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Whate'er of mungril no one class admits,
A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.

Nor absent they, no members of her state,
Who pay her homage in her sons, the great;
Who, false to Phoebus, bow the knee to Baal;
Or impious, preach his word without a call,
Patrons, who sneak from living worth to dead,
With-hold the pension, and set up the head;
Or vest dull Flattery in the sacred gown;
Or give from fool to fool the laurel crown.
And (last and worse) with all the cant of wit,
Without the soul, the Muses' hypocrite.

Let standard-authors, thus, like trophies borne, 90 Appear more glorious, as more hack'd and torn. And you, my critics! in the chequer'd shade, Admire new light through holes yourselves have made.

100

There march'd the bard and blockhead side by side,

Who rhym'd for hire, and patroniz'd for pride.
Narcissus, prais'd with all a parson's power,
Look'd a white lily sunk beneath a shower.
There mov'd Montalto with superior air;
His stretch'd-out arm display'd a volume fair;
Courtiers and patriots in two ranks divide,
Through both he pass'd, and bow'd from side to
But as in graceful act, with awful eye, [side;
Compos'd he stood, bold Benson thrust him by: 110
On two unequal crutches propt he came,
Milton's on this, on that one Johnston's name.
The decent knight retir'd with sober rage,
Withdrew his hand, and clos'd the poinpous page.
But (happy for him as the times went then)
Appear'd Apollo's mayor aud aldermen,
On whom three hundred gold-capt youths await,
To lug the ponderous volume off in state. [wits!
When Dulness smiling :-" Thus revive the
But murder first, and mince them all to bits;
As erst Medea (cruel, so to save!)

A new edition of old son gave;

VARIATION.

Ver. 114.

120

"Leave not a foot of verse, a foot of stone, A page, a grave, that they can call their own; But spread, my sons, your glory thin or thick, On passive paper, or on solid brick. 130 So by each bard, an alderman shall sit, A heavy lord shall hang at every wit, And while on Fame's triumphal car they ride, Some slave of mine be pinion'd to their side."

Now crowds on crowds around the goddess press, Each eager to present the first address. Dunce scorning dunce beholds the next advance, But fop shows fop superior complaisance.

REMARKS.

Ver. 128. A page, a gråve,] For what less than a grave can be granted to a dead author? or what less than a page can be allowed a living one!

Ver. 128. A page,] Pagina, not pedissequus. A page of a book, not a servant, follower, or attendant: no poet having had a page since the death of Mr. Thomas Durfey.-Scribl.

Ver. 131. So by each bard an alderman, &c.] Vide the Tombs of the Poets, editio Westmonasteriensis.

Ibid.--an alderman shall sit,] Alluding to the monument erected for Butler by alderman Barber.

Ver. 132. A heavy lord shall hang at every wit,] How unnatural an image, and how ill-supported! saith Aristarchus. Had it been,

A heavy wit shall hang at every lord, something might have been said, in an age so dis

What! no respect, he cried, for Shakespeare's tinguished for well-judging patrons. For lord, page?

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Ver. 115. &c.] These four lines were printed in a separate leaf by Mr. Pope in the last edition, which he himself gave, of the Dunciad, with directions to the printer, to put this leaf into its place as soon as sir T. H.'s Shakespeare should be published.

Ver. 119. Thus revive. &c.] The goddess applands the practice of tacking the obscure names of persons not eminent in any branch of learning, to those of the most distinguished writers; either by printing editions of their works with impertinent alterations of their text, as in the former instances; or by setting up monuments disgraced with their own vile names and inscriptions, as in the latter.

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then, read load; that is, of debts here, and of commentaries hereafter. To this purpose, conspicuous is the case of the poor author of Hudibras, whose body, long since weighed down to the grave, by a load of debts, has lately had a more unmerciful load of commentaries laid upon his spirit; wherein the editor has achieved more than Virgil himself, when he turned critic, could boast of, which was only, that he had picked golď out of another man's dung, whereas the editor has picked it out of his own.-Scribl.

Aristarchus thinks the common reading right : and that the author himself had been struggling, and but just shaken off his load when he wrote the following epigram:

My lord complains, that Pope, stark mad with gardens,

Has lopt three trees the value of three farthings: But he's my neighbour, cries the peer polite, And if he'll visit me, I'll wave my right. What? on compulsion? and against my will, A lord's acquaintance? Let him file his bill. Ver. 137, 138.

Dunce scorning dunce beholds the next advance, But top shows fop superior complaisance. } This is not to be ascribed so much to the different manners of a court and college, as to the different effects which a pretence to learning, and a pretence to wit, have on blockheads. For as judgment consists in finding out the differences in things, and wit in finding out their likenesses, so the dunce

140

When lo! a spectre rose, whose index-hand
Held forth by virtue of the dreadful wand;
His beaver'd brow a birchen garland wears,
Dropping with infant's blood, and mother's tears.
O'er every vein a shuddering horrour runs ;
Eaton and Winton shake through all their sons.
All flesh is humbled, Westminster's bold race
Shrink, and confess the Genius of the place:
The pale boy-senator yet tingling stands,
And holds his breeches close with both his hands.
Then thus, since man from beast by words is
known,

Words are man's province, words we teach alone.
When Reason doubtful, like the Samian letter, 151
Points him two ways, the narrower is the better.
Plac'd at the door of Learning, youth to guide,
We never suffer it to stand too wide.

To ask, to guess, to know, as they commence,
As fancy opens the quick springs of sense,
We ply the memory, we load the brain,
Bind rebel Wit, and double chain on chain,
Confine the thought, to exercise the breath;
And keep them in the pale of words till death. 160
Whate'er the talents, or howe'er design'd,
We hang one jingling padlock on the mind:
A poet the first day, he dips his quill;
And what the last? a very poet still.
Pity! the charm works only in our wall,
Lost, lost too soon in yonder house or hall.
There truant Windham every Muse gave o'er,
There Talbot sunk, and was a wit no more!
How sweet an Ovid, Murray was our boast!
How many Martials were in Pulteney lost!
Else sure some bard, to our eternal praise,
In twice ten thousand rhyming nights and days,
Had reach'd the work, the all that mortal can;
And South beheld that master-piece of man.
"Oh" (cry'd the goddess)" for some pedant reign!
Some gentle James, to bless the land again;
To stick the doctor's chair into the throne,
Give law to words, or war with words alone,

REMARKS.

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This great prince was the first who assumed the title of Sacred Majesty, which his loyal clergy transferred from God to him. "The principles of passive obedience and non-resistance (says the author of the Dissertation on Parties, Letter 8), which before his time had skulked perhaps in some old homily, were talked, written, and preached into vogue in that inglorious reign."

Ver. 194. Though Christ-church, &c.] This line is doubtless spurious, and foisted in by the 170 impertinence of the editor; and accordingly we have put it in between hooks. For I affirm this college came as early as any other, by its proper deputies; nor did any college pay homage to Dulness in its whole body.-Bentl.

is all discord and dissension, and constantly busied in reproving, examining, confuting, &c. while the fop flourishes in peace, with songs and hymns of praise, addresses, characters, epithalamiums,

&c.

Ver. 140. the dreadful wand;] A cane usually borne by schoolmasters, which drives the poor souls about like the wand of Mercury.-Scribl.

Ver. 151. like the Samian letter, The letter Y used by Pythagoras as an emblem of the different roads of virtue and vice.

Et tibi quæ Samios diduxit litera ramos.-Pers. Ver. 174. that master-piece of man.] Viz. an epigram. The famous Dr. South declared a per fect epigram to be as difficult a performance as an epic poem. And the critics say, "An epic poem is the greatest work human nature is capable

of." Ver. 176. Some gentle James, &c.] Wilson tells us that this king, James the First, took upon himself to teach the Latin tongue to Car, earl of Somerset ; and that Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador would speak false Latin to him, ou pur pose to give him the pleasure of correcting it, whereby he wrought himself into his good graces.

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Ver. 196. still expelling Locke,] In the year 1703 there was a meting of the heads of the University of Oxford to censure Mr. Locke's Essay on Human Understanding, and to forbid the reading of it. See his Letters in the last Edit.

Ver. 198. On German Crouzaz, and Dutch Burgers lyck ] There seems to be an improbability that the doctors and heads of houses should ride on horseback, who of late days, being gouty or unwieldy, have kept their coaches. But these are horses of great strength, and fit to carry any weight, as their German and Dutch extraction av manifest; and very famous we may conclude, being honour'd with names, as were the horses Pegasus and Bucephalus -Scribl.

Though I have the greatest deference to the penetration of this eminent scholiast, and must own that nothing can be more natural than his interpretation, or juster than that rule of criticism, which directs us to keep to the literal sense, when no apparent absurdity accompanies it (and sure there is no absurdity in supposing a logician on horseback), yet still I must needs think the hackneys here celebrated were not real horses, nor even Centaurs, which, for the sake of the learned Chiron, I should rather be inclined to think, if I were forced to find them four legs, but downright plain men, though logicians: and only thus ine-. tamorphosed by a rule of rhetorie, of which cardinal Perron gives us an example, where he calls Clavius, Un esprit pesant, lourd, sans subtilité, ni gentillesse, un gros cheval d'Alle

magne."

200

As many quit the streams that murmuring fall
To lull the sons of Margaret and Clare-hall,
Where Bentley late tempestuous wont to sport
In troubled waters, but now sleeps in port.
Before them march'd that awful Aristarch;
Plow'd was his front with many a deep remark:
His hat, which never vail'd to human pride,
Walker with reverence took, and laid aside.
Low bow'd the rest: he, kingly, did but nod:
So upright quakers please both man and God.
"Mistress! dismiss that rabble from your throne:
Avaunt is Aristarchus yet unknown!
The mighty scholiast, whose unweary'd pains
Made Horace dull, and humbled Milton's strains.
Turn what they will to verse, their toil is vain,
Critics like me shall make it prose again.
Roman and Greek grammarians! know your better:
Author of something yet more great than letter;

REMARKS.

210

Here I profess to go opposite to the whole stream of commentators. I think the poet only aimed, though awkwardly, at an elegant Græcism in this representation; for in that language the word xos [horse] was often prefixed to others, to denote greatness of strength; as irokázalov, ἵππόγλωσσον ἱππομάραθρον, and particularly ΙπποINOMON, a great connoisseur, which comes nearest to the case in hand.-Scip. Maff.

Ver. 199. the streams] The river Cam, running by the walls of these colleges, which are particularly famous for their skill in disputation.

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Ver. 220. of Me or Te,] It was a serious dispute, about which the learned were much divided, and some treatises written: had it been about meum and tuum it could not be more contested, than whether at the end of the first Ode of Horace, to read, Me doctarum hederæ præmia frontium, or, Te doctarum hedera.-By this the learned

Ver. 202. sleeps in port.] viz. "Now retired into harbour, after the tempests that had long agitated his society." So Scriblerus. But the learned Scipio Maffei understands it of a certain wine called port, from Oporto, a city of Portugal, of which this professor invited him to drink abun-scholiast would seem to insinuate that the dispute dantly. Scip. Maff. De Compotation. Academicis. [And to the opinion of Manci inclineth the sagacious annotator on Dr. King's Advice to Horace.]

was not about meum and tuum, which is a inistake: for, as a venerable sage observeth, words are the counters of wisemen, but the money of fools; so that we see their property was indeed concerned.--Scribl.

Ver. 210. Aristarchus.] A famous commentator and corrector of Homer, whose name has been Ver. 222. Or give up Cicero to C or K.] frequently used to signify a complete critic. The Grammatical disputes about the manner of procompliment paid by our author to this eminentnouncing Cicero's name in Greek. It is a dispute professor, in applying to him so great a name, was the reason that he hath omitted to comment

on this part which contains his own praises. We shall therefore supply that loss to our best ability. Scribl.

Ver. 214. Critics like me-] Alluding to two famous editions of Horace and Milton; whose richest veins of poetry he had prodigally reduced to the poorest and most beggarly prosc.-Verily the learned scholiast is grievously mistaken. Aristarchus is not boasting here of the wonders of his art in annihilating the sublime; but of the usefulness of it, in reducing the turgid to its proper class; the words "make it prose again," plainly showing that prose it was, though ashamed of its original, and therefore to prose it should return. Indeed, much it is to be lamented that Dulness doth not confine her critics to this useful task; and commission them to dismount what Aristophanes calls Ρημαθ' ίπποβάμονα, all prose on hors-back.-Scribl.

Ver. 216. Author of something yet more great than letter;] Alluding to those grammarians, such as Palamedes and Simonides, who invented

whether in Latin the name of Hermagoras should end in as or a. Quintilian quotes Cicero as writing it Hermagora, which Bently rejects, and says Quintilian must be mistaken, Cicero could not write it so, and that in this case he would not believe Cicero himself. These are his very words: Ego vero Ciceronem ita scripsisse ne Ciceroni quidem affirmanti crediderim.-Epist. ad Mill. in fin. Frag. Menand. et Phil.

Ver. 223, 224. Freind-Alsop] Dr. Robert Freind, master of Westminster-school, and canon of Christ-church, Dr. Anthony Alsop, a happy imitator of the Horatian style.

Ver. 226. Manilius and Solinus] Some critics having had it in their choice to comment either on Virgil or Manilius, Pliny or Solinus, have chosen the worse author, the more freely to display their critical capacity.

Ver. 228, &c. Suidas, Gellius, Stobæus] The first a dictionary-writer, a collector of impertinent facts and barbarous words; the second a minute critic; the third an author, who gave his commonplace book to the public, where we happen to find much mince-meat of old books.

The critic eye, that microscope of wit, Sees hairs and pores, examines bit by bit: How parts relate to parts, or they to whole; The body's harmony, the beaming soul, Are things which Kuster, Burman, Wasse shall see, When man's whole frame is obvious to a flea. "Ah, think not, mistress! more true Dulness lies In Folly's cap, than Wisdom's grave disguise. 240 Like buoys, that never sink into the flood, On Learning's surface we but lie and nod, Thine is the genuine head of many a house, And much divinity without a Nous. Nor could a Barrow work on every block, Nor has one Atterbury spoil'd the flock. See! still thy own, the heavy canon roll, And metaphysic smokes involve the pole. For thee we dim the eyes, and stuff the head With all such reading as was never read: For thee explain a thing till all men doubt it, And write about it, goddess, and about it: So spins the silk-worm small its slender store, And labours, till it clouds itself all o'er. What though we let some better sort of fool Thrid ev'ry science, run through every school? Never by tumbler through the hoops was shown Such skill in passing all, and touching none. He may indeed (if sober all this time) Plague with dispute, or persecute with rhyme. 260 We only furnish what he cannot use,

250

Or wed to what he must divorce, a Muse:
Full in the midst of Euclid dip at once,
And petrify a genius to a dunce:
Or set on metaphysic ground to prance,
Show all his paces, not a step advancé.
With the same cement, ever sure to bind,
We bring to one dead level every mind.
Then take him to develop if you can,
And hew the block off, and get out the man.
But wherefore waste I words? I see advance
Whore, pupil, and lac'd governor, from France.

REMARKS.

270

Ver. 245, 246. Barrow, Atterbury] Isaac Barrow, master of Trinity, Francis Atterbury, dean of Christ-church, both great geniuses and eloquent preachers; one more conversant in the sublime geometry, the other in classical learning; but who equally made it their care to advance the polite arts in their several societies.

Ver. 272. lac'd governor] Why lac'd? Because gold and silver are necessary trimming to denote the dress of a person of rank, and the governor must be supposed so in foreign countries, to be admitted into courts and other places of fair reception. But how comes Aristarchus to know at sight that this governor came from France? Know? Why, by the laced coat.-Scribl.

280

Walker! our hat"- -nor more he deign'd to say,
But, stern as Ajax' spectre, strode away.
In flow'd at once a gay embroider'd race,
And tittering push'd the pedants off the place:
Some would have spoken, but the voice was drown'd
By the French horn, or by the opening hound.
The first came forwards, with as easy mien,
As if he saw St. James's and the queen.
When thus th' attendant orator begun,
"Receive, great empress, thy accomplish'd son':
Thine from the birth, and sacred from the rod,
A dauntless infant! never scar'd with God.
The sire saw, one by one, his virtues wake:
The mother begg'd the blessing of a rake.
Thou gav'st that ripeness, which so soon began,
And ceas'd so soon, he ne'er was boy, nor man.
Through school and college, thy kind cloud o'er-

cast,

Safe and unseen the young Æneas past: Thence bursting glorious, all at once let down, Stunn'd with his giddy larum half the town.

REMARKS.

290

Ver. 280. As if he saw St. James's] Reflecting on the disrespectful and indecent behaviour of several forward young persons in the presence, so offensive to all serious men, and to none more than the good Scriblerus.

Ver. 281. th' attendant orator] The governor above-said. The poet gives him no particular name; being unwilling, I presume, to offend or to do injustice, to any, by celebrating one only with whom this character agrees, in preference to so many who equally deserve it.-Scribl,

Ver. 284. A dauntless infant! never scar'd with God] i. e. Brought up in the enlarged principles of modern education; whose great point is, to keep the infant mind free from the prejudices of opinion, and the growing spirit unbroken by terrifying names. Amongst the happy consequences of this reformed discipline, it is not the least, that we have never afterwards any occasion for the priest, whose trade, as a modern wit informs us, is only to finish what the nurse began.

-Scribl.

Ver. 286.-the blessing of a rake.] Scriblerus is here much at a loss to find out what this blessing should be. He is sometimes tempted to imagine it might be the marrying a great fortune: but this, again, for the vulgarity of it, he rejects, as something uncommon seemed to be prayed for. And after many strange conceits, not at all to the honour of the fair sex, he at length rests in this, that it was, that her son might pass for a wit; in which opinion he fortifies himself by ver. 316. where the orator, speaking of his pupil, says,

that he

Intrigued with glory, and with spirit whor'd, which seems to insinuate that her prayer was

Ibid. Whore, pupil, and lac'd governor] Some critics have objected to the order here, being of opinion that the governor should have the pre-heard. cedence before the whore, if not before the pupil. But were he so placed, it might be thought to insinuate that the governor led the pupil to the whore; and were the pupil placed first, he might be supposed to lead the governor to her. our impartial poet, as he is drawing their picture, represents them in the order in which they are nerally seen; namely, the pupil between the whore and the governor, but placeth the whore first. as she usually governs both the other.

But

every where else, lays open the very soul of Here the good scholiast, as, indeed, modern criticism, while he makes his own ignorance of a poctical expression hold open the door to much erudition and learned conjecture: the blessing of a rake signifying no more than that he might be a rake; the effects of a thing for the thing itself, a common figure. The careful mother only wished her son might be a rake, as well knowing that its attendant blessings would follow of course.

Her too receive (for her my soul adores),
So may the sons of sons of sons of whores
Prop thine, O empress! like each neighbour
And make a long posterity thy own." [throne,
Pleas'd, she accepts the hero and the dame,
Wraps in her veil, and frees from sense or shame.
Then look'd, and saw a lazy, lolling sort,

300 Unseen at church, at senate, or at court,
Of ever-listless loiterers, that attend

Intrepid then, o'er seas and lands he flew :
Europe he saw, and Europe saw him too.
There all thy gifts and graces we display,
Thou, only thou, directing all our way:
To where the Seine, ́obsequious as she runs,
Pours at great Bourbon's feet her silken sons;
Or Tyber, now no longer Roman, rolls,
Vain of Italian arts, Italian souls;
To happy convents, bosom'd deep in vines,
Where slumber abbots, purple as their wines :
To isles of fragrance, lily-silver'd vales,
Diffusing languor in the panting gales:
To lands of singing, or of dancing slaves,
Love-whispering woods, and lute-resounding waves,
But chief her shrine where naked Venus keeps,
And Cupids ride the lion of the deeps,
Where, eas'd of fleets, the Adriatic main
Wafts the smooth eunuch and enamour'd swain.
Led by my hand, he saunter'd Europe round, 311
And gather'd every vice on christian ground;
Saw every court, heard every king declare
His royal sense, of operas or the fair;
The stews and palace equally explor'd,
Intrigued with glory, and with spirit whor'd;
Try'd all hors d'œuvres, all liqueurs defin'd,
Judicious drank, and greatly-daring din'd;
Dropt the dull lumber of the Latin store,
Spoil'd his own language, and acquir'd no more;
All classic learning lost on classic ground;
And last turn'd air, the echo of a sound;
See now, half cur'd, and perfectly well-bred,
With nothing but a solo in his head;
As much estate, and principle, and wit,

As Jansen, Fleetwood, Cibber shall think fit;
Stol'n from a duel, follow'd by a nun,
And if a borough chuse him, not undone;
Sce, to my country happy I restore

321

329

This glorious youth, and add one Venus more.

REMARKS.

No cause, no trust, no duty, and no friend, 340
Thee too, my Paridel; she mark'd thee there,
Stretch'd on the rack of a too easy chair,
And heard thy everlasting yawn confess
The pains and penalties of idleness.
She pity'd but her pity only shed
Benigner influence on thy nodding head.

But Annius, crafty seer, with ebon wand,
And well-dissembled emerald on his hand,
False as his gems, and canker'd as his coins,
Came, cramin'd with capon, from where Pollis
dines,
350

360

Soft, as the wily fox is seen to creep,
Where bask on sunny banks the simple sheep,
Walk round and round, now prying here, now there,
So he; but pious, whisper'd first his prayer.
"Grant, gracious goddess! grant me stil to cheat,
O may thy cloud still cover the deceit !
Thy choicer mists on this assembly shed,
But pour them thickest on the noble head.
So shall each youth, assisted by our eyes,
See other Cæsars, other Homers rise;
Through twilight ages hunt th' Athenian fowl,
Which Chalcis gods; and mortals call an owl,
Now see an Attys, now a Cecrops clear,
Nay, Mahomet! the pigeon at thine ear:
Be rich in ancient brass, though not in gold,
And keep his Lares, though his house be sold;
To headless Phebe his fair briae postpone,
Honour a Syrian prince above his own;
Lord of an Otho, if I vouch it true;

Ver. 307. But chief, &c.] These two lines, in Blest in one Niger, till he knows of two."
their force of imagery and colouring, emulate and
equal the pencil of Rubens.

Ver. 308. And Cupids ride the lion of the deeps;] The winged lion, the arms of Venice. This republic heretofore the most considerable in Europe, for her naval force and the extent of her commerce; now illustrious for her carnivals.

Ver. 318. greatly-daring din'd;] It being indeed no small risque to eat through those extraordinary compositions, whose disguised ingredients are generally unknown to the guests, and highly inflammatory and unwholesome.

Ver. 324. With nothing but a solo in his head;] With nothing but a solo? Why, if it be a solo, how should there be any thing else? Palpable tautology! Read boldly au opera, which is enough of conscience for such a head as has lost all its

Latin. Bentl.

Ver. 326. Jansen, Fleetwood, Cibber] Three very eminent persons, all managers of plays: who, though not governors by profession, had, each in his way, concerned themselves in the education of youth; and regulated their wits, their morals, or their finances, at that period of their age which is the most important, their entrance into the polite world. Of the last of these, and his talents for this end, see Book i. ver. 199, &c.

REMARKS.

370

Ver. 331. Her too receive, &c.] This confirms what the learned Scriblerus advanced in his note on ver. 272, that the governor, as well as the pupil, had a particular interest in this lady.

Ver. 341. Thee too, my Paridel !] The poet seems to speak of this young gentleman with great affection. The name is taken from Spenser, who gives it to a wandering courtly squire, that travelled about for the same reason for which many young squires are now fond of travelling, and especially to Paris.

Ver. 347. Annius,] The name taken from Annins the monk of Viterbo, famous for many impositions and forgeries of ancient manuscripts and inscriptions, which he was prompted to by mere vanity, but our Annius had a more substantial

motive.

Ver. 363. Attys and Cecrops] The first king of Atheus, of whom it is hard to suppose any coins are extant; but not so improbable as what follows, that there should be any of Mahomet, who forbad all images; and the story of whose pigeon was a monkish fable. Nevertheless one of these Anniuses made a counterfeit medal of that impostor, now in the collection of a learned nobleman.

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