Having proved, to his own satisfaction, the positive happiness of the righteous in the best of all possible worlds, Pope concludes with a fine apostrophe to St. John, "the master of the poet and his song," in the course of which he adjures his friend to

Teach me, like thee, in various nature wise,
To fall with dignity, with temper rise;
Formed by thy converse happily to steer
From grave to gay, from lively to severe ;
Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease,
Intent to reason, or polite to please.
Oh! while along the stream of time thy name
Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame,
Say, shall my little bark attendant sail,
Pursue the triumph and partake the gale ?
When statesmen, heroes, kings, in dust repose,
Whose sons shall blush their fathers were thy foes,
Shall then this verse to future age pretend
Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend?
That, urged by thee, I turned the tuneful art
From sounds to things, from fancy to the heart;
From wit's false mirror held up nature's light;
Showed erring pride, Whatever is, is right?
That reason, passion, answer one great aim;
That true self-love and social are the same;
That virtue only makes our bliss below;
And all our knowledge is ourselves to know.

CHAPTER XLIV

1733

The Reception of the "Essay on Man "-Death of Mrs. Pope-Country House VisitsDennis's Benefit

HE reception of the "Essay on Man"

THE

mixed, but on the whole flattering. The rumour that it was the work of an eminent divine, industriously spread by Pope himself, was generally · believed, and many good folk read the poem as a pious manual. Some people declared that they could not understand one word of it, though when they discovered that it was by the great Mr. Pope, the obscurity became less apparent. Warburton,1 the future champion of the Essay, said that it was collected from the worst passages of the worst authors, and that the doctrines were rank Atheism. No general attack, however, was made on the orthodoxy of the poem till it was translated into French.

1 William Warburton (1698-1779), the future Bishop of Gloucester, began his career in an attorney's office. He took orders in 1723. He had not published much beyond translations and pamphlets at this time (1733), but he was the friend and correspondent of Theobald, and other literary men of the Grub Street community. His patron was Sir Robert Sutton, who gave him the living of Brant Broughton in 1728. Warburton is credited with the saying that Milton "borrowed out of pride, Dryden from want of leisure, Addison from modesty, and Pope from want of genius."

In a note prefixed to an edition of the Essay that was published in 1735, Pope says that he wrote it in verse rather than prose for two reasons. First, because principles and precepts so written strike and hold the reader more strongly; secondly, because he found he could express himself more shortly in verse, "and much of the force as well as the grace of the arguments depend on their conciseness." He claims to have reduced the science of human nature to a few clear points, since the disputes had all been occasioned by the details. He contends that if his Essay has any merit it is because it steers between the extremes of doctrines seemingly opposite, passes over terms utterly unintelligible, and forms a temperate, yet not inconsistent, and short yet not imperfect, system of ethics. Pope probably did not realise that he had represented the course of events as what Johnson calls "a necessary concatenation of indissoluble fatality"; while Bolingbroke is said to have ridiculed him behind his back for teaching what he had not learnt, and advancing principles which he did not understand.1 But the Richardsons, who were in Pope's confidence, declared that he was well aware of

1 It would have been well if Bolingbroke, instead of encouraging Pope to write didactic and controversial verse, had remembered his own dictum :

"Should the poet make syllogisms in verse, or pursue a long process of reasoning in the didactic style, he would be sure to tire his readers on the whole. . . . He must contract, he may shadow, he has a right to omit, whatever may not be cast in the poetic mould, and when he cannot instruct he may hope to please. In short, it seems to me that the business of philosophers is to dilate, to press, to prove, to convince; and that of the poet to hint, to touch his subjects with short and spirited strokes, to warm the affections and speak to the heart."

the deistic and fatalistic tendency of certain passages in his poem, which they had often discussed with him. The secret of the authorship was strictly kept until the appearance of the third book in the winter of 1733-4. Besides Bolingbroke, Fortescue and Richardson were in the secret, but for a time both Swift and Caryll were kept in the dark. On March 8 Pope wrote to Caryll :

"The town is now very full of a new poem entitled 'An Essay on Man,' attributed, I think with reason, to a divine. It has merit, in my opinion, but not so much as they give it. At least it is incorrect, and has some inaccuracies in the expressions—one or two of an unhappy kind, for they may cause the author's sense to be turned, contrary to what I think his intention, a little unorthodoxically."

The subject is continued in a letter on March 20. "The poem you writ to me of, prevails much in the opinion of the world, and is better relished than at first, insomuch that I hear we are in a week or two to have the second part to the same tune. I cannot but say I think there is merit in it; and I perceive the divines have no objection to it, though now it is agreed not to be written by one-Dr. Croxall, Dr. Secker, and some others having solemnly denied it." 1

Bolingbroke was well aware of Pope's moral cowardice, his desire to appear orthodox to the orthodox, and free-thinking to the free-thinking. "I know," he writes on one occasion, "your mental precaution enough to know that you will screen

1 The poem was also attributed to Bolingbroke, Young, and Lord Paget.

yourself against any direct charge of heterodoxy." The poet himself confessed that he did not proceed with his comprehensive ethical scheme because he did not care to live continually in boiling water, and he could not say what he desired to say without provoking every church on the face of the earth.

Pope's long and devoted attendance on his mother was brought to an end by her death on June 7 of this year.1 1 On June 10 he wrote to ask Richardson to come and sketch the dead face.

"Her end," he says, cc was as easy as her life was innocent; and as it cost her not a groan, or even a sigh, there is yet upon her countenance such an expression of tranquillity, nay, almost of pleasure, that [it is so far from horrid] it is even amiable to behold it. It would afford the finest image of a saint expired that ever painter drew; and it would be the greatest obligation which even that obliging art could ever bestow upon a friend, if you could come and sketch it for me."

Mrs. Pope was buried the next day in Twickenham church, being carried to the grave by six poor men of the village and followed by six poor women, to each of whom was given a suit of dark grey cloth. Later, Pope put up an obelisk to the memory of his mother in a secluded part of his grounds. On the pedestal was inscribed :

Ah Editha!
Matrum Optima!

Mulierum Amantissima!

Vale!

1 She was 91, according to her baptismal register, but Pope thought she was 93.