Then there is Silia, who storms and rages because she has a pimple on her nose; and Papilla, who yearns for a park, but, as soon as the park is purchased, dissolves into tears on account of "the odious, odious trees"; and Narcissa,' whose nature, tolerably mild, "To make a wash would hardly stew a child"; and Philomede, who "sins with poets through pure love of wit"; and Flavia, who has too much sense to pray :

2

Nor asks of God, but of her stars, to give
The mighty blessing, "while we live, to live."
Then all for death, that opiate of the soul,
Lucretia's dagger, Rosamunda's bowl.3

The famous character of Atossa, generally applied to the Duchess of Marlborough, was not published till after the poet's death. Report said that the duchess bribed him to suppress the character, but he had prepared it for publication in Warburton's edition of his "Works.' It was written, however, in so ambiguous a style that it was almost equally applicable to the Duchess of Buckingham. There is a tradition that Pope had the temerity to read the passage in manuscript to each duchess as the character of the other. A few lines from this remarkable satire may be quoted. After alluding

1 Warton had been told that Narcissa was intended for the Duchess of Hamilton.

Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough, who was devotedly attached to Congreve, and raised a monument to him in Westminster Abbey. She died in 1733.

This may be an allusion to Lady Lechmere, daughter of Lord Howard, who made, according to the gossip of the day, an unsuccessful attempt to poison herself, in consequence of her heavy losses at cards.

to the inconsistencies of his other female contemporaries, the poet asks:

But what are these to great Atossa's mind?
Scarce once herself, by turns all womankind!
Who, with herself, or others, from her birth
Finds all her life one warfare upon earth;
Shines in exposing knaves and painting fools,
Yet is whate'er she hates and ridicules.

Strange! by the means defeated of the ends,
By spirit robbed of power, by warmth of friends,
By wealth of followers! without one distress,
Sick of herself through very selfishness!

Lady Suffolk is described in the character of Chloe, who has every pleasing and every prudent quality, but lacks a heart.

She speaks, behaves, and acts just as she ought,

But never, never reached one generous thought.

Your secrets are safe with Chloe, but you will never hear one of hers, and even when she sees her friend in deep despair she is able to observe "how much a chintz exceeds mohair."

Of all her dears she never slandered one,
But cares not if a thousand are undone.
Would Chloe know if you're alive or dead?
She bids her footman put it in her head.1

Having observed that in men various ruling passions are found, the poet asserts that in women, two only divide the sex.

The love of pleasure and the love of sway.

1 Warton records that Pope, being at dinner with Lady Suffolk one night, heard her tell her footman to remind her to inquire on the morrow for Mrs. Blount, who was ill.

Men, some to business, some to pleasure take;

But every woman is at heart a rake.

Men, some to quiet, some to public strife;

But every lady would be queen for life.

As we have seen in "The Rape of the Lock and other poems, Pope's ideal woman was chiefly distinguished by good-humour tempered by good sense, and in his concluding passage on the perfect woman he dwells entirely on the charm of an unvarying amiability. The ideal is blessed with a temperWhose unclouded ray

Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day.

Charms by accepting, by submitting sways,
Yet has her humour most when she obeys.
Let fops or fortune fly which way they will,
Disdains all loss of tickets or codille;

Spleen, vapours, or small-pox, above them all,
And mistress of herself though china fall.

The conclusion, though in effect a repetition of the charges of inconsistency already levelled against women, is twisted into a kind of compliment to the sex in general, and an immortal tribute to Patty in particular.

And yet, believe me, good as well as ill,
Woman's at best a contradiction still.
Heaven, when it strives to polish all it can

Its last best work, but forms a softer man.

Picks from each sex, to make the favourite blest,
Your love of pleasure, our desire of rest;
Blends, in exception to all general rules,
Your taste of follies, with our scorn of fools;
Reserve with frankness, art with truth allied,
Courage with softness, modesty with pride;
Fixed principles, with fancy ever new :
Shakes this together, and produces-you!

Be this a woman's fame; with this unblest,
Toasts live a scorn, and beauties die a jest.
This Phoebus promised (I forget the year)
When those blue eyes first opened on our sphere.
Ascendant Phoebus watched that hour with care,
Averted half your parents' simple prayer;
And gave you beauty, but denied the pelf
That buys your sex a tyrant o'er itself.

The generous god who wit and gold refines,
And ripens spirits, as he ripens mines,

Kept dross for duchesses-the world shall know it—
To you gave sense, good-humour, and a poet.

Bolingbroke, as we have seen, regarded the "Characters of Women as the finest of the satires, and his opinion was shared by Johnson, though not by modern critics. Exquisite as is the technique of the work, brilliant as are the satires, it was an error of judgment for a poet who had undertaken to write about women's characters to begin by denying that most women had any character at all. With this belief in his mind, he was compelled to create a museum of monstrosities-to write a chapter of fabulous mythology. He cannot even agree with himself, for, having denied women characters, he says (in a note) that their characters are more various than those of men. He puts forward a series of lampoons as genuine portraits. "There is no truth in Pope's satiric sketches of women-not even colourable truth; but if there were, how frivolous, how hollow, to to erect into solemn monumental protestations against the whole female sex, what turn out to be pure casual eccentricities, or else personal idiosyncrasies, or else foibles shockingly exaggerated!" 1

1 De Quincey.

CHAPTER XLVII

1735

The Literary Correspondence of Mr. Pope

THE

to a

HE concluding line of the "Epistle to
Lady"-

To you gave sense, good-humour, and a poet

led certain persons to believe that Pope was about to be married to Miss Blount. To one of these matter-of-fact friends Pope wrote:

"Your other question about intending marriage made me laugh for if that line meant any such thing it must be over. It is in the preterperfect tense, 'gave a poet' (?). It is a new sort of father for marriage he gave me long ago to Belinda, as he did Homer to Achilles, and it is a mercy he has not given me to more ladies, but that I am almost as little inclined to celebrate that way as the other."

In the course of this letter, the poet once again denies (by implication) the authorship of the "Sober Advice from Horace." The name of the great Bentley had been affixed to the notes, and

1 A most tasteless and unmannerly joke on the part of Pope, since the notes were both dull and indecent. In an anonymous letter to Mr. Pope, it was said that "to forge a note under Dr.