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Daily Journal, Aug. 8. Letter charging the author of the Dunciad with treason.

Durgen: A plain Satire on a pompous Satirist. By Edward Ward, with a little of James Moore. Apollo's Maggot in his Cups. By E. Ward. Gulliveriana Secunda. Being a collection of many of the libels in the newspapers, like the former volume under the same title, by Smedley. Advertised in the Craftsman, Nov. 9, 1728, with this remarkable promise, that Any thing which any body should send as Mr. Pope's or Dr. Swift's, should be inserted and published as theirs.'

6

Pope Alexander's Supremacy and Infallibility examined, &c. By George Ducket and John Dennis, quarto.

Dean Jonathan's Paraphrase on the ivth chapter of Genesis. Writ by E. Roome, folio, 1729.

Labeo. A Paper of Verses by Leonard Welsted, which after came into one Epistle, and was published by James Moore, quarto, 1730. Another part of it came out in Welsted's own name, under the just title of Dulness and Scandal, folio, 1731.

THERE HAVE BEEN SINCE PUBLISHED,

Verses on the Imitator of Horace. [By a Lady, or between a Lady, a Lord, and a Court-Squire.] Printed for J. Roberts, folio.

An Epistle from a Nobleman to a Doctor of Divinity, from Hampton Court, [Lord Harvey.] Printed for J. Roberts. Also folio.

A Letter from Mr. Cibber to Mr. Pope. Printed for W. Lewis, in Covent Garden, octavo.

161

ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE

First Edition with Notes, Quarto, 1729.

It will be sufficient to say of this edition, that the reader has here a much more correct and complete copy of the Dunciad than has hitherto appeared. I cannot answer but some mistakes may have slipped into it, but a vast number of others will be prevented by the names being now not only set at length, but justified by the authorities and reasons given. I make no doubt the author's own motive to use real rather than feigned names, was his care to preserve the innocent from any false application; whereas, in the former editions, which had no more than the initial letters, he was made, by keys printed here, to hurt the inoffensive; and (what was worse) to abuse his friends, by an impression at Dublin.

The commentary which attends this poem was sent me from several hands, and consequently must be unequally written; yet will have one advantage over most commentaries, that it is not made upon conjectures, or at a remote distance of time and the reader cannot but derive one pleasure from the very obscurity of the persons it treats of, that it partakes of the nature of a secret, which most people love to be let into, though the men or the things be ever so inconsiderable or trivial.

Of the persons, it was judged proper to give some account: for, since it is only in this monument that they must expect to survive, (and here

survive they will, as long as the English tongue shall remain such as it was in the reigns of Queen Anne and King George) it seemed but humanity to bestow a word or two upon each, just to tell what he was, what he writ, when he lived, and when he died.

If a word or two more are added upon the chief offenders, it is only as a paper pinned upon the breast to mark the enormities for which they suffered; lest the correction only should be remembered, and the crime forgotten.

In some articles it was thought sufficient barely to transcribe from Jacob, Curl, and other writers of their own rank, who were much better acquainted with them than any of the authors of this comment can pretend to be. Most of them had drawn each other's characters on certain occasions; but the few here inserted are all that could be saved from the general destruction of such works.

Of the part of Scriblerus I need say nothing: his manner is well enough known, and approved by all but those who are too much concerned to be judges.

The imitations of the ancients are added, to gratify those who either never read, or may have forgotten them; together with some of the parodies and allusions to the most excellent of the moderns. If, from the frequency of the former, any man think the poem too much a cento, our poet will but appear to have done the same thing in jest which Boileau did in earnest, and upon which Vida, Fracastorius, and many of the most eminent Latin poets, professedly valued themselves.

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163

ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE FIRST EDITION OF

THE FOURTH BOOK OF THE DUNCIAD,

When printed separately in the Year 1742.

WE apprehend it can be deemed no injury to the author of the three first books of the Dunciad that we publish this fourth. It was found merely by accident, in taking a survey of the library of a late eminent nobleman; but in so blotted a condition, and in so many detached pieces, as plainly showed it to be not only incorrect, but unfinished. That the author of the three first books had a design to extend and complete his poem in this manner, appears from the dissertation prefixed to it, where it is said, that 'The design is more extensive, and that we may expect other episodes to complete it;' and, from the declaration in the argument to the third book, that 'The accomplishment of the prophecies therein, would be the theme hereafter of a greater Dunciad.' But whether or no he be the author of this, we declare ourselves ignorant. If he be, we are no more to be blamed for the publication of it, than Tucca and Varius for that of the last six books of the Eneid, though, perhaps, inferior to the former.

If any person be possessed of a more perfect copy of this work, or of any other fragments of it, and will communicate them to the publisher, we shall make the next edition more complete: in which we also promise to insert any criticisms that shall be published (if at all to the purpose) with

the names of the authors; or any letters sent us (though not to the purpose) shall yet be printed, under the title of Epistolæ obscurorum virorum ; which, together with some others of the same kind, formerly laid by for that end, may make no unpleasant addition to the future impressions of this poem.

ADVERTISEMENT

ΤΟ

THE COMPLETE EDITION OF 1743.

I HAVE long had a design of giving some sort of notes on the works of this poet. Before I had the happiness of his acquaintance, I had written a commentary on his Essay on Man, and have since finished another on the Essay on Criticism. There was one already on the Dunciad, which had met with general approbation; but I still thought some additions were wanting (of a more serious kind) to the humorous notes of Scriblerus, and even to those written by Mr. Cleland, Dr. Arbuthnot, and others. I had lately the pleasure to pass some months with the author in the country, where I prevailed upon him to do what I had long desired, and favour me with his explanation of several passages in his works. It happened, that just at that juncture was published a ridiculous book against him, full of personal reflections, which furnished him with a lucky opportunity of improving this poem, by giving it the only thing it wanted, a more considerable hero. He was always sensible of its defect in that particular, and

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