[311] 'On Codrus' old, or Dunton's modern bed:' of Codrus the poet's bed, see Juvenal, describing his poverty very copiously, Sat. iii. ver. 103, &c. John Dunton was a broken bookseller, and abusive scribbler. He wrote Neck or Nothing, a violent satire on some ministers of state; a libel on the Duke of Devonshire, and the Bishop of Peterborough, &c.—P.

[312] 'And Tutchin flagrant from the scourge:' John Tutchin, author of some vile verses, and of a weekly paper called the Observator. He was sentenced to be whipped through several towns in the west of England, upon which he petitioned King James II. to be hanged. When that prince died in exile, he wrote an invective against his memory, occasioned by some humane elegies on his death. He lived to the time of Queen Anne.—P.

[313] 'There Ridpath, Roper:' authors of the Flying-post and Post-boy, two scandalous papers on different sides, for which they equally and alternately deserved to be cudgelled, and were so.—P.

[314] 'Himself among the storied chiefs he spies:' the history of Curll's being tossed in a blanket and whipped by the scholars of Westminster is well known.—P.

[315] 'Eliza:' Eliza Haywood. This woman was authoress of those most scandalous books called the Court of Carimania, and the New Utopia.—P.

[316] 'Kirkall:' the name of an engraver. Some of this lady's works were printed in four volumes in 12mo, with her picture thus dressed up before them.—P.

[317] 'Osborne, Thomas;' a bookseller in Gray's Inn, very well qualified by his impudence to act this part; and therefore placed here instead of a less deserving predecessor. This man published advertisements for a year together, pretending to sell Mr Pope's subscription books of Homer's Iliad at half the price. Of which books he had none, but cut to the size of them (which was quarto) the common books in folio, without copperplates, on a worse paper, and never above half the value.—P. This was the man Johnson knocked down.

[318] 'Rolli:' Paolo Antonio Rolli, an Italian poet, and writer of many operas in that language, which, partly by the help of his genius, prevailed in England near twenty years. He taught Italian to some fine gentlemen, who affected to direct the operas.—P.

[319] 'Bentley:' this applies not to Richard but to Thomas Bentley, his nephew, and a small imitator of his great uncle.

[320] 'Welsted:' Leonard Welsted, author of the Triumvirate, or a Letter in verse from Palaemon to Celia at Bath, which was meant for a satire on Mr P. and some of his friends about the year 1718.—P.

[321] 'With thunder rumbling from the mustard bowl:' the old way of making thunder and mustard were the same; but since it is more advantageously performed by troughs of wood with stops in them. Whether Mr Dennis was the inventor of that improvement, I know not; but it is certain that being once at a tragedy of a new author, he fell into a great passion at hearing some, and cried, ''Sdeath! that is my thunder.'—P.

[322] 'Norton:' see ver. 417.—J. Durant Breval, author of a very extra-ordinary Book of Travels, and some poems.—P.

[323] 'Webster:' the editor of a newspaper called the Weekly Miscellany.

[324] 'Whitfield:' the great preacher—what a contrast to his satirist!

[325] 'As morning prayer, and flagellation end:' it is between eleven and twelve in the morning, after church service, that the criminals are whipped in Bridewell. This is to mark punctually the time of the day: Homer does it by the circumstance of the judges rising from court, or of the labourers' dinner; our author by one very proper both to the persons and the scene of his poem, which we may remember commenced in the evening of the Lord-mayor's day. The first book passed in that night; the next morning the games begin in the Strand; thence along Fleet Street (places inhabited by booksellers); then they proceed by Bridewell towards Fleet-ditch; and, lastly, through Ludgate to the City and the temple of the goddess.—P.

[326] 'Dash through thick and thin—love of dirt—dark dexterity:' the three chief qualifications of party-writers: to stick at nothing, to delight in flinging dirt, and to slander in the dark by guess.—P.

[327] 'The weekly journals:' papers of news and scandal intermixed, on different sides and parties, and frequently shifting from one side to the other, called the London Journal, British Journal, Daily Journal, &c., the concealed writers of which for some time were Oldmixon, Roome, Arnall, Concanen, and others; persons never seen by our author.—P.

[328] 'A peck of coals a-piece:' our indulgent poet, whenever he has spoken of any dirty or low work, constantly puts us in mind of the poverty of the offenders, as the only extenuation of such practices. Let any one but remark, when a thief, a pickpocket, a highwayman, or a knight of the post are spoken of, how much our hate to those characters is lessened, if they add a needy thief, a poor pickpocket, a hungry highwayman, a starving knight of the post, &c.—P.

[329] 'In naked majesty Oldmixon stands:' Mr John Oldmixon, next to Sir Dennis the most ancient critic of our nation.—P.

[330] 'Next Smedley dived:' the person here mentioned, an Irishman, was author and publisher of many scurrilous pieces, a weekly Whitehall journal, in the year 1722, in the name of Sir James Baker; and particularly whole volumes of Billingsgate against Dr Swift and Mr Pope, called Gulliveriana and Alexandriana, printed in octavo, 1728.—P.

[331] 'Aaron Hill:' see life.

[332] 'With each a sickly brother at his back: sons of a day, &c:' these were daily papers, a number of which, to lessen the expense, were printed one on the back of another.—P.

[333] 'Osborne:' a name assumed by the eldest and gravest of these writers, who at last, being ashamed of his pupils, gave his paper over, and in his age remained silent.—P.

[334] 'Gazetteers:' temporary journals, the ephemerals of the then press, the spawn of the minister of the hour, 'born and dying with the foul breath that made them.'

[335] 'William Arnall:' bred an attorney, was a perfect genius in this sort of work. He began under twenty with furious party-papers; then succeeded Concanen in the 'British Journal.' At the first publication of the 'Dunciad,' he prevailed on the author not to give him his due place in it, by a letter professing his detestation of such practices as his predecessor's. But since, by the most unexampled insolence, and personal abuse of several great men, the poet's particular friends, he most amply deserved a niche in the temple of infamy: witness a paper, called the 'Free Briton;' a dedication entitled, 'To the genuine blunderer,' 1732, and many others. He wrote for hire, and valued himself upon it; not indeed without cause, it appearing that he received 'for Free Britons, and other writings, in the space of four years, no less than ten thousand nine hundred and ninety-seven pounds, six shillings, and eight pence, out of the Treasury.' But frequently, through his fury or folly, he exceeded all the bounds of his commission, and obliged his honourable patron to disavow his scurrilities.—P.

[336] 'The plunging prelate:' Bishop Sherlock.

[337] 'And Milbourn:' Luke Milbourn, a clergyman, the fairest of critics, who, when he wrote against Mr Dryden's Virgil, did him justice in printing at the same time his own translations of him, which were intolerable.—P.

[338] 'Lud's famed gates:' 'King Lud, repairing the city, called it after his own name, Lud's Town; the strong gate which he built in the west part he likewise, for his own honour, named Ludgate. In the year 1260, this gate was beautified with images of Lud and other kings. Those images in the reign of Edward VI. had their heads smitten off, and were otherwise defaced by unadvised folks. Queen Mary did set new heads upon their old bodies again. The 28th of Queen Elizabeth, the same gate was clean taken down, and newly and beautifully builded, with images of Lud and others, as afore.' Stowe's Survey of London.—P.

[339] 'Thrice Budgell aim'd to speak:' famous for his speeches on many occasions about the South Sea Scheme, &c. 'He is a very ingenious gentleman, and hath written some excellent Epilogues to Plays, and one small piece on Love, which is very pretty.' Jacob, Lives of Poets, vol. ii. p. 289. But this gentleman since made himself much more eminent, and personally well known to the greatest statesmen of all parties, as well as to all the courts of law in this nation.—P.

[340] 'Toland and Tindal:' two persons, not so happy as to be obscure, who wrote against the religion of their country. Toland, the author of the Atheist's liturgy, called 'Pantheisticon,' was a spy, in pay to Lord Oxford. Tindal was author of the 'Rights of the Christian Church,' and 'Christianity as Old as the Creation.' He also wrote an abusive pamphlet against Earl S——, which was suppressed, while yet in MS., by an eminent person, then out of the ministry, to whom he showed it, expecting his approbation: this doctor afterwards published the same piece, mutatis mutandis, against that very person.—P.

[341] 'Christ's no kingdom here:' this is said by Curll, Key to Dunc., to allude to a sermon of a reverend Bishop (Hoadley).—P.

[342] 'Centlivre:' Mrs Susanna Centlivre, wife to Mr Centlivre, Yeoman of the Mouth to his Majesty. She wrote many plays, and a song (says Mr Jacob, vol. i. p. 32) before she was seven years old. She also wrote a ballad against Mr Pope's Homer, before he began it.—P.

[343] 'Motteux:' translator of Don Quixote.

[344] 'Boyer the state, and Law the stage gave o'er:' A. Boyer, a voluminous compiler of annals, political collections, &c.—William Law, A.M., wrote with great zeal against the stage; Mr Dennis answered with as great.—P. William Law was an extraordinary man. His 'Serious Call' made Dr Johnson religious. He became mystical in his views.

[345] 'Morgan:' a writer against religion.

[346] 'Mandeville:' the famous author of the 'Fable of the Bees.'

[347] 'Norton:' Norton Defoe, natural offspring of the famous Daniel. He edited the 'Flying Post,' and was a detractor of Pope.

[348] 'Taylor:' John Taylor, the water-poet, an honest man, who owns he learned not so much as the Accidence—a rare example of modesty in a poet!

'I must confess I do want eloquence, And never scarce did learn my Accidence; For having got from possum to posset, I there was gravell'd, could no further get.'

He wrote fourscore books in the reign of James I. and Charles I., and afterwards (like Edward Ward) kept an ale-house in Long-Acre. He died in 1654.—P.

[349] 'Benlowes:' a country gentleman, famous for his own bad poetry, and for patronising bad poets, as may be seen from many dedications of Quarles and others to him. Some of these anagrammed his name, Benlowes, into Benevolus; to verify which, he spent his whole estate upon them.—P.

[350] 'And Shadwell nods the poppy:' Shadwell took opium for many years, and died of too large a dose, in the year 1692.—P.

[351] 'Old Bavius sits:' Bavius was an ancient poet, celebrated by Virgil for the like cause as Bayes by our author, though not in so Christian-like a manner: for heathenishly it is declared by Virgil of Bavius, that he ought to be hated and detested for his evil works; qui Bavium non odit; whereas we have often had occasion to observe our poet's great good nature and mercifulness through the whole course of this poem. Scribl.—P.

[352] 'Brown and Mears:' booksellers, printers for anybody.—The allegory of the souls of the dull coming forth in the form of books, dressed in calf's leather, and being let abroad in vast numbers by booksellers, is sufficiently intelligible.—P.

[353] 'Ward in pillory:' John Ward of Hackney, Esq., member of parliament, being convicted of forgery, was first expelled the House, and then sentenced to the pillory on the 17th of February 1727. Mr Curll (having likewise stood there) looks upon the mention of such a gentleman in a satire as a great act of barbarity. Key to the Dunc., 3d edit. p. 16. And another author reasons thus upon it: Durgen., 8vo, pp. 11, 12, 'How unworthy is it of Christian charity to animate the rabble to abuse a worthy man in such a situation? What could move the poet thus to mention a brave sufferer, a gallant prisoner, exposed to the view of all mankind? It was laying aside his senses, it was committing a crime, for which the law is deficient not to punish him! nay, a crime which man can scarce forgive or time efface! Nothing surely could have induced him to it but being bribed by a great lady,' &c. (to whom this brave, honest, worthy gentleman was guilty of no offence but forgery, proved in open court). But it is evident this verse could not be meant of him, it being notorious that no eggs were thrown at that gentleman. Perhaps, therefore, it might be intended of Mr Edward Ward, the poet, when he stood there.—P.

[354] 'Settle:' Elkanah Settle was once a writer in vogue, as well as Cibber, both for dramatic poetry and politics.—P.

[355] 'Monarch:' Chi Ho-am-ti, Emperor of China, the same who built the great wall between China and Tartary, destroyed all the books and learned men of that empire.—P.

[356] 'Physic of the soul:' the caliph, Omar I., having conquered Egypt, caused his general to burn the Ptolemaean library, on the gates of which was this inscription, [Greek: PSYCHES IATREION], the Physic of the soul.—P.

[357] 'Happy!—had Easter never been:' wars in England anciently, about the right time of celebrating Easter.—P.

[358] 'Jacob, the scourge of grammar, mark with awe:' this gentleman is son of a considerable maltster of Romsey in Southamptonshire, and bred to the law under a very eminent attorney; who, between his more laborious studies, has diverted himself with poetry. He is a great admirer of poets and their works, which has occasioned him to try his genius that way. He has wrote in prose the Lives of the Poets, Essays, and a great many law-books, The Accomplished Conveyancer, Modern Justice, &c.' Giles Jacob of himself, Lives of Poets, vol. i. He very grossly, and unprovoked, abused in that book the author's friend, Mr Gay.—P.

[359] 'Horneck and Roome:' these two were virulent party-writers, worthily coupled together, and one would think prophetically, since, after the publishing of this piece, the former dying, the latter succeeded him in honour and employment. The first was Philip Horneck, author of a Billingsgate paper called The High German Doctor. Edward Roome was son of an undertaker for funerals in Fleet Street, and wrote some of the papers called Pasquin, where by malicious innuendos he endeavoured to represent our author guilty of malevolent practices with a great man then under prosecution of Parliament. Of this man was made the following epigram:

'You ask why Roome diverts you with his jokes, Yet if he writes, is dull as other folks? You wonder at it. This, sir, is the case, The jest is lost unless he prints his face.'

Popple was the author of some vile plays and pamphlets. He published abuses on our author in a paper called the Prompter.—P.

[360] 'Goode:' an ill-natured critic, who wrote a satire on our author, called The Mock Aesop, and many anonymous libels in newspapers for hire.—P.

[361] 'Ralph:' James Ralph, a name inserted after the first editions, not known to our author till he writ a swearing-piece called Sawney, very abusive of Dr Swift, Mr Gay, and himself. These lines allude to a thing of his, entitled Night, a Poem. This low writer attended his own works with panegyrics in the journals, and once in particular praised himself highly above Mr Addison, in wretched remarks upon that author's account of English Poets, printed in a London journal, September 1728. He was wholly illiterate, and knew no language, not even French. Being advised to read the rules of dramatic poetry before he began a play, he smiled and replied, 'Shakspeare wrote without rules.' He ended at last in the common sink of all such writers, a political newspaper, to which he was recommended by his friend Arnall, and received a small pittance for pay.—P. B. Franklin seems to have thought that his friend Ralph was alluded to here. See his Autobiography.

[362] 'Behold yon pair:' one of these was author of a weekly paper called The Grumbler, as the other was concerned in another called Pasquin, in which Mr Pope was abused with the Duke of Buckingham and Bishop of Rochester. They also joined in a piece against his first undertaking to translate the Iliad, entitled Homerides, by Sir Iliad Doggrel, printed 1715.—P.

[363] 'Wormius hight:' let not this name, purely fictitious, be conceited to mean the learned Olaus Wormius; much less (as it was unwarrantably foisted into the surreptitious editions) our own antiquary, Mr Thomas Hearne, who had no way aggrieved our poet, but, on the contrary, published many curious tracts which he hath to his great contentment perused.—P.

[364] 'Lo! Henley stands,' &c.: J. Henley, the orator; he preached on the Sundays upon theological matters, and on the Wednesdays upon all other sciences. Each auditor paid one shilling. He declaimed some years against the greatest persons, and occasionally did our author that honour.—P.

[365] 'Sherlock, Hare, Gibson:' bishops of Salisbury, Chichester, and London, whose Sermons and Pastoral Letters did honour to their country as well as stations.—P.

[366] Of Toland and Tindal, see book ii. Thomas Woolston was an impious madman, who wrote in a most insolent style against the miracles of the Gospel, in the year 1726, &c.—P.

[367] 'A sable sorcerer:' Dr Faustus, the subject of a set of farces, which, lasted in vogue two or three seasons, in which both playhouses strove to outdo each other for some years.—P.

[368] 'Hell rises, Heaven descends, and dance on earth:' this monstrous absurdity was actually represented in Tibbald's Rape of Proserpine.—P.

[369] 'Lo! one vast egg:' in another of these farces, Harlequin is hatched upon the stage, out of a large egg.—P.

[370] 'Immortal Rich:' Mr John Rich, master of the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden, was the first that excelled this way.—P.

[371] Booth and Cibber were joint managers of the Theatre in Drury Lane.—P.

[372] 'Though long my party:' Settle, like most party-writers, was very uncertain in his political principles. He was employed to hold the pen in the character of a popish successor, but afterwards printed his narrative on the other side. He had managed the ceremony of a famous pope-burning on Nov. 17, 1680, then became a trooper in King James's army, at Hounslow Heath. After the Revolution he kept a booth at Bartholomew Fair, where, in the droll called St George for England, he acted in his old age in a dragon of green leather of his own invention; he was at last taken into the Charter-house, and there died, aged sixty years.—P.

[373] 'Polypheme:' he translated the Italian Opera of Polifemo, but unfortunately lost the whole gist of the story. The Cyclops asks Ulysses his name who tells him his name is Noman. After his eye is put out, he roars and calls the brother Cyclops to his aid: they inquire who has hurt him? he answers Noman; whereupon they all go away again. Our ingenious translator made Ulysses answer, 'I take no name,' whereby all that followed became unintelligible. Hence it appears that Mr Gibber (who values himself on subscribing to the English translation of Homer's Iliad) had not that merit with respect to the Odyssey, or he might have been better instructed in the Greek Punology.—P.

[374] 'Faustus, Pluto,' &c.: names of miserable farces, which it was the custom to act at the end of the best tragedies, to spoil the digestion of the audience.—P.

[375] 'Ensure it but from fire:' in Tibbald's farce of Proserpine, a corn-field was set on fire; whereupon the other play-house had a barn burned down for the recreation of the spectators. They also rivalled each other in showing the burnings of hell fire, in Dr Faustus.—P.

[376] 'Another AEschylus appears:' it is reported of AEschylus, that when his tragedy of the Furies was acted, the audience were so terrified that the children fell into fits, and the big-bellied women miscarried.—P.

[377] '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 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. In favour 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 nearly ninety years.—P.

[378] 'Ambrose Philips:' 'he was,' saith Mr Jacob, 'one of the wits at Button's, and a justice of the peace.'—P.

[379] 'While Jones' and Boyle's united labours fall:' at the time when this poem was written, the banqueting-house of Whitehall, the church and piazza of Covent Garden, and the palace and chapel of Somerset House, the works of the famous Inigo Jones, had been for many years so neglected as to be in danger of ruin. The portico of Covent Garden church had been just then restored and beautified at the expense of the Earl of Burlington, who, at the same time, by his publication of the designs of that great master and Palladio, as well as by many noble buildings of his own, revived the true taste of architecture in this kingdom.—P.

[380] 'Mad Mathesis:' alluding to the strange conclusions some mathematicians have deduced from their principles, concerning the real quantity of matter, the reality of space, &c.—P. W.

[381] 'Pure space:' i.e. pure and defaecated from matter. 'Ecstatic stare:' the action of men who look about with full assurance of seeing what does not exist, such as those who expect to find space a real being.—W.

[382] 'Running round the circle, finds it square:' regards the wild and fruitless attempts of squaring the circle.—P. W.

[383] 'Nor couldst thou,' &c.: this noble person in the year 1737, when the act aforesaid was brought into the House of Lords, opposed it in an excellent speech (says Mr Cibber), 'with a lively spirit, and uncommon eloquence.' This speech had the honour to be answered by the said Mr Cibber, with a lively spirit also, and in a manner very uncommon, in the 8th chapter of his Life and Manners.—P.

[384] 'Harlot form:' the attitude given to this phantom represents the nature and genius of the Italian Opera; its affected airs, its effeminate sounds, and the practice of patching up these operas with favourite songs, incoherently put together. These things were supported by the subscriptions of the nobility. This circumstance, that Opera should prepare for the opening of the grand sessions, was prophesied of in book iii. ver. 304,

'Already Opera prepares the way, The sure forerunner of her gentle sway.'

P. W.

[385] 'Division reign:' alluding to the false taste of playing tricks in music with numberless divisions, to the neglect of that harmony which conforms to the sense, and applies to the passions. Mr Handel had introduced a great number of hands, and more variety of instruments into the orchestra, and employed even drums and cannon to make a fuller chorus; which proved so much too manly for the fine gentlemen of his age, that he was obliged to remove his music into Ireland. After which they were reduced, for want of composers, to practise the patch-work above mentioned.—P. W.

[386] 'Chromatic:' that species of the ancient music called the Chromatic was a variation and embellishment, in odd irregularities, of the diatonic kind. They say it was invented about the time of Alexander, and that the Spartans forbad the use of it, as languid and effeminate.—W.

[387] 'Wake the dull church, and lull the ranting stage:' i.e. dissipate the devotion of the one by light and wanton airs; and subdue the pathos of the other by recitative and sing-song.—W.

[388] 'Narcissus:' Lord Hervey.

[389] 'Bold Benson:' this man endeavoured to raise himself to fame by erecting monuments, striking coins, setting up heads, and procuring translations of Milton; and afterwards by as great passion for Arthur Johnston, a Scotch physician's version of the Psalms, of which he printed many fine editions. See more of him, book iii. v. 325.—P. W.

[390] 'The decent knight:' Sir Thomas Hanmer, who was about to publish a very pompous edition of a great author, at his own expense.—P. W.

[391] 'So by each bard an alderman,' &c.: alluding to the monument of Butler erected by Alderman Barber.

[392] 'The Samian letter:' the letter Y, used by Pythagoras as an emblem of the different roads of Virtue and Vice.

'Et tibi quae Samios diduxit litera ramos.'—Pers. P. W.

[393] 'House or Hall:' Westminster Hall and the House of Commons.—W.

[394] 'Master-piece of man:' viz., an epigram. The famous Dr South declared a perfect epigram to be as difficult a performance as an epic poem. And the critics say, 'An epic poem is the greatest work human nature is capable of.'—P. W.

[395] 'Gentle James:' Wilson tells us that this king, James I., took upon himself to teach the Latin tongue to Carr, Earl of Somerset; and that Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, would speak false Latin to him, on purpose to give him the pleasure of correcting it, whereby he wrought himself into his good graces.—P. W. See Fortunes of Nigel.

[396] 'Locke:' in the year 1703 there was a meeting of the heads of the University of Oxford to censure Mr Locke's Essay on Human Understanding, and to forbid the reading it. See his Letters in the last edit.—P. W.

[397] 'Crousaz:' see Life.

[398] 'The streams:' the River Cam, running by the walls of these colleges, which are particularly famous for their skill in disputation.—P. W.

[399] 'Sleeps in port:' viz., 'now retired into harbour, after the tempests that had long agitated his society.' So Scriblerus. But the learned Scipio Maffei understands it of a certain wine called port, from Oporto a city of Portugal, of which this professor invited him to drink abundantly. Scip. Maff., De Compotationibus Academicis.—P. W.

[400] 'Letter:' alluding to those grammarians, such as Palamedes and Simonides, who invented single letters. But Aristarchus, who had found out a double one, was therefore worthy of double honour.—Scribl. W.

[401] 'Digamma:' alludes to the boasted restoration of the Aeolic digamma, in his long-projected edition of Homer. He calls it something more than letter, from the enormous figure it would make among the other letters, being one gamma set upon the shoulders of another.—P. W.

[402] 'Cicero:' grammatical disputes about the manner of pronouncing Cicero's name in Greek.—W.

[403] 'Freind—Alsop:' Dr Robert Freind, master of Westminster school, and canon of Christ-church—Dr Anthony Alsop, a happy imitator of the Horatian style.—P. W.

[404] 'Manilius or Solinus:' some critics having had it in their choice to comment either on Virgil or Manilius, Pliny or Solinus, have chosen the worse author, the more freely to display their critical capacity.—P. W.

[405] 'Suidas, Gellius, Stobaeus:' the first a dictionary-writer, a collector of impertinent facts and barbarous words; the second a minute critic; the third an author, who gave his common-place book to the public, where we happen to find much mince-meat of old books.—P. W.

[406] 'Divinity:' a word much affected by the learned Aristarchus in common conversation, to signify genius or natural acumen. But this passage has a further view: [Greek: Nous] was the Platonic term for mind, or the first cause, and that system of divinity is here hinted at which terminates in blind nature without a [Greek: Nous].—P. W.

[407] 'Petrify a genius:' those who have no genius, employed in works of imagination; those who have, in abstract sciences.—P. W.

[408] 'And hew the block off:' a notion of Aristotle, that there was originally in every block of marble a statue, which would appear on the removal of the superfluous parts.—P. W.

[409] 'Ajax' spectre:' see Homer Odyss. xi., where the ghost of Ajax turns sullenly from Ulysses the traveller, who had succeeded against him in the dispute for the arms of Achilles.—Scribl. W.

[410] 'The first came forwards:' this forwardness or pertness is the certain consequence, when the children of Dulness are spoiled by too great fondness of their parent.—W.

[411] 'As if he saw St James's:' reflecting on the disrespectful and indecent behaviour of several forward young persons in the presence, so offensive to all serious men, and to none more than the good Scriblerus.—P. W.

[412] 'Lily-silver'd vales:' Tube roses.—P.

[413] 'Lion of the deeps:' the winged Lion, the arms of Venice.—P. W.

[414] 'Greatly-daring dined:' it being, indeed, no small risk to eat through those extraordinary compositions, whose disguised ingredients are generally unknown to the guests, and highly inflammatory and unwholesome.—P. W.

[415] 'Jansen, Fleetwood, Cibber:' three very eminent persons, all managers of plays; who, though not governors by profession, had, each in his way, concerned themselves in the education of youth, and regulated their wits, their morals, or their finances, at that period of their age which is the most important—their entrance into the polite world.—P. W.

[416] 'Paridel:' the poet seems to speak of this young gentleman with great affection. The name is taken from Spenser, who gives it to a wandering courtly squire, that travelled about for the same reason for which many young squires are now fond of travelling, and especially to Paris.—P. W.

[417] 'Annius:' the name taken from Annius the Monk of Viterbo, famous for many impositions and forgeries of ancient manuscripts and inscriptions, which he was prompted to by mere vanity, but our Annius had a more substantial motive. Annius, Sir Andrew Fontaine.—P. W.

[418] 'Still to cheat:' some read skill, but that is frivolous, for Annius hath that skill already; or if he had not, skill were not wanting to cheat such persons.—Bentl. P. W.

[419] 'Hunt the Athenian fowl:' the owl stamped on the reverse on the ancient money of Athens.—P. W.

[420] 'Attys and Cecrops:' the first king of Athens, of whom it is hard to suppose any coins are extant; but not so improbable as what follows, that there should be any of Mahomet, who forbad all images, and the story of whose pigeon was a monkish fable. Nevertheless, one of these Annius's made a counterfeit medal of that impostor, now in the collection of a learned nobleman.—P. W.

[421] 'Mummius:' this name is not merely an allusion to the mummies he was so fond of, but probably referred to the Roman General of that name, who burned Corinth, and committed the curious statues to the captain of a ship, assuring him, 'that if any were lost or broken, he should procure others to be made in their stead,' by which it should seem (whatever may be pretended) that Mummius was no virtuoso.-P. W.

[422] 'Cheops:' a king of Egypt, whose body was certainly to be known, as being buried alone in his pyramid, and is therefore more genuine than any of the Cleopatras. This royal mummy, being stolen by a wild Arab, was purchased by the consul of Alexandria, and transmitted to the Museum of Mummius; for proof of which he brings a passage in Sandys's Travels, where that accurate and learned voyager assures us that he saw the sepulchre empty, which agrees exactly (saith he) with the time of the theft above mentioned. But he omits to observe that Herodotus tells the same thing of it in his time.—P. W.

[423] 'Speak'st thou of Syrian princes:' the strange story following, which may be taken for a fiction of the poet, is justified by a true relation in Spon's Voyages. Vaillant (who wrote the History of the Syrian Kings as it is to be found on medals) coming from the Levant, where he had been collecting various coins, and being pursued by a corsair of Sallee, swallowed down twenty gold medals. A sudden bourasque freed him from the rover, and he got to land with them in his belly. On his road to Avignon, he met two physicians, of whom he demanded assistance. One advised purgations, the other vomits. In this uncertainty he took neither, but pursued his way to Lyons, where he found his ancient friend, the famous physician and antiquary Dufour, to whom he related his adventure. Dufour first asked him whether the medals were of the higher empire? He assured him they were. Dufour was ravished with the hope of possessing such a treasure—he bargained with him on the spot for the most curious of them, and was to recover them at his own expense.—P. W.

[424] 'Witness, great Ammon:' Jupiter Ammon is called to witness, as the father of Alexander, to whom those kings succeeded in the division of the Macedonian Empire, and whose horns they wore on their medals.—P. W.

[425] 'Douglas:' a physician of great learning and no less taste; above all, curious in what related to Horace, of whom he collected every edition, translation, and comment, to the number of several hundred volumes.—P. W.

[426] 'And named it Caroline:' it is a compliment which the florists usually pay to princes and great persons, to give their names to the most curious flowers of their raising. Some have been very jealous of vindicating this honour, but none more than that ambitions gardener, at Hammersmith, who caused his favourite to be painted on his sign, with this inscription—'This is my Queen Caroline.'—P. W.

[427] 'Moss:' of which the naturalists count I can't tell how many hundred species.—P. W.

[428] 'Wilkins' wings:' one of the first projectors of the Royal Society, who, among many enlarged and useful notions, entertained the extravagant hope of a possibility to fly to the moon; which has put some volatile geniuses upon making wings for that purpose.—P. W.

[429] 'Moral evidence:' alluding to a ridiculous and absurd way of some mathematicians in calculating the gradual decay of moral evidence by mathematical proportions; according to which calculation, in about fifty years it will be no longer probable that Julius Caesar was in Gaul, or died in the senate-house.—P. W.

[430] 'The high priori road:' those who, from the effects in this visible world, deduce the eternal power and Godhead of the First Cause, though they cannot attain to an adequate idea of the Deity, yet discover so much of him as enables them to see the end of their creation, and the means of their happiness; whereas they who take this high priori road (such as Hobbes, Spinoza, Descartes, and some better reasoners) for one that goes right, ten lose themselves in mists, or ramble after visions, which deprive them of all right of their end, and mislead them in the choice of the means.—P. W.

[431] 'Make Nature still:' this relates to such as, being ashamed to assert a mere mechanic cause, and yet unwilling to forsake it entirely, have had recourse to a certain plastic nature, elastic fluid, subtile matter, &c.—P. W.

[432]

'Thrust some mechanic cause into his place, Or bind in matter, or diffuse in space:'

The first of these follies is that of Descartes; the second, of Hobbes; the third, of some succeeding philosophers.—P. W.

[433] 'Bright image:' bright image was the title given by the later Platonists to that vision of nature which they had formed out of their own fancy, so bright that they called it [Greek: Autopton Agalma], or the self-seen image, i. e., seen by its own light. This ignis fatuus has in these our times appeared again in the north; and the writings of Hutcheson, Geddes, and their followers, are full of its wonders. For in this lux borealis, this self-seen image, these second-sighted philosophers see everything else.—Scribl. W. Let it be either the Chance god of Epicurus, or the Fate of this goddess.—W.

[434] 'Theocles:' thus this philosopher calls upon his friend, to partake with him in these visions:

'To-morrow, when the eastern sun With his first beams adorns the front Of yonder hill, if you're content To wander with me in the woods you see, We will pursue those loves of ours, By favour of the sylvan nymphs:

and invoking, first, the genius of the place, we'll try to obtain at least some faint and distant view of the sovereign genius and first beauty.' Charact. vol. ii. p. 245.—P. W.

[435] 'Society adores:' see the Pantheisticon, with its liturgy and rubrics, composed by Toland.—W.

[436] 'Silenus:' Silenus was an Epicurean philosopher, as appears from Virgil, Eclog. vi., where he sings the principles of that philosophy in his drink. He is meant for one Thomas Gordon.—P. W.

[437] 'First, slave to words:' a recapitulation of the whole course of modern education described in this book, which confines youth to the study of words only in schools, subjects them to the authority of systems in the universities, and deludes them with the names of party distinctions in the world,—all equally concurring to narrow the understanding, and establish slavery and error in literature, philosophy, and politics. The whole finished in modern free-thinking; the completion of whatever is vain, wrong, and destructive to the happiness of mankind, as it establishes self-love for the sole principle of action.—P. W.

[438] 'Smiled on by a queen:' i.e. this queen or goddess of Dulness.—P.

[439] 'Mr Philip Wharton, who died abroad and outlawed in 1791.

[440] 'Nothing left but homage to a king:' so strange as this must seem to a mere English reader, the famous Mons. de la Bruyere declares it to be the character of every good subject in a monarchy; 'where,' says he, 'there is no such thing as love of our country; the interest, the glory, and service of the prince, supply its place.'—De la Republique, chap. x.—P.

[441] 'The balm of Dulness:' the true balm of Dulness, called by the Greek physicians [Greek: Kolakeia], is a sovereign remedy against inanity, and has its poetic name from the goddess herself. Its ancient dispensators were her poets; and for that reason our author, book ii. v. 207, calls it the poet's healing balm; but it is now got into as many hands as Goddard's Drops or Daffy's Elixir.—W.

[442] 'The board with specious miracles he loads:' these were only the miracles of French cookery, and particularly pigeons en crapeau were a common dish.—P. W.

[443] 'Seve and verdeur:' French terms relating to wines, which signify their flavour and poignancy.—P. W.

[444] 'Bladen—Hays:' names of gamesters. Bladen is a black man. Robert Knight, cashier of the South Sea Company, who fled from England in 1720 (afterwards pardoned in 1742). These lived with the utmost magnificence at Paris, and kept open tables frequented by persons of the first quality of England, and even by princes of the blood of France.—P. W. The former note of 'Bladen is a black man,' is very absurd. The manuscript here is partly obliterated, and doubtless could only have been, Wash blackmoors white, alluding to a known proverb.—Scribl. P. W. Bladen was uncle to Collins the poet. See our edition of 'Collins.'

[445] 'Gregorian, Gormogon:' a sort of lay-brothers, slips from the root of the freemasons.—P. W.

[446] 'Arachne's subtile line:' this is one of the most ingenious employments assigned, and therefore recommended only to peers of learning. Of weaving stockings of the webs of spiders, see the Phil. Trans.—P. W.

[447] 'Sergeant call:' alluding perhaps to that ancient and solemn dance, entitled, A Call of Sergeants.—P. W.

[448] 'Teach kings to fiddle:' an ancient amusement of sovereign princes, viz. Achilles, Alexander, Nero; though despised by Themistocles, who was a republican. 'Make senates dance:' either after their prince, or to Pontoise, or Siberia.—P. W.

[449] 'Gilbert:' Archbishop of York, who had attacked Dr King, of Oxford, a friend of Pope's.

[450] Verses 615-618 were written many years ago, and may be found in the state poems of that time. So that Scriblerus is mistaken, or whoever else have imagined this poem of a fresher date.—P. W.

[451] 'Truth to her old cavern fled:' alluding to the saying of Democritus, that Truth lay at the bottom of a deep well, from whence he had drawn her; though Butler says, he first put her in, before he drew her out.—W.

[452] Read thus confidently, instead of 'beginning with the word books, and ending with the word flies,' as formerly it stood. Read also, 'containing the entire sum of one thousand seven hundred and fifty-four verses,' instead of 'one thousand and twelve lines;' such being the initial and final words, and such the true and entire contents of this poem. Thou art to know, reader! that the first edition thereof, like that of Milton, was never seen by the author (though living and not blind). The editor himself confessed as much in his preface; and no two poems were ever published in so arbitrary a manner. The editor of this had as boldly suppressed whole passages, yea the entire last book, as the editor of Paradise Lost added and augmented. Milton himself gave but ten books, his editor twelve; this author gave four books, his editor only three. But we have happily done justice to both; and presume we shall live, in this our last labour, as long as in any of our others.—Bentl.

[453] Milbourn on Dryden's Virgil, 8vo, 1698, p. 6.

[454] Ibid. p. 38.

[455] Ibid. p. 192.

[456] Ibid. p. 8.

[457] Whip and Key, 4to, printed for R. Janeway, 1682, preface.

[458] Ibid.

[459] Milbourn, p. 9.

[460] Ibid. p. 176.

[461] Ibid. p. 39.

[462] Whip and Key, preface.

[463] Oldmixon, Essay on Criticism, p. 84.

[464] Milbourn, p. 2.

[465] Ibid. p. 35.

[466] Ibid. pp. 22, 192.

[467] Ibid. p. 72.

[468] Ibid. p. 203.

[469] Ibid, p. 78.

[470] Ibid, p. 206.

[471] Ibid. p. 19.

[472] Ibid. p. 144, 190.

[473] Ibid. p. 67.

[474] Milbourn, p. 192.

[475] Ibid. p. 125.

[476] Whip and Key, preface.

[477] Milbourn, p. 105.

[478] Ibid. p. 11.

[479] Ibid. p. 176.

[480] Ibid. p. 57.

[481] Whip and Key, preface.

[482] Milbourn, p. 34.

[483] Ibid. p. 35.

[484] Dennis's Remarks on the Rape of the Lock, preface, p. xii.

[485] Dunciad Dissected.

[486] Preface to Gulliveriana.

[487] Dennis, Character of Mr P.

[488] Theobald, Letter in Mist's Journal, June 22, 1728.

[489] List at the end of a Collection of Verses, Letters, Advertisements, 8vo, printed for A. Moore, 1728, and the preface to it, p. 6.

[490] Dennis's Remarks on Homer, p. 27.

[491] Preface to Gulliveriana, p. 11.

[492] Dedication to the Collection of Verses, Letters, &c., p. 9.

[493] Mist's Journal of June 8, 1728.

[494] Character of Mr P. and Dennis on Homer.

[495] Dennis's Remarks on Pope's Homer, p. 12.

[496] Ibid. p. 14.

[497] Character of Mr P., p. 17, and Remarks on Homer, p. 91.

[498] Dennis's Remarks on Homer, p. 12.

[499] Daily Journal, April 23, 1728.

[500] Supplement to the Profund, preface.

[501] Oldmixon, Essay on Criticism, p. 66.

[502] Dennis's Remarks, p. 28.

[503] Homerides, p. 1, &c.

[504] British Journal, Nov. 25, 1727.

[505] Dennis, Daily Journal, May 11, 1728.

[506] Dennis, Remarks on Homer, Preface.

[507] Dennis's Remarks on the Rape of the Lock, preface, p. 9.

[508] Character of Mr P., p. 3.

[509] Ibid.

[510] Dennis, Remarks on Homer, p. 37.

[511] Ibid, p. 8.

END OF POPE'S WORKS.