A brief analysis of the game played on this occasion will clear up the passage and leave the reader free to admire the ingenuity with which Pope has described the contest in terms of epic poetry.

Belinda declares spades trumps and so becomes the "ombre." She leads one after the other the three matadores; and takes three tricks. She then leads the next highest card, the king of spades, and wins a fourth trick. Being out of trumps she now leads the king of clubs; but the baron, who has actually held more spades than Belinda, trumps it with the queen of spades. All the trumps are now exhausted and the baron's long suit of diamonds is established. He takes the sixth, seventh, and eighth tricks with the king, queen, and knave of diamonds, respectively. Everything now depends on the last trick, since Belinda and the baron each have taken four. The baron leads the ace of hearts and Belinda takes it with the king, thus escaping "codille" and winning the stake.

'30 the sacred nine':

the nine Muses.

'41 succint':

tucked up.

'54 one Plebeian card':

one of Belinda's opponents is now out of trumps and discards a low card on her lead.

'61 Pam':

a term applied to the knave of clubs which was always the highest card in Lu, another popular game of that day.

'74 the globe':

the jeweled ball which forms one of the regalia of a monarch. The aspect of playing cards has changed not a little since Pope's day, but the globe is still to be seen on the king of clubs.

'79 Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts':

these are the losing cards played by Belinda and the third player on the baron's winning diamonds.

'99'

Pope's old enemy, Dennis, objected to the impropriety of Belinda's filling the sky with exulting shouts, and some modern critics have been foolish enough to echo his objection. The whole scene is a masterpiece of the mock-heroic. The game is a battle, the cards are warriors, and Belinda's exclamations of pleasure at winning are in the same fashion magnified into the cheers of a victorious army.

'100 long canals':

the canals which run through the splendid gardens of Hampton Court, laid out by William III in the Dutch fashion.

'106 The berries crackle':

it would seem from this phrase that coffee was at that time roasted as well as ground in the drawing-room. In a letter written shortly after the date of this poem Pope describes Swift as roasting coffee "with his own hands in an engine made for that purpose."

Coffee had been introduced into England about the middle of the seventeenth century. In 1657 a barber who had opened one of the first coffeehouses in London was indicted for "making and selling a sort of liquor called coffee, as a great nuisance and prejudice of the neighborhood." In Pope's time there were nearly three thousand coffee-houses in London.

'The mill':

the coffee-mill.

'107 Altars of Japan':

japanned stands for the lamps.

'117-118'

The parenthesis in these lines contains a hit at the would-be omniscient politicians who haunted the coffee-houses of Queen Anne's day, and who professed their ability to see through all problems of state with their eyes half-shut. Pope jestingly attributes their wisdom to the inspiring power of coffee.

'122 Scylla':

the daughter of King Nisus in Grecian legends. Nisus had a purple hair and so long as it was untouched he was unconquerable. Scylla fell in love with one of his enemies and pulled out the hair while Nisus slept. For this crime she was turned into a bird. The story is told in full in Ovid's 'Metamorphoses', Bk. VIII.

'127 Clarissa':

it does not appear that Pope had any individual lady in mind. We do not know, at least, that any lady instigated or aided Lord Petre to cut off the lock.

'144 An earthly Lover':

we know nothing of any love affair of Miss Fermor's. Pope mentions the "earthly lover" here to account for Ariel's desertion of Belinda, for he could only protect her so long as she "rejected mankind"; compare Canto I, ll. 67-68.

'147 Forfex':

a Latin word meaning scissors.

'152'

Pope borrowed this idea from Milton, who represents the wound inflicted on Satan, by the Archangel Michael as healing immediately—

Th' ethereal substance closed Not long divisible.

—'Paradise Lost', VI, 330-331.

'165 Atalantis': 'The New Atalantis',

a four-volume "cornucopia of scandal" involving almost every public character of the day, was published by a Mrs. Manley in 1709. It was very widely read. The Spectator found it, along with a key which revealed the identities of its characters, in the lady's library already mentioned ('Spectator', No. 37).

'166 the small pillow':

a richly decorated pillow which fashionable ladies used to prop them up in bed when they received morning visits from gentlemen. Addison gives an account of such a visit in the 'Spectator', No. 45.

'167 solemn days':

days of marriage or mourning, on which at this time formal calls were paid.

'173 the labour of the gods':

the walls of Troy built by Apollo and Neptune for King Laomedon.

'178 unresisted':

irresistible.



CANTO IV

'8 Cynthia':

a fanciful name for any fashionable lady. No individual is meant.

'manteau':

a loose upper garment for women.

'16 Spleen':

the word is used here as a personification of melancholy, or low spirits. It was not an uncommon affectation in England at this time. A letter to the 'Spectator', No. 53, calls it "the distemper of the great and the polite."

'17 the Gnome':

Umbriel, who in accordance with his nature now proceeds to stir up trouble. Compare Canto I, ll. 63-64.

'20'

The bitter east wind which put every one into a bad humor was supposed to be one of the main causes of the spleen.

'23 She':

the goddess of the spleen. Compare l. 79.

'84 Megrim':

headache.

'29 store':

a large supply.

'38 night-dress':

the modern dressing-gown. The line means that whenever a fashionable beauty bought a new dressing-gown she pretended to be ill in order to show her new possession to sympathetic friends who called on her.

'40 phantoms':

these are the visions, dreadful or delightful, of the disordered imagination produced by spleen.

'43 snakes on rolling spires':

like the serpent which Milton describes in 'Paradise Lost', IX, 501-502, "erect amidst his circling spires."

'46 angels in machines':

angels coming to help their votaries. The word "machine" here has an old-fashioned technical sense. It was first used to describe the apparatus by which a god was let down upon the stage of the Greek theater. Since a god was only introduced at a critical moment to help the distressed hero, the phrase, "deus ex machina," came to mean a god who rendered aid. Pope transfers it here to angels.

'47 throngs':

Pope now describes the mad fancies of people so affected by spleen as to imagine themselves transformed to inanimate objects.

'51 pipkin':

a little jar. Homer ('Iliad', XVIII, 373-377) tells how Vulcan had made twenty wonderful tripods on living wheels that moved from place to place of their own accord.

'52'

Pope in a note to this poem says that a lady of his time actually imagined herself to be a goose-pie.

'56 A branch':

so AEneas bore a magic branch to protect him when he descended to the infernal regions ('AEneid', VI, 136-143).

'Spleenwort':

a sort of fern which was once supposed to be a remedy against the spleen.

'58 the sex':

women.

'59 vapours':

a form of spleen to which women were supposed to be peculiarly liable, something like our modern hysteria. It seems to have taken its name from the fogs of England which were thought to cause it.

'65 a nymph':

Belinda, who had always been so light-hearted that she had never been a victim of the spleen.

'89 Citron-waters':

a liqueur made by distilling brandy with the rind of citrons. It was a fashionable drink for ladies at this time.

'71'

Made men suspicious of their wives.

'82 Ulysses':

Homer ('Odyssey', X, 1-25) tells how AEolus, the god of the winds, gave Ulysses a wallet of oxhide in which all the winds that might oppose his journey homeward were closely bound up.

'89 Thalestris':

the name of a warlike queen of the Amazons. Pope uses it here for a friend of Belinda's, who excites her to revenge herself for the rape of her lock. It is said that this friend was a certain Mrs. Morley.

'102 loads of lead':

curl papers used to be fastened with strips of lead.

'105 Honour':

female reputation.

'109 toast':

a slang term in Pope's day for a reigning beauty whose health was regularly drunk by her admirers. Steele ('Tatler', No. 24) says that the term had its rise from an accident that happened at Bath in the reign of Charles II. A famous beauty was bathing there in public, and one of her admirers filled a glass with the water in which she stood and drank her health.

"There was in the place," says Steele "a gay fellow, half-fuddled, who offered to jump in, and swore though he liked not the liquor, he would have the Toast. He was opposed in his resolution; yet this whim gave foundation to the present honor which is done to the lady we mention in our liquors, who has ever since been called a TOAST."

To understand the point of the story one must know that it was an old custom to put a bit of toast in hot drinks.

In this line in the poem Thalestris insinuates that if Belinda submits tamely to the rape of the lock, her position as a toast will be forfeited.

'113-116'

Thalestris supposes that the baron will have the lock set in a ring under a bit of crystal. Old-fashioned hair-rings of this kind are still to be seen.

'117 Hyde-park Circus':

the Ring of Canto I, l. 44. Grass was not likely to grow there so long as it remained the fashionable place to drive.

'118 in the sound of Bow':

within hearing of the bells of the church of St. Mary le Bow in Cheapside. So far back as Ben Jonson's time (Eastward Ho, I, ii, 36) it was the mark of the unfashionable middle-class citizen to live in this quarter. A "wit" in Queen Anne's day would have scorned to lodge there.

'121 Sir Plume':

this was Sir George Brown, brother of Mrs. Morley (Thalestris). He was not unnaturally offended at the picture drawn of him in this poem. Pope told a friend many years later that

"nobody was angry but Sir George Brown, and he was a good deal so, and for a long time. He could not bear that Sir Plume should talk nothing but nonsense."

'124 a clouded cane':

a cane of polished wood with cloudlike markings. In the 'Tatler', Mr. Bickerstaff sits in judgment on canes, and takes away a cane, "curiously clouded, with a transparent amber head, and a blue ribband to hang upon his wrist," from a young gentleman as a piece of idle foppery. There are some amusing remarks on the "conduct" of canes in the same essay.

'133'

The baron's oath is a parody of the oath of Achilles ('Iliad', I, 234).

'142'

The breaking of the bottle of sorrows, etc., is the cause of Belinda's change of mood from wrath as in l. 93 to tears, 143-144.

'155 the gilt Chariot':

the painted and gilded coach in which ladies took the air in London.

'156 Bohea:'

tea, the name comes from a range of hills in China where a certain kind of tea was grown.

'162 the patch-box:'

the box which held the little bits of black sticking-plaster with which ladies used to adorn their faces. According to Addison ('Spectator', No. 81), ladies even went so far in this fad as to patch on one side of the face or the other, according to their politics.



CANTO V

'5 the Trojan:'

AEneas, who left Carthage in spite of the wrath of Dido and the entreaties of her sister Anna.

'7-36'

Pope inserted these lines in a late revision in 1717, in order, as he said, to open more clearly the moral of the poem. The speech of Clarissa is a parody of a famous speech by Sarpedon in the 'Iliad', XII, 310-328.

'14'

At this time the gentlemen always sat in the side boxes of the theater; the ladies in the front boxes.

'20'

As vaccination had not yet been introduced, small-pox was at this time a terribly dreaded scourge.

'23'

In the 'Spectator', No. 23, there is inserted a mock advertisement, professing to teach the whole art of ogling, the church ogle, the playhouse ogle, a flying ogle fit for the ring, etc.

'24'

Painting the face was a common practice of the belles of this time. 'The Spectator', No. 41, contains a bitter attack on the painted ladies whom it calls the "Picts."

'37 virago:'

a fierce, masculine woman, here used for Thalestris.

'45'

In the 'Iliad' (Bk. XX) the gods are represented as taking sides for the Greeks and Trojans and fighting among themselves. Pallas opposes Ares, or Mars; and Hermes, Latona.

'48 Olympus:'

the hill on whose summit the gods were supposed to dwell, often used for heaven itself.

'50 Neptune:'

used here for the sea over which Neptune presided.

'53 a sconce's height:'

the top of an ornamental bracket for holding candles.

'61'

Explain the metaphor in this line.

'64'

The quotation is from a song in an opera called 'Camilla'.

'65'

The Maeander is a river in Asia Minor. Ovid ('Heroides', VII, 1-2) represents the swan as singing his death-song on its banks.

'68'

Chloe: a fanciful name. No real person is meant.

'71'

The figure of Jove weighing the issue of a battle in his scales is found in the 'Iliad', VIII, 69-73. Milton imitated it in 'Paradise Lost', IX, 996-1004. When the men's wits mounted it showed that they were lighter, less important, than the lady's hair, and so were destined to lose the battle.

'89-96'

This pedigree of Belinda's bodkin is a parody of Homer's account of Agamemnon's scepter ('Iliad', II, 100-108).

'105-106'

In Shakespeare's play Othello fiercely demands to see a handkerchief which he has given his wife, and takes her inability to show it to him as a proof of her infidelity.

'113'

the lunar sphere: it was an old superstition that everything lost on earth went to the moon. An Italian poet, Ariosto, uses this notion in a poem with which Pope was familiar ('Orlando Furioso', Canto XXXIV), and from which he borrowed some of his ideas for the cave of Spleen.

'122'

Why does Pope include "tomes of casuistry" in this collection?

'125'

There was a legend that Romulus never died, but had been caught up to the skies in a storm. Proculus, a Roman senator, said that Romulus had descended from heaven and spoken to him and then ascended again (Livy, I, 16).

'129' Berenice's Locks:

Berenice was an Egyptian queen who dedicated a lock of hair for her husband's safe return from war. It was said afterward to have become a constellation, and a Greek poet wrote some verses on the marvel.

'132'

Why were the Sylphs pleased?

'133' the Mall:

the upper side of St. James's park in London, a favorite place at this time for promenades.

'136' Rosamonda's lake:

a pond near one of the gates of St. James's park, a favorite rendezvous for lovers.

'137' Partridge:

an almanac maker of Pope's day who was given to prophesying future events. Shortly before this poem was written Swift had issued a mock almanac foretelling that Partridge would die on a certain day. When that day came Swift got out a pamphlet giving a full account of Partridge's death. In spite of the poor man's protests, Swift and his friends kept on insisting that he was dead. He was still living, however, when Pope wrote this poem. Why does Pope call him "th' egregious wizard"?

'138' Galileo's eyes:

the telescope, first used by the Italian astronomer Galileo.

'140' Louis XIV of France,

the great enemy of England at this time

'—Rome:'

here used to denote the Roman Catholic Church.

'143 the shining sphere:'

an allusion to the old notion that all the stars were set in one sphere in the sky. Belinda's lost lock, now a star, is said to add a new light to this sphere.

147 What are the "fair suns"?



* * * * *



AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM

INTRODUCTION

The 'Essay on Criticism' was the first really important work that Pope gave to the world. He had been composing verses from early boyhood, and had actually published a set of 'Pastorals' which had attracted some attention. He was already known to the literary set of London coffeehouses as a young man of keen wit and high promise, but to the reading public at large he was as yet an unknown quantity. With the appearance of the 'Essay', Pope not only sprang at once into the full light of publicity, but seized almost undisputed that position as the first of living English poets which he was to retain unchallenged till his death. Even after his death down to the Romantic revival, in fact, Pope's supremacy was an article of critical faith, and this supremacy was in no small measure founded upon the acknowledged merits of the 'Essay on Criticism.' Johnson, the last great representative of Pope's own school of thought in matters literary, held that the poet had never excelled this early work and gave it as his deliberate opinion that if Pope had written nothing else, the 'Essay' would have placed him among the first poets and the first critics. The 'Essay on Criticism' is hardly an epoch-making poem, but it certainly "made" Alexander Pope.

The poem was published anonymously in the spring of 1711, when Pope was twenty-three years old. There has been considerable dispute as to the date of its composition; but the facts seem to be that it was begun in 1707 and finished in 1709 when Pope had it printed, not for publication, but for purposes of further correction. As it stands, therefore, it represents a work planned at the close of Pope's precocious youth, and executed and polished in the first flush of his manhood. And it is quite fair to say that considering the age of its author the 'Essay on Criticism' is one of the most remarkable works in English.

Not that there is anything particularly original about the 'Essay.' On the contrary, it is one of the most conventional of all Pope's works. It has nothing of the lively fancy of 'The Rape of the Lock', little or nothing of the personal note which stamps the later satires and epistles as so peculiarly Pope's own. Apart from its brilliant epigrammatic expression the 'Essay on Criticism' might have been written by almost any man of letters in Queen Anne's day who took the trouble to think a little about the laws of literature, and who thought about those laws strictly in accordance with the accepted conventions of his time. Pope is not in the least to be blamed for this lack of originality. Profound original criticism is perhaps the very last thing to be expected of a brilliant boy, and Pope was little more when he planned this work. But boy as he was, he had already accomplished an immense amount of desultory reading, not only in literature proper, but in literary criticism as well. He told Spence in later years that in his youth he had gone through all the best critics, naming especially Quintilian, Rapin, and Bossu. A mere cursory reading of the Essay shows that he had also studied Horace, Vida, and Boileau. Before he began to write he had, so he told Spence, "digested all the matter of the poem into prose." In other words, then, the 'Essay on Criticism' is at once the result of Pope's early studies, the embodiment of the received literary doctrines of his age, and, as a consecutive study of his poems shows, the programme in accordance with which, making due allowance for certain exceptions and inconsistencies, he evolved the main body of his work.

It would, however, be a mistake to treat, as did Pope's first editor, the 'Essay on Criticism' as a methodical, elaborate, and systematic treatise. Pope, indeed, was flattered to have a scholar of such recognized authority as Warburton to interpret his works, and permitted him to print a commentary upon the 'Essay', which is quite as long and infinitely duller than the original. But the true nature of the poem is indicated by its title. It is not an 'Art of Poetry' such as Boileau composed, but an 'Essay'. And by the word "essay," Pope meant exactly what Bacon did,—a tentative sketch, a series of detached thoughts upon a subject, not a complete study or a methodical treatise. All that we know of Pope's method of study, habit of thought, and practice of composition goes to support this opinion. He read widely but desultorily; thought swiftly and brilliantly, but illogically and inconsistently; and composed in minute sections, on the backs of letters and scraps of waste paper, fragments which he afterward united, rather than blended, to make a complete poem, a mosaic, rather than a picture.

Yet the 'Essay' is by no means the "collection of independent maxims tied together by the printer, but having no natural order," which De Quincey pronounced it to be. It falls naturally into three parts. The first deals with the rules derived by classic critics from the practice of great poets, and ever since of binding force both in the composition and in the criticism of poetry. The second analyzes with admirable sagacity the causes of faulty criticism as pride, imperfect learning, prejudice, and so on. The third part discusses the qualities which a true critic should possess, good taste, learning, modesty, frankness, and tact, and concludes with a brief sketch of the history of criticism from Aristotle to Walsh. This is the general outline of the poem, sufficient, I think, to show that it is not a mere bundle of poetic formulae. But within these broad limits the thought of the poem wanders freely, and is quite rambling, inconsistent, and illogical enough to show that Pope is not formulating an exact and definitely determined system of thought.

Such indeed was, I fancy, hardly his purpose. It was rather to give clear, vivid, and convincing expression to certain ideas which were at that time generally accepted as orthodox in the realm of literary criticism. No better expression of these ideas can be found anywhere than in the 'Essay' itself, but a brief statement in simple prose of some of the most important may serve as a guide to the young student of the essay.

In the first place, the ultimate source alike of poetry and criticism is a certain intuitive faculty, common to all men, though more highly developed in some than others, called Reason, or, sometimes, Good Sense. The first rule for the budding poet or critic is "Follow Nature." This, by the way, sounds rather modern, and might be accepted by any romantic poet. But by "Nature" was meant not at all the natural impulses of the individual, but those rules founded upon the natural and common reason of mankind which the ancient critics had extracted and codified from the practice of the ancient poets. Pope says explicitly "to follow nature is to follow them;" and he praises Virgil for turning aside from his own original conceptions to imitate Homer, for:

Nature and Homer were, he found, the same.

Certain exceptions to these rules were, indeed, allowable,—severer critics than Pope, by the way, absolutely denied this,—but only to the ancient poets. The moderns must not dare to make use of them, or at the very best moderns must only venture upon such exceptions to the rules as classic precedents would justify. Inasmuch as all these rules were discovered and illustrated in ancient times, it followed logically that the great breach with antiquity, which is called the Middle Ages, was a period of hopeless and unredeemed barbarism, incapable of bringing forth any good thing. The light of literature began to dawn again with the revival of learning at the Renaissance, but the great poets of the Renaissance, Spenser and Shakespeare, for example, were "irregular," that is, they trusted too much to their individual powers and did not accept with sufficient humility the orthodox rules of poetry. This dogma, by the way, is hardly touched upon in the 'Essay', but is elaborated with great emphasis in Pope's later utterance on the principles of literature, the well-known 'Epistle to Augustus'. Finally with the establishment of the reign of Reason in France under Louis XIV, and in England a little later, the full day had come, and literary sins of omission and commission that might be winked at in such an untutored genius as Shakespeare were now unpardonable. This last dogma explains the fact that in the brief sketch of the history of criticism which concludes the 'Essay', Pope does not condescend to name an English poet or critic prior to the reign of Charles II.

It would be beside the purpose to discuss these ideas to-day or to attempt an elaborate refutation of their claims to acceptance. Time has done its work upon them, and the literary creed of the wits of Queen Anne's day is as antiquated as their periwigs and knee-breeches. Except for purposes of historical investigation it is quite absurd to take the 'Essay on Criticism' seriously.

And yet it has even for us of to-day a real value. Our age absolutely lacks a standard of literary criticism; and of all standards the one least likely to be accepted is that of Pope and his fellow-believers. Individual taste reigns supreme in this democratic age, and one man's judgment is as good as, perhaps a little better than, another's. But even this democratic and individual age may profit by turning back for a time to consider some of the general truths, as valid to-day as ever, to which Pope gave such inimitable expression, or to study the outlines of that noble picture of the true critic which St. Beuve declared every professed critic should frame and hang up in his study. An age which seems at times upon the point of throwing classical studies overboard as useless lumber might do far worse than listen to the eloquent tribute which the poet pays to the great writers of antiquity. And finally nothing could be more salutary for an age in which literature itself has caught something of the taint of the prevailing commercialism than to bathe itself again in that spirit of sincere and disinterested love of letters which breathes throughout the 'Essay' and which, in spite of all his errors, and jealousies, and petty vices, was the master-passion of Alexander Pope.



'6 censure:'

the word has here its original meaning of "judge," not its modern "judge severely" or "blame."

'8'

Because each foolish poem provokes a host of foolish commentators and critics.

'15-16'

This assertion that only a good writer can be a fair critic is not to be accepted without reservation.

'17'

The word "wit" has a number of different meanings in this poem, and the student should be careful to discriminate between them. It means

1) mind, intellect, l. 61; 2) learning, culture, l 727; 3) imagination, genius, l. 82; 4) the power to discover amusing analogies, or the apt expression of such an analogy, ll. 449, 297; 5) a man possessed of wit in its various significations, l. 45; this last form usually occurs in the plural, ll. 104, 539.

'26 the maze of schools:'

the labyrinth of conflicting systems of thought, especially of criticism.

'21 coxcombs ... fools:'

what is the difference in meaning between these words in this passage?

'30-31'

In this couplet Pope hits off the spiteful envy of conceited critics toward successful writers. If the critic can write himself, he hates the author as a rival; if he cannot, he entertains against him the deep grudge an incapable man so often cherishes toward an effective worker.

'34 Maevius:'

a poetaster whose name has been handed down by Virgil and Horace. His name, like that of his associate, Bavius, has become a by-word for a wretched scribbler.

'Apollo':

here thought of as the god of poetry. The true poet was inspired by Apollo; but a poetaster like Maevius wrote without inspiration, as it were, in spite of the god.

'40-43'

Pope here compares "half-learned" critics to the animals which old writers reported were bred from the Nile mud. In 'Antony and Cleopatra', for example, Lepidus says, "Your serpent of Egypt is bred now of your mud by the operation of your sun; so is your crocodile." Pope thinks of these animals as in the unformed stage, part "kindled into life, part a lump of mud." So these critics are unfinished things for which no proper name can be found. "Equivocal generation" is the old term used to denote spontaneous generation of this sort. Pope applies it here to critics without proper training who spring spontaneously from the mire of ignorance.

'44 tell:'

count.

'45'

The idea is that a vain wit's tongue could out-talk a hundred ordinary men's.

'53 pretending wit:'

presuming, or ambitious mind.

'56-58 memory ... understanding imagination.'

This is the old threefold division of the human mind. Pope means that where one of these faculties is above the average in any individual, another of them is sure to fall below. Is this always the case?

'63 peculiar arts:'

special branches of knowledge.

'73'

In what sense can nature be called the source, the end, and the test of art?

'76 th' informing soul:'

the soul which not only dwells in, but animates and molds the body.

'80-81'

What two meanings are attached to "wit" in this couplet?

'84 'Tis more:'

it is more important.

'the Muse's steed:'

Pegasus, the winged horse of Greek mythology, was supposed to be the horse of the Muses and came to be considered a symbol of poetic genius.

'86 gen'rous:'

high-bred.

'88'

What is the difference between "discovered" and "devised"?

'94 Parnassus' top:'

the Muses were supposed to dwell on the top of Parnassus, a mountain in Greece. Great poets are here thought of as having climbed the mountain to dwell with the Muses.

'96'

What is (cf. text) "the immortal prize"?

'99 She',

i.e. learned Greece, especially Greek criticism, which obtained the rules of poetry from the practice of great poets, and, as it were, systematized their inspiration.

'104 following wits':

later scholars.

'105'

What is meant by "the mistress" and "the maid" in this line?

'109 Doctor's bills:'

prescriptions.

'112'

These are the prosy commentators on great poets, whose dreary notes often disgust readers with the original.

'120 fable:'

plot.

'123'

What is the difference between "cavil" and "criticise"?

'129 the Mantuan Muse:'

the poetry of Virgil, which Pope thinks the best commentary on Homer. In what sense is this to be understood?

'130 Maro:'

Virgil, whose full name was Publius Vergilius Maro, Pope here praises Virgil's well-known imitation of Homer. Since "nature and Homer were the same," a young poet like Virgil could do nothing better than copy Homer.

'138 the Stagirite:'

Aristotle, a native of Stagyra, was the first and one of the greatest of literary critics. His "rules" were drawn from the practice of great poets, and so, according to Pope, to imitate Homer was to obey the "ancient rules."

'141'

There are some beauties in poetry which cannot be explained by criticism.

'142 happiness:'

used here to express the peculiar charm of spontaneous poetic expression as contrasted with "care," 'i.e.' the art of revising and improving, which can be taught.

'152 vulgar bounds:'

the limitations imposed upon ordinary writers.

'157 out of ... rise:'

surpass the ordinary scenes of nature.

'159 Great wits:'

poets of real genius.

'160 faults:'

here used in the sense of irregularities, exceptions to the rules of poetry. When these are justified by the poet's genius, true critics do not presume to correct them. In many editions this couplet comes after l. 151. This was Pope's first arrangement, but he later shifted it to its present position.

'162 As Kings:'

the Stuart kings claimed the right to "dispense with laws," that is, to set them aside in special instances. In 1686 eleven out of twelve English judges decided in a test case that "it is a privilege inseparably connected with the sovereignty of the king to dispense with penal laws, and that according to his own judgment." The English people very naturally felt that such a privilege opened the door to absolute monarchy, and after the fall of James II, Parliament declared in 1689 that "the pretended power of suspending of laws ... without the consent of Parliament, is illegal."

'164 its End:'

the purpose of every law of poetry, namely, to please the reader. This purpose must not be "transgressed," 'i.e.' forgotten by those who wish to make exceptions to these laws.

'166 their precedent:'

the example of classic poets.

'179 stratagems ... error:'

things in the classic poets which to carping critics seem faults are often clever devices to make a deeper impression on the reader.

'180 Homer nods:'

Horace in his 'Art of Poetry' used this figure to imply that even the greatest poet sometimes made mistakes. Pope very neatly suggests that it may be the critic rather than the poet who is asleep.

'181 each ancient Altar:'

used here to denote the works of the great classic writers. The whole passage down to l. 200 is a noble outburst of enthusiasm for the poets whom Pope had read so eagerly in early youth.

'186 consenting Paeans:'

unanimous hymns of praise.

'194 must ... found:'

are not destined to be discovered till some future time.

'196'

Who is "the last, the meanest of your sons"?

'203 bias:'

mental bent, or inclination.

'208'

This line is based upon physiological theories which are now obsolete. According to these wind or air supplied the lack of blood or of animal spirits in imperfectly constituted bodies. To such bodies Pope compares those ill-regulated minds where a deficiency of learning and natural ability is supplied by self-conceit.

'216' The Pierian spring:

the spring of the Muses, who were called Pierides in Greek mythology. It is used here as a symbol for learning, particularly for the study of literature.

'222' the lengths behind:

the great spaces of learning that lie behind the first objects of our study.

'225-232'

This fine simile is one of the best expressions in English verse of the modesty of the true scholar, due to his realization of the boundless extent of knowledge. It was such a feeling that led Sir Isaac Newton to say after all his wonderful discoveries,

"I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary whilst the great ocean of truth lay all the time undiscovered before me."

'244' peculiar parts:

individual parts.

'248 ev'n thine, O Rome:'

there are so many splendid churches in Rome that an inhabitant of this city would be less inclined than a stranger to wonder at the perfect proportions of any of them. But there are two, at least, the Pantheon and St. Peter's, which might justly evoke the admiration even of a Roman. It was probably of one of these that Pope was thinking.

'265'

What is the difference between "principles" and "notions" in this line?

'265 La Mancha's Knight:'

Don Quixote. The anecdote that follows is not taken from Cervantes' novel, but from a continuation of it by an author calling himself Avellanada. The story is that Don Quixote once fell in with a scholar who had written a play about a persecuted queen of Bohemia. Her innocence in the original story was established by a combat in the lists, but this the poet proposed to omit as contrary to the rules of Aristotle. The Don, although professing great respect for Aristotle, insisted that the combat was the best part of the story and must be acted, even if a special theater had to be built for the purpose, or the play given in the open fields. Pope quotes this anecdote to show how some critics in spite of their professed acceptance of general rules are so prejudiced in favor of a minor point as to judge a whole work of art from one standpoint only.

'270 Dennis:'

John Dennis, a playwright and critic of Pope's time. Pope and he were engaged in frequent quarrels, but this first reference to him in Pope's works is distinctly complimentary. The line probably refers to some remarks by Dennis on the Grecian stage in his 'Impartial Critic', a pamphlet published in 1693.

'273 nice:'

discriminating; in l. 286 the meaning is "over-scrupulous, finicky."

'276 unities:'

according to the laws of dramatic composition generally accepted in Pope's day, a play must observe the unities of subject, place, and time. That is, it must have one main theme, not a number of diverse stories, for its plot; all the scenes must be laid in one place, or as nearly so as possible; and the action must be begun and finished within the space of twenty-four hours.

'286 Curious:'

fastidious, over-particular.

'288 by a love to parts:'

by too diligent attention to particular parts of a work of art, which hinders them from forming a true judgment of the work as a whole.

'289 Conceit:'

an uncommon or fantastic expression of thought. "Conceits" had been much sought after by the poets who wrote in the first half of the seventeenth century.

'297 True Wit:'

here opposed to the "conceit" of which Pope has been speaking. It is defined as a natural idea expressed in fit words.

'299 whose truth ... find:'

of whose truth we find ourselves at once convinced.

'308 take upon content:'

take for granted.

'311-317'

Show how Pope uses the simile of the "prismatic glass" to distinguish between "false eloquence" and "true expression."

'319 decent:'

becoming.

'328 Fungoso:'

a character in Ben Jonson's 'Every Man out of his Humour'. He is the son of a miserly farmer, and tries hard, though all in vain, to imitate the dress and manners of a fine gentleman.

'329 These sparks:'

these would-be dandies.

'337 Numbers:'

rhythm, meter.

'341 haunt Parnassus:

read poetry.—ear:' note that in Pope's day this word rhymed with "repair" and "there."

'344 These:'

critics who care for the meter only in poetry insist on the proper number of syllables in a line, no matter what sort of sound or sense results. For instance, they do not object to a series of "open vowels," 'i.e.' hiatuses caused by the juxtaposition of such words as "tho" and "oft," "the" and "ear." Line 345 is composed especially to show how feeble a rhythm results from such a succession of "open vowels." They do not object to bolstering up a line with "expletives," such as "do" in l. 346, nor to using ten "low words," 'i.e.' short, monosyllabic words to make up a line.

'347'

With this line Pope passes unconsciously from speaking of bad critics to denouncing some of the errors of bad poets, who keep on using hackneyed phrases and worn-out metrical devices.

'356 Alexandrine:'

a line of six iambic feet, such as l. 357, written especially to illustrate this form. Why does Pope use the adjective "needless" here?

'361 Denham's strength ... Waller's sweetness:'

Waller and Denham were poets of the century before Pope; they are almost forgotten to-day, but were extravagantly admired in his time. Waller began and Denham continued the fashion of writing in "closed" heroic couplets, 'i.e.' in verses where the sense is for the most part contained within one couplet and does not run over into the next as had been the fashion in earlier verse. Dryden said that "the excellence and dignity of rhyme were never fully known till Mr. Waller taught it," and the same critic spoke of Denham's poetry as "majestic and correct."

'370 Ajax:'

one of the heroes of the 'Iliad'. He is represented more than once as hurling huge stones at his enemies. Note that Pope has endeavored in this and the following line to convey the sense of effort and struggle. What means does he employ? Do you think he succeeds?

'372 Camilla:'

a heroine who appears in the latter part of the 'AEneid' fighting against the Trojan invaders of Italy. Virgil says that she was so swift of foot that she might have run over a field of wheat without breaking the stalks, or across the sea without wetting her feet. Pope attempts in l. 373 to reproduce in the sound and movement of his verse the sense of swift flight.

'374 Timotheus:'

a Greek poet and singer who was said to have played and sung before Alexander the Great. The reference in this passage is to Dryden's famous poem, 'Alexander's Feast'.

'376 the son of Libyan Jove:'

Alexander the Great, who boasted that he was the son of Jupiter. The famous oracle of Jupiter Ammon situated in the Libyan desert was visited by Alexander, who was said to have learned there the secret of his parentage.

'383 Dryden:'

this fine compliment is paid to a poet whom Pope was proud to acknowledge as his master. "I learned versification wholly from Dryden's works," he once said. Pope's admiration for Dryden dated from early youth, and while still a boy he induced a friend to take him to see the old poet in his favorite coffee-house.

'391' admire:

not used in our modern sense, but in its original meaning, "to wonder at." According to Pope, it is only fools who are lost in wonder at the beauties of a poem; wise men "approve," 'i.e.' test and pronounce them good.

'396-397'

Pope acknowledged that in these lines he was alluding to the uncharitable belief of his fellow-Catholics that all outside the fold of the Catholic church were sure to be damned.

'400 sublimes:'

purifies.

'404 each:'

each age.

'415 joins with Quality:'

takes sides with "the quality," 'i.e.' people of rank.

'429'

Are so clever that they refuse to accept the common and true belief, and so forfeit their salvation.

'441 Sentences:'

the reference is to a mediaeval treatise on Theology, by Peter Lombard, called the 'Book of Sentences'. It was long used as a university text-book.

'444 Scotists and Thomists:'

mediaeval scholars, followers respectively of Duns Scotus and Thomas Aquinas. A long dispute raged between their disciples. In this couplet Pope points out that the dispute is now forgotten, and the books of the old disputants lie covered with cobwebs in Duck-lane, a street in London where second-hand books were sold in Pope's day. He calls the cobwebs "kindred," because the arguments of Thomists and Scotists were as fine spun as a spider's web.

'449'

"The latest fashionable folly is the test, or the proof, of a quick, up-to-date wit." In other words, to be generally accepted an author must accept the current fashion, foolish though it may be.

'457'

This was especially true in Pope's day when literature was so closely connected with politics that an author's work was praised or blamed not upon its merits, but according to his, and the critic's, politics.

'459 Parsons, Critics, Beaus':

Dryden, the head of English letters in the generation before Pope, had been bitterly assailed on various charges by parsons, like Jeremy Collier, critics like Milbourn, and fine gentlemen like the Duke of Buckingham. But his works remained when the jests that were made against them were forgotten.

'463'

Sir Richard Blackmore, a famous doctor in Dryden's day, was also a very dull and voluminous writer. He attacked Dryden in a poem called 'A Satire against Wit'. Luke Milbourn was a clergyman of the same period, who abused Dryden's translation of Virgil.

'465 Zoilus':

a Greek critic who attacked Homer.

'481'

The English language and the public taste had changed very rapidly during the century preceding Pope. He imagined that these changes would continue so that no poet's reputation would last longer than a man's life, "bare threescore," and Dryden's poetry would come to be as hard to understand and as little read as Chaucer's at that time. It is worth noting that both Dryden and Pope rewrote parts of Chaucer in modern English.

'506-507'

Explain why "wit" is feared by wicked men and shunned by the virtuous, hated by fools, and "undone" or ruined by knaves.

'521 sacred':

accursed, like the Latin 'sacer'.

'527 spleen':

bad temper.

'534 the fat age':

the reign of Charles II, as ll. 536-537 show, when literature became notoriously licentious.

'538 Jilts ... statesmen':

loose women like Lady Castlemaine and the Duchess of Portsmouth had great influence on the politics of Charles II's time, and statesmen of that day like Buckingham and Etheredge wrote comedies.

'541 Mask':

it was not uncommon in Restoration times for ladies to wear a mask in public, especially at the theater. Here the word is used to denote the woman who wore a mask.

'544 a Foreign reign':

the reign of William III, a Dutchman. Pope, as a Tory and a Catholic, hated the memory of William, and here asserts, rather unfairly, that his age was marked by an increase of heresy and infidelity.

'545 Socinus':

the name of two famous heretics, uncle and nephew, of the sixteenth century, who denied the divinity of Christ.

'549'

Pope insinuates here that the clergy under William III hated an absolute monarch so much that they even encouraged their hearers to question the absolute power of God.

'551 admir'd:'

see note l. 391.

'552 Wit's Titans:'

wits who defied heaven as the old Titans did the gods. The reference is to a group of freethinkers who came into prominence in King William's reign.

'556 scandalously nice:'

so over-particular as to find cause for scandal where none exists.

'557 mistake an author into vice:'

mistakenly read into an author vicious ideas which are not really to be found in his work.

'575'

Things that men really do not know must be brought forward modestly as if they had only been forgotten for a time.

'577 That only:'

good-breeding alone.

'585 Appius:'

a nickname for John Dennis, taken from his tragedy, 'Appius and Virginia', which appeared two years before the 'Essay on Criticism'. Lines 585-587 hit off some of the personal characteristics of this hot-tempered critic. "Tremendous" was a favorite word with Dennis.

'588 tax:'

blame, find fault with.

'591'

In Pope's time noblemen could take degrees at the English universities without passing the regular examinations.

'617'

Dryden's 'Fables' published in 1700 represented the very best narrative poetry of the greatest poet of his day. D'Urfey's 'Tales', on the other hand, published in 1704 and 1706, were collections of dull and obscene doggerel by a wretched poet.

'618 With him:'

according to "the bookful blockhead."

'619 Garth:'

a well-known doctor of the day, who wrote a much admired mock-heroic poem called 'The Dispensary'. His enemies asserted that he was not really the author of the poem.

'623'

Such foolish critics are just as ready to pour out their opinions on a man in St. Paul's cathedral as in the bookseller's shops in the square around the church, which is called St. Paul's churchyard.

'632 proud to know:'

proud of his knowledge.

'636 humanly:'

an old form for "humanely."

'642 love to praise:'

a love of praising men.

'648 Maeonian Star:'

Homer. Maeonia, or Lydia, was a district in Asia which was said to have been the birthplace of Homer.

'652 conquered Nature:'

Aristotle was a master of all the knowledge of nature extant in his day.

'653 Horace:'

the famous Latin poet whose 'Ars Poetica' was one of Pope's models for the 'Essay on Criticism'.

'662 fle'me:'

phlegm, according to old ideas of physiology, one of the four "humours" or fluids which composed the body. Where it abounded it made men dull and heavy, or as we still say "phlegmatic."

'663-664'

A rather confused couplet. It means, "Horace suffers as much by the misquotations critics make from his work as by the bad translations that wits make of them."

'665 Dionysius:'

Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a famous Greek critic. Pope's manner of reference to him seems to show that he had never read his works.

'667 Petronius:'

a courtier and man of letters of the time of Nero. Only a few lines of his remaining work contain any criticism.

'669 Quintilian's work:'

the 'Institutiones Oratoriae' of Quintilianus, a famous Latin critic of the first century A.D.

'675 Longinus:'

a Greek critic of the third century A.D., who composed a famous work called 'A Treatise on the Sublime'. It is a work showing high imagination as well as careful reasoning, and hence Pope speaks of the author as inspired by the Nine, 'i.e.' the Muses.

'692'

The willful hatred of the monks for the works of classical antiquity tended to complete that destruction of old books which the Goths began when they sacked the Roman cities. Many ancient writings were erased, for example, in order to get parchment for monkish chronicles and commentaries.

'693 Erasmus:'

perhaps the greatest scholar of the Renaissance. Pope calls him the "glory of the priesthood" on account of his being a monk of such extraordinary learning, and "the shame" of his order, because he was so abused by monks in his lifetime. Is this a good antithesis?

'697 Leo's golden days:'

the pontificate of Leo X (1513-1521). Leo himself was a generous patron of art and learning. He paid particular attention to sacred music (l. 703), and engaged Raphael to decorate the Vatican with frescoes. Vida (l. 704) was an Italian poet of his time, who became famous by the excellence of his Latin verse. One of his poems was on the art of poetry, and it is to this that Pope refers in l. 706.

'707-708'

Cremona was the birthplace of Vida; Mantua, of Virgil.

'709'

The allusion is to the sack of Rome by the Constable Bourbon's army in 1527. This marked the end of the golden age of arts in Italy.

'714 Boileau:'

a French poet and critic (1636-1711). His 'L'Art Poetique' is founded on Horace's 'Ars Poetica'.

'723 the Muse:'

'i.e.' the genius, of John Sheffield (1649-1720), Duke of Buckingham (not to be confounded with Dryden's enemy). Line 724 is quoted from his 'Essay on Poetry'.

'725 Roscommon:'

Wentworth Dillon (1633-1684), Earl of Roscommon, author of a translation of the 'Ars Poetica' and of 'An Essay on Translated Verse'.

'729 Walsh:'

a commonplace poet (1663-1708), but apparently a good critic. Dryden, in fact, called him the best critic in the nation. He was an early friend and judicious adviser of Pope himself, who showed him much of his early work, including the first draft of this very poem. Pope was sincerely attached to him, and this tribute to his dead friend is marked by deep and genuine feeling.

'738 short excursions:'

such as this 'Essay on Criticism' instead of longer and more ambitious poems which Pope planned and in part executed in his boyhood. There is no reason to believe with Mr. Elwin that this passage proves that Pope formed the design of the poem after the death of Walsh.



* * * * *



AN ESSAY ON MAN

INTRODUCTION

The 'Essay on Man' is the longest and in some ways the most important work of the third period of Pope's career. It corresponds closely to his early work, the 'Essay on Criticism'. Like the earlier work, the 'Essay on Man' is a didactic poem, written primarily to diffuse and popularize certain ideas of the poet. As in the earlier work these ideas are by no means original with Pope, but were the common property of a school of thinkers in his day. As in the 'Essay on Criticism', Pope here attempts to show that these ideas have their origin in nature and are consistent with the common sense of man. And finally the merit of the later work, even more than of the earlier, is due to the force and brilliancy of detached passages rather than to any coherent, consistent, and well-balanced system which it presents.

The close of the seventeenth century and beginning of the eighteenth was marked by a change of ground in the sphere of religious controversy. The old debates between the Catholic and Protestant churches gradually died out as these two branches of Western Christianity settled down in quiet possession of the territory they still occupy. In their place arose a vigorous controversy on the first principles of religion in general, on the nature of God, the origin of evil, the place of man in the universe, and the respective merits of optimism and pessimism as philosophic theories. The controversialists as a rule either rejected or neglected the dogmas of revealed religion and based their arguments upon real or supposed facts of history, physical nature, and the mental processes and moral characteristics of man. In this controversy the two parties at times were curiously mingled. Orthodox clergymen used arguments which justified a strong suspicion of their orthodoxy; and avowed freethinkers bitterly disclaimed the imputation of atheism and wrote in terms that might be easily adopted by a devout believer.

Into this controversy Pope was led by his deepening intimacy with Bolingbroke, who had returned from France in 1725 and settled at his country place within a few miles of Twickenham. During his long exile Bolingbroke had amused himself with the study of moral philosophy and natural religion, and in his frequent intercourse with Pope he poured out his new-found opinions with all the fluency, vigor, and polish which made him so famous among the orators and talkers of the day. Bolingbroke's views were for that time distinctly heterodox, and, if logically developed, led to complete agnosticism. But he seems to have avoided a complete statement of his ideas to Pope, possibly for fear of shocking or frightening the sensitive little poet who still remained a professed Catholic. Pope, however, was very far from being a strict Catholic, and indeed prided himself on the breadth and liberality of his opinions. He was, therefore, at once fascinated and stimulated by the eloquent conversation of Bolingbroke, and resolved to write a philosophical poem in which to embody the ideas they held in common. Bolingbroke approved of the idea, and went so far as to furnish the poet with seven or eight sheets of notes "to direct the plan in general and to supply matter for particular epistles." Lord Bathurst, who knew both Pope and Bolingbroke, went so far as to say in later years that the 'Essay' was originally composed by Bolingbroke in prose and that Pope only put it into verse. But this is undoubtedly an exaggeration of what Pope himself frankly acknowledged, that the poem was composed under the influence of Bolingbroke, that in the main it reflected his opinions, and that Bolingbroke had assisted him in the general plan and in numerous details. Very properly, therefore, the poem is addressed to Bolingbroke and begins and closes with a direct address to the poet's "guide, philosopher, and friend."

In substance the 'Essay on Man' is a discussion of the moral order of the world. Its purpose is "to vindicate the ways of God to man," and it may therefore be regarded as an attempt to confute the skeptics who argued from the existence of evil in the world and the wretchedness of man's existence to the impossibility of belief in an all-good and all-wise God. It attempts to do this, not by an appeal to revelation or the doctrines of Christianity, but simply on the basis of a common-sense interpretation of the facts of existence.

A brief outline of the poem will show the general tenor of Pope's argument.

The first epistle deals with the nature and state of man with respect to the universe. It insists on the limitations of man's knowledge, and the consequent absurdity of his presuming to murmur against God. It teaches that the universe was not made for man, but that man with all his apparent imperfections is exactly fitted to the place which he occupies in the universe. In the physical universe all things work together for good, although certain aspects of nature seem evil to man, and likewise in the moral universe all things, even man's passions and crimes conduce to the general good of the whole. Finally it urges calm submission and acquiescence in what is hard to understand, since "one truth is clear,—whatever is, is right."

The second epistle deals with the nature of man as an individual. It begins by urging men to abandon vain questionings of God's providence and to take up the consideration of their own natures, for "the proper study of mankind is man." Pope points out that the two cardinal principles of man's nature are self-love and reason, the first an impelling, the second a regulating power. The aim of both these principles is pleasure, by which Pope means happiness, which he takes for the highest good. Each man is dominated by a master passion, and it is the proper function of reason to control this passion for good and to make it bear fruit in virtue. No man is wholly virtuous or vicious, and Heaven uses the mingled qualities of men to bind them together in mutual interdependence, and makes the various passions and imperfections of mankind serve the general good. And the final conclusion is that "though man's a fool, yet God is wise."

The third epistle treats of the nature of man with respect to society. All creatures, Pope asserts, are bound together and live not for themselves alone, but man is preeminently a social being. The first state of man was the state of nature when he lived in innocent ignorance with his fellow-creatures. Obeying the voice of nature, man learned to copy and improve upon the instincts of the animals, to build, to plow, to spin, to unite in societies like those of ants and bees. The first form of government was patriarchal; then monarchies arose in which virtue, "in arms or arts," made one man ruler over many. In either case the origin of true government as of true religion was love. Gradually force crept in and uniting with superstition gave rise to tyranny and false religions. Poets and patriots, however, restored the ancient faith and taught power's due use by showing the necessity of harmony in the state. Pope concludes by asserting the folly of contention for forms of government or modes of faith. The common end of government as of religion is the general good. It may be noticed in passing that Pope's account of the evolution of society bears even less relation to historical facts than does his account of the development of literature in the 'Essay on Criticism.'

The last epistle discusses the nature of happiness, "our being's end and aim." Happiness is attainable by all men who think right and mean well. It consists not in individual, but in mutual pleasure. It does not consist in external things, mere gifts of fortune, but in health, peace, and competence. Virtuous men are, indeed, subject to calamities of nature; but God cannot be expected to suspend the operation of general laws to spare the virtuous. Objectors who would construct a system in which all virtuous men are blest, are challenged to define the virtuous and to specify what is meant by blessings. Honors, nobility, fame, superior talents, often merely serve to make their possessors unhappy. Virtue alone is happiness, and virtue consists in a recognition of the laws of Providence, and in love for one's fellow-man.

Even this brief outline will show, I think, some of the inconsistencies and omissions of Pope's train of thought. A careful examination of his arguments in detail would be wholly out of place here. The reader who wishes to pursue the subject further may consult Warburton's elaborate vindication of Pope's argument, and Elwin's equally prosy refutation, or better still the admirable summary by Leslie Stephen in the chapter on this poem in his life of Pope ('English Men of Letters'). No one is now likely to turn to the writer of the early eighteenth century for a system of the universe, least of all to a writer so incapable of exact or systematic thinking as Alexander Pope. If the 'Essay on Man' has any claim to be read to-day, it must be as a piece of literature pure and simple. For philosophy and poetry combined, Browning and Tennyson lie nearer to our age and mode of thought than Pope.

Even regarded as a piece of literature the 'Essay on Man' cannot, I think, claim the highest place among Pope's works. It obtained, indeed, a success at home and abroad such as was achieved by no other English poem until the appearance of 'Childe Harold'. It was translated into French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Polish, and Latin. It was imitated by Wieland, praised by Voltaire, and quoted by Kant. But this success was due in part to the accuracy with which it reflected ideas which were the common property of its age, in part to the extraordinary vigor and finish of its epigrams, which made it one of the most quotable of English poems. But as a whole the Essay is not a great poem. The poet is evidently struggling with a subject that is too weighty for him, and at times he staggers and sinks beneath his burden. The second and third books in particular are, it must be confessed, with the exception of one or two fine outbursts, little better than dull, and dullness is not a quality one is accustomed to associate with Pope. The 'Essay on Man' lacks the bright humor and imaginative artistry of 'The Rape of the Lock,' and the lively portraiture, vigorous satire, and strong personal note of the 'Moral Epistles' and 'Imitations of Horace'. Pope is at his best when he is dealing with a concrete world of men and women as they lived and moved in the London of his day; he is at his worst when he is attempting to seize and render abstract ideas.

Yet the 'Essay on Man' is a very remarkable work. In the first place, it shows Pope's wonderful power of expression. No one can read the poem for the first time without meeting on page after page phrases and epigrams which have become part of the common currency of our language. Pope's "precision and firmness of touch," to quote the apt statement of Leslie Stephen, "enables him to get the greatest possible meaning into a narrow compass. He uses only one epithet, but it is the right one." Even when the thought is commonplace enough, the felicity of the expression gives it a new and effective force. And there are whole passages where Pope rises high above the mere coining of epigrams. As I have tried to show in my notes he composed by separate paragraphs, and when he chances upon a topic that appeals to his imagination or touches his heart, we get an outburst of poetry that shines in splendid contrast to the prosaic plainness of its surroundings. Such, for example, are the noble verses that tell of the immanence of God in his creation at the close of the first epistle, or the magnificent invective against tyranny and superstition in the third (ll. 241-268).

Finally the 'Essay on Man' is of interest in what it tells us of Pope himself. Mr. Elwin's idea that in the 'Essay on Man' Pope, "partly the dupe, partly the accomplice of Bolingbroke," was attempting craftily to undermine the foundations of religion, is a notion curiously compounded of critical blindness and theological rancor. In spite of all its incoherencies and futilities the 'Essay' is an honest attempt to express Pope's opinions, borrowed in part, of course, from his admired friend, but in part the current notions of his age, on some of the greatest questions that have perplexed the mind of man. And Pope's attitude toward the questions is that of the best minds of his day, at once religious, independent, and sincere. He acknowledges the omnipotence and benevolence of God, confesses the limitations and imperfections of human knowledge, teaches humility in the presence of unanswerable problems, urges submission to Divine Providence, extols virtue as the true source of happiness, and love of man as an essential of virtue. If we study the 'Essay on Man' as the reasoned argument of a philosopher, we shall turn from it with something like contempt; if we read it as the expression of a poet's sentiments, we shall, I think, leave it with an admiration warmer than before for a character that has been so much abused and so little understood as that of Pope.



THE DESIGN

'2 Bacon's expression:'

in the dedication of his 'Essays' (1625) to Buckingham, Bacon speaks of them as the most popular of his writings, "for that, as it seems, they come home to men's business and bosoms."

'11 anatomy:' dissection.

EPISTLE I

'1 St. John:'

Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke, Pope's "guide, philosopher, and friend," under whose influence the 'Essay on Man' was composed.

'5 expatiate:'

range, wander.

'6'

Pope says that this line alludes to the subject of this first Epistle, "the state of man here and hereafter, disposed by Providence, though to him unknown." The next two lines allude to the main topics of the three remaining epistles, "the constitution of the human mind ... the temptations of misapplied self-love, and the wrong pursuits of power, pleasure, and false happiness."

'9 beat ... field:'

the metaphor is drawn from hunting. Note how it is elaborated in the following lines.

'12 blindly creep ... sightless soar:'

the first are the ignorant and indifferent; those who "sightless soar" are the presumptuous who reason blindly about things too high for human knowledge.

'15 candid:'

lenient, free from harsh judgments.

'16'

An adaptation of a well-known line of Milton's 'Paradise Lost', l, 26.

'17-23'

Pope lays down as the basis of his system that all argument about man or God must be based upon what we know of man's present life, and of God's workings in this world of ours.

'29 this frame:'

the universe. Compare 'Hamlet', II, ii, 310, "this goodly frame, the earth."

'30 nice dependencies:'

subtle inter-relations.

'31 Gradations just:'

exact shades of difference.

'32 a part:'

the mind of man, which is but a part of the whole universe.

'33 the great chain:'

according to Homer, Jove, the supreme God, sustained the whole creation by a golden chain. Milton also makes use of this idea of the visible universe as linked to heaven in a golden chain, 'Paradise Lost', II, 1004-1006, and 1051-1052.

'41 yonder argent fields:'

the sky spangled with silvery stars. The phrase is borrowed from Milton, 'Paradise Lost', III, 460.

'42 Jove:'

the planet Jupiter.

'satellites:'

Pope preserves here the Latin pronunciation, four syllables, with the accent on the antepenult.

'43-50.'

Pope here takes it for granted that our universe, inasmuch as it is the work of God's infinite wisdom, must be the best system possible. If this be granted, he says, it is plain that man must have a place somewhere in this system, and the only question is whether "God has placed him wrong."

'45'

Every grade in creation must be complete, so as to join with that which is beneath and with that which is above it or there would be a lack of coherency, a break, somewhere in the system.

'47 reas'ning life:'

conscious mental life.

'51-60'

Pope argues here that since man is a part of the best possible system, whatever seems wrong in him must be right when considered in relation to the whole order of the universe. It is only our ignorance of this order which keeps us from realizing this fact.

'55 one single:'

the word "movement" is understood after "single."

'61-68'

Pope here illustrates his preceding argument by analogy. We can know no more of God's purpose in the ordering of our lives than the animals can know of our ordering of theirs.

'64 AEgypt's God:'

One of the gods of the Egyptians was the sacred bull, Apis.

'68 a deity:'

worshiped as a god, like the Egyptian kings and Roman emperors.

'69-76'

Pope now goes on to argue that on the basis of what has been proved we ought not to regard man as an imperfect being, but rather as one who is perfectly adapted to his place in the universe. His knowledge, for example, is measured by the brief time he has to live and the brief space he can survey.

'69 fault:'

pronounced in Pope's day as rhyming with "ought."

'73-76'

These lines are really out of place. They first appeared after l. 98; then Pope struck them out altogether. Just before his death he put them into their present place on the advice of Warburton, who probably approved of them because of their reference to a future state of bliss. It is plain that they interfere with the regular argument of the poem.

'79'

This line is grammatically dependent upon "hides," l. 77.

'81 riot:'

used here in the sense of "luxurious life." The lamb is slain to provide for some feast.

'86 Heav'n:'

'i.e.' God. Hence the relative "who" in the next line.

'92-98'

Pope urges man to comfort himself with hope, seeing that he cannot know the future.

'93 "What future bliss:"

the words "shall be" are to be understood after this phrase.

'96'

Point out the exact meaning of this familiar line.

'97 from home:'

away from its true home, the life to come. This line represents one of the alterations which Warburton induced Pope to make. The poet first wrote "confined at home," thus representing this life as the home of the soul. His friend led him to make the change in order to express more clearly his belief in the soul's immortality.

'89'

Show how "rests" and "expatiates" in this line contrast with "uneasy" and "confined" in l. 97.

'99-112'

In this famous passage Pope shows how the belief in immortality is found even among the most ignorant tribes. This is to Pope an argument that the soul must be immortal, since only Nature, or God working through Nature, could have implanted this conception in the Indian's mind.

'102 the solar walk:'

the sun's path in the heavens.

'the milky way:'

some old philosophers held that the souls of good men went thither after death.

Pope means that the ignorant Indian had no conception of a heaven reserved for the just such as Greek sages and Christian believers have. All he believes in is "an humbler heaven," where he shall be free from the evils of this life. Line 108 has special reference to the tortures inflicted upon the natives of Mexico and Peru by the avaricious Spanish conquerors.

'109-110'

He is contented with a future existence, without asking for the glories of the Christian's heaven.

'111 equal sky:'

impartial heaven, for the heaven of the Indians was open to all men, good or bad.

'113-130'

In this passage Pope blames those civilized men who, though they should be wiser than the Indian, murmur against the decrees of God. The imperative verbs "weigh," "call," "say," etc., are used satirically.

'113 scale of sense:'

the scale, or means of judgment, which our senses give us.

'117 gust:'

the pleasure of taste.

'120'

The murmurers are dissatisfied that man is not at once perfect in his present state and destined to immortality, although such gifts have been given to no other creature.

'123 reas'ning Pride:'

the pride of the intellect which assumes to condemn God's providence.

'131-172'

In this passage Pope imagines a dialogue between one of the proud murmurers he has described and himself. His opponent insists that the world was made primarily for man's enjoyment (ll. 132-140). Pope asks whether nature does not seem to swerve from this end of promoting human happiness in times of pestilence, earthquake, and tempest (ll. 141-144). The other answers that these are only rare exceptions to the general laws, due perhaps to some change in nature since the world began (ll. 145-148). Pope replies by asking why there should not be exceptions in the moral as well as in the physical world; may not great villains be compared to terrible catastrophes in nature (ll. 148-156)? He goes on to say that no one but God can answer this question, that our human reasoning springs from pride, and that the true course of reasoning is simply to submit (ll. 156-164). He then suggests that "passions," by which he means vices, are as necessary a part of the moral order as storms of the physical world (ll. 165-172).

'142 livid deaths':

pestilence.

'143-144'

Pope was perhaps thinking of a terrible earthquake and flood that had caused great loss of life in Chili the year before this poem appeared.

'150 Then Nature deviates':

Nature departs from her regular order on such occasions as these catastrophes.

'151' that end:

human happiness, as in l. 149.

'156'

Caesar Borgia, the wicked son of Pope Alexander VI, and Catiline are mentioned here as portents in the moral world parallel to plagues and earthquakes in the physical.

'160 young Ammon':

Alexander the Great. See note on 'Essay on Criticism', l. 376.

'163'

Why do we accuse God for permitting wickedness when we do not blame Him for permitting evil in the natural world?

'166 there':

in nature.

'here':

in man.

'173-206'

In this section Pope reproves those who are dissatisfied with man's faculties. He points out that all animals, man included, have powers suited to their position in the world (ll. 179-188), and asserts that if man had keener senses than he now has, he would be exposed to evils from which he now is free (ll. 193-203).

'176 To want':

to lack.

'177'

Paraphrase this line in prose.

'181 compensated':

accented on the antepenult.

'183 the state':

the place which the creature occupies in the natural world.

'195 finer optics':

keener power of sight.

'197 touch':

a noun, subject of "were given," understood from l. 195.

'199 quick effluvia':

pungent odors. The construction is very condensed here; "effluvia" may be regarded like "touch" as a subject of "were given" (l. 195); but one would expect rather a phrase to denote a keener sense of smell than man now possesses.

'202 music of the spheres':

it was an old belief that the stars and planets uttered musical notes as they moved along their courses. These notes made up the "harmony of the spheres." Shakespeare ('Merchant of Venice', V, 64-5) says that our senses are too dull to hear it. Pope, following a passage in Cicero's 'Somnium Scipionis', suggests that this music is too loud for human senses.

'207-232'

Pope now goes on to show how in the animal world there is an exact gradation of the faculties of sense and of the powers of instinct. Man alone is endowed with reason which is more than equivalent to all these powers and makes him lord over all animals.

'212'

The mole is almost blind; the lynx was supposed to be the most keen-sighted of animals.

'213-214'

The lion was supposed by Pope to hunt by sight alone as the dog by scent. What does he mean by "the tainted green"?

'215-216'

Fishes are almost deaf, while birds are very quick of hearing.

'219 nice:'

keenly discriminating.

'healing dew:'

healthful honey.

'221-222'

The power of instinct which is barely perceptible in the pig amounts almost to the power of reason in the elephant.

'223 barrier:'

pronounced like the French 'barriere', as a word of two syllables with the accent on the last.

'226 Sense ... Thought:'

sensation and reason.

'227 Middle natures:'

intermediate natures, which long to unite with those above or below them. The exact sense is not very clear.

'233-258'

In this passage Pope insists that the chain of being stretches unbroken from God through man to the lowest created forms. If any link in this chain were broken, as would happen if men possessed higher faculties than are now assigned them, the whole universe would be thrown into confusion. This is another answer to those who complain of the imperfections of man's nature.

'234 quick:'

living. Pope does not discriminate between organic and inorganic matter.

'240 glass:'

microscope.

'242-244'

Inferior beings might then press upon us. If they did not, a fatal gap would be left by our ascent in the scale.

'247 each system:'

Pope imagines the universe to be composed of an infinite number of systems like ours. Since each of these is essential to the orderly arrangement of the universe, any disorder such as he has imagined would have infinitely destructive consequences. These are described in ll. 251-257.

'267-280'

In these lines Pope speaks of God as the soul of the world in an outburst of really exalted enthusiasm that is rare enough in his work.

'269 That:'

a relative pronoun referring to "soul," l. 268.

'270 th' ethereal frame:' the heavens.

'276 as perfect in a hair as heart:'

this has been called "a vile antithesis," on the ground that there is no reason why hair and heart should be contrasted. But Pope may have had in mind the saying of Christ. "the very hairs of your head are all numbered." The hairs are spoken of here as the least important part of the body; the heart, on the other hand, has always been thought of as the most important organ. There is, therefore, a real antithesis between the two.

'278 Seraph ... burns:'

the seraphim according to old commentators are on fire with the love of God.

'280 equals all:'

makes all things equal. This does not seem consistent with the idea of the gradations of existence which Pope has been preaching throughout this Epistle. Possibly it means that all things high and low are filled alike with the divine spirit and in this sense all things are equal. But one must not expect to find exact and consistent philosophy in the 'Essay on Man'.

'281-294'

Here Pope sums up the argument of this Epistle, urging man to recognize his ignorance, to be content with his seeming imperfections, and to realize that "whatever is, is right."

'282 Our proper bliss:'

our happiness as men.

'283 point:'

appointed place in the universe.

'286 Secure:'

sure.

'289'

Hobbes, an English philosopher with whose work Pope was, no doubt, acquainted, says, "Nature is the art whereby God governs the world."



* * * * *



AN EPISTLE TO DR ARBUTHNOT



INTRODUCTION

Next to 'The Rape of the Lock', I think, the 'Epistle to Arbuthnot' is the most interesting and the most important of Pope's poems—the most important since it shows the master poet of the age employing his ripened powers in the field most suitable for their display, that of personal satire, the most interesting, because, unlike his former satiric poem the 'Dunciad', it is not mere invective, but gives us, as no other poem of Pope's can be said to do, a portrait of the poet himself.

Like most of Pope's poems, the 'Epistle to Arbuthnot' owes its existence to an objective cause. This was the poet's wish to justify himself against a series of savage attacks, which had recently been directed against him. If Pope had expected by the publication of the 'Dunciad' to crush the herd of scribblers who had been for years abusing him, he must have been woefully disappointed. On the contrary, the roar of insult and calumny rose louder than ever, and new voices were added to the chorus. In the year 1733 two enemies entered the field against Pope such as he had never yet had to encounter—enemies of high social position, of acknowledged wit, and of a certain, though as the sequel proved quite inadequate, talent for satire. These were Lady Mary Wortley Montague and Lord John Hervey.

Lady Mary had been for years acknowledged as one of the wittiest, most learned, and most beautiful women of her day. Pope seems to have met her in 1715 and at once joined the train of her admirers. When she accompanied her husband on his embassy to Constantinople in the following year, the poet entered into a long correspondence with her, protesting in the most elaborate fashion his undying devotion. On her return he induced her to settle with her husband at Twickenham. Here he continued his attentions, half real, half in the affected gallantry of the day, until, to quote the lady's own words to her daughter many years after, "at some ill-chosen time when she least expected what romancers call a declaration, he made such passionate love to her, as, in spite of her utmost endeavours to be angry and look grave, provoked an immoderate fit of laughter," and, she added, from that moment Pope became her implacable enemy. Certainly by the time Pope began to write the 'Dunciad' he was so far estranged from his old friend that he permitted himself in that poem a scoffing allusion to a scandal in which she had recently become involved. The lady answered, or the poet thought that she did, with an anonymous pamphlet, 'A Pop upon Pope', describing a castigation, wholly imaginary, said to have been inflicted upon the poet as a proper reward for his satire. After this, of course, all hope of a reconciliation was at an end, and in his satires and epistles Pope repeatedly introduced Lady Mary under various titles in the most offensive fashion. In his first 'Imitation of Horace', published in February, 1733, he referred in the most unpardonable manner to a certain Sappho, and the dangers attendant upon any acquaintance with her. Lady Mary was foolish enough to apply the lines to herself and to send a common friend to remonstrate with Pope. He coolly replied that he was surprised that Lady Mary should feel hurt, since the lines could only apply to certain women, naming four notorious scribblers, whose lives were as immoral as their works. Such an answer was by no means calculated to turn away the lady's wrath, and for an ally in the campaign of anonymous abuse that she now planned she sought out her friend Lord Hervey. John Hervey, called by courtesy Lord Hervey, the second son of the Earl of Bristol, was one of the most prominent figures at the court of George II. He had been made vice-chamberlain of the royal household in 1730, and was the intimate friend and confidential adviser of Queen Caroline. Clever, affable, unprincipled, and cynical, he was a perfect type of the Georgian courtier to whom loyalty, patriotism, honesty, and honor were so many synonyms for folly. He was effeminate in habits and appearance, but notoriously licentious; he affected to scoff at learning but made some pretense to literature, and had written 'Four Epistles after the Manner of Ovid', and numerous political pamphlets. Pope, who had some slight personal acquaintance with him, disliked his political connections and probably despised his verses, and in the 'Imitation' already mentioned had alluded to him under the title of Lord Fanny as capable of turning out a thousand lines of verse a day. This was sufficient cause, if cause were needed, to induce Hervey to join Lady Mary in her warfare against Pope.

The first blow was struck in an anonymous poem, probably the combined work of the two allies, called 'Verses addressed to the Imitator of Horace', which appeared in March, 1733, and it was followed up in August by an 'Epistle from a Nobleman to a Doctor of Divinity', which also appeared anonymously, but was well known to be the work of Lord Hervey. In these poems Pope was abused in the most unmeasured terms. His work was styled a mere collection of libels; he had no invention except in defamation; he was a mere pretender to genius. His morals were not left unimpeached; he was charged with selling other men's work printed in his name,—a gross distortion of his employing assistants in the translation of the 'Odyssey',—he was ungrateful, unjust, a foe to human kind, an enemy like the devil to all that have being. The noble authors, probably well aware how they could give the most pain, proceeded to attack his family and his distorted person. His parents were obscure and vulgar people; and he himself a wretched outcast:

with the emblem of [his] crooked mind Marked on [his] back like Cain by God's own hand.

And to cap the climax, as soon as these shameful libels were in print, Lord Hervey bustled off to show them to the Queen and to laugh with her over the fine way in which he had put down the bitter little poet.

In order to understand and appreciate Pope's reception of these attacks, we must recall to ourselves the position in which he lived. He was a Catholic, and I have already (Introduction, p. x) called attention to the precarious, tenure by which the Catholics of his time held their goods, their persons, their very lives, in security. He was the intimate of Bolingbroke, of all men living the most detested by the court, and his noble friends were almost without exception the avowed enemies of the court party. Pope had good reason to fear that the malice of his enemies might not be content to stop with abusive doggerel. But he was not in the least intimidated. On the contrary, he broke out in a fine flame of wrath against Lord Hervey, whom he evidently considered the chief offender, challenged his enemy to disavow the 'Epistle', and on his declining to do so, proceeded to make what he called "a proper reply" in a prose 'Letter to a Noble Lord'. This masterly piece of satire was passed about from hand to hand, but never printed. We are told that Sir Robert Walpole, who found Hervey a convenient tool in court intrigues, bribed Pope not to print it by securing a good position in France for one of the priests who had watched over the poet's youth. If this story be true, and we have Horace Walpole's authority for it, we may well imagine that the entry of the bribe, like that of Uncle Toby's oath, was blotted out by a tear from the books of the Recording Angel.

But Pope was by no means disposed to let the attacks go without an answer of some kind, and the particular form which his answer took seems to have been suggested by a letter from Arbuthnot. "I make it my last request," wrote his beloved physician, now sinking fast under the diseases that brought him to the grave, "that you continue that noble disdain and abhorrence of vice, which you seem so naturally endued with, but still with a due regard to your own safety; and study more to reform than to chastise, though the one often cannot be effected without the other." "I took very kindly your advice," Pope replied, "... and it has worked so much upon me considering the time and state you gave it in, that I determined to address to you one of my epistles written by piecemeal many years, and which I have now made haste to put together; wherein the question is stated, what were, and are my motives of writing, the objections to them, and my answers." In other words, the 'Epistle to Arbuthnot' which we see that Pope was working over at the date of this letter, August 25, 1734, was, in the old-fashioned phrase, his 'Apologia', his defense of his life and work.

As usual, Pope's account of his work cannot be taken literally. A comparison of dates shows that the 'Epistle' instead of having been "written by piecemeal many years" is essentially the work of one impulse, the desire to vindicate his character, his parents, and his work from the aspersions cast upon them by Lord Hervey and Lady Mary. The exceptions to this statement are two, or possibly three, passages which we know to have been written earlier and worked into the poem with infinite art.

The first of these is the famous portrait of Addison as Atticus. I have already spoken of the reasons that led to Pope's breach with Addison (Introduction, p. xv); and there is good reason to believe that this portrait sprang directly from Pope's bitter feeling toward the elder writer for his preference of Tickell's translation. The lines were certainly written in Addison's lifetime, though we may be permitted to doubt whether Pope really did send them to him, as he once asserted. They did not appear in print, however, till four years after Addison's death, when they were printed apparently without Pope's consent in a volume of miscellanies. It is interesting to note that in this form the full name "Addison" appeared in the last line. Some time later Pope acknowledged the verses and printed them with a few changes in his 'Miscellany' of 1727, substituting the more decorous "A—-n" for the "Addison" of the first text. Finally he worked over the passage again and inserted it, for a purpose that will be shown later, in the 'Epistle to Arbuthnot'.

It is not worth while to discuss here the justice or injustice of this famous portrait. In fact, the question hardly deserves to be raised. The passage is admittedly a satire, and a satire makes no claim to be a just and final sentence. Admitting, as we must, that Pope was in the wrong in his quarrel with Addison, we may well admit that he has not done him full justice. But we must equally admit that the picture is drawn with wonderful skill, that praise and blame are deftly mingled, and that the satire is all the more severe because of its frank admission of the great man's merits. And it must also be said that Pope has hit off some of the faults of Addison's character,—his coldness, his self-complacency, his quiet sneer, his indulgence of flattering fools—in a way that none of his biographers have done. That Pope was not blind to Addison's chief merit as an author is fully shown by a passage in a later poem, less well known than the portrait of Atticus, but well worth quotation. After speaking of the licentiousness of literature in Restoration days, he goes on to say: