Tho' each may feel encreases and decays, Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own, 455 410 415 And own stale nonsense which they ne'er invent. 420 NOTES. VER. 408. Some ne'er] There is very little poetical expreffion from this line to ver. 450. It is only mere profe, fringed with rhyme. Good fenfe in a very profaic style. Reasoning, not poetry. VER. 420, Let a Lord] "You ought not to write verses, (faid George the Second, who had little tafte, to Lord Hervey,) 'tis beneath your rank; leave fuch work to little Mr. Pope; it is his trade." But this Lord Hervey wrote fome that were above the level of thofe defcribed here by our author. The Vulgar thus through Imitation err; So much they scorn the croud, that if the throng 425 And are but damn'd for having too much wit. Some praise at morning what they blame at night; But always think the last opinion right. 431 A Mufe by these is like a mistress us'd, This hour she's idoliz'd, the next abus'd; While their weak heads, like towns unfortify'd, We think our fathers fools, fo wife we grow; Our wifer fons, no doubt, will think us fo. 439 445 NOTES, If VER. 425. By being fingular ;] Of which truth there cannot be a ftronger example than the learned commentator on our author; "Who (to use his own excellent words on the character of Bayle) ftruck into the province of paradox, as an exercise for the restless vigour of his mind." VER. 444. Scotifts] So denominated from Johannes Duns Scotus, Erafmus tells us, an eminent Scotift affured him, that it was impoffible to underftand one fingle propofition of this famous Duns, If Faith itself has diff'rent dreffes worn, What wonder modes in Wit fhould take their turn? NOTES. Oft' Duns, unless you had his whole metaphyfics by heart. This hero of incomprehenfible fame fuffered a miferable. reverse at Oxford in the time of Henry VIII. That grave antiquary, Mr. Antony Wood, (in the Vindication of himself and his writings from the reproaches of the Bishop of Salisbury), fadly laments the deformation, as he calls it, of that Univerfity by the King's Commiffioners; and even records the blafphemous fpeeches of one of them, in his own words-"We have fet Duns in Boccardo, with all his blind gloffers, fast nailed up upon pofts in all common houfes of easement." Upon which our venerable antiquary thus exclaims: "If fo be, the commiffioners had fuch difrefpect for that most famous author J. Duns, who was fo much admired by our predeceffors, and fo difficult to be understood, that the Doctors of those times, namely, Dr. William Roper, Dr. John Keynton, Dr. William Mowse, &c. professed, that, in twenty-eight years study, they could not understand him rightly, what then had they for others of inferior note ?"What indeed! But they, If fo be, that most famous J. Duns was fo difficult to be understood, (for that this is a moft theologic proof of his great worth, is paft all doubt), I fhould conceive our good old Antiquary to be a little mistaken. And that the nailing up his Proteus of the Schools was done by the commiffioners in honour of the most famous Duns: There being no other way of catching the fense of fo flippery and dodging an author, who had eluded the pursuit of three of their most renowned doctors in full cry after him, for eight and twenty years together. And this boccardo in which he was confined, feemed very fit for the purpose; it being observed, that men are never more serious and thoughtful than in that place of retirement. Scribl. VER.444. Thomifts] From Thomas Aquinas, a truly great genius, -who, in those blind ages, was the fame in theology, that our Friar Bacon was in natural philosophy; lefs happy than our countryman in this, that he foon became furrounded with a number of dark gloffers, who never left him till they had extinguished the radiance of that light, which had pierced through the thickest night of Monkery, the thirteenth century, when the Waldenfes were Luppreffed, and Wickliffe not yet rifen. 24 W. Thomifts] Oft, leaving what is natural and fit, The current folly proves the ready wit; VARIATIONS. VER. 447. Between this and ver. 452. The rhyming clowns that gladded Shakespear's age, And authors thought their reputation fafe, Which liv'd as long as fools were pleas'd to laugh. NOTES. 448 And VER. 444. Thomifts] The Summa fummæ, &c. of Thomas Aquinas, is a treatise well deferving a moft attentive perusal, and contains an admirable view of Aristotle's Ethics. Aquinas did not understand Greek; what he knew of Ariftotle he got from Averroes, an Arabian, whom the Spanish Jews first tranflated into Hebrew, and from Hebrew into Latin. VER. 445. Amidst their kindred cobwebs] Were common fenfe difpofed to credit any of the Monkifh miracles of the dark and blind ages of the church, it would certainly be one of the seventh century recorded by honeft Bale. "In the fixth general council (fays he) holden at Conftantinople, Anno Dom. 680, contra Monothelitas, where the Latin Mafs was firft approved, and the Latin minifters deprived of their lawfull wives, fpiders webbs, in wonderfull copye were feen falling down from above, upon the heads of the people, to the marvelous aftonishment of many.". The jufteft emblem and prototype of School Metaphyfics, the divinity of Scotifts and Thomifts, which afterwards fell, in wonderfull copye on the heads of the people, in fupport of Tranfubftantiation, to the marvellous aftonishment of many, as it continues to do to this day. W. This is very forced and far-fetched. VER. 445. Duck-lane. ] A place where old and fecond-hand books were fold formerly, near Smithfield. P. VER. 448. Oft, leaving what is natural] Ita comparatum eft humanum ingenium, ut optimarum rerum fatietate defatigetur. Unde And authors think their reputation fafe, Which lives as long as fools are pleas'd to laugh. Some valuing those of their own fide or mind, Still make themselves the measure of mankind: 450 NOTES. Unde fit, artes, neceffitatis vi quâdam crefcere, aut decrefcere femper, & ad fummum fastigium evectas, ibi non diu poffe confiftere. Thus mufic, deferting fimple and pathetic expreffion, is taken up with tricks of execution, and a fort of flight of hand. Thus Borromini, to be new and original, has, as Mr. Walpole expreffes it, twisted and curled architecture, by inverting the volutes of the Ionic order. L'ennui du Beau, amene le gout du Singulier. This will happen in every country, every art, and every age. VER. 450. And authors think their reputation safe, ; the Which lives as long as fools are pleas'd to laugh.] This is an admirable fatire on thofe called Authors in fashion men who get the laugh on their fide. He fhews, on how pitiful a basis their reputation ftands, the changling difpofition of fools to laugh, who are always carried away with the last joke. W. Another forced interpretation! VER. 451. As long as fools] "Mirabile eft (fays Tully) De Oratore, lib. iii. quum plurimum in faciendo inter doctum & rudem, quàm non multum differant in judicando." Horace and Milton declare againft general approbation, and wish for fit audience though few. And Tully relates, in his Brutus, the story of Antimachus, who, when his numerous auditors all gradually left him, except Plato, faid, I ftill continue reading my work; Plato, enim mihi unus inftar eft omnium. The noble confidence and strength of mind, in Milton, is not in any circumstance more visible and more admirable, than his writing a poem in a ftyle and manner that he was fure would not be relished or regarded by his corrupt contemporaries. He was different in this respect from Bernardo Taffo, the father of his beloved Torquato, who, to fatisfy the vulgar taste and current opinions of his country, new-modelled his epic poem Amadigi, to make it more wild and romantic, and lefs fuited to the rules of Aristotle. VER. 452. Side or mind,] Are two vulgar words, unworthy of our author. Fondly |