out proof, that descriptive poetry was by no means the excellence of Pope; he draws this inference from the few images introduced in this poem, which would not equally belong to any other place. He must inquire whether Windsor Forest has in reality any thing peculiar. The Stag-chase is not, he says, so full, so animated, and so circumstantiated as Somerville's. Barely to say that one performance is not so good as another, is to criticise with little exactness. But Pope has directed that we should in every work regard the author's end. The Stagchase is the main subject of Somerville, and might therefore be properly dilated in all its circumstances; in Pope it is only incidental, and was to be despatched in a few lines. He makes a just observation, "that the description of the external beauties of nature is usually the first effort of a young genius, before he hath studied nature and passions. Some of Milton's most early as well as most exquisite pieces are his Lycidas, l'Allegro, and Il Penseroso, if we may except his ode on the Nativity of Christ, which is indeed prior in order of time, and in which a penetrating critic might have observed the seeds of that boundless imagination which was one day to produce the Paradise Lost." Mentioning Thomson and other descriptive poets, he remarks, that writers fail in their copies for want of acquaintance with originals, and justly ridicules those who think they can form just ideas of valleys, mountains, and rivers, in a garret of the Strand. For this reason I cannot regret with this author, that Pope laid aside his design of writing American pastorals; for as he must have painted scenes which he never saw, and manners which he never knew, his performance, though it might have been a pleasing amusement of fancy, would have exhibited no representation of nature or of life. After the pastorals, the critic considers the lyric poetry of Pope, and dwells longest on the Ode on St. Cecilia's Day, which he, like the rest of mankind, places next to that of Dryden, and not much below it. He remarks after Mr. Spence, that the first stanza is a perfect concert. The second he thinks a little flat; he justly commends the fourth, but without notice of the best line in that stanza, or in the poem: Transported demi-gods stood round, And men grew heroes at the sound. of passion. They can only be adapted to general purposes; but the particular and minuter propriety must be sought only in the sentiment and language. Thus the numbers are the same in Colin's Complaint, and in the ballad of Darby and Joan, though in one sadness is represented, and in the other tranquillity; so the measure is the same of Pope's Unfortunate Lady, and the Praise of Voiture. He observes very justly, that the odes both of Dryden and Pope conclude unsuitably and unnaturally with epigram. He then spends a page upon Mr. Handel's music to Dryden's ode, and speaks of him with that regard which he has generally obtained among the lovers of sound. He finds something amiss in the air "With ravished ears," but has overlooked or forgotten the grossest fault in that composition, which is that in this line. Revenge, revenge, Timotheus cries. He has laid much stress upon the two latter words, which are merely words of connexion, and ought in music to be considered as parenthetical. From this ode is struck out a digression on the nature of odes, and the comparative excellence of the ancients and moderns. He mentions the chorus which Pope wrote for the Duke of Buckingham; and thence takes occasion to treat of the chorus of the ancients. He then comes to another ode, of "The dying Christian to his Soul," in which finding an apparent imitation of Flatman, he falls into a pleasing and learned speculation on the resembling passages to be found in different poets. He mentions with great regard Pope's ode on Solitude, written when he was but twelve years old, but omits to mention the poem on Silence, composed, I think, as early, with much greater elegance of diction, music of numbers, extent of observation, and force of thought. If he had happened to think on Baillet's chapter of Enfans celebres, he might have made on this occasion a very entertaining dissertation on early excellence. He comes next to the Essay on Criticism, the stupendous performance of a youth not yet twenty years old; and after having detailed the felicities of condition to which he imagines Pope to have owed his wonderful prematurity of mind, he tells us that he is well informed this essay was first written in prose. There is nothing In the latter part of the ode he objects to the improbable in the report, nothing indeed but stanza of triumph: Thus song could reveal, &c. as written in a measure ridiculous and burlesque, and justifies his answer by observing that Addison uses the same numbers in the scene of Rosamond between Grideline and Sir Trusty: How unhappy is he, &c. That the measure is the same in both passages, must be confessed, and both poets perhaps chose their numbers properly; for they both meant to express a kind of airy hilarity. The two passions of merriment and exultation are undoubtedly different; they are as different as a gambol and a triumph, but each is a species of joy; and poetical measures have not in any language been so far refined as to provide for the subdivisions what is more likely than the contrary; yet I cannot forbear to hint to this writer and all others, the danger and weakness of trusting too readily to information. Nothing but experience could evince the frequency of false information, or enable any man to conceive that so many groundless reports should be propagated as every man of eminence may hear of himself. Some men relate what they think as what they know; some men of confused memories and habitual inaccuracy ascribe to one man what belongs to another; and some talk on without thought or care. A few men are sufficient to broach falsehoods, which are afterwards innocently diffused by successive relaters. He proceeds on examining passage after passage of this essay; but we must pass over all those criticisms to which we have not something WRITINGS AND GENIUS OF POPE to add or to object, or where this author does not | descended from Fassoni to Boileau, from Boileau differ from the general voice of mankind. We to Garth, and from Garth to Pope. Garth is cannot agree with him in his censure of the mentioned perhaps with too much honour; but comparison of a student advancing in science all are confessed to be inferior to Pope. There with a traveller passing the Alps, which is per- is in his remarks on this work no discovery of any haps the best simile in our language; that in latent beauty, nor any thing subtle or striking which the most exact resemblance is traced be- he is indeed commonly right, but has discussed tween things in appearance utterly unrelated to no difficult question. each other. That the last line conveys no new idea, is not true; it makes particular what was before general. Whether the description which he adds from another author be, as he says, more full and striking than that of Pope, is not to be inquired. Pope's description is relative, and can admit no greater length than is usually allowed to a simile, nor any other particulars than such as form the corespondence. Unvaried rhymes, says this writer, highly disgust readers of a good ear. It is surely not the ear but the mind that is offended. The fault arising from the use of common rhymes is, that by reading the past line the second may be guessed, and half the composition loses the grace of novelty. The translation of the Epistle of Sappho to This seems not to be accurately conceived or expressed: an alexandrine with the addition of Phaon, is next considered: but Sappho and Ovid two syllables, is no more an alexandrine than are more the subjects of this disquisition than with the detraction of two syllables. Sternhold Pope. We shall therefore pass over it to a piece and Hopkins did generally write in the alternate of more importance, the Epistle of Eloisa to Abemeasure of eight and six syllables; but Hopkins lard, which may justly be regarded as one of the commonly rhymed the first and third, Sternhold works on which the reputation of Pope will o only the second and fourth: so that Sternhold stand in future times. may be considered as writing couplets of long lines; but Hopkins wrote regular stanzas. From the practice of printing the long lines of fourteen syllables in two short lines, arose the license of some of our poets, who, though professing to write in stanzas, neglected the rhymes of the first and third lines. Pope has mentioned Petronius among the great names of criticism, as the remarker justly observes, without any critical merit. It is to be suspected that Pope had never read his book, and mentioned him on the credit of two or three sentences which he had often seen quoted, imagining that where there was so much there must necessarily be more. Young men in haste to be renowned, too frequently talk of books which they have scarcely seen. The revival of learning mentioned in this poem, affords an opportunity of mentioning the chief periods of literary history, of which this writer reckons five: that of Alexander, of Ptolemy Philadelphus, of Augustus, of Leo the Tenth, of Queen Anne. These observations are concluded with a remark which deserves great attention: "In no polished nation, after criticism has been much studied, and the rules of writing established, has any very extraordinary book ever appeared." The Rape of the Lock was always regarded by Pope as the highest production of his genius. On occasion of this work, the history of the comic heroic is given; and we are told that it The critic pursues Eloisa through all the These are the pieces examined in this volume; He has interspersed some passages of Pope's to write without a master, by copying printed | which the solution of this great question is books. His father used to order him to make necessary, have been demonstrated without any English verses, and would oblige him to correct solution, or by means of the solution of some and retouch them over and over, and at last former writer. could say, “These are good rhymes.” He rejects the Manichean system, but imputes At eight years of age, he was committed to to it an absurdity, from which, amidst all its one Taverner, a priest, who taught him the absurdities, it seems to be free, and adopts the rudiments of the Latin and Greek. At this time system of Mr. Pope. "That pain is no evil, if he met with Ogleby's Homer, which seized his asserted with regard to the individuals who sufattention: he fell next upon Sandys's Ovid, and fer it, is downright nonsense: but if considered remembered these two translations with pleasure as it affects the universal system, is an undoubted to the end of his life. truth, and means only that there is no more pain About ten, being at school near Hyde-Park-in it than what is necessary to the production of corner, he was taken to the playhouse, and was happiness. How many soever of these evils so struck with the splendour of the drama, that then force themselves into the creation, so long he formed a kind of play out of Ogleby's Homer, as the good preponderates, it is a work well intermixed with verses of his own. He per-worthy of infinite wisdom and benevolence; and suaded the head-boys to act this piece, and Ajax notwithstanding the imperfections of its parts, was performed by his master's gardener. They the whole is most undoubtedly perfect." And were habited according to the pictures in Ogleby. in the former part of the Letter, he gives the At twelve he retired with his father to Windsor principle of his system in these words: "OmniForest, and formed himself by study in the best potence cannot work contradictions, it can only English poets. affect all possible things. But so little are we acquainted with the whole system of nature, that we know not what are possible, and what are not: but if we may judge from that constant mixture of pain with pleasure, and inconveniency with advantage, which we must observe in every thing round us, we have reason to conclude that to endue created beings with perfection, that is, to produce Good exclusive of Evil, is one of those impossibilities which even infinite power cannot accomplish," In this extract it was thought convenient to dwell chiefly upon such observations as relate immediately to Pope, without deviating with the author into incidental inquiries. We intend to kindle, not to extinguish, curiosity, by this slight sketch of a work abounding with curious quotations and pleasing disquisitions. He must be much acquainted with literary history, both of remote and late times, who does not find in this essay many things which he did not know before: and if there be any too learned to be instructed in facts or opinions, he may yet properly read this book as a just specimen of literary moderation. This is elegant and acute, but will by no means calm discontent, or silence curiosity; for whether Evil can be wholly separated from Good or not, it is plain that they may be mixed in various degrees, and as far as human eyes can judge, the degree of Evil might have been less without REVIEW OF A FREE INQUIRY INTO THE NA. any impediment to Good. TURE AND ORIGIN OF EVIL. THIS is a treatise consisting of Six Letters upon a very difficult and important question, which I am afraid this author's endeavours will not free from the perplexity which has entangled the speculatists of all ages, and which must always continue while we see but in part. He calls it a Free Inquiry, and indeed his freedom is, I think, greater than his modesty. Though he is far from the contemptible arrogance, or the impious licentiousness, of Bolingbroke, yet he decides too easily upon questions out of the reach of human determination, with too little consideration of mortal weakness, and with too much vivacity for the necessary caution. In the first letter on Evil in general, he observes, that "it is the solution of this important question, whence came Evil, alone, that can ascertain the moral characteristic of Good, without which there is an end of all distinction between Good and Evil." Yet he begins this Inquiry by this declaration: "That there is a Supreme Being, infinitely powerful, wise, and benevolent, the great Creator and Preserver of all things, is a truth so clearly demonstrated, that it shall be here taken for granted." What is this but to say, that we have already reason to grant the existence of those attributes of God, which the present Inquiry is designed to prove? The present Inquiry is then surely made to no purpose. The attributes, to the demonstration of The second Letter on the evils of imperfection, is little more than a paraphrase of Pope's epis tles, or yet less than a paraphrase, a mere translation of poetry into prose. This is surely to attack difficulty with very disproportionate abilities, to cut the Gordian knot with very blunt instruments. When we are told of the insufficiency of former solutions, why is one of the latest which no man can have forgotten, given us again? I am told that this pamphlet is not the effort of hunger: what can it be then but the product of vanity? and yet how can vanity be gratified by plagiarism or transcription? When this speculatist finds himself prompted to another performance, let him consider whether he is about to disburden his mind, or employ his fingers; and if I might venture to offer him a subject, I should wish that he would solve this question, Why he that has nothing to write, should desire to be a writer? Yet is not this Letter without some sentiments, which, though not new, are of great importance, and may be read with pleasure in the thousandth repetition. "Whatever we enjoy, is purely a free gift from our Creator; but that we enjoy no more, can never sure be deemed an injury, or a just reason to question his infinite benevolence. All our happiness is owing to his goodness; but that it is no greater, is owing only to ourselves; that is, to our not having any inherent right to any hap piness, or even to any existence at all. This is may to. 2 no more to be imputed to God, than the wants | felicity upon the whole accrues to the universe, Thus far he speaks what every man must approve, and what every wise man has said before him. He then gives us the system of subord nation, not invented, for it was known I think to the Arabian metaphysicians, but adopted by Pope; and from him borrowed by the diligent researches of this great investigator. "No system can possibly be formed, even in imagination, without a subordination of parts. Every animal body must have different members subservient to each other; every picture must be composed of various colours, and of light and shade; all harmony must be formed of trebles, tenors, and basses; every beautiful and useful edifice must consist of higher and lower, more and less magnificent apartments, This is in the very essence of all created things, and therefore cannot be prevented by any means whatever, unless by not creating them at all." These instances are used instead of Pope's oak and weeds, or Jupiter and his satellites; but neither Pope nor this writer have much contributed to solve the difficulty. Perfection or imperfection of unconscious beings has no meaning as referred to themselves; the bass and the treble are equally perfect; the mean and magnificent apartments feel no pleasure or pain from the comparison. Pope might ask the weed, why it was less than the oak, but the weed would never ask the question for itself. The bass and treble differ only to the hearer, meanness and magnificence only to the inhabitant. There is no Evil but must inhere in a conscious being, or be referred to it; that is, Evil must be felt before it is Evil. Yet even on this subject many questions might be offered, which human understanding has not yet answered, and which the present haste of this extract will not suffer me to dilate. He proceeds to an humble detail of Pope's opinion: "The universe is a system whose very essence consists in subordination; a scale of beings descending by insensible degrees from infinite perfection to absolute nothing; in which, though we may justly expect to find perfection in the whole, could we possibly comprehend it; yet would it be the highest absurdity to hope for it in all its parts, because the beauty and happiness of the whole depend altogether on the just inferiority of its parts, that is, on the comparative imperfections of the several beings of which it is composed." "It would have been no more an instance of God's wisdom to have created no beings but of the highest and most perfect order, than it would be of a painter's art to cover his whole piece with one single colour, the most beautiful he could compose. Had he confined himself to such, nothing could have existed but demi-gods, or archangels, and then all inferior orders must have been void and uninhabited: but as it is surely more agreeable to infinite Benevolence, that all these should be filled up with beings capable of enjoying happiness themselves, and contributing to that of others, they must necessarily be filled with inferior beings, that is, with such as are less perfect, but from whose existence, notwithstanding that less perfection, more than if no such had been created. It is moreover highly probable, that there is such a connexion between all ranks and orders by subordinate degrees, that they mutually support each other's existence, and every one in its place is absolutely necessary towards sustaining the whole vast and magnificent fabric. "Our pretences for complaint could be of this only, that we are not so high in the scale of existence as our ignorant ambition may desire; a pretence which must eternally subsist; because, were we ever so much higher, there would be still room for infinite power to exalt us; and since no link in the chain can be broke, the same reason for disquiet must remain to those who succeed to that chasm, which must be occasioned by our preferment. A man can have no reason to repine that he is not an angel; nor a horse that he is not a man; much less, that in their several stations they possess not the faculties of another; for this would be an insufferable misfortune." This doctrine of the regular subordination of beings, the scale of existence, and the chain of nature, I have often considered, but always left the inquiry in doubt and uncertainty. That every being not infinite, compared with infinity, must be imperfect, is evident to intuition; that whatever is imperfect must have a certain line which it cannot pass, is equally certain. But the reason which determined this limit, and for which such being was suffered to advance thus far, and no farther, we shall never be able to discern. Our discoveries tell us, the Creator has made beings of all orders, and that therefore one of them must be such as man. But this system seems to be established on a concession, which, if it be refused, cannot be ex torted. Every reason which can be brought to prove, that there are beings of every possible sort, will prove that there is the greatest number possible of every sort of beings; but this with respect to man we know, if we know any thing, not to be true. It does not appear even to the imagination, that of three orders of being, the first and the third receive any advantage from the imperfection of the second, or that indeed they may not equally exist, though the second had never been, or should cease to be; and why should that be concluded necessary, which cannot be proved even to be useful? The scale of existence from infinity to nothing, cannot possibly have being. The highest being not infinite must be, as has been often observed, at an infinite distance below infinity. Cheyne, who, with the desire inherent in mathematicians to reduce every thing to mathematical images, considers all existence as a cone, allows that the basis is at an infinite distance from the body. And in this distance between finite and infinite, there will be room for ever for an infinite series of indefinable existence. Between the lowest positive existence and nothing, wherever we suppose positive existence to cease, is another chasm infinitely deep; where there is room again for endless orders of subor dinate nature, continued for ever and for ever, and yet infinitely superior to non-existence. To these meditations humanity is unequal. But yet we may ask, not of our Maker, but of each other, since on the one side creation, wherever it stops, must stop infinitely below infinity, and on the other infinitely above nothing, what necessity there is that it should proceed so far either way, that beings so high or so low should ever have existed? We may ask; but I believe no created wisdom can give an adequate answer. Nor is this all. In the scale, wherever it begins or ends, are infinite vacuities. At whatever distance we suppose the next order of beings to be above man, there is room for an intermediate order of beings between them; and if for one order, then for infinite orders; since every thing that admits of more or less, and consequently all the parts of that which admits them, may be infinitely divided. So that, as far as we can judge, there may be room in the vacuity between any two steps of the scale, or between any two points of the cone of being, for infinite exertion of infinite power. philosopher and the peasant, are in some mea⚫ Much of these positions is perhaps true, and The That hope and fear are inseparably or very frequently connected with poverty and riches, my surveys of life have not informed me. milder degrees of poverty are sometimes supported by hope, but the more severe often sink *** down in motionless despondence. Life must be Thus it appears how little reason those who seen before it can be known. This author and repose their reason upon the scale of being have Pope perhaps never saw the miseries which they to triumph over those who recur to any other ex-imagine thus easy to be borne. The poor indeed pedient of solution, and what difficulties arise on every side to repress the rebellions of presumptuous decision. Qui pauca considerat, facile pronuncial. In our passage through the boundless ocean of disquisition we often take frogs for land, and after having long toiled to approach them, find, instead of repose and harbours, new storms of objection, and fluctuations of uncertainty. We are next entertained with Pope's alleviations of those evils which we are doomed to suffer. are insensible of many little vexations which That want of taste for one enjoyment is sup- without any other reason the slave, or tool, or "Poverty, or the want of riches, is generally compensated by having more hopes, and fewer fears, by a greater share of health, and a more exquisite relish of the smallest enjoyments, than With folly no man is willing to confess himthose who possess them are usually blessed with. self very intimately acquainted, and therefore its The want of taste and genius, with all the plea-pains and pleasures are kept secret. But what sures that arise from them, are commonly recom- the author says of its happiness seems applicable pensed by a more useful kind of common sense, only to fatuity, or gross dulness; for that infetogether with a wonderful delight, as well as suc-riority of understanding which makes one man cess, in the busy pursuits of a scrambling world. The sufferings of the sick are greatly relieved by many trifling gratifications imperceptible to others, and sometimes almost repaid by the inconceivable transports occasioned by the return of health and vigour. Folly cannot be very grievous, because imperceptible; and I doubt not but there is some truth in that rant of a mad poet, that there is a pleasure in being mad, which none but madmen know. Ignorance, or the want of knowledge and literature, the appointed lot of all born to poverty, and the drudgeries of life, is the only opiate capable of infusing that insensibility which can enable them to endure the miseries of the one and the fatigues of the other. It is a cordial administered by the gra- Concerning the portion of ignorance necescious hand of Providence; of which they ought sary to make the condition of the lower classes never to be deprived by an ill-judged and im- of mankind safe to the public and tolerable to proper education. It is the basis of all subordi- themselves, both morals and policy exact a nicer nation, the support of society, and the privilege inquiry than will be very soon or very easily of individuals: and I have ever thought it a most made. There is undoubtedly a degree of knowremarkable instance of the divine wisdom, that ledge which will direct a man to refer all to whereas in all animals, whose individuals rise Providence, and to acquiesce in the condition little above the rest of their species, knowledge which omniscient Goodness has determined to is instinctive; in man, whose individuals are so allot him; to consider this world as a phantom widely different, it is acquired by education; by that must soon glide from before his eyes, and which means the prince and the labourer, the the distresses and vexations that encompass |