About this time he publifhed the Temple of Fame, which, as he tells Steele in their correspondence, he had written two years before; that is, when he was only twenty-two years old, an early time of life for fo much learning and fo much obfervation as that work exhibits.

On this poem Dennis afterwards published some remarks, of which the most reasonable is, that fome of the lines reprefent motion as exhibited by fculpture.

Of the Epiftle from Eloifa to Abelard, I do not know the date. His firft inclination to attempt a compofition of that tender kind arofe, as Mr. Savage told me, from his perufal of Prior's Nutbrown Maid. How much he has furpaffed Prior's work it is not neceffary

to

to mention, when perhaps it may be faid with juftice, that he has excelled every compofition of the fame kind. The mixture of religious hope and refignation gives an elevation and dignity. to disappointed love, which images merely natural cannot beftow. The gloom of a convent ftrikes the imagination with far greater force than the folitude of a grove.

This piece was, however, not much his favourite in his latter years, though I never heard upon what principle he flighted it..

In the next year (1713) he published Windfor Foreft; of which part was, as he relates, written at fixteen, about the fame time as his Paftorals, and the lat

ter

ter part was added afterwards: where the addition begins we are not told. The lines relating to the Peace confefs their own date. It is dedicated to Lord Lanfdown, who was then high in reputation and influence among the Tories; and it is faid that the conclufion of the poem gave great pain to Addison, both as a poet and a politician. Reports like this are often fpread with boldness very difproportionate to their evidence. Why should Addison receive any particular disturbance from the laft lines of Windfor Foreft? If contrariety of opinion could poifon a politician, he would not live a day; and, as a poet, he must have felt Pope's force of genius much more from many other parts of his works.

The

The pain that Addifon might feel it' is not likely that he would confess; and it is certain that he fo well fuppreffed his difcontent, that Pope now thought himself his favourite; for having been confulted in the revifal of Cato, he introduced it by a Prologue; and, when Dennis published his Remarks, undertook not indeed to vindicate but to revenge his friend, by a Narrative of the Frenzy of John Dennis.

There is reason to believe that Addifon gave no encouragement to this difingenuous hoftility; for, fays Pope, in a Letter to him," indeed your opinion, "that 'tis entirely to be neglected, "would be my own in my own cafe; "but I felt more warmth here than I

"did when I first faw his book against "myfelf (though indeed in two minutes "it made me heartily merry)." Addison was not a man on whom fuch cant of fenbility could make much impreffion. He left the pamphlet to itself, having difowned it to Dennis, and perhaps did not think Pope to have deserved much by his officioufness.

This year was printed in the Guardian the ironical comparison between the Paftorals of Phillips and Pope; a compofition of artifice, criticism, and literature, to which nothing equal will eafily be found. The fuperiority of Pope is fo ingeniously diffembled, and the feeble lines of Phillips fo fkilfully preferred, that Steele, being deceived, was unwilling