Lo! thy dread Empire, CHAOS! is restor❜d; Thy hand, great Anarch! lets the curtain fall, 655 NOTES TO THE POEMS ODE ON SOLITUDE "This was a very early production of our author, written at about twelve years old."-Pope. AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM "The Essay on Criticism is a poem of that species for which our author's genius was particularly turned, the didactic and moral. . . . We are, indeed, amazed to find such a knowledge of the world, such a maturity of judgment, and such a penetration into human nature, as are here displayed, in so very young a writer as was Pope when he produced this Essay, for he was not twenty years old. . . . When we consider the just taste, the strong sense, the knowledge of men, books, and opinions that are so predominant in the Essay on Criticism, we must readily agree to place the author among the first critics, though not, as Dr. Johnson says, 'among the first poets,' on this account alone. As a poet he must rank much higher for his Eloisa and Rape of the Lock."-Warton. Essays on the art of poetry had been written in verse, in antiquity by Horace, in the Renaissance by Vida, in the seventeenth century by Boileau and others. Pope, however, discussed the art of poetry from the point of view, not of the artist, but of the reading public. He lived in an age when every gentleman desired to be, and was expected to be, a discriminating judge of literature. Ability to discuss poetry, with wit and sense, was a valuable social accomplishment. 328. Fungoso. A character in Ben Jonson's Every Man out of his Humour. 374. Timotheus' varied lays. See Alexander's Feast, Dryden's ode in celebration of the power of music. 445. Duck-lane. “A place where old and second-hand books were sold formerly, near Smithfield.”—Pope. 585. "This picture was taken to himself by John Dennis, a furious old critic by profession, who, upon no other provocation, wrote against this essay and its author, in a manner perfectly lunatic: for, as to the mention made of him in v. 270, he took it as a compliment, and said it was treacherously meant to cause him to overlook this abuse of his person."-Pope. 619. “A common slander at that time in prejudice of that deserving author. Our poet did him this justice, when that slander most prevailed; and it is now (perhaps the sooner for this very verse) dead and forgotten."-Pope. 723. An Essay on Poetry by the Duke of Buckingham. 725. An Essay on Translated Verse by Wentworth Dillon, Earl of Roscommon. 729. William Walsh, born 1663, died 1709, a mediocre poet, but a friend to the youthful Pope. It was he who used to tell Pope that England had had many great poets, but not one who was correct; and he therefore advised Pope to aim at correct ness. THE RAPE OF THE LOCK In the vicinity of Windsor there were a number of Catholic families, with which Pope and his parents, being Catholics, formed social relations. To these families belonged the characters of this poem. Lord Petre stole a lock of Miss Fermor's hair, and an unpleasantness between the families ensued. John Caryll, also of an ancient Catholic family, suggested to Pope that he treat the incident in mock-heroic verse, with the purpose of laughing the unpleasantness away. Pope told his friend Spence many years later that the poem "had its effect in the two families. Nobody but Sir George Brown was angry, and he was a good deal so, and for a long time. He could not bear that Sir Plume should talk nothing but nonsense.” "The Rape of the Lock is the best or most ingenious of Pope's works. It is the most exquisite specimen of filigree work ever invented. It is admirable in proportion as it is made of nothing. 'More subtle web Arachne cannot spin, Nor the fine nets, which oft we woven see Of scorched dew, do not in th' air more lightly flee.' Faerie Queene, II, xii, 77. "It is made of gauze and silver spangles. The most glittering appearance is given to every thing, to paste, pomatum, billet-doux, and patches. Airs, languid airs, breathe around;— the atmosphere is perfumed with affectation. A toilette is described with the solemnity of an altar raised to the goddess of vanity, and the history of a silver bodkin is given with all the pomp of heraldry. No pains are spared, no profusion of ornament, no splendour of poetic diction, to set off the meanest things. The balance between the concealed irony and the assumed gravity, is as nicely trimmed as the balance of power in Europe. The little is made great, and the great little. You hardly know whether to laugh or weep. It is the triumph of insignificance, the apotheosis of foppery and folly. It is the perfection of the mock-heroic!"—Hazlitt. ELEGY TO THE MEMORY OF AN UNFORTUNATE LADY The identity of the unfortunate lady of this poem has remained a mystery. Probably she was fictitious. Pope had warmly espoused the cause of Mrs. Weston, sister of the first Viscount Gage, of an ancient Suffolk Catholic family; she separated from her husband soon after marriage, but she did not commit suicide and her case is otherwise not parallel to the story of this poem. "Que le coeur de Pope sentait avec autant de liberté que son esprit pensait, cette élégie le prouve. Il y a devancé sur le sujet du suicide les sentiments, les révoltes, les paradoxes même, si vous voulez, que la littérature moderne, depuis Goethe et Rousseau, nous a rendus familiers. Malgré l'extrême unité de style de cette pièce, il n'y a pas un romantique moderne qui n'eût pu y retrouver quelque chose de sa ressemblance. Le sentiment général pourrait être de George Sand dans sa première et plus éloquente période. Tout le début de la pièce, la vision, l'interrogation aux puissances suprêmes, pourrait être de Shelley, car il y règne ce ton d'aristocratisme platonicien qui lui fait prodiguer les beaux mépris aux tyrannies vulgaires d'ici-bas, et les superbes images des vies inutiles assimilées aux lampes sépulcrales, des âmes indolentes assimilées aux rois d'Orient prisonniers dans leurs palais, sont entièrement dans le goût de celles dont fourmillent la Reine Mab et Alastor. La malédiction pourrait être de lord Byron, dont elle a l'accent vengeur."-Montégut. ELOÏSA TO ABELARD "Abelard and Eloisa flourished in the twelfth century; they were two of the most distinguished Persons of their age in learning and beauty, but for nothing more famous than for their unfortunate passion. After a long course of calamities, they retired, each to a several convent, and consecrated the remainder of their days to religion. It was many years after this separation, that a letter of Abelard's to a Friend, which contained the history of his misfortune, fell into the hands of Eloisa. This awakening all her Tenderness, occasioned those celebrated letters (out of which the following is partly extracted) which give so lively a picture of the struggles of grace and nature, virtue and passion."-Pope. "Il est certain que Pope comprend tout, absolument tout, des choses de l'amour, depuis les plus triviales jusqu'aux plus hautes. Sur ce sujet, quand il est enjoué, son imagination est libertine avec délices, et quand il est sérieux, son âme est passionnée avec emportement. Et il exprime ces choses avec autant de finesse et de force qu'il les sent, sans pruderie, sans réticences, sans hypocrisie de langage, pensant sans doute avec Montaigne qu'il n'est pas d'un esprit ferme et sain de n'oser parler qu'entre les dents du plus universel de nos sentiments. Ce qui nous étonne après lecture répétée, c'est que cette oeuvre ne soit pas plus célèbre qu'elle ne l'est, car ce n'est pas seulement une des expressions les plus fortes de la passion qui aient été données, c'est la seule qui existe de l'amour absolu. Toutes les autres peintures sont partielles: amour du coeur, amour de l'âme, amour des sens; celle-là seule comprend toutes ces variétés et les dépasse encore.”—Montégut. PROLOGUE TO CATO Addison's play, Cato, was produced in 1713, just after the conclusion of the Peace of Utrecht. The play was borne to success on the wave of the political excitement of the moment, Whigs and Tories vying with one another in applause, each side desirous of claiming for its own the patriot portrayed in the play. Addison disavowed any partisan purpose, and |