But sick of fops, and poetry, and prate, 230 235 240 Proud as Apollo on his forked hill, Sate full-blown Bufo puff'd by every quill; Fed with soft dedication all day long, Horace and he went hand in hand in song. His library, where busts of poets dead And a true Pindar stood without a head, Received of wits an undistinguish'd race, Who first his judgment ask'd, and then a place : Much they extoll'd his pictures, much his seat; And flatter'd every day, and some days eat: Till grown more frugal in his riper days, He paid some bards with port, and some with praise; To some a dry rehearsal was assign❜d, And others (harder still) he paid in kind. Dryden alone (what wonder?) came not nigh; Dryden alone escaped this judging eye: But still the great have kindness in reserve; He help'd to bury whom he help'd to starve. May some choice patron bless each gray goose quill! May every Bavius have his Bufo still! 246 250 232 Sate full-blown Bufo. This character has been supposed to allude to lord Halifax. Against this supposition, it has been observed, that Halifax died in 1715, when Pope was but twenty-seven. But this was by no means too unripe an age to have sustained injury, or have felt resentment. The character evidently applies to a patron, a poet, and that poet a minister. Halifax was known as the three: if not to him, to whom else will it apply? Pope was not accustomed to fight with the air. But Halifax deserves the praise at least of liberality seeing the stage at a low ebb, he offered £500 as a premium for the best comedy; an example more admired than followed by future lord chamberlains. 4 So when a statesman wants a day's defence, O, let me live my own, and die so too, (To live and die is all I have to do) 260 256 They left me Gay. Gentleness of manners and mediocrity of genius were Gay's passports to fame.: he obtained the reputation of a poet by living among poets; and he was suffered to live among them, because, while his manners pleased, his talents were incapable of rivalry. His Fables' are acknowleged triflings: of the 'Beggars' Opera' it is impossible that he should bave been more than the nominal author: its sarcastic, searching, and characteristic force was totally beyond his conception: he was capable of neither its wit nor its wickedness. While we have evidence, on the one hand, that the idea of the Newgate Pastoral' was suggested by Swift, and the plan submitted to Pope; we have, on the other, evidence, in the singular insipidity of his subsequent opera, 'Polly,' that Gay was destitute of all dramatic power. His life was vexed by disappointments at court; and Addison has been charged with thus doing injury to the friend of Pope: but the sources were higher-the queen and sir Robert Walpole. Gay had sought preferment through Mrs. Howard, notoriously the king's mistress: and he who sought it through this channel, deserved to lose it. He writes to Swift, Mrs. Howard has declared herself very strongly to both the king and queen as my protector.' The queen, naturally hostile to this species of influence, traversed it on all occasions, and Gay failed. The 'Beggars' Opera,' which came out soon after, was filled with satire on the minister, though satire which never came from Gay; and the failure was irretrievable. POPE. II. N Maintain a poet's dignity and ease, And see what friends, and read what books I please : Above a patron, though I condescend I pay my debts, believe, and say my prayers; Nor know if Dennis be alive or dead. 265 270 Why am I ask❜d what next shall see the light? Heavens! was I born for nothing but to write? Has life no joys for me? or, to be grave, Have I no friend to serve, no soul to save? 'I found him close with Swift.'-'Indeed? no doubt,' 275 Cries prating Balbus, 'something will come out.' "Tis all in vain, deny it as I will: 'No, such a genius never can lie still ;' And then for mine obligingly mistakes The first lampoon sir Will or Bubo makes. 280 280 Will or Bubo makes. Sir William Young, and Bubb Doddington, afterwards lord Melcombe. Doddington's name has gone down to perpetual contempt by the avowed baseness of his principles. His well-known Diary' is a trite, trifling, and nearly unintelligible performance; useful only as a proof of the diligence with which a political trader may consign himself to infamy. Doddington had many advantages of nature and fortune : he was handsome, well-bred, a wit in the court circles, and the possessor of considerable wealth. Lady M. Montague, a sufficient judge of all the merits and demerits of her society, pronounces him the all-accomplished Mr. Doddington.' He was a frequent speaker in the house, and became an ostentatious partisan of Frederic, prince of Wales. Walpole has preserved a curious extravagance of Doddington's sorrow on his death. Poor guiltless I! and can I choose but smile, 285 290 Cursed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow, That tends to make one worthy man my foe, Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear, Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear! But he who hurts a harmless neighbor's peace, Insults fallen worth, or beauty in distress, Who loves a lie, lame slanders helps about, Who writes a libel, or who copies out; That fop, whose pride affects a patron's name, Yet absent, wounds an author's honest fame; Who can your merit selfishly approve, And show the sense of it without the love; Who has the vanity to call you friend, Yet wants the honor, injured, to defend; Who tells whate'er you think, whate'er you say, And, if he lie not, must at least betray: 295 300 Who to the dean' and 'silver bell' can swear, silk, Sporus, that mere white curd of ass's milk? 305 305 Let Sporus tremble. Lord Hervey, whom Pope conceived to have joined lady M. Montague in lampooning him. Middleton (Life of Cicero) describes lord Hervey as an intelligent and polished nobleman, steadily patriotic in his views, and remarkable for his literary ardor. Yet we may fairly make Satire or sense, alas! can Sporus feel? P. Yet let me flap this bug with gilded wings, In mumbling of the game they dare not bite. way; 315 As shallow streams run dimpling all the Or at the ear of Eve, familiar toad, Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad, 320 Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies. 325 331 Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust, Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust. some deduction for the language of a preface, and still more for the language of a man like Middleton. In his first edition, Pope had used the more becoming name of Paris: no reason but its bitterness has been assigned for the change. |