345

That not for Fame, but Virtue's better end,
He ftood the furious foe, the timid friend,
The damning critic, half-approving wit,
The coxcomb hit, or fearing to be hit ;
Laugh'd at the loss of friends he never had,
The dull, the proud, the wicked, and the mad;
The distant threats of vengeance on his head,
The blow unfelt, the tear he never fhed;
The tale reviv'd, the lye fo oft o'erthrown, 350
Th' imputed trash, and dulness not his own;
The morals blacken'd when the writings 'fcape,
The libell'd perfon, and the pictur'd shape;
Abuse, on all he lov'd, or lov'd him, spread,
A friend in exile, or a father, dead;

NOTES.

355

VER. 350. the lie fo oft o'erthrown,] As, that he received fubfcriptions for Shakespear, that he fet his name to Mr. Broome's verses, &c. which, though publicly disproved, were nevertheless shamelessly repeated in the Libels, and even in that called the Nobleman's Epiftle.

1

P.

VER. 351. Th' imputed trash,] Such as profane Pfalms, Court Poems, and other fcandalous things, printed in his name by Curl and others.

P.

VER. 354. Abufe, on all he lov'd, or lev'd him, fpread,] Namely, on the Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Burlington, Lord Bathurst, Lord Bolingbroke, Bishop Atterbury, Dr. Swift, Dr. Arbuthnot, Mr. Gay, his Friends, his Parents, and his very Nurse, aspersed in printed papers, by James Moore, G. Ducket,L.W.elfted, Tho.Bentley, and other obfcure perfons. P.

The whisper, that to Greatness still too near,
Perhaps, yet vibrates on his Sov'REIGN's Ear---
Welcome for thee, fair Virtue! all the past:
For thee, fair Virtue! welcome ev'n the last!
A. But why infult the poor, affront the great?
P. A knave's a knave to me, in ev'ry state: 361
Alike my scorn, if he fucceed or fail,
Sporus at court, or Japhet in a jail,

A hireling fcribler, or a hireling peer,
Knight of the poft corrupt, or of the shire; 365
If on a Pillory, or near a Throne,

He gain his Prince's ear, or lose his own.

NOTES.

VER. 356. The whisper, that to Greatness ftill too near,] By the whisper is meant calumniating honeft characters. Shakefpear has finely expreffed this office of the fycophant of Greatnefs in the following line:

"Rain facrificial whisp'rings in his ear."

By which is meant the immolating men's reputations to the vice or vanity of his Patron.

VER. 357. Perhaps, yet vibrates] What force and elegance of Expreffion! which, in one word, conveys to us the phyfical effects of found, and the moral effects of an often repeated flander.

VER. 359. For thee, fair Virtue! welcome ev'n the last!] This line is remarkable for prefenting us with the most amiable image of steddy Virtue, mixed with a modest concern for his being forced to undergo the feverest proofs of his love for it; which was the being thought hardly of by his SOVEREIGN.

370

Yet foft by nature, more a dupe than wit, Sappho can tell you how this man was bit: This dreaded Sat'rift Dennis will confefs Foe to his pride, but Friend to his distress: So humble, he has knock'd at Tibbald's door, Has drunk with Cibber, nay has rhym'd for Moor. Full ten years flander'd, did he once reply? Three thousand funs went down on Welfted's lye. To please his Mistress, one afpers'd his life; 376 He lash'd him not, but let her be his wife:

VARIATIONS.

VER, 368. in the MS.

Once, and but once, his heedless Youth was bit,
And lik'd that dang'rous thing, a Female Wit:
Safe as he thought, tho' all the prudent chid;
He writ no Libels, but my Lady did:

Great odds in am'rous or poetic game,

Where Woman's is the fin, and Man's the fhame.

NOTES.

VER. 374. ten years] It was fo long after many libels before the Author of the Dunciad published that poem, till when, he never writ a word in answer to the many fcurrilities and falfhoods concerning him.

P.

VER. 375. Welfted's lye. ] This man had the impudence to tell in print, that Mr. P. had occafioned a Lady's death, and to name a perfon he never heard of. He also published that he libell'd the Duke of Chandos; with whom (it was added) that he had lived in familiarity, and received from him a prefent of five hundred pounds: the falfhood of both which is known to his Grace. Mr. P. never received any prefent, farther than the fubfcription for Homer, from him, or from Any great Man whatfoever.

P.

Let Budgel charge low Grubstreet on his quill,
And write whate'er he pleas'd, except his Will;
Let the two Curls of Town and Court, abuse 380
His father, mother, body, foul, and muse.
Yet why? that Father held it for a rule,
It was a fin to call our neighbour fool:

NOTE S.

VER. 378. Let Budgel] Budgel, in a weekly pamphlet called the Bee, bestowed much abufe on him, in the imagination that he writ fome things about the Laft Will of Dr. Tindal, in the Grubflreet Journal; a Paper wherein he never had the leaft hand, direction, or fupervifal, nor the leaft knowledge of its Author.

P.

VER. 379. except his Will;] Alluding to Tindall's Will: by which, and other indirect practices, Budgell, to the exclufion of the next heir, a nephew, got to himself almost the whole fortune of a man entirely unrelated to him.

VER. 381. His father, mother, &c.] In fome of Curl's and other pamphlets, Mr. Pope's Father was faid to be a Mechanic, a Hatter, a Farmer, nay a Bankrupt. But, what is stranger, a Nobleman (if fuch a reflection could be thought to come from a Nobleman) had dropt an allufion to that pitiful untruth, in a paper called an Epifle to a Doctor of Divinity: and the following line,

"Hard as thy Heart, and as thy Birth obfcure,"

had fallen from a like Courtly pen, in certain Verfes to the Imitator of Horace. Mr. Pope's Father was of a Gentleman's Family in Oxfordshire, the head of which was the Earl of Downe, whofe fole Heirefs married the Earl of Lindfay His Mother was the daughter of William Turner, Efq; of York: She had three brothers, one of whom was killed, another died in the fervice of King Charles; the eldest following his fortunes, and becoming a general officer in Spain, left her what cftate remained after the fequeftrations and forfeitures of her family-Mr. Pope died in 1717, aged 75; She in 1733, aged 93, a very few weeks after this Poem was finished

That harmless mother thought no wife a whore: Hear this, and spare his family, James Moore! 385 Unfpotted names, and memorable long!

If there be force in Virtue, or in Song.

Of gentle blood (part fhed in Honour's cause, While yet in Britain Honour had applaufe) Each parent fprung--A. What fortune, pray?-P. Their own,

390 And better got, than Beftia's from the throne.

NOTES.

The following infcription was placed by their fon on their Monument in the parish of Twickenham, in Middlesex :

D. O. M.

ALEXANDRO, POPE. VIRO. INNOCVO. PROBO. PIO.
QVI. VIXIT. ANNOS. LXXV. OB. MDCCXVII,

ET. EDITHAE. CONIVGI. INCVLPABILI.

PIENTISSIMAE. QVAE. VIXIT. ANNOS.

XCIII. OB. MDCCXXXIII.

PARENTIBVS. BENEMERENTIBUS. FILIVS. FECIT.

ET. SIBI.

P.

VER. 390. A. What fortune, pray?] His friend's perfonating the Town in this place, and affuming its impertinent curiofity, gives great fpirit to the ridicule of the queftion.—Julian has a parallel ftroke, in his farcastic discourse to the people of Antioch, where he tells them a story out of Plutarch, concerning Cato; who, when he came near their city, found their youth under arms, and the magif:rates in the. robes of office. On which, alighting in an ill humour w his friends, who he imagined had informed them of his ::proach, the Master of the ceremonies came up; and, advant cing before the company, accofted him in this m "Stranger, how far off is Demetrius?" Now this Domes