Chapter XVI: Part 16

The interview between Addison and Pope took place in the presence of Steele and Gay. They met with cold civility. Addison's reserve wore away, as was usual with him, when wine and conversation imparted some warmth to his native phlegm. At a moment the generous Steele deemed auspicious, he requested Addison would perform his promise in renewing his friendship with Pope. Pope expressed his desire: he said he was willing to hear his faults, and preferred candour and severity rather than forms of complaisance; but he spoke in a manner as conceiving Addison, and not himself, had been the aggressor. So much like their humblest inferiors do great men act under the influence of common passions: Addison was overcome with anger, which cost him an effort to suppress; but, in the formal speech he made, he reproached Pope with indulging a vanity that far exceeded his merit; that he had not yet attained to the excellence he imagined; and observed, that his verses had a different air when Steele and himself corrected them; and, on this occasion, reminded Pope of a particular line which Steele had improved in the "Messiah."[235] Addison seems at that moment to have forgotten that he had trusted, for the last line of his own dramatic poem, rather to the inspiration of the poet he was so contemptuously lecturing than to his own.[236] He proceeded with detailing all the abuse the herd of scribblers had heaped on Pope; and by declaring that his Homer was "an ill-executed thing," and Tickell's had all the spirit. We are told, he concluded "in a low hollow voice of feigned temper," in which he asserted that he had ceased to be solicitous about his own poetical reputation since he had entered into more public affairs; but, from friendship for Pope, desired him to be more humble, if he wished to appear a better man to the world.

When Addison had quite finished schooling his little rebel, Gay, mild and timid (for it seems, with all his love for Pope, his expectations from the court, from Addison's side, had tethered his gentle heart), attempted to say something. But Pope, in a tone far more spirited than all of them, without reserve told Addison that he appealed from his judgment, and did not esteem him able to correct his verses; upbraided him as a pensioner from early youth, directing the learning which had been obtained by the public money to his own selfish desire of power, and that he "had always endeavoured to cut down new-fledged merit." The conversation now became a contest, and was broken up without ceremony. Such was the notable interview between two rival wits, which only ended in strengthening their literary quarrel; and sent back the enraged satirist to his inkstand, where he composed a portrait, for which Addison was made to sit, with the fine _chiar' oscuro_ of Horace, and with as awful and vindictive features as the sombre hand of Juvenal could have designed.

FOOTNOTES:

[225] Sir William Blackstone's Discussion on the Quarrel between
Addison and Pope was communicated by Dr. Kippis in his
"Biographia Britannica," vol. i. p. 56. Blackstone is there
designated as "a gentleman of considerable rank, to whom the
public is obliged for works of much higher importance."

[226] Dennis asserts in one of his pamphlets that Pope, fermenting
with envy at the success of Addison's _Cato_, went to Lintot,
and persuaded him to engage this redoubted critic to write the
remarks on _Cato_--that Pope's gratitude to Dennis for having
complied with his request was the well-known narrative of
Dennis "being placed as a lunatic in the hands of Dr. Norris,
a curer of mad people, at his house in Hatton-garden, though
at the same time I appeared publicly every day, both in the
park and in the town." Can we suppose that Dennis tells a
falsehood respecting Pope's desiring Lintot to engage Dennis
to write down _Cato_? If true, did Pope wish to see Addison
degraded, and at the same time take an opportunity of
ridiculing the critic, without, however, answering his
arguments? The secret history of literature is like that of
politics?

[Dennis took a strong dislike to Addison's _Cato_, and his
style of criticism is thus alluded to in the humorous account
of his frenzy written by Pope: "On all sides of his room were
pinned a great many sheets of a tragedy called _Cato_, with
notes on the margin by his own hand. The words _absurd_,
_monstrous_, _execrable_, were everywhere written in such
large characters, that I could read them without my
spectacles." Warton says that "Addison highly disapproved of
this bitter satire on Dennis, and Pope was not a little
chagrined at this disapprobation; for the narrative was
intended to court the favour of Addison, by defending his
_Cato_: in which seeming defence Addison was far from thinking
our author sincere."]

[227] In the notes to the Prologue to the Satires.

[228] Pope's conjecture was perfectly correct. Dr. Warton confirms it
from a variety of indisputable authorities.--Warton's "Pope,"
vol. iv. p. 34.

[229] In the "Freeholder," May, 1716.

[230] Pope himself thus related the matter to Spence: "Phillips seemed
to have been encouraged to abuse me in coffee-houses and
conversations; and Gildon wrote a thing about Wycherly, in
which he had abused both me and my relations very grossly.
Lord Warwick himself told me one day that it was in vain for
me to endeavour to be well with Mr. Addison; that his jealous
temper would never admit of a settled friendship between us,
and to convince me of what he had said, assured me that
Addison had encouraged Gildon to publish those scandals, and
had given him ten guineas after they were published."--ED.

[231] The strongest parts of Sir William Blackstone's discussion turn
on certain inaccurate dates of Ruffhead, in his statements,
which show them to be inconsistent with the times when they
are alleged to have happened. These erroneous dates had been
detected in an able article in the Monthly Review on that
work, April, 1769. Ruffhead is a tasteless, confused, and
unskilful writer--Sir William has laid great stress on the
incredible story of Addison paying Gildon to write against
Pope, "a man so amiable in his moral character." It is
possible that the Earl of Warwick, who conveyed the
information, might have been a malicious, lying youth; but
then Pope had some knowledge of mankind--he believed the
story, for he wrote instantly, with honest though heated
feelings, to Addison, and sent him, at that moment, the first
sketch of the character of Atticus. Addison used him very
civilly ever after--but it does not appear that Addison ever
contradicted the tale of the officious Earl. All these facts,
which Pope repeated many years after to Spence, Sir William
was not acquainted with, for they were transcribed from
Spence's papers by Johnson, after Blackstone had written.
[This is fully in accordance with his previous conduct, as he
described it to Spence; on the first notification of the Earl
of Warwick's news, "the next day when I was heated with what I
had heard, I wrote a letter to Mr. Addison, to let him know
that I was not unacquainted with this behaviour of his; that
if I was to speak severely of him, in return for it, it should
not be in such a dirty way; and that I should rather tell
himself freely of his faults, and allow his good qualities;
and that it should be something in the following manner: I
then adjoined the first sketch of what has since been called
my Satire on Addison. Mr. Addison used me very civilly ever
after, and never did me any injustice that I know of from that
time to his death, which was about three years after."]

[232] That Addison did occasionally divert Pope's friends from him,
appears from the advice which Lady Mary Wortley Montague says
he gave to her--"Leave him as soon as you can, he will
certainly play you some devilish trick else: he has an
appetite to satire." Malone thinks this may have been said
under the irritation produced by the verses on Addison, which
Pope sent to him, as described above. Pope's love of satire,
and unflinching use of it, was as conspicuous as Addison's
nervous dislike to it.--ED.

[233] From Lord Egmont's MS. Collections.--See the "Addenda Kippis's
Biographia Britannica."

[234] The earliest and most particular narrative of this remarkable
interview I have hitherto only traced to "Memoirs of the
Life and Writings of A. Pope, Esq., by William Ayre, Esq.,"
1745, vol. i. p. 100. This work comes in a very suspicious
form; it is a huddled compilation, yet contains some
curious matters; and pretends, in the title-page, to be
occasionally drawn from "original MSS. and the testimonies
of persons of honour." He declares, in the preface, that he
and his friends "had means and some helps which were never
public." He sometimes appeals to several noble friends of
Pope as his authorities. But the mode of its publication,
and that of its execution, are not in its favour. These
volumes were written within six months of the decease of
our poet; have no publisher's name; and yet the author,
whoever he was, took out "a patent, under his majesty's royal
signet," for securing the copyright. This Ayre is so
obscure an author, though a translator of Tasso's "Aminta,"
that he seems to have escaped even the minor chronicles of
literature. At the time of its publication there appeared
"Remarks on Squire Ayre's Memoirs of Pope." The writer
pretends he has discovered him to be only one of the
renowned Edmund Curll's "squires," who, about that time, had
created an order of literary squires, ready to tramp at
the funeral of every great personage with his life. The
"Remarker" then addresses Curll, and insinuates he speaks
from personal knowledge of the man:--"You have an adversaria
of title-pages of your own contrivance, and which your authors
are to write books to. Among what you call _the occasional,
or black list_, I have seen Memoirs of Dean Swift, Pope,
&c." Curll, indeed, was then sending forth many pseudo
squires, with lives of "Congreve," "Mrs. Oldfield," &c.; all
which contained some curious particulars, picked up in
coffee-houses, conversations, or pamphlets of the day. This
William Ayre I accept as "a squire of low degree," but a real
personage. As for this interview, Ayre was certainly
incompetent to the invention of a single stroke of the
conversations detailed: where he obtained all these
interesting particulars, I have not discovered. Johnson
alludes to this interview, states some of its results, but
refers to no other authority than floating rumours.

[235] The line stood originally, and nearly literally copied from
Isaiah--

"He wipes the tears for ever from our eyes;"

which Steele retouched, as it now stands--

"From every face he wipes off every tear."

Dr. Warton prefers the rejected verse. The latter, he thinks,
has too much of modern quaintness. The difficulty of choice
lies between that naked simplicity which scarcely affects, and
those strokes of art which are too apparent.

[236] The last line of Addison's tragedy read originally--

"And oh! 'twas this that ended Cato's life."

A very weak line, which was altered at the suggestion of Pope
as it stands at present:--

"And robs the guilty world of Cato's life."--ED.

BOLINGBROKE AND MALLET'S POSTHUMOUS QUARREL WITH POPE.

Lord BOLINGBROKE affects violent resentment for Pope's pretended
breach of confidence in having printed his "Patriot King"--WARBURTON'S
apology for POPE'S disinterested intentions--BOLINGBROKE instigates
MALLET to libel POPE, after the poet's death--The real motive for
libelling POPE was BOLINGBROKE'S personal hatred of WARBURTON, for the
ascendancy the latter had obtained over the poet--Some account of
their rival conflicts--BOLINGBROKE had unsettled POPE'S religious
opinions, and WARBURTON had confirmed his faith--POPE, however,
refuses to abjure the Catholic religion--Anecdote of POPE'S anxiety
respecting a future state--MALLET'S intercourse with POPE: anecdote of
"The Apollo Vision," where MALLET mistook a sarcasm for a
compliment--MALLET'S character--Why LEONIDAS GLOVER declined writing
the Life of Marlborough--BOLINGBROKE'S character hit off--WARBURTON,
the concealed object of this posthumous quarrel with POPE.

On the death of POPE, 1500 copies of one of Lord BOLINGBROKE'S works, "The Patriot King," were discovered to have been secretly printed by Pope, but never published. The honest printer presented the whole to his lordship, who burned the edition in his gardens at Battersea. The MS. had been delivered to our poet by his lordship, with a request to print a few copies for its better preservation, and for the use of a few friends.

Bolingbroke affected to feel the most lively resentment for what he chose to stigmatise as "a breach of confidence." "His thirst of vengeance," said Johnson, "incited him to blast the memory of the man over whom he had wept in his last struggles; and he employed Mallet, another friend of Pope, to tell the tale to the public with all its aggravations. Warburton, whose heart was warm with his legacy, and tender by the recent separation," apologised for Pope. The irregular conduct which Bolingbroke stigmatised as a breach of trust, was attributed to a desire of perpetuating the work of his friend, who might have capriciously destroyed it. Our poet could have no selfish motive; he could not gratify his vanity by publishing the work as his own, nor his avarice by its sale, which could never have taken place till the death of its author; a circumstance not likely to occur during Pope's lifetime.[237]

The vindictive rage of Bolingbroke; the bitter invective he permitted MALLET to publish, as the editor of his works; and the two anonymous pamphlets of the latter, which I have noticed in the article of WARBURTON; are effects much too disproportionate to the cause which is usually assigned. JOHNSON does not develope the secret motives of what he has energetically termed "Bolingbroke's thirst of vengeance." He and Mallet carried their secret revenge beyond all bounds: the lordly stoic and the irritated bardling, under the cloak of anonymous calumny, have but ill-concealed the malignity of their passions. Let anonymous calumniators recollect, in the midst of their dark work, that if they escape the detection of their contemporaries, their reputation, if they have any to lose, will not probably elude the researches of the historian;--a fatal witness against them at the tribunal of posterity.

The preface of Mallet to the "Patriot King" of Bolingbroke, produced a literary quarrel; and more pamphlets than perhaps I have discovered were published on this occasion.

Every lover of literature was indignant to observe that the vain and petulant Mallet, under the protection of Pope's

Guide, philosopher, and friend!

should have been permitted to have aspersed Pope with the most degrading language. Pope is here always designated as "This Man." Thus "_This Man_ was no sooner dead than Lord Bolingbroke received information that an entire edition of 1500 copies of these papers had been printed; that this very _Man_ had corrected the press, &c." Could one imagine that this was the Tully of England, describing our Virgil? For Mallet was but the mouthpiece of Bolingbroke.

After a careful detection of many facts concerning the parties now before us, I must attribute the concealed motive of this outrage on Pope to the election the dying poet made of Warburton as his editor. A mortal hatred raged between Bolingbroke and Warburton. The philosophical lord had seen the mighty theologian ravish the prey from his grasp. Although Pope held in idolatrous veneration the genius of Bolingbroke, yet had this literary superstition been gradually enlightened by the energy of Warburton. They were his good and his evil genii in a dreadful conflict, wrestling to obtain the entire possession of the soul of the mortal. Bolingbroke and Warburton one day disputed before Pope, and parted never to meet again. The will of Pope bears the trace of his divided feelings: he left his MSS. to Bolingbroke as his executor, but his works to Warburton as his editor. The secret history of Bolingbroke and Warburton with Pope is little known: the note will supply it.[238]

But how did the puny Mallet stand connected with these great men? By the pamphlets published during this literary quarrel he appears to have enjoyed a more intimate intercourse with them than is known. In one of them he is characterised "as a fellow who, while Mr. Pope lived, was as diligent in licking his feet, as he is now in licking your lordship's; and who, for the sake of giving himself an air of importance, in being joined with you, and for the vanity of saying 'the Author and I,'--'the Editor and me,'--has sacrificed all his pretensions to friendship, honour, and humanity."[239] An anecdote in this pamphlet assigns a sufficient motive to excite some wrath in a much less irritable animal than the self-important editor of Bolingbroke's Works. The anecdote may be distinguished as

THE APOLLO VISION.

"The editor (Mallet) being in company with the person to whom Mr. Pope has consigned the care of his works (Warburton), and who, he thought, had some intention of writing Mr. Pope's life, told him he had an anecdote, which he believed nobody knew but himself. I was sitting one day (said he) with Mr. Pope, in his last illness, who coming suddenly out of a reverie, which you know he frequently fell into at that time, and fixing his eyes steadfastly upon me; 'Mr. M. (said he), I have had an odd kind of vision. Methought I saw my own head open, and Apollo came out of it; I then saw your head open, and Apollo went into it; after which our heads closed up again.' The gentleman (Warburton) could not help smiling at his vanity; and with some humour replied, 'Why, sir, if I had an intention of writing _your_ life, this might perhaps be a proper anecdote; but I don't see, that in Mr. Pope's it will be of any consequence at all.'" P. 14.

This exhibits a curious instance of an author's egotism, or rather of Mallet's conceit, contriving, by some means, to have his name slide into the projected Life of Pope by Warburton, who appears, however, always to have treated him with the contempt Pope himself evidently did.[240] What opinion could the poet have entertained of the taste of that weak and vain critic, who, when Pope published anonymously "The Essay on Man," being asked if anything new had appeared, replied that he had looked over a thing called an "Essay on Man," but, discovering the utter want of skill and knowledge in the author, had thrown it aside. Pope mortified him by confiding to him the secret.

"The Apollo Vision" was a stinging anecdote, and it came from Warburton either directly or indirectly. This was followed up by "A Letter to the Editor of the Letters on the Spirit of Patriotism, the Idea of a Patriot King," &c., a dignified remonstrance of Warburton himself; but "The Impostor Detected and Convicted, or the Principles and Practices of the Author of the Spirit of Patriotism (Lord Bolingbroke) set forth in a clear light, in a Letter to a Member of Parliament in Town, from his Friend in the Country, 1749," is a remarkable production. Lord Bolingbroke is the impostor and the concealed Jacobite. Time, the ablest critic on these party productions, has verified the predictions of this seer. We discover here, too, a literary fact, which is necessary to complete our present history. It seems that there were omissions and corrections in the edition Pope printed of "The Patriot King," which his caution or his moderation prompted, and which such a political demagogue as Bolingbroke never forgave. They are thus alluded to: "Lord B. may remember" (from a conversation held, at which the writer appears to have been present), "that a difference in opinion prevailed, and a few points were urged by that gentleman (Pope) in opposition to some particular tenets which related to the limitation of the English monarchy, and to the ideal doctrine of a patriot king. These were Mr. P.'s reasons for the emendations he made; and which, together with the consideration that both their lives were at that time in a declining state, was the true cause, and no other, of his care to preserve those letters, by handing them to the press, with the precaution mentioned by the author." Indeed the cry raised against the _dead man_ by Bolingbroke and Mallet, was an artificial one: that it should ever have tainted the honour of the bard, or that it should ever have been excited by his "Philosopher and Friend," are equally strange; it is possible that the malice of Mallet was more at work than that of Bolingbroke, who suffered himself to be the dupe of a man held in contempt by Pope, by Warburton, and by others. But the pamphlet I have just noticed might have enraged Bolingbroke, because his true character is ably drawn in it. The writer says that "a person in an eminent station of life abroad, when Lord B---- was at Paris to transact a certain affair, said, _C'est certainement un homme d'esprit, mais un coquin sans probite_." This was a very disagreeable truth!

In one of these pamphlets, too, Bolingbroke was mortified at his dignity being lessened by the writer, in comparing his lordship with their late friend Pope.--"I venture to foretell, that the name of Mr. Pope, in spite of your unmanly endeavours, shall revive and blossom in the dust, from his own merits; and presume to remind you, that _yours_, had it not been for _his_ genius, _his_ friendship, _his_ idolatrous veneration for _you_, might, in a short course of years, have died and been forgotten." Whatever the degree of genius Bolingbroke may claim, doubtless the verse of Pope has embalmed his fame. I have never been able to discover the authors of these pamphlets, who all appear of the first rank, and who seem to have written under the eye of Warburton. The awful and vindictive Bolingbroke, and the malignant and petulant Mallet, did not long brood over their anger: he or they gave it vent on the head of Warburton, in those two furious pamphlets, which I have noticed in the "Quarrels of Warburton." All these pamphlets were published in the same year, 1749, so that it is now difficult to arrange them according to their priority. Enough has been shown to prove, that the loud outcry of Bolingbroke and Mallet, in their posthumous attack on Pope, arose from their unforgiving malice against him, for the preference by which the poet had distinguished Warburton; and that Warburton, much more than Pope, was the real object of this masked battery.

FOOTNOTES:

[237] At the time, to season the tale for the babble of Literary
Tattlers, it was propagated that POPE intended, on the death
of BOLINGBROKE, to sell this eighteenpenny pamphlet at a
guinea a copy; which would have produced an addition of as
many hundreds to the thousands which the poet had honourably
reaped from his Homer. This was the ridiculous lie of the day,
which lasted long enough to obtain its purpose, and to cast an
odium on the shade of Pope. Pope must have been a miserable
calculator of _survivorships_, if ever he had reckoned on
this.

[238] Splendid as was the genius of Bolingbroke, the gigantic force of
Warburton obtained the superiority. Had the contest solely
depended on the effusions of genius, Bolingbroke might have
prevailed; but an object more important than human interests
induced the poet to throw himself into the arms of Warburton.

The "Essay on Man" had been reformed by the subtle aid of
Warburton, in opposition to the objectionable principles which
Bolingbroke had infused into his system of philosophy: this,
no doubt, had vexed Bolingbroke. But another circumstance
occurred of a more mortifying nature. When Pope one day showed
Warburton Bolingbroke's "Letters on the Study and Use of
History," printed, but not published, and concealing the name
of the author, Warburton not only made several very free
strictures on that work, but particularly attacked a
digression concerning the authenticity of the Old Testament.
Pope requested him to write his remarks down as they had
occurred, which he instantly did; and Pope was so satisfied
with them, that he crossed out the digression in the printed
book, and sent the animadversions to Lord Bolingbroke, then at
Paris. The style of the great dogmatist, thrown out in heat,
must no doubt have contained many fiery particles, all which
fell into the most inflammable of minds. Pope soon discovered
his officiousness was received with indignation. Yet when
Bolingbroke afterwards met Warburton he dissimulated: he used
the language of compliment, but in a tone which claimed
homage. The two most arrogant geniuses who ever lived, in vain
exacted submission from each other: they could allow of no
divided empire, and they were born to hate each other.
Bolingbroke suppressed his sore feelings, for at that very
time he was employed in collecting matter to refute the
objections; treasuring up his secret vengeance against Pope
and Warburton, which he threw out immediately on the death of
Pope. I collect these particulars from Ruffhead, p. 527, and
whenever, in that volume, Warburton's name is introduced, it
must be considered as coming from himself.

The reasonings of Bolingbroke appear at times to have
disturbed the religious faith of our poet, and he owed much to
Warburton in having that faith confirmed. But Pope rejected,
with his characteristic good sense, Warburton's tampering with
him to abjure the Catholic religion. On the belief of a future
state, Pope seems often to have meditated with great anxiety;
and an anecdote is recorded of his latest hours, which shows
how strongly that important belief affected him. A day or two
before his death he was at times delirious, and about four
o'clock in the morning he rose from bed and went to the
library, where a friend who was watching him found him busily
writing. He persuaded him to desist, and withdrew the paper he
had written. The subject of the thoughts of the delirious poet
was a new theory on the "Immortality of the Soul," in which he
distinguished between those material objects which tended to
strengthen his conviction, and those which weakened it. The
paper which contained these disordered thoughts was shown to
Warburton, and surely has been preserved.

[239] "A letter to the Lord Viscount B----ke, occasioned by his
treatment of a deceased friend." Printed for A. Moore, without
date. This pamphlet either came from Warburton himself, or
from one of his intimates. The writer, too, calls Pope his
friend.

[240] We find also the name of Mallet closely connected with another
person of eminence, the Patriot-Poet, Leonidas Glover. I take
this opportunity of correcting a surmise of Johnson's in his
Life of Mallet, respecting Glover, and which also places
Mallet's character in a true light.

A minute life of Mallet might exhibit a curious example of
mediocrity of talent, with but suspicious virtues, brought
forward by the accident of great connexions, placing a
bustling intriguer much higher in the scale of society than
"our philosophy ever dreamt of." Johnson says of Mallet, that
"It was remarkable of him, that he was the only Scot whom
Scotchmen did not commend." From having been accidentally
chosen as private tutor to the Duke of Montrose, he wound
himself into the favour of the party at Leicester House; he
wrote tragedies conjointly with Thomson, and was appointed,
with Glover, to write the Life of the Duke of Marlborough. Yet
he had already shown to the world his scanty talent for
biography in his "Life of Lord Bacon," on which Warburton so
acutely animadverted.

According to Johnson's account, the Duchess of Marlborough
assigned the task of writing the Life of the Duke to Glover
and to Mallet, with a remuneration of a thousand pounds. She
must, however, have mortified the poets by subjoining the
sarcastic prohibition that "no verses should be inserted."
Johnson adds, "Glover, _I suppose, rejected with disdain the
legacy_, and devolved the whole work upon Mallet."

The cause why Glover declined this work could not, indeed, be
known to Johnson: it arose from a far more dignified motive
than the petty disdain of the legacy, which our great literary
biographer has surmised. It can now be told in his own words,
which I derive from a very interesting extract communicated to
me by my friend Mr. Duppa, from that portion of the MS.
Memoirs of Glover not yet published.

I shall first quote the remarkable codicil from the original
will of her Grace, which Mr. Duppa took the pains to consult.
She assigns her reasons for the choice of her historians, and
discriminates between the two authors. After bequeathing the
thousand pounds for them, she adds: "I believe Mr. Glover is a
very honest man, who wishes, as I do, all the good that can
happen, to preserve the liberties and laws of England. Mr.
Mallet was recommended to me by the late Duke of Montrose,
whom I admired extremely for his great steadiness and
behaviour in all things that related to the preservation of
our laws and the public good."--Thus her Grace has expressed a
personal knowledge and confidence in Glover, distinctly marked
from her "recommended" acquaintance Mallet.

Glover refused the office of historian, not from "disdain of
the legacy," nor for any deficient zeal for the hero whom he
admired. He refused it with sorrowful disappointment; for,
besides the fantastical restrictions of "not writing any
verses;" and the cruel one of yoking such a patriot with the
servile Mallet, there was one which placed the revision of the
work in the hands of the Earl of Chesterfield: this was the
_circumstance_ at which the dignified genius of Glover
revolted. Chesterfield's mean political character had excited
his indignation; and he has drawn a lively picture of this
polished nobleman's "eager prostitution," in his printed
Memoirs, recently published under the title of "Memoirs of a
celebrated Literary and Political Character," p. 24.

In the following passage, this great-minded man, for such he
was, "unburthens his heart in a melancholy digression from his
plain narrative."

"Composing such a narrative (alluding to his own Memoirs)
and endeavouring to establish such a temper of mind, I
cannot at intervals refrain from regret that the _capricious
restrictions_ in the Duchess of Marlborough's will,
appointing me to write the life of her illustrious husband,
compelled me to reject the undertaking. There, conduct,
valour, and success abroad; prudence, perseverance,
learning, and science, at home; would have shed some portion
of their graces on their historian's page: a mediocrity of
talent would have felt an unwonted elevation in the bare
attempt of transmitting so splendid a period to succeeding
ages." Such was the dignified regret of Glover!

Doubtless, he disdained, too, his colleague; but Mallet reaped
the whole legacy, and still more, a pension: pretending to be
always occupied on the Life of Marlborough, and every day
talking of the great discoveries he had made, he contrived to
make this nonentity serve his own purposes. Once hinting to
Garrick, that, in spite of chronology, by some secret device
of anticipation, he had reserved a niche in this great work
for the Roscius of his own times, the gratitude of Garrick was
instant. He recollected that Mallet was a tragedy-writer; and
it also appeared that our dramatic bardling had one ready. As
for the pretended Life of Marlborough, not a line appears ever
to have been written!

Such was the end of the ardent solicitude and caprice of the
Duchess of Marlborough, exemplified in the last solemn act of
life, where she betrayed the same warmth of passion, and the
same arrogant caprice she had always indulged, at the cost of
her judgment, in what Pope emphatically terms "the trade of
the world." She was

"The wisest fool much time has ever made."

Even in this darling project of her last ambition, to
immortalise her name, she had incumbered it with such arrogant
injunctions, mixed up such contrary elements, that they were
certain to undo their own purpose. Such was the barren harvest
she gathered through a life of passion, regulated by no
principle of conduct. One of the most finished portraits of
Pope is the Atossa, in his "Epistle on Woman." How admirably
he shows what the present instant proves, that she was one
who, always possessing the _means_, was sure to lose the
_ends_.

LINTOT'S ACCOUNT-BOOK.

An odd sort of a literary curiosity has fallen in my way. It throws some light on the history of the heroes of the _Dunciad_; but such _minutiae literariae_ are only for my bibliographical readers.

It is a book of accounts, which belonged to the renowned BERNARD LINTOT, the bookseller, whose character has been so humorously preserved by Pope, in a dialogue which the poet has given as having passed between them in Windsor Forest. The book is entitled "_Copies, when Purchased_." The power of genius is exemplified in the ledger of the bookseller as much as in any other book; and while I here discover, that the moneys received even by such men of genius as Gay, Farquhar, Cibber, and Dr. King, amount to small sums, and such authors as Dennis, Theobald, Ozell, and Toland, scarcely amount to anything, that of Pope much exceeds 4000_l._

I am not in all cases confident of the nature of these "Copies purchased;" those works which were originally published by Lintot may be considered as purchased at the sums specified: some few might have been subsequent to their first edition. The guinea, at that time, passing for twenty-one shillings and sixpence, has occasioned the fractions.

I transcribe Pope's account. Here it appears that he sold "The Key to the Lock" and "Parnell's Poems." The poem entitled, "To the Author of a Poem called _Successio_," appears to have been written by Pope, and has escaped the researches of his editors. The smaller poems were contributed to a volume of Poetical Miscellanies, published by Lintot.[241]

MR. POPE.

L s. d.
_19 Feb. 1711-12._
Statius, First Book } 16 2 6
Vertumnus and Pomona }

_21 March, 1711-12._
First Edition Rape 7 0 0

_9 April, 1712._
To a Lady presenting Voiture }
Upon Silence } 3 16 6
To the Author of a Poem called _Successio_ }

_23 Feb. 1712-13._
Windsor Forest 32 5 0

_23 July, 1713._
Ode on St. Cecilia's day 15 0 0

_20th Feb. 1713-14._
Additions to the Rape 15 0 0

_1 Feb. 1714-15._
Temple of Fame 32 5 0

_30 April, 1715._
Key to the Lock 10 15 0

_17 July, 1716._
Essay on Criticism[242] 15 0 0

_13 Dec. 1721._
Parnell's Poems 15 0 0

_23 March, 1713._
Homer, vol. i. 215 0 0
650 books on royal paper 176 0 0

_9 Feb. 1715-16._
Homer, vol. ii. 215 0 0

_7 May, 1716._
650 royal paper 150 0 0
This article is repeated to the sixth volume of
of Homer. To which is to be added another sum
of 840_l._, paid for an assignment of all
the copies. The whole of this part of the
account amounting to 3203 4 0

Copy-moneys for the Odyssey, vols. i. ii. iii.,
and 750 of each vol. royal paper, 4to. 615 6 0

Ditto for the vols. iv. v. and 750 do. 425 18 7-1/2
----------------
L4244 8 7-1/2
================

MR. GAY.

L s. d.
_12 May, 1713._
Wife of Bath 25 0 0

_11 Nov. 1714._
Letter to a Lady 5 7 6

_14 Feb. 1714._
The What d'ye call it? 16 2 6

_22 Dec. 1715._
Trivia 43 0 0
Epistle to the Earl of Burlington 10 15 0

_4 May, 1717._
Battle of the Frogs 16 2 6

_8 Jan. 1717._
Three Hours after Marriage 43 2 6
The Mohocks, a Farce, 2_l._ 10_s._
(Sold the Mohocks to him again.[243])
Revival of the Wife of Bath 75 0 0
------------
L234 10 0

MR. DENNIS.

L s. d.
_Feb. 24, 1703-4._
Liberty Asserted, one half share[245] 7 3 0

_10 Nov. 1708._
Appius and Virginia 21 10 0

_25 April, 1711._
Essay on Public Spirit 2 12 6

_6 Jan. 1711._
Remarks on Pope's Essay 2 12 6

Dennis must have sold himself to criticism from ill-nature, and not for pay. One is surprised that his two tragedies should have been worth a great deal more than his criticism. Criticism was then worth no more than too frequently it deserves; Dr. Sewel, for his "Observations on the Tragedy of _Jane Shore_," received only a guinea.

I had suggested a doubt whether Theobald attempted to translate from the original Greek: one would suppose he did by the following entry, which has a line drawn through it, as if the agreement had not been executed. Perhaps Lintot submitted to pay Theobald for _not doing_ the Odyssey when Pope undertook it.

MR. THEOBALD.

L s. d.
_23 May, 1713._
Plato's Phaedon 5 7 6
For _AEsculus's_ Trag. 1 1 6
being part of Ten Guineas.

_12 June, 1714._
La Motte's Homer 3 4 6

_April_ 21, 1714. Articles signed by Mr. Theobald, to translate
for B. Lintot the 24 books of Homer's Odyssey into English blank
verse. Also the four Tragedies of Sophocles, called OEdipus
Tyrannus, OEdipus Coloneus, Trachiniae, and Philoctetes, into
English blank verse, with Explanatory Notes to the twenty-four
Books of the Odyssey, and to the four Tragedies. To receive, for
translating every 450 Greek verses, with Explanatory Notes
thereon, the sum of 2_l._ 10_s._

To translate likewise the Satires and Epistles of Horace into
English rhyme. For every 120 Latin lines so translated, the sum of
1_l._ 1_s._ 6_d._

These Articles to be performed, according to the time specified,
under the penalty of fifty pounds, payable by either party's
default in performance.

Paid in hand, 2_l._ 10_s._

It appears that Toland never got above 5_l._, 10_l._, or 20_l._, for his publications. See his article in "Calamities of Authors," p. 155. I discovered the humiliating conditions that attended his publications, from an examination of his original papers. All this author seems to have reaped from a life devoted to literary enterprise, and philosophy, and patriotism, appears not to have exceeded 200_l._

Here, too, we find that the facetious Dr. King threw away all his sterling wit for five miserable pounds, though "The Art of Cookery," and that of "Love," obtained a more honourable price. But a mere school-book probably inspired our lively genius with more real facetiousness than any of those works which communicate so much to others.

DR. KING.

L s. d.
_18 Feb. 1707-8._
Paid for Art of Cookery 32 5 0

_16 Feb. 1708-9._
Paid for the First Part of Transactions 5 0 0
Paid for his Art of Love 32 5 0

_23 June, 1709._
Paid for the Second Part of the Transactions[246] 5 0 0

_4 March, 1709-10._
Paid for the History of Cajamai 5 0 0

_10 Nov. 1710._
Paid for King's Gods 50 0 0

_1 July, 1712._
Useful Miscellany, Part I 1 1 6
Paid for the Useful Miscellany 3 0 0

Lintot utters a groan over "The Duke of Buckingham's Works" (Sheffield), for "having been _jockeyed_ of them by Alderman Barber and Tonson." Who can ensure literary celebrity? No bookseller would _now_ regret being _jockeyed_ out of his Grace's works!

The history of plays appears here somewhat curious:--tragedies, then the fashionable dramas, obtained a considerable price; for though Dennis's luckier one reached only to 21_l._, Dr. Young's _Busiris_ acquired 84_l._ Smith's _Phaedra and Hippolytus_, 50_l._; Rowe's _Jane Shore_, 50_l._ 15_s._; and _Jane Gray_, 75_l._ 5_s._ Cibber's _Nonjuror_ obtained 105_l._ for the copyright.

Is it not a little mortifying to observe, that among all these customers of genius whose names enrich the ledger of the bookseller, Jacob, that "blunderbuss of law," while his law-books occupy in space as much as Mr. Pope's works, the amount of his account stands next in value, far beyond many a name which has immortalised itself!

FOOTNOTES:

[241] "Miscellaneous Poems and Translations, by several Hands,"
1712.--The second edition appeared in 1714; and in the
title-page are enumerated the poems mentioned in this account,
and Pope's name affixed, as if he were the actual editor--an
idea which Mr. Nichols thought he affected to discountenance.
It is probable that Pope was the editor. We see, by this
account, that he was paid for his contributions.

[242] This was a new edition, published conjointly by Lintot and
Lewis, the Catholic bookseller and early friend of Pope, of
whom, and of the first edition, 1711, I have preserved an
anecdote, p. 280.

[243] The late Isaac Reed, in the Biog. Dramatica, was uncertain
whether Gay was the author of this unacted drama. It is a
satire on the inhuman frolics of the bucks and bloods of
those days, who imitated the savageness of the Indians
whose name they assumed.[244] Why Gay repurchased "The
Mohocks," remains to be discovered. Was it another joint
production with Pope?--The literary co-partnership between
Pope and Gay has never been opened to the curious. It is
probable that Pope was consulted, if not concerned, in
writing "The What d'ye call it?" which, Jacob says in his
"Poetical Register," "exposes several of our eminent
poets." Jacob published while Gay was living, and seems to
allude to this literary co-partnership; for, speaking of
Gay, he says: "that having an inclination to poetry, by the
strength of his own genius, and the _conversation_ of Mr.
Pope, he has made some progress in poetical writings."

This tragi-comical farce of "The Mohocks" is satirically
dedicated to Dennis, "as a _horrid_ and _tremendous_ piece,
formed on the model of his own 'Appius and Virginia.'" This
touch seems to come from the finger of Pope. It is a
mock-tragedy, for the Mohocks themselves rant in blank verse;
a feeble performance, far inferior to its happier predecessor,
"The What d'ye call it?"

[244] The brutal amusements of these "Mohocks," and the helpless
terror of London, is scarcely credible in modern days. Wild
bands of drunken men nightly infested the streets, attacking
and ill-using every passer-by. A favourite pastime was to
surround their victim with drawn swords, pricking him on every
side as he endeavoured to escape. Many persons were maimed and
dangerously wounded. Gay, in his _Trivia_, has noted some of
their more innocent practical jokes; and asks--

"Who has not trembled at the Mohock's name?
Was there a watchman took his hourly rounds,
Safe from their blows or new invented wounds?"

Swift, in his notes to Stella, has expressed his dread, while
in London, of being maimed, or perhaps killed, by them.--ED.

[245] Bought of Mr. George Strahan, bookseller.

[246] For an account of these humorous pieces, see the following
article on "The Royal Society."

POPE'S EARLIEST SATIRE.

We find by the first edition of Lintot's "Miscellaneous Poems," that the anonymous lines "To the Author of a Poem called _Successio_," was a literary satire by Pope, written when he had scarcely attained his fourteenth year. This satire, the first probably he wrote for the press, and in which he has succeeded so well, that it might have induced him to pursue the bent of his genius, merits preservation. The juvenile composition bears the marks of his future excellences: it has the tune of his verse, and the images of his wit. Thirty years afterwards, when occupied by the _Dunciad_, he transplanted and pruned again some of the original images.

The hero of this satire is Elkanah Settle. The subject is one of those Whig poems, designed to celebrate the happiness of an uninterrupted "Succession" in the Crown, at the time the Act of Settlement passed, which transferred it to the Hanoverian line. The rhymer and his theme were equally contemptible to the juvenile Jacobite poet.

The hoarse and voluminous Codrus of Juvenal aptly designates this eternal verse-maker;--one who has written with such constant copiousness, that no bibliographer has presumed to form a complete list of his works.[247]

When Settle had outlived his temporary rivalship with Dryden, and was reduced to mere Settle, he published party-poems, in folio, composed in Latin, accompanied by his own translations. These folio poems, uniformly bound, except that the arms of his patrons, or rather his purchasers, richly gilt, emblazon the black morocco, may still be found. These presentation-copies were sent round to the chiefs of the party, with a mendicant's petition, of which some still exist. To have a clear conception of the _present views_ of some politicians, it is necessary to read their history backwards. In 1702, when Settle published "Successio," he must have been a Whig. In 1685 he was a Tory, commemorating, by a heroic poem, the coronation of James II., and writing periodically against the Whigs. In 1680 he had left the Tories for the Whigs, and conducted the whole management of burning the Pope, then a very solemn national ceremony.[248] A Whig, a pope-burner, and a Codrus, afforded a full draught of inspiration to the nascent genius of our youthful satirist.

Settle, in his latter state of wretchedness, had one standard _elegy_ and _epithalamium_ printed off with _blanks_. By the ingenious contrivance of inserting the name of any considerable person who died or was married, no one who had gone out of the world or was entering into it but was equally welcome to this dinnerless livery-man of the draggled-tailed Muses. I have elsewhere noticed his last exit from this state of poetry and of pauperism, when, leaping into a green dragon which his own creative genius had invented, in a theatrical booth, Codrus, in hissing flames and terrifying-morocco folds, discovered "the fate of talents misapplied!"

TO THE AUTHOR OF A POEM ENTITLED "SUCCESSIO."

Begone, ye critics, and restrain your spite;
Codrus writes on, and will for ever write.
The heaviest Muse the swiftest course has gone,
As clocks run fastest when most lead is on.[249]
What though no bees around your cradle flew,
Nor on your lips distill'd their golden dew;
Yet have we oft discover'd in their stead,
A swarm of drones that buzz'd about your head.
When you, like Orpheus, strike the warbling lyre,
Attentive blocks stand round you, and admire.
Wit past through thee no longer is the same,
As meat digested takes a different name;[250]
But sense must sure thy safest plunder be,
Since no reprisals can be made on thee.
Thus thou mayst rise, and in thy daring flight
(Though ne'er so weighty) reach a wondrous height:
So, forced from engines, lead itself can fly,
And pond'rous slugs move nimbly through the sky.[251]
Sure Bavius copied Maevius to the full,
And CHAERILUS[252] taught CODRUS to be dull;
Therefore, dear friend, at my advice give o'er
This needless labour, and contend no more
To prove a _dull Succession_ to be true,
Since 'tis enough we find it so in you.

FOOTNOTES:

[247] The fullest account we have of Settle, a busy scribe in his day,
is in Mr. Nichols's "Literary Anecdotes," vol. i. p. 41.

[248] It was the custom when party feeling ran high on the subject of
papacy, towards the close of the reign of Charles the Second,
to get up these solemn mock-processions of the Pope and
Cardinals, accompanied with figures to represent Sir
Edmundbury Godfrey, and other subjects well adapted to heat
popular feelings, and parade them through the streets of
London. The day chosen for this was the anniversary of the
Coronation of Queen Elizabeth (Nov. 17), and when the
procession reached Temple-bar, the figure of the Pope was
tossed from his chair by one dressed as the Devil into a great
bonfire made opposite the statue of Queen Elizabeth, on the
city side of Temple-bar. Two rare tracts describe these
"solemn mock-processions," as they are termed, in 1679 and
1680. Prints were also published depicting the whole
proceedings, and descriptive pamphlets from the pen of Settle,
who arranged these shows.--ED.

[249] Thus altered in the _Dunciad_, book i., ver. 183--

"As clocks to weight their nimble motions owe,
The wheels above urged by the load below."

[250] This original image a late caustic wit (Horne Tooke), who
probably had never read this poem, employed on a certain
occasion. Godwin, who had then distinguished himself by his
genius and by some hardy paradoxes, was pleading for them as
hardily, by showing that they did not originate in him--that
they were to be found in Helvetius, in Rousseau, and in other
modern philosophers. "Ay," retorted the cynical wit; "so you
eat at my table venison and turtle, but from you the same
things come quite changed!" The original, after all, is in
Donne, long afterwards versified by our poet. See Warton's
edition, vol. iv. p. 257. Pope must have been an early reader
of Donne.

[251] Thus altered in the _Dunciad_, book i. ver. 181--

"As, forced from wind-guns, lead itself can fly,
And pond'rous slugs cut swiftly through the sky."

[252] Perhaps, by _Chaerilus_, the juvenile satirist designated
_Flecknoe_, or _Shadwell_, who had received their immortality
of dulness from his master, catholic in poetry and opinions,
Dryden.

THE ROYAL SOCIETY.

THE ROYAL SOCIETY at first opposed from various quarters--their
Experimental Philosophy supplants the Aristotelian methods--suspected
of being the concealed Advocates of Popery, Arbitrary Power, and
Atheism--disappointments incurred by their promises--the simplicity
of the early Inquirers--ridiculed by the Wits and others--Narrative
of a quarrel between a Member of the Royal Society and an
Aristotelian--Glanvill writes his "Plus Ultra," to show the
Improvements of Modern Knowledge--Character of Stubbe of
Warwick--his Apology, from himself--opposes the "Plus Ultra" by the
"Plus Ultra reduced to a Nonplus"--his "Campanella revived"--the
Political Projects of Campanella--Stubbe persecuted, and menaced
to be publicly whipped; his Roman spirit--his "Legends no
Histories"--his "Censure on some Passages of the History of the
Royal Society"--Harvey's ambition to be considered the Discoverer of
the Circulation of the Blood, which he demonstrates--Stubbe describes
the Philosophy of Science--attacks Sprat's Dedication to the
King--The Philosophical Transactions published by Sir Hans Sloane
ridiculed by Dr. King--his new Species of Literary Burlesque--King's
character--these attacks not ineffectually renewed by Sir John Hill.

The Royal Society, on its first establishment, at the era of the Restoration, encountered fierce hostilities; nor, even at later periods, has it escaped many wanton attacks. A great revolution in the human mind was opening with that establishment; for the spirit which had appeared in the recent political concussion, and which had given freedom to opinion, and a bolder scope to enterprise, had now reached the literary and philosophical world; but causes of the most opposite natures operated against this institution of infant science.

In the first place, the new experimental philosophy, full of inventions and operations, proposed to supplant the old scholastic philosophy, which still retained an obscure jargon of terms, the most frivolous subtilties, and all those empty and artificial methods by which it pretended to decide on all topics. Too long it had filled the ear with airy speculation, while it starved the mind that languished for sense and knowledge. But this emancipation menaced the power of the followers of Aristotle, who were still slumbering in their undisputed authority, enthroned in our Universities. For centuries the world had been taught that the philosopher of Stagira had thought on every subject: Aristotle was quoted as equal authority with St. Paul, and his very image has been profanely looked on with the reverence paid to Christ. BACON had fixed a new light in Europe, and others were kindling their torches at his flame. When the great usurper of the human understanding was once fairly opposed to Nature, he betrayed too many symptoms of mere humanity. Yet this great triumph was not obtained without severe contention; and upon the Continent even blood has been shed in the cause of words. In our country, the University of Cambridge was divided by a party who called themselves _Trojans_, from their antipathy to the _Greeks_, or the Aristotelians; and once the learned Richard Harvey, the brother of Gabriel, the friend of Spenser, stung to madness by the predominant powers, to their utter dismay set up their idol on the school-gates, with his heels upwards, and ass's ears on his head. But at this later period, when the Royal Society was established, the war was more open, and both parties more inveterate. Now the world seemed to think, so violent is the reaction of public opinion, that they could reason better without Aristotle than with him: that he had often taught them nothing more than self-evident propositions, or had promoted that dangerous idleness of maintaining paradoxes, by quibbles and other captious subtilties. The days had closed of the "illuminated," the "profound," and the "irrefragable," titles, which the scholastic heroes had obtained; and the Aristotelian four modes, by which all things in nature must exist, of _materialiter_, _formaliter_, _fundamentaliter_, and _eminenter_, were now considered as nothing more than the noisy rattles, or chains of cherry-stones, which had too long detained us in the nursery of the human mind.[253] The world had been cheated with words instead of things; and the new experimental philosophy insisted that men should be less loquacious, but more laborious.