(above all) that felf-opinion f which caufeth it to feem to themselves vaftly greater than it is, and is the prime motive of their fetting up in this fad and forry merchandise. The great power of these Goddeffes acting in alliance (whereof as the one is the mother of Induftry, fo is the other of Plodding) was to be exemplified in fome one great and remarkable Action: And none could be more fo than that which our poet hath chofen; viz. the restoration of the reign of Chaos and Night, by the ministry of Dulness their daughter, in the removal of her imperial feat from the City to the polite World; as the Action of the Æneid is the restoration of the empire of Troy, by the removal of the race from thence to Latium. But as Homer fingeth only the Wrath of Achilles, yet includes in his Poem the whole hiftory of the Trojan war, in like manner our author hath drawn into this fingle Action the whole hiftory of Dulness and her children. A Perfon muft next be fixed upon to fupport this Action. This Phantom in the Poet's mind must have a Name : He finds it to be --: and he becomes of courfe the Hero of the poem. The Fable being thus, according to the best example, one and entire, as contained in the Propofition; the Machinery is a continued chain of Allegories, fetting forth the whole Power, Ministry, and Empire of f Book I. ver. 80. g Ibid. chap. vii, viii. Boffu, chap. viii. Vide Ariftot. Poetic. cap. ix. Dulnefs, Dulness, extended through her fubordinate inftruments, in all her various operations. This is branched into Episodes, each of which hath its Moral apart, though all conducive to the main end. The Crowd affembled in the fecond book, demonftrates the design to be more extensive than to bad poets only, and that we may expect other Episodes of the Patrons, Encouragers, or Paymafters of fuch authors, as occafion shall bring them forth. And the third book, if well confidered, feemeth to embrace the whole world. Each of the Games relateth to fome or other vile clafs of writers: The first concerneth the Plagiary, to whom he giveth the name of Moore; the fecond, the libellous Novelift, whom he styleth Eliza; the third, the Flattering Dedicator; the fourth, the bawling Critic, or noify Poet; the fifth, the dark and dirty Party-writer; and fo of the reft: affigning to each fome proper name or other, fuch as he could find. As for the Characters, the public hath already acknowledged how justly they are drawn: The manners are fo depicted, and the sentiment fo peculiar to those to whom applied, that furely to transfer them to any other or wiser perfonages, would be exceeding difficult : And certain it is, that every perfon concerned, being confulted apart, hath readily owned the resemblance of every portrait, his own excepted. So Mr. Cibber calls them," a parcel of poor wretches, fo many filly "flies but adds, our Author's Wit is remarkably : i Cibber's Letter to Mr. P. page 9. 12. 41. 66 more bare and barren, whenever it would fall foul "on Cibber, than upon any other Perfon whatever." The Defcriptions are fingular, the Comparisons very quaint, the Narration various, yet of one colour: The purity and chastity of Diction is fo preferved, that, in the places most fufpicious, not the words but only the images have been cenfured, and yet are those images no other than have been fanctified by ancient and claffical Authority (though, as was the manner of those good times, not fo curiously wrapped up) yea, and commented upon by the most grave Doctors, and approved Critics. As it beareth the name of Epic, it is thereby fubjected to fuch fevere indifpenfable rules as are laid on all Neoterics, a ftrict imitation of the Ancients; infomuch that any deviation, accompanied with whatever poetic beauties, hath always been cenfured by the found Critic. How exact that limitation hath been in this piece, appeareth not only by its general ftructure, but by particular illufions infinite, many whereof have escaped both the commentator and poet himfelf; yea divers by his exceeding diligence are fo altered and interwoven with the reft, that several have already been, and more will be, by the ignorant abused, as altogether and originally his own. In a word, the whole poem proveth itself to be the work of our Author when his faculties were in full vigour and perfection; at that exact time when years have ripened the Judgment, without diminishing the Imagination which, by good Critics, is held to be punctually punctually at forty. For at that feafon it was that Virgil finished his Georgics; and Sir Richard Blackmore at the like age compofing his Arthurs, declared the fame to be the very Acme and pitch of life for Epic poefy: Though fince he hath altered it to fixty, the year in which he published his Alfred k. True it is, that the talents for Criticism, namely fmartness, quick cenfure, vivacity of remark, certainty of affeveration, indeed all but acerbity, feem rather the gifts of Youth than of riper Age: But it is far otherwife in Poetry; witness the works of Mr. Rymer annd Mr. Dennis, who beginning with Criticifm, became afterwards fuch Poets as no age hath paralleled. With good reafon therefore did our author chufe to write his Effay on that fubject at twenty, and reserve for his maturer years this great and wonderful work of the Dunciad. [56] RICARDUS ARISTARCHUS OF OF THE HERO OF THE POEM. F the Nature of Dunciad in general, whence derived, and on what authority founded, as well as of the art and conduct of this our poem in particular, the learned and laborious Scriblerus hath, according to his manner, and with tolerable share of judgment, differtated. But when he cometh to speak of the Person of the Hero fitted for fuch Poem, in truth he miferably halts and hallucinates: for, mifled by one Monfieur Boffu, a Gallic critic, he prateth of I cannot tell what Phantom of a Hero, only raised up to fupport the Fable. A putid conceit! As if Homer and Virgil, like modern Undertakers, who firft build their house and then feek out for a tenant, had contrived the ftory of a War and a Wandering, before they once thought either of Achilles or Æneas. We fhall therefore set our good brother and the world also right in this particular, by afsuring them, that, in the greater Epic, the prime intention of the Muse is to exalt Heroic Virtue, in order to propagate the love of it among the children of men ; and confequently that the Poet's first thought must needs be turned upon a real fubject meet for laud and celebration; not one whom he is to make, but one whom he may find, truly illuftrious. This is the primum mobile of |