brated with equal elegance, tenderness, and gratitude, in the Epistle to Arbuthnot. In this year alfo he col lected all his Poems, and published them, with a very` judicious Preface, in a beautiful edition, in folio, and in quarto.

In the year 1720, when the publication of the Iliad was completed, which he began 1712, he became one of the infatuated adventurers in the famous and fatal South-Sea scheme, and luckily withdrew the fum of money he had hazarded, without being a great lofer.'

As the æras of a mere author's life can be marked only by the series of his publications, which however fhew the progrefs of his genius and labours, I proceed to obferve, that, in 1721, he published the exquifité Poems of his friend Parnell, to which he prefixed the fine Epistle to Lord Oxford; and in the fame year engaged with Tonfon to give an edition of Shake» fpeare, in fix quarto volumes; for which he received the fum of two hundred and seventeen pounds twelve fhillings. For this edition he was juftly attacked by Theobald, first in Shakespeare Reftored, and after wards in a formal edition, to which Warburton contributed many remarks; and by Theobald many deficiencies, errors, and mistakes were pointed out. Pope was fo mortified by this failure, that from this time, it is faid, he became an enemy to collators, commentators, and verbal critics, hinting that he mifcarried in this undertaking, for which he was not qualified,

66 was no Latin tranflation of that commentator. "Alexander Politi (if I remember right) began that "work fome years afterwards, but never proceeded "far in it. The perfon employed by Mr. Pope was "not at leisure to go on with the work; and Mr. "Pope (by his bookseller, I suppose,) sent to Jefferies, "a bookfeller at Cambridge, to find out a student "who would undertake the tafk. Jefferies applied "to Dr. Thirlby, who was my tutor, and who "pitched upon me. I would have declined the ❝ work, having, as I told my tutor, other studies to "pursue, to fit me for taking my degree. But he

qui quicquid volebat valdè volebat, would not hear ❝ of any excufe. So I complied. I cannot recollect "what Mr. Pope allowed for each book of Homer; "I have a notion that it was three or four guineas. "I took as much care as I could to perform the task 66 to his fatisfaction; but I was afhamed to defire my " tutor to give himself the trouble of overlooking my operations; and he, who always used to think and

66

fpeak too favourably of me, faid, that I did not "want his help. He never perused one line of it "before it was printed, nor perhaps afterwards.

"When I had gone through fome books, (I forget"how many,) Mr. Jefferies let us know that Mr. "Pope had a friend to do the reft, and that we "might give over.

"When I fent my papers to Jefferies, to be con"veyed to Mr. Pope, I inserted, as I remember,

".fome

"fome remarks on a paffage, where Mr. Pope, in “ my opinion, had made a mistake. But, as I was

not directly employed by him, but by a bookfeller, "I did not inform him who I was, or fet my name " to my papers.

"When that part of Homer came out in which "I had been concerned, I was eager, as it may be "fuppofed, to fee how things ftood; and much "pleased to find that he had not only used almost "all my notes, but had hardly made any alteration " in the expreffions. I obferved also, that, in a ́ "subsequent edition, he corrected the place to " which I had made objections.

"I was in fome hopes, in those days, (for I was

young,) that Mr. Pope would make inquiry about * his co-adjutor, and take fome civil notice of him. "But he did not; and I had no notion of obtruding "myself upon him.-I never faw his face."

The first four books were published 1715, and the largeness of the fubfcription enabled him also to purchase the houfe at Twickenham, befides the an nuities above-mentioned; to which he removed, hav ing perfuaded his father to fell his little property at Binfield.

But

*Dr. Johnson says, the first confiderable work published by fubfcription was Dryden's Virgil; but the folio edition of Paradife Loft was so published some years before.

by having a mind too great for fuch minute employment *.

Soon afterwards he gave out Proposals for a Tranflation of the Odysey; and took for his co-adjutors, Fenton and Broome; the former of whom, both from his genius and learning, was eminently qualified for the tafk. He, himself, tranflated only twelve books; and at the end of the notes, which were compiled by Broomet, a false statement was given of their respective shares; but it is now afcertained by Spence's papers, that Fenton tranflated the first, fourth, nineteenth, and twentieth Books; and Broome the second, fixth, eighth, eleventh, twelfth, fixteenth, eighteenth, and twenty-third Books. Lintot agreed to pay Pope one hundred pounds for each volume; the number of fubfcribers was five hundred and feventy-four; and of copies eight hundred and nineteen. He is faid to have given to Fenton for his affiftance,

On this occafion Mallet addreffed to him an Epistle on Verbal Criticism; full of affected contempt for a fort of learning with. which Mallet, as well as Pope, was unacquainted. This Epiftle procured him the friendship of Pope, who commends it in his Letters, though Mallet was afterwards the perfon that Bolingbroke employed to revile the memory of Pope, for publishing the idea of a Patriot King: The most unmeaning of all Bolingbroke's Treatifes, and which, as faid Count Powniatowski, the late unhappy King of Poland, proves nothing at all.

+ But the poftfcript to the notes was written by Pope himself, and is fo fine a piece of criticifm, that it is inferted in this edition, among his profe pieces.

affiftance, three hundred pounds; and to Broome five hundred.

About this time he was full of grief and anxiety, on account of the impeachment of his friend Bishop Atterbury, for whom he feems to have felt the greatest affection and regard. And being fummoned before the Lords at the trial, to give some account of Atterbury's domestic life and employments, not being used to speak in a large affembly, he made feveral blunders in the few words he had to utter.

In 1726, Mr. Jofeph Spence, Fellow of New College in Oxford, but not yet Profeffor of Poetry, as Dr. Johnson imagined him to be, (my father holding that office at the time,) published an Effay on the Odyssey, in a dialogue betwixt Philypfus and Antiphaus, after the manner of Bouhours and Dryden on the Drama, in which its beauties and blemishes were minutely confidered. The candour, the politeness, the true taste, and judgment, with which this criticifm was conducted, were fo very acceptable and pleafing to Pope, that he immediately courted the acquaintance of the ingenious Author, who, notwithstanding Dr. Johnson's invidious affertion, was an excellent fcholar, and earnestly invited him to spend fome time with him at Twickenham; and I have now before me a Letter which Spence wrote from thence, to his intimate friend Mr. Pitt, the tranflator of Vida and Virgil, defcribing to him the uncommonly kind

and