B Y virtue of the Authority in Us vested by the Act for fubjecting Poets to the Power of a Licenser, We have revised this Piece; where, finding the Ayle and appellation of King to have been given to a certain Pretender, PfeudoPoet, or Phantom, of the name of Tibbald; and apprehending the fame may be deemed in fome fort a reflection on Majesty, or at least an infult on that Legal Authority which has bestowed on another Person the Crown of Poefy: We have ordered the faid Pretender, Pfeudo-Poet, or Phantom, utterly to vanish and evaporate out of this Work; and do declare the said Throne of Poesy from benceforth to be abdicated and vacant, unless duly and lawfully supplied by the Laureate himself. And it is hereby enalted, that no other Person do prefume to fill the fame. BY THE AUTHOR. A DECLARATION. WHEREAS certain Haberdashers of Points and Particles, being instigated by the spirit of Pride, and affuming to themselves the name of Critics and Restorers, have taken upon them to adulterate the common and current sense of of our Glorious Ancestors, Poets of this Realm, by clipping, coining, defacing the images, mixing their own base alloy, or otherwise falsifying the fame; which they publish, utter, and vend as genuine; the faid Haberdafters having no right thereto, as neither heirs, executors, administrators, assigns, or in any fort related to fuch Poets, to all or any of them: Now We, having carefully revised this our Dunciad, * beginning with the words The Mighty Mother, and ending with the words buries All, containing the entire fum of One thoufand seven hundred and fifty-four verses, declare every word, figure, point, and comma, of this impression to be authentic: and do therefore strictly enjoin and forbid any person or persons whatsoever, to erase, reverse, put between hooks, or by any other means, directly or indirectly, change or mangle any of them. And we do bereby earnestly exhort all our brethren to follow this our example, which we heartily wish our great Predeceffors had heretofore fet, as a remedy and prevention of all fuch abuses: Provided always, that nothing in this Declaration shall be construed to limit the lawful and undoubted right of every subject of this Realm to judge, cenfure, or condemn, in the whole, or in part, any Poem or Poet whatsoever. Given under our hand at London, this third day of January, in the year of our Lord One thousand feven hundred and thirty and two. Declarat' cor' me, JOHN BARBER, Mayor. * Read thus confidently, instead off "beginning with the word Books, and "ending with the word Flies," as formerly it ftood: read alfo, "containing the " entire fum of One thousand feven hundred and fifty-four verses," instead of "One thousand and twelve lines;" fuch being the initial and final words, and such the true and entire contents of this Foem. Thou art to know, Reader! that the first edition thereof, like that of Milton, was never feen by the Author, (though living, and not blind:) the editor himself confefled as much in his preface; and no two poems were ever published in fo arbitrary a manner. The editor of this had as boldly fupprefled whole paflages, yea, the entire laft book, as the editor of Paradife Loft added and augmented. Milton himself gave but ten books, his editor twelve this Author gave four books, his editor only three. But we have happily done justice to both; and prefume we shall live, in this our laft labour, as long as in any of our others. Y 3 Bemley TO DR. JONATHAN SWIFT. The Argument. THE Propofition, the Invocation, and the Inscription. Then the original of the great Empire of Dulness, and cause of the continuance thereof. The College of the Goddess in the City, with her private academy for poets in particular; the governors of it, and the four cardinal virtues. Then the Poem haftes into the midst of things, presenting her, on the evening of a Lord Mayor's day, revolving the long fucceffion of her fons, and the glories past and to come. She fixes her eye on Bayes, to be the inftrument of that great event which is the fubject of the Poem. He is described pensive among his books, giving up the caufe, and apprehending the period of her empire. After debating whether to betake himself to the church, or to gaming, or to party-writing, he raises an altar of proper Books, and (making first his folean prayer and declaration) purposes thereon to facrifice all his unfuccefsful writings. As the pile is kindled, the Goddess, beholding the flame from her feat, Aies and puts it out, by cafting upon it the Poem of Thule. She forthwith reveals herself to him, transports him to her Temple, unfolds her arts, and initiates him into her mysteries; then announc ing the death of Eufden the Poet-Laureat, anoints him, carries him to Court, and proclaims him fuccessor. THE mighty Mother, and her Son, who brings You REMARKS. The Dunciad.] It is an inconvenience to which writers of reputation are subject, that the justice of their resentment is not always rightly under. stood: for the calumnies of dull authors being foon forgotten, and those whom they aimed to injure not caring to recall to memory the particulars of false and scandalous abuse, their neceffary correction is fufpected of severity unprovoked. But in this case it would be but candid to estimate the chastisement on the general character of the offender, compared with that of the perfon injured. Let this serve with the candid reader in juftification of the Poet, and, on occafion, of the Editor. This Poem was written in the year 1726. In the next year an imperfect edition was published at Dublin, and reprinted in London in twelves; another at Dublin, and another at London, in octavo; and three others in twelves the fame year: but there was no perfect edition before that of London in quarto, which was attended with notes. We are willing to acquaint porerity, that this poem was presented to King George II. and his Queen, by the hands of Sir Robert Walpole, on the 12th of March, 1728-9. Schol. Vet. VARIATIONS. v. 1. The mighty Mother, &c.] In the first edition it was thus: Books and the man I fing, the first who brings Say, great Patricians! fince yourselves inspire IMITATIONS. Say, great Patricians! fince yourselves inspire ----Dii coeptis (nam vos mutatis et illas.) Ovid Met. I. You by whose care, in vain decry'd and curst, In eldest time, ere mortals writ or read, Still her old empire to refstore the tries, REMARKS. 5 10 5 20 Or It was expressly confeffed in the preface to the first edition, that this Poem was not published by the Author himself. It was printed originally in a foreign country. And what foreign country? Why, one notorious for blunders; where finding blanks only instead of proper names, these blunderers filled them up at their pleafure. to The very Hero of the Poem hath been mistaken this hour; fo that we are obliged to open our Notes with a difcovery who he really was. We learn from the former editor, that this piece was prefented by the hands of Sir Robert Walpole to King George II. Now the Author directly tells us, his Hero is the man -----who brings The Smithfield Mufes to the ear of kings. And it is notorious who was the perfon on whom this Prince conferred the honour of the laurel. It appears as plainly from the apostrophe to the Great in the third verse, that Tibbald could not be the perfon, who was never an Author in fashion or careffed by the great: whereas this fingle characteristic is fufficient to point out the true Hero; who, above all other Poets of his time, was the peculiar delight and chofen companion of the nobility of England; and wrote, as he himself tells us, certain of his works at the earnest defire of perfons of quality. Lastly, The fixth verse affords full proof; this Poet being the only one who was univerfally known to have had a fon to exactly like him, in his poetical, theatrical, political and moral capacities, that it could justly be Laid of him, Still Dunce the Second reigns like Dunce the First. IMITATIONS. Bentley. v. 6.] Alluding to a verse of Mr. Dryden, not in Mac Fleckno, (as is said ignorantly in the Key to the Dunciad, p. 1.) but in his verses to Mr. Congreve, And Tom the Second reigns like Tom the Firt." 25 Or praise the Court, or magnify mankind, Close to those walls where Folly holds her throne, And laughs to think Monroe would take her down, 30 Where o'er the gates, by his fam'd father's hand, Great Cibber's brazen, brainless brothers stand, One cell there is, conceal'd from vulgar eye, The cave of Poverty and Poetry: 35 Escape in monsters, and amaze the Town; 40 Hence hymning Tyburn's elegiac lines; Sepulchral Hence Journals, Medley's, Merc'ries, Magazines: REMARKS. v. 31.----by his fam'd father's hand.] Mr. Caius-Gabriel Cibber, father f the Poet laureate. The two ftatues of the lunatics over the gates of Bedlam-hospital were done by him, and (as the fon justly fays of them) are no ill monuments of his fame as an artist. VARIATIONS. After ver. 22. in the MSS. Or in the graver gown instruct mankind, Or filent let thy morals tell thy mind. But this was to be understood, as the Poet says, ironice, like the 23d verse. 2. 29. Close to those walls, &c.] In the former edit. thus: The cave of Poverty and Poetry. 2. 41. In the former edit. Hence hymning 'Tyburn's elegiac lay, Hence the foft fing-fong on Cecilia's day. ข. 42. Alludes to the annual fongs composed to mufic on St. Cecilia's feaft. IMITATIONS. v. 41, 42. Hence hymning Tyburn's---Hence, &c.]. --Genus unde Latinum, "Albanique patres, atque altæ mænia Romæ." Virg. An, I. |