dulness will find somebody to do it right."4 Tandem Phœbus adest, morsusque inferre parantem Congelat, et patulos, ut erant, indurat hiatus." BY AUTHORITY. needs be had; even for this we have a remedy. We By virtue of the authority in us vested by the act can easily derive our hero's pedigree from a goddess for subjecting poets to the power of a licenser, we of iro small power and authority amongst men; and have revised this piece; where, finding the style and legitimate and instal him after the right classical and authentic fashion: for, like as the ancient sages found a son of Mars in a mighty warrior; a son of Neptune in a skilful seaman; a son of Phoebus in a harmonious poet; so have we here, if need be, a son of Fortune 1 See Life, p. 148. 2 p. 149. 8 p. 436, 437. 11 p. 57. 14 Life, p. 6 3 p. 424. appellation of King to have been given to a certain pretender, pseudo-poet, or phantom, of the name of Tibbald; and apprehending the same may be deemed sult on that legal authority which has bestowed on in some sort a reflection on majesty, or at least an inanother person the crown of poesy: We have ordered 3 p. 17. 1 See Life, p. 424. 2 p. 19. |