public print." Let us join to this what is written by the author of the Rival Modes, the said Mr. James Moore Smith, in a letter to our author himself, who had informed him a month before that play was acted, Jan. 27, 1726-7, that, 'These verses, which he had before given him leave to insert in it, would be Known for his, some copics being got abroad. He desires nevertheless, that since the lines had been read in his comedy to several, Mr. P. would not de. prive it of them,' &c. Surely, if we add the testimonies of the lord Bolingbroke, of the lady to whom the said verses were originally addressed, of Hugh Bethel, esq. and others, who knew them as our author's long before the said gentleman composed his pay, it is hoped, the ingenuous, that affect not error will rectify their opinion by the suffrage of so honourable personages. And yet followeth another charge, insinuating no less than his enmity both to church and state, which could come from no other informer than the said Mr. James Moore Smith. "The Memoirs of a Parish Clerk was a very dull and unjust abuse of a person who wrote in defence of our religion and constitution, and who has been dead many years." This seemeth also most untrue, it being known to divers that these memoirs were written at the seat of the lord Harcourt, in Oxfordshire, before that excellent person (bishop Burnet's) death, and many years before the appearance of that history, of which they are pretended to be an abuse. Most true it is, that Mr. Moore had such a design and was himself the man who pressed Dr. Arbuthnot and Mr. Pope to assist him therein; and that he borrowed those memoirs of our author, when that history came forth, with intent to turn them to such abuse 1 Daily Journal, March 19. 1728. But being able to obtain from our author but one sin· gle hint, and either changing his mind, or having inore mind than ability, he contented himself to keep the said memoirs, and read them as his own to all his ac. quaintance. A noble person there is, into whose company Mr. Pope once chanced to introduce him, who well remembereth the conversation of Mr Moore to have turned upon the 'contempt he had for the work of that reverend prelate, and how full hẻ was of a design he declared himself to have, of ex. posing it.' This noble person is the earl of Peterborough. Here in truth should we crave pardon of all the foresaid right honourable and worthy personages, for having mentioned them in the same page with such weekly riff-raff railers and rhymers: but that we had their ever-honoured commands for the same; and that they are introduced not as witnesses in the controversy, but as witnesses that cannot be controverted; not to dispute, but to decide. Certain it is, that dividing our writers into twɑ classes, of such who were acquaintance, and of sich who were strangers to our author; the former are those who speak well, and the other those who spear evil of him. Of the first class, the most noble John Duke of Buckingham suins up his character in these lines: And yet so wondrous, so sublime a thing, So also is he deciphered by 1 Verses to Mr. P. on his translation of BonRSE. The Hon. Simon Harcourt. 'Say, wondrous youth, what column wilt thou choose, What laurell'd arch, for thy triumphant muse? Though each great ancient court thee to his shirine Though every laurel through the dome be thine, Go to the good and just, an awful train! Thy soul's delight." Recorded in like manner for his virtuous dispost tion, and gentle bearing, by the ingenious Mr. Waller Hart, a this apostrophe: Oh. ever worthy, ever crown'd with praise! Bless'd in thy life, and bless'd in all thy lays, Add, that the Sisters every thought refinc, And e'en thy life be faultless as thy line, Yet envy still with fiercer rage pursues, Obscures the virtue, and defames the muse. A soul like thine, in pain, in grief, resign'd, Views with just scorn the malice of mankind."2 The witty and moral satirist, Dr. Edward Young, wishing some check to the corruption and evil man ners of the times, calleth out upon our poet to under, take a task so worthy of his virtue : Why slumbers Pope, who leads the Muses' train, Nor hears that virtue, which he loves, complain 1' Mr. Mallet, in his epistle on Verbal Criticism: 'Whose life, severely scann'd, transcends his lays, For wit supreme, is but his second praise.' Mr. Hammond, .hat delicate and correct imitator of Tibullus, in his Love Elegies, Elegy xiv. 1 Poem prefixed to his works. 2 In his poems, printed for B. Lintot. 3 Universal Passion, sat. 4. Now fired by Pope and virtue, leave the age in his elegant and philosophical poem the Seasons: Although not sweeter his own Homer sings, Yet is his life the more endearing song.' To the same tune also singeth that learned clerk, of Suffolk, Mr. William Broome: 'Thus, nobly rising in fair virtue's cause, From thy own life transcribe the unerring laws." And, to close all, hear the reverend dean of St Patrick's: 'A soul with every virtue fraught, By patriots, priests, and poets taught: Whose filial piety excels Whatever Grecian story tells. A genius for each business fit; Whose meanest talent is his wit,' &c. Let us now recreate thee by turning to the other side, and showing his character drawn by those with whom he never conversed, and whose countenances he could not know, though turned against him: First again commencing with the high-voiced and never enough quoted Mr. John Dennis, who, in his Reflections on the Essay on Criticism, thus describeth him: 'A little affected hypocrite, who has nothing in his mouth but candour, truth, friend. ship, good-nature, humanity, and magnanimity. He is so great a lover of falsehood, that whenever he has a mind to calumniate his contemporaries, he brands them with some defect which was just con 1 In his poems at the end of the Odyssey. trary to some good quality for which all their friends and acquaintance commend them. He seems to have a particular pique to people of quality, and au thors of that rank.-He must derive his religion from St. Omer's.'-But in the character of Mr. P. and his writings (printed by S. Popping, 1716) he saith, "Though he is a professor of the worst religion, yet he laughs at it;' but that nevertheless he is a virus lent papist; and yet a pillar of the church of England.' Of both which opinions Mr. Lewis Theobald Frems also to be; declaring in Mist's Journal of June 22, 1718, That if he is not shrewdly abused, he made it his practice to cackle to both parties in their own sentiments.' But as to his pique against people of quality, the same journalist doth not agree, but saith (May 8, 1728,)' He had by some means or other, the acquaintance and friendship of the whole body of our nobili.y.' However contradictory this may appear, Mr. Dennis and Gildon, in the character last cited, make it all plain, by assuring us, 'That he is a creature tha. reconciles all contradictions: he is a beast, and a man, a Whig and a Tory; a writer (at one and the same time) of Guardians and Examiners; an asser. tor of liberty, and of the dispensing power of kings; a Jesuitical professor of truth; a base and foul protender to candour.' So that, upon the whole account, we must conclude him either to have been a great hypocrite, or a very honest man; a terrible impostor apon both parties, or very moderate to either. Be it as to the judicious reader shall seem good. Sure it is, he is little favoured of certain authors. whose wrath is perilous; for one declares he ough i The names of two weekly papers-- |