The Works of the English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper: Broome, Pope, Pitt ...

been architect to the crown for above fifty years, who built most of the churches in London, laid the first store of St. Paul's, and lived to finish it, had been displaced from his employment at the age of near ninety years.

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Ver. 331. in the former edition thus:
-O Swift! thy doorn,

Ver. 326. Ambrose Philips] "He was" (saith Mr. Jacob) [Broome. one of the wits at Button's, and a And Pope's translating ten whole years with justice of the peace:" but he hath since met with On which was the following Note: "He concludes higher preferment in Ireland: and a much greater his irony with a stroke upon himself: for whoever character we have of him in Mr. Gildon's Conimagines this a sarcasm on the other ingenions plete Art of Poetry, vol. i. p. 157. "Indeed he confesses, he dares not set him quite on the same person, is surely mistaken. The opinion our anthor had of him was sufficiently shown by his joining foot with Virgil, lest it should seem flattery, but him in the undertaking of the Odyssey; in which he is much mistaken if posterity does not afford him a greater esteem than he at present enjoys."vious agreement, discharged his part so much to Mr. Broome, having engaged without any preHe endeavoured to create some misunderstanding Mr. Pope's satisfaction, that he gratified him with between our author and Mr. Addison, whom also the full sum of five hundred pounds, and a present Soon after he abused as much. His constant cry of all those books for which his own interest could was, that Mr. P. was an enemy to the government; procure him subscribers, to the value of one hunand in particular he was the avowed author of a dred more. The author only seems to lament, report very industriously spread, that he had a that he was employed in translation at all." hand in a party paper called the Examiner: a falsehood well known to those yet living, who had the direction and publication of it

Ver. 328. While Jones' and Boyle's united labours fall:] At the time when this poem was written, the banquetting-house of Whitehall, the church and piazza of Covent-garden, and the palace and chapel of Somerset-house, the works of the famous Inigo Jones, had been for many years so neglected, as to be in danger of ruin. The portico of Covent-garden church had been just then restored and beautified at the expense of the earl of Burlington; who, at the same time, by his publication of the designs of that great master and Palladio, as well as by many noble buildings of his own, revived the true taste of architecture in this kingdom.

Ver. 330. Gay dies unpension'd, &c.] See Mr. Gay's fable of the Hare and many Friends. This gentleman was early in the friendship of our author, which continued to his death. He wrote several works of humour with great success, the Shepherd's Week, Trivia, the What d'ye call it, Fables; and lastly, the celebrated Beggar's Opera; a piece of satire which hit all tastes and degrees of men, from those of the highest quality to the very rabble: that verse of Horace :

Primores populi arripuit, populumque tributim, could never be so justly applied as to this. The vast success of it was unprecedented, and almost incredible: what is related of the wonderful effects of the ancient music or tragedy hardily caine up to it: Sophocles and Euripides were less followed and famous. It was acted in London sixty-three days, uninterrupted; and renewed the next season with equal applauses. It spread into all the great towns of England, was played in many places to the thirtieth and fortieth time, and at Bath and Bristol fifty, &c. It made its progress into Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, where it was performed twenty-four days together: it was last acted in Minorca. The fame of it was not con

REMARKS.

fined to the author only; the ladies carried about with them the favourite songs of it in fans; and houses were furnished with it in screens. The person who acted Polly, till then obscure, became all at once the favourite of the town; her pictures life written, books of letters and verses to her, were engraved, and sold in great numbers, her published; and pamphlets made even of her sayings and jests.

Furthermore, it drove out of England, for that season, the Italian opera, which had carried all before it for ten years. That idol of the nobility and people, which the great critic Mr. Dennis by the labours and outeries of a whole life could not overthrow, was demolished by a single stroke of this gentleman's pen. This happened in the year 1728. Yet so great was his modesty, that he constantly prefixed to all the editions of it this motto, Nos hæc novimus esse nihil.

Ver. 332. And Pope's, ten years to comment and translate.] The author here plainly laments that he was so long employed in translating and commenting. He began the Iliad in 1713, and finished it in 1719. The edition of Shakespeare (which he undertook merely because nobody else would) took up near two years more in the drudgery of comparing impressions, rectifying the scenery, &c. and the translation of half the Odyssey employed him from that time to 1725.

Ver. 333. Proceed, great days! &c.] It may perhaps seem incredible, that so great a revolution in learning as is here prophesied, should be brought about by such weak instruments as have been [hitherto] described in our poem: but do not thou, gentle reader, rest too secure in thy contempt of these instruments. Remember what the Dutch stories somewhere relate, that a great part of their provinces was once overflowed, by a small opening made in one of their dykes by a single

water-rat.

Enough enough! the raptur'd monarch cries! And thro' the ivory gate the vision flies.

REMARKS.

However, that such is not seriously the judgment of our Poet, but that he conceiveth better hopes from the diligence of our schools, from the regularity of our universities, the discernment of our great men, the accomplishments of our nobility, the encouragement of our patrons, and the genius of our writers of all kinds (notwithstanding some few exceptions in each), may plainly be seen from his conclusion; where, causing all this vision to pass through the ivory gate, he expressly, in the language of poesy, declares all such imaginations to be wild, ungrounded, and fictitious. Scribl.

VARIATIONS.

After ver. 338. in a former edit. were the following lines:

Signs following signs lead on the mighty year ;
See, the dull stars roll round and re-appear.
She comes! the cloud-compelling power, behold!
With Night primeval, and with Chaos old.
Lo! the great Anarch's ancient reign restored,
Light dies before her uncreating word.
As one by one, at dread Medea's strain,
The sickening stars fade off th' etherial plain:
As Argus' eyes, by Hermes' wand opprest,
Clos'd one by one to everlasting rest;
Thus at her felt approach, and secret might,
Art after art goes out, and all is night.
See sculking Truth in her old cavern lie,
Secur'd by mountains of heap'd casuistry:
Philosophy, that touch'd the heavens before,
Shrinks to her hidden cause, and is no more:
See Physic beg the Stagyrite's defence !
See Metaphysic call for aid on Sense!
See Mystery to Mathematics fly!

In vain! they gaze, turn giddy, rave, and die.
Thy hand, great Dulness! lets the curtain fall,
And universal darkness buries all.

BOOK IV.

ARGUMENT.

THE poet being, in this book, to declare the completion of the prophecies mentioned at the end of the former, makes a new invocation; as the greater poets are wont, when some high and worthy matter is to be sung. He shows the goddess coming in her majesty, to destroy order and science, and to substitute the kingdom of the dull upon Earth. How she leads captive the Sciences, and silences the Muses; and what they be who succeed in their stead. All her children, by a wonderful attraction, are drawn about her; and bear along with them divers others, who promote her empire by connivance, weak resistance, or discouragement of arts; such as half wits, tasteless admirers, vain pretenders, the flatterers of dunces, or the patrons of them. All these crowd round her; one of them, offering to approach her, is driven back by a rival, but she commends and encourages both. The first who speak in fort are the geniuses of the schools, who assure her of their care to advance her cause by confining youth VOL. XII.

to words, and keeping them out of the way of real knowledge. Their address, and her gracious answer; with her charge to them and the universities. The universities appear by their proper deputies, and assure her that the same method is observed in the progress of education. The speech of Aristarchus on this subject. They are driven off by a band of young gentlemen returned from travel with their tu tors; one of whom delivers to the goddess, in a polite oration, an account of the whole conduct and fruits of their travels: presenting to her at the same time a young nobleman perfectly accomplished. She receives him graciously, and endues him with the happy quality of want of shame. She sees loitering about her a number of indolent persons abandoning all business and duty, and dying with laziness: to these approaches the antiquary Annius, entreating her to make them virtuosos, and assign them over to him: but Mummius, another antiquary, complaining of his fraudulent proceeding, she finds a method to reconcile their difference. Then enter a troop of people fantastically adorned, offering her strange and exotic presents: amongst them, one stands forth and demands justice on another, who had deprived him of one of the greatest curiosities in nature: but he justifies himself so well, that the goddess gives them both her approbation. She recommends to them to find proper employment for the indolents before mentioned, in the study of butterflies, shells, birds-nests, moss, &c. but with particular caution, not to proceed beyond trifles, to any ufeful or extensive views of Nature, or of the Author of Nature. Against the last of these apprehensions, she is secured by a hearty address from the minute philosophers and free-thinkers, one of whom speaks in the name of the rest. The youth, thus instructed and principled, are delivered to her in a body, by the hands of Silenus; and then admitted to taste the cup of the Magus her high priest, which causes a total oblivion of all obligations, divine, civil, moral, or rational. To these her adepts she sends priests, attendants, and comforters, of various kinds; confers on them orders and degrees; and then dismissing them with a speech, confirming to each his privileges, and telling what she expects from each, concludes with a yawn of extraordinary virtue: the progress and effects whercof on all orders of men, and the consummation of all, in the restoration of Night and Chaos, conclude the poein.

BOOK IV.

YET, yet a moment, one dim ray of light Indulge, dread Chaos, and eternal Night!

REMARKS.

The Dunciad, Book IV.] This book may properly be distinguished from the former, by the name of the Greater Dunciad, not so indeed in size, but in subject; and so far contrary to the distinction antiently made of the Greater and Lesser Iliad. But much are they mistaken who imagine this work in any wise inferior to the for'mer, or of any other hand than of our poet; of

Of darkness visible so much be lent,
As half to show, half veil the deep intent.
Ye powers! whose mysteries restor'd I sing,
To whom Time bears me on his rapid wing,
Suspend a while your force inertly strong,
Then take at once the poet and the song.

Now flam'd the dog-star's unpropitious ray,
Smote every brain, and wither'd every bay;
Sick was the Sun, the owl forsook his bower,
The moon-struck prophet felt the madding hour:
Then rose the seed of Chaos and of Night,
To blot out order, and extinguish light,
Of dull and venal a new world to mold,
And bring Saturnian days of lead and gold.

She moug's the throne: her head a cloud con

In broad effulgence all below reveal'd,
('Tis thus aspiring Dulness ever shines)
Soft on her lap her laureate sou reclines.

REMARKS.

[ceal'd,

Beneath her foot-stool, Science groans in chains,
And wit dreads exile, penalties, and pains.
There foam'd rebellious Logic, gagg'd and bound;
There, stript, fair Rhetoric languish'd on the ground;
His blunted arms by Sophistry are borne,

And shameless Billingsgate her robes adorn.
Morality, by her false guardians drawn,
Chicane in furs, and Casuistry in lawn,
Gasps, as they straiten at each end the cord,
And dies, when Dulness gives her Page the word. 50
Mad Mathesis alone was unconfin'd,

Too mad for mere material chains to bind,
Now to pure space lifts her extatic stare,
Now running round the circle, finds it square.

REMARKS.

verified his prophecy (p. 243. of his own Life, Svo. ch. ix.) where he says, "the reader will be as much pleased to find me a dunce in my old age, as he was to prove me a brisk blockhead in my youth." Wherever there was any room for briskness, or alacrity of any sort, even in sink

which I am much more certain than that the Iliad itself was the work of Solomon, or the Batrachomuomachia of Homer, as Barnes hath affirmed.-ing, he hath had it allowed; but here, where Bentl.

Ver. 1, &c.] This is an invocation of much piety. The poet, willing to approve himself a genuine son, beginneth by showing (what is ever agrecable to Dulness) his high respect for antiquity and a great family, how dead or dark soever: next declareth his passion for explaining mysteries; and lastly his impatience to be reunited to her-Scribl.

the

there is nothing for him to do but to take his natural rest, he must permit his historian to be silent. It is from their actions only that princes have their character, and poets from their works : and if in those he be as much asleep as any fool, the poet must leave him and them to sleep to all eternity.-Bentl.

Ibid. her laureate] "When I find my name in the satirical works of this poet, I never look upon Ver. 2. dread Chaos, and eternal Night!] In-it as any malice meant to me, but profit to himvoked, as the restoration of their empire is self. For he considers that my face is more known action of the poem. than most in the nation; and therefore a lick at the laureate will be a sure bait ad captandum valgus, to catch little readers."-Life of Colley Cibber, ch. ii.

Ver. 14. To blot out order, and extinguish light, The two great ends of her mission; the one in quality of daughter of Chaos, the other as daughter of Night. Order here is to be under- Now if it be certain, that the works of our poet stood extensively, both as civil and moral; the have owed their success to this ingenious expedistinction between high and low in society, and dient, we hence derive an unanswerable argutrue and false in individuals: light as intellectualment, that this fourth Dunciad, as well as the only, wit, science, arts. former three, hath had the author's last band, Ver. 15. Of dull and venal] The allegory con- and was by him intended for the press: or else to tinued; dull referring to the extinction of lightwhat purpose hath he crowned it, as we see, by or science; venal to the destruction of order, and this finishing stroke, the profitable lick at the the truth of things. laureate ?-Bentl.

Ibid. A new world] In allusion to the Epicurean Ver. 21, 22. Beneath her foot-stool, &c.] We opinion, that from the dissolution of the natural are next presented with the pictures of those whom world into Night and Chaos, a new one should the goddess leads in captivity. Science is only aise; this the poet alluding to, in the produc-depressed and confined so as to be rendered usetion of a new moral world, makes it partake of its original principles.

Ver. 16. Lead and gold.] i. e. dull and venal. Ver. 20. her laureate son reclines.] With great judginent it is imagined by the poet, that such a colleague as Dulness had elected, should sleep on the throne, and have very little share in the action of the poem. Accordingly he hath done little or nothing from the day of his anointing; having past through the second book without taking part in any thing that was transacted about him; and through the third in profound sleep. Nor ought this, well considered, to seem strange in our days, when so many king-consorts have done the like.-Scribl.

less; but wit or genius, as a more dangerous and active enemy, punished, or driven away: Duness being often reconciled in some degree with learning, but never upon any terms with wit. And accordingly it will be seen that she admits something like each science, as casuistry, sophistry, &c. but nothing like wit, opera alone supplying its place.

There

Ver. 30. gives her Page the word.] was a judge of this name, always ready to hang any man that came before him, of which he was suffered to give a hundred miserable examples, during a long life, even to his dotage.-Though the candid Scriblerus imagined page here to mean no more than a page or mute, and to allude to the custom of strangling state criminals in Turkey by mutes or pages. A practice more decent than that of our Page, who, before he hanged any one, loaded him with reproachful language.-Scribl.

But held in tenfold bonds the Muses lie,
Watch'd both by Envy's and by Flattery's eye,
There to her heart sad Tragedy addrest
The dagger wont to pierce the tyrant's breast;
But sober History restrain'd her rage,
And promis'd vengeance on a barbarous age.
There sunk Thalia, nerveless, cold, and dead,
Had not her sister Satire held her head:
Nor could'st thou, Chesterfield! a tear refuse,
Thou wep'st, and with thee wept each gentle Muse.
When lo! a harlot form soft sliding by,
With mincing step, small voice, and languid eye:

REMARKS.

Ver. 39. But sober History] History attends on tragedy, satire on comedy, as their substitutes in the discharge of their distinct functions; the one ia high life, recording the crimes and punishments of the great; the other in low, exposing the vices or follies of the common people. But it may be asked, How came history and satire to be admitted with impunity to minister comfort to the Muses, even in the presence of the goddess, and in the midst of all her triumphs? "A question," says Scriblerus, "which we thus resolve: History was brought up in her infancy by Dulness herself; but being afterwards espoused into a noble house, she forgot (as is usual) the humility of her birth, and the cares of her early friends. This occasioned a long estrangement between her and Dulness. At length, in process of time, they met together in a monk's cell, were reconciled, and became better friends than ever. After this they had a second quarrel, but it held not long, and are now again on reasonable terms, and so are likely to continue." This acounts for the connivance shown to history on this occasion. But the boldness of satire springs from a very different cause; for the reader ought to know, that she alone of all the sisters is unconquerable, never to be silenced, when truly inspired and animated (as should seem) from above, for this very purpose, to oppose the kingdom of Dulness to her last breath.

O Cara! Cara! silence all that train:
Joy to great Chaos! let division reign :
Chromatic tortures soon shall drive them hence,
Break all their nerves, and fritter all their sense;
One trill shall harmonize joy, grief, and rage,
Wake the dull Church, and lull the ranting Stage;
To the same notes thy sons shall hum, or snore,
And all thy yawning daughters cry, encore.
Another Phoebus, thy own Phoebus, reigns,
Joys in my jiggs, and dances in my chains.
But soon, ah soon, rebellion will commence,
If Music meanly borrows aid from Sense:
Strong in new arms, lo! Giant Handel stands,
Like bold Briareus, with a hundred hands;
To stir, to rouze, to shake the soul he comes,
And Jove's own thunders follow Mars's drums.
Arrest him, empress, or you sleep no more---
She heard, and drove him to th' Hibernian shore. 70
And now had Fame's posterior trumpet blown,
And all the nations summon'd to the throne.
The young, the old, who feel her inward sway,
One instinct seizes, and transports away.
None need a guide, by sure attraction led,
And strong impulsive gravity of head:
None want a place, for all their centre found,
Hung to the goddess, and coher'd around.
Not closer orb, in orb, conglob'd are seen
The buzzing bees about their dusky queen.

The gathering number, as it moves along,
Involves a vast involuntary throng,
Who, gently drawn, and struggling less and less,
Roll in her vortex, and her power confess.
Not those alone who passive own her laws,
But who, weak rebels, more advance her cause.
Whate'er of duace in college or in town
Sneers at another, in toupee or gown;

REMARKS.

Ver. 54. Let division reign:] Alluding to the false taste of playing tricks in music with numberless divisions, to the neglect of that harmony which conforms to the sense, and applies to the passions. Mr. Handel had introduced a great number of hands, and more variety of instruments into the orchestra, and employed even drums and cannon to make a fuller chorus: which proved so much too manly for the fine gentlemen of his that he was obliged to reinove his music into Ireland. After which they were reduced, for want of composers, to practise the patch-work

Ver. 43. Nor could'st thou, &c.] This noble person in the year 1737, when the act aforesaid was brought into the house of lords, opposed it in an excellent speech (says Mr. Cibber)" with a lively spirit, and uncommon eloquence." This speech had the honour to be answered by the said Mr. Cibber, with a lively spirit also, and in a manner very uncommon, in the eighth chapter of of his Life and Manners. And here, gentle reader. would I gladly insert the other speech, whereby thou mightest judge between them; but I must defer it on account of some differences not yet adjusted between the noble author, and myself, concerning the true reading of certain passages.-above-mentioned. Beutl.

Ver. 45. When lo! a harlot form] The attitude given to this phantom represents the nature and genius of the Italian opera; its affected airs, its effeminate sounds, and the practice of patching up these operas with favourite songs, incoherently put together. These things were supported by the subscriptions of the nobility. This circumstance, that opera should prepare for the opening of the grand sessions, was prophesied of in Ecok iii. ver. 304.

Already Opera prepares the way,

The sure forerunner of her gentle sway.

age,

The

Ver. 76. to 101. It ought to be observed that here are three classes in this assembly. first, of men absolutely and avowedly dull, who naturally albare to the goddess, and are imaged in the simile of the bees about their queen. The se ond involuntarily drawn to her, though not earing to own her influence; from ver. 81. to 90. The third of such as, though not members of her state, yet advance her service by flattering Dulness, cultivating mistaken talents, patronizing vile scribblers, discouraging living merit, or setting up for wits, and men of taste in arts they understand not; from ver. 91. to 101.

Nor absent they, no members of her state,
Who pay her homage in her sons, the great;
Who, false to Phoebus, bow the knee to Baal;
Or impious, preach his word without a call,
Patrons, who sneak from living worth to dead,
With-hold the pension, and set up the head;
Or vest dull Flattery in the sacred gown;
Or give from fool to fool the laurel crown.
And (last and worse) with all the cant of wit,
Without the soul, the Muses' hypocrite.
There march'd the bard and blockhead side by
side,

100

Who rhym'd for hire, and patroniz'd for pride.
Narcissus, prais'd with all a parson's power,
Look'd a white lily sunk beneath a shower.
There mov'd Montalto with superior air;
His stretch'd-out arm display'd a volume fair;
Courtiers and patriots in two ranks divide,
Through both he pass'd, and bow'd from side to
But as in graceful act, with awful eye, [side;
Compos'd he stood, bold Benson thrust him by : 110
On two unequal crutches propt he came,
Milton's on this, on that one Johnston's name.
The decent knight retir'd with sober rage,
Withdrew his hand, and clos'd the pompous page.
But (happy for him as the times went then)
Appear'd Apollo's mayor and aldermen,

Let standard-authors, thus, like trophies borne,
Appear more glorious, as more hack'd and torn.
And you, my critics! in the chequer'd shade,
Admire new light through holes yourselves have
made.

"Leave not a foot of verse, a foot of stone,
A page, a grave, that they can call their own;
But spread, my sons, your glory thin or thick,
On passive paper, or on solid brick.
So by each bard, an alderman shall sit,
A heavy lord shall hang at every wit,
And while on Fame's triumphal car they ride,
Some slave of mine be pinion'd to their side."

130

Now crowds on crowds around the goddess press,
Each eager to present the first address.
Dunce scorning dunce beholds the next advance,
But fop shows fop superior complaisance.

REMARKS.

Ver. 128. A page, a grave,] For what less than a grave can be granted to a dead author? or what less than a page can be allowed a living one!

Ver. 128. A page,] Pagina, not pedissequus. A page of a book, not a servant, follower, or attendant: no poet having had a page since the death of Mr. Thomas Durfey.-Scribl.

Ver. 131. So by each bard an alderman, &c.] Vide the Tombs of the Poets, editio Westmonasteriensis.

Ibid.--an alderman shall sit,] Alluding to the monument erected for Butler by alderman Barber.

Ver. 132. A heavy lord shall hang at every wit,] How unnatural an image, and how ill-supported! saith Aristarchus. Had it been,

A heavy wit shall hang at every lord, something might have been said, in an age so dis

What! no respect, he cried, for Shakespeare's tinguished for well-judging patrons. For lord, page?

REMARKS.

Ver. 108-bow'd from side to side:] As being of

no one party.

then, read load; that is, of debts here, and of commentaries hereafter. To this purpose, conspicuous is the case of the poor author of Hudibras, whose body, long since weighed down to the Ver. 110. bold Benson] This man endeavoured grave, by a load of debts, has lately had a more to raise himself to fame by erecting monuments, unmerciful load of commentaries laid upon his striking coins, setting up heads, and procuring spirit; wherein the editor has achieved more translations, of Milton; and afterwards by as great than Virgil himself, when he turned critic, could a passion for Arthur Johnston, a Scotch phy-oast of, which was only, that he had picked gold sician's Version of the Psalms, of which he printed many fine editions. See more of him, Book iii.

ver. 325.

Ver. 115. The decent knight] An eminent person who was about to publish a very poinpous edition of a great author at his own expense.

Ver. 115, &c.] These four lines were printed in a separate leaf by Mr. Pope in the last edition, which he himself gave, of the Dunciad, with directions to the printer, to put this leaf into its place as soon as sir T. H.'s Shakespeare should be published.

out of another man's dung; whereas the editor has picked it out of his own.-Scribl.

Aristarchus thinks the common reading right: and that the author himself had been struggling, and but just shaken off his load when he wrote the following epigram:

My lord complains, that Pope, stark mad with
gardens,

Has lopt three trees the value of three farthings:
But he's my neighbour, cries the peer polite,
And if he'll visit me, I'll wave my right.
What on compulsion? and against my will,
A lord's acquaintance? Let him file his bill.
Ver. 137, 138.

Ver. 119. Thus revive, &c.] The goddess applands the practice of tacking the obscure names Dunce scorning dunce beholds the next advance, of persons not eminent in any branch of learning, But fop shows fop superior complaisauce.] to those of the most distinguished writers; either This is not to be ascribed so much to the differst by printing editions of their works with imper-mauners of a court and college, as to the different tinent alterations of their text, as in the former instances; or by setting up monuments disgraced with their own vile names and inscriptions, as in the latter.

effects which a pretence to learning, and a pretence to wit, have on blockheads. For as judgment consists in finding out the differences in things, and wit in finding out their likenesses, so the dunce

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