'Now, Bavius, take the poppy from thy brow, And place it here! here, all ye heroes, bow! 'This, this is he foretold by ancient rhymes,819 Th' Augustus born to bring Saturnian times. Signs following signs lead on the mighty year! See! the dull stars roll round and reappear. See, see, our own true Phœbus wears the bays! Our Midas sits Lord Chancellor of plays! On poets' tombs see Benson's titles writ! 825 REMARKS. 325 On poets' tombs see Benson's titles writ] W-m Benson (Surveyor of the buildings to his Majesty King George I.) gave in a report to the Lords, that their house and the Painted Chamber adjoining, were in immediate danger of falling; whereupon the Lords met in a committee to appoint some other place to sit in while the house should be taken down. But it being proposed to cause some other builders first to inspect it, they found it in very good condition. The Lords upon this were going upon an address to the King against Benson for such a misrepresentation; but the Earl of Sunderland, then Secretary, gave them an assurance that his Majesty would remove him, which was done accordingly. In favour of this man, the famous Sir Christopher Wren, who had been architect to the Crown for above fifty years, who built most of the churches in London, laid the first stone of St. Paul's, and lived to finish it, had been displaced from his employment at the age of near ninety years. IMITATIONS. 819 820 This, this is he foretold by ancient rhymes, Hic vir, hic est! tibi quem promitti sæpius audis, Sæcula qui rursus Latio, regnata per arva Saturno quondam”. VIRG. EN. VI. Saturnian here relates to the age of lead, mentioned b. i. ver. 26. 330 Lo! Ambrose Philips is preferr❜d for wit! 326 Till Birch shall blush with noble blood no more; REMARKS. 826-Ambrose Philips] 'He was (saith Mr. Jacob) one of the wits at Button's, and a justice of the peace.' But he hath since met with higher preferment in Ireland: and a much greater character we have of him in Mr. Gildon's complete Art of Poetry, vol. i. p. 157. 'Indeed, he confesses, he dares not set him quite on the same foot with Virgil, lest it should seem flattery, but he is much mistaken if posterity does not afford him a greater esteem than he at present enjoys.' He endeavoured to create some misunderstanding between our author and Mr. Addison, whom also soon after he abused as much. 330 Gay dies unpension'd, &c.] See Mr. Gay's fable of the Hare and many Friends. This gentleman was early in the friendship of our author, which continued to his death. He wrote several works of humour with great success: The Shepherd's Week, Trivia, The What-d'ye-call it, Fables; and, lastly, that prodigy of fortune, the Beggar's Opera. 333 Proceed, great days! &c.-Till Birch shall blush, &c.] Another great prophet of Dulness, on this side Styx, promiseth those days to be near at hand. 'The devil (saith he) licensed bishops to license masters of schools to instruct youth in the knowledge of the heathen gods, their religion, &c. The schools and universities will soon be tired and ashamed of classics, and such trumpery.' Hutchinson's Use of Reason recovered. SCRIBL Till Thames see Eton's sons for ever play, 'Enough! enough!' the raptur'd monarch cries! And through the ivory gate the vision flics.340 IMITATIONS. 840 And through the ivory gate, &c.] 'Sunt geminæ somni portæ; quarum altera fertur VIRG. EN. VI. Oct 20 329 BOOK IV. ARGUMENT. The poet being, in this book, to declare the completion of the prophecies mentioned at the end of the former, makes a new invocation; as the greater poets are wont, when some high and worthy matter is to be sung. He shows the goddess coming in her majesty to destroy order and science, and to substitute the kingdom of the Dull upon earth. How she leads captive the sciences, and silences the muses; and what they be who succeed in their stead. All her children, by a wonderful attraction, are drawn about her; and bear along with them divers others, who promote her empire by connivance, weak resistance, or discouragement of arts; such as half-wits, tasteless admirers, vain pretenders, the flatterers of dunces, or the patrons of them.. All these crowd round her; one of them offering to approach her, is driven back by a rival, but she commends and encourages both. The first who speak in form are the geniuses of the schools, who assure her of their care to advance her cause by confining youth to words, and keeping them out of the way of real knowledge. Their address, and her gracious answer; with her charge to them and the universities. The universities appear by their proper deputies, and assure her that the same method is observed in the progress of education. The speech of Aristarchus on this subject. They are driven off by a band of young gentlemen returned from travel with their tutors; one of whom delivers to the goddess, in a polite oration, an account of the whole conduct and fruits of their travels; presenting to her at the same time a young nobleman perfectly accomplished. She receives him graciously, and endues him with the happy quality of want of shame. She sees loitering about her a number of indolent persons abandoning all business and duty, and dying with laziness: to these approaches the antiquary Annius, entreating her to make them virtuosos, and assign them over to him; but Mummius, another antiquary, complaining of his fraudulent proceeding, she finds a method to reconcile their difference. Then enter a troop of people fantastically adorned, offering her strange and exotic presents: among them, one stands forth, and demands justice on another who had deprived him of one of the greatest curiosities in nature; but he justifies himself so well, that the goddess gives them both her approbation. She recommends to them to find proper employment for the indolents before mentioned, in the study of butterflies, shells, birdsnests, moss, &c. but with particular caution not to proceed beyond trifles, to any useful or extensive views of nature, or of the Author of nature. Against the last of these apprehensions, she is secured by a hearty address from the minute philosophers and freethinkers, one of whom speaks in the name of the rest. The youth thus instructed and principled, are delivered to her in a body, by the hands of Silenus; and then admitted to taste the cup of the Magus, her high priest, which causes a total oblivion of all obligations, divine, civil, moral, or rational. To these her adepts she sends priests, attendants, and comforters, of various kinds, confers on them orders and degrees; and then dismissing them with a speech, confirming to each his privileges, and telling what she expects from each, concludes with a yawn of extraordinary virtue: the progress and effects whereof on all orders of men, and the consummation of all, in the restoration of night and chaos, conclude the poem. YET, yet a moment, one dim ray of light Indulge, dread Chaos, and eternal Night!2 As half to show, half veil the deep intent. REMARKS. 2 dread Chaos and eternal Night] Invoked, as the restoration of their empire is the action of the poem. |