Chapter XV: Part 15

Johnson remarks that the learning and observation exhibited in the Temple of Fame were uncommon for a youth of twenty-two. The authority for Pope's age was an expression in his letter to Steele, Nov. 16, 1712, where he says of his work, "I was so diffident of it as to let it lie by me these two years just as you now see it;" and he adds in a note, "hence it appears this poem was writ before the author was twenty-two years old." With the discrepancy usual with him when the dates of his compositions were in question, he stated on the title-page of the various reprints of the Temple of Fame, that it was "written in the year 1711," the first day of which found him nearer twenty-three than twenty-two. He did not publish it till 1715, and between his twenty-fifth year when he showed it to Steele, and his twenty-seventh year when it appeared, he subjected the poem to an extensive revision. "I have read over your Temple of Fame twice," wrote Steele, Nov. 12, 1712, "and cannot find anything amiss of weight enough to call a fault, but see in it a thousand, thousand beauties." "Since you say," Pope replied, "you see nothing that may be called a fault, can you not think it so that I have confined the attendance of guardian spirits to heaven's favourites only?" He remedied the defect by getting rid of the guardian spirits; and with his own testimony to the changes which the plan underwent, the learning can only be considered as displaying the compass of his knowledge when he was upwards of twenty-six. It is surprising that Johnson should have thought that a very small amount of classical mythology, and an acquaintance with the broad characteristics of a few celebrities of antiquity, was an unusual acquisition even for a man of twenty-two. Warton has pointed out that the narrow range of Pope's reading was more remarkable than its extent. He has not alluded to the Greek tragedians, and had probably never looked into a single play of AEschylus, Sophocles, or Euripides. The observation of life, which Johnson thought as precocious as the learning, is not of the recondite kind, and belongs exclusively to Chaucer. In whatever light we view the Temple of Fame it must be ranked at best with the secondary class of Pope's productions, and the indifference with which it was regarded up to Johnson's time has continued unabated up to ours. The eight lines on the rocks of Zembla are fine, and there is an occasional good line in other portions of the piece, but the poem seldom rises above a cold, and somewhat languid elegance, and like the "pale suns" which the author describes, it "rolls away unfelt."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: The remainder of this sentence was omitted by Pope in the later editions of his poem.]

[Footnote 2: Pope forgot that he had transferred portions of the second book to his own imitation.]

[Footnote 3: The parallel passages from Chaucer were not given by Pope till 1736, and he then added the last sentence to the original advertisement.]

[Footnote 4: These remarks of Pope appeared in the form of a note to the first edition.]

[Footnote 5: Specimens of the British Poets, ed. Cunningham, p. 5.]

[Footnote 6: Singer's Spence, p. 211.]

[Footnote 7: Spence, p. 214.]

THE TEMPLE OF FAME.

In that soft season,[1] when descending show'rs[2]
Call forth the greens, and wake the rising flow'rs;[3]
When opening buds salute the welcome day,[4]
And earth relenting[5] feels the genial ray;
As balmy sleep had charmed my cares to rest, 5
And love itself was banished from my breast,[6]
(What time the morn mysterious visions brings,[7]
While purer slumbers spread their golden wings)
A train of phantoms in wild order rose,
And joined, this intellectual scene[8] compose. 10
I stood, methought, betwixt earth, seas, and skies;[9]
The whole creation open to my eyes:
In air self-balanced hung the globe below,[10]
Where mountains rise, and circling oceans flow;
Here naked rocks, and empty wastes were seen, 15
There tow'ry cities, and the forests green;
Here sailing ships delight the wand'ring eyes;
There trees, and intermingled temples rise:[11]
Now a clear sun the shining scene displays;[12]
The transient landscape now in clouds decays. 20
O'er the wide prospect as I gazed around,
Sudden I heard a wild promiscuous sound,
Like broken thunders that at distance roar,
Or billows murm'ring on the hollow shore:[13]
Then, gazing up, a glorious pile beheld, 25
Whose tow'ring summit ambient clouds concealed.
High on a rock of ice the structure lay,[14]
Steep its ascent, and slipp'ry was the way;[15]
The wondrous rock like Parian marble shone,
And seemed, to distant sight, of solid stone. 30
Inscriptions here of various names I viewed,[16]
The greater part by hostile time subdued;
Yet wide was spread their fame in ages past,
And poets once had promised they should last.
Some fresh engraved appeared of wits renowned; 35
I looked again, nor could their trace be found.
Critics I saw, that other names deface,
And fix their own, with labour, in their place:
Their own, like others, soon their place resigned,
Or disappeared, and left the first behind. 40
Nor was the work impaired by storms alone,[17]
But felt th' approaches of too warm a sun;
For Fame, impatient of extremes, decays
Not more by envy than excess of praise.[18]
Yet part no injuries of heav'n could feel,[19] 45
Like crystal faithful to the graving steel:
The rock's high summit, in the temple's shade,
Nor heat could melt, nor beating storm invade.
Their names inscribed unnumbered ages past
From time's first birth, with time itself shall last; 50
These ever new, nor subject to decays,
Spread, and grow brighter with the length of days.
So Zembla's rocks (the beauteous work of frost)[20]
Rise white in air, and glitter o'er the coast;
Pale suns, unfelt, at distance roll away, 55
And on th' impassive ice the lightnings play;
Eternal snows the growing mass supply,
Till the bright mountains prop th' incumbent sky[21]:
As Atlas fixed, each hoary pile appears,[22]
The gathered winter of a thousand years.[23] 60
On this foundation Fame's high temple stands;
Stupendous pile! not reared by mortal hands.[24]
Whate'er proud Rome or artful Greece beheld,
Or elder Babylon, its frame excelled.
Four faces had the dome,[25] and ev'ry face 65
Of various structure, but of equal grace:
Four brazen gates, on columns lifted high,[26]
Salute the diff'rent quarters of the sky.[27]
Here fabled chiefs in darker ages born,
Or worthies old, whom arms or arts adorn,[28] 70
Who cities raised, or tamed a monstrous race,
The walls in venerable order grace.[29]
Heroes in animated marble frown,[30]
And legislators seem to think in stone.
Westward, a sumptuous frontispiece appeared, 75
On Doric pillars of white marble reared,[31]
Crowned with an architrave of antique mold,
And sculpture rising on the roughened gold,[32]
In shaggy spoils here Theseus was beheld,[33]
And Perseus dreadful with Minerva's shield:[34] 80
There great Alcides stooping with his toil,
Rests on his club, and holds th' Hesperian spoil.[35]
Here Orpheus sings; trees moving to the sound
Start from their roots, and form a shade around:
Amphion there the loud-creating lyre 85
Strikes,[36] and beholds a sudden Thebes aspire!
Cithaeron's echoes answer to his call,
And half the mountain rolls into a wall:
There might you see the length'ning spires ascend,
The domes swell up, the widening arches bend, 90
The growing tow'rs like exhalations rise,[37]
And the huge columns heave into the skies.[38]
The Eastern front was glorious to behold,
With di'mond flaming and barbaric gold.[39]
There Ninus shone, who spread th' Assyrian fame, 95
And the great founder of the Persian name:[40]
There in long robes the royal Magi stand,
Grave Zoroaster waves the circling wand,
The sage Chaldaeans, robed in white, appeared,[41]
And Brachmans, deep in desert woods revered.[42] 100
These stopped the moon, and called th' unbodied shades
To midnight banquets in the glimm'ring glades;
Made visionary fabrics round them rise,
And airy spectres skim before their eyes;[43]
Of talismans and sigils knew the pow'r, 105
And careful watched the planetary hour.[44]
Superior, and alone, Confucius stood,[45]
Who taught that useful science, to be good.
But on the South, a long majestic race
Of Egypt's priests the gilded niches grace, 110
Who measured earth, described the starry spheres,
And traced the long records of lunar years.[46]
High on his car, Sesostris struck my view,
Whom sceptered slaves in golden harness drew:
His hands a bow and pointed jav'lin hold;[47] 115
His giant limbs are armed in scales of gold.[48]
Between the statues obelisks were placed,
And the learn'd walls with hieroglyphics graced.[49]
Of Gothic structure was the Northern side,[50]
O'erwrought with ornaments of barb'rous pride: 120
There huge Colosses rose, with trophies crowned,
And Runic characters were graved around.
There sat Zamolxis with erected eyes,[51]
And Odin here in mimic trances dies.[52]
There on rude iron columns, smeared with blood,[53] 125
The horrid forms of Scythian heroes stood,
Druids and bards[54] (their once loud harps unstrung),
And youths that died to be by poets sung.
These, and a thousand more, of doubtful fame,
To whom old fables gave a lasting name, 130
In ranks adorned the temple's outward face;
The wall in lustre and effect like glass,
Which o'er each object casting various dyes,
Enlarges some, and others multiplies:[55]
Nor void of emblem was the mystic wall, 135
For thus romantic Fame increases all.
The temple shakes, the sounding gates unfold,[56]
Wide vaults appear, and roofs of fretted gold:[57]
Raised on a thousand pillars, wreathed around
With laurel-foliage, and with eagles crowned: 140
Of bright transparent beryl were the walls,[58]
The friezes gold, and gold the capitals:
As heav'n with stars, the roof with jewels glows,
And ever-living lamps depend in rows.[59]
Full in the passage of each spacious gate, 145
The sage historians in white garments wait;[60]
Graved o'er their seats the form of Time was found,
His scythe reversed, and both his pinions bound.
Within stood heroes, who through loud alarms
In bloody fields pursued renown in arms. 150
High on a throne with trophies charged, I viewed
The youth that all things but himself subdued;[61]
His feet on sceptres and tiaras trod,
And his horned head belied the Libyan god.[62]
There Caesar, graced with both Minervas,[63] shone; 155
Caesar, the world's great master, and his own;[64]
Unmoved, superior still in ev'ry state,
And scarce detested in his country's fate.[65]
But chief were those, who not for empire fought,
But with their toils their people's safety bought: 160
High o'er the rest Epaminondas stood;[66]
Timoleon, glorious in his brother's blood;[67]
Bold Scipio, saviour of the Roman state;
Great in his triumphs, in retirement great;
And wise Aurelius, in whose well-taught mind, } 165
With boundless pow'r, unbounded virtue joined, }
His own strict judge, and patron of mankind,[68] }
Much-suff'ring heroes next their honours claim,
Those of less noisy, and less guilty fame,[69]
Fair Virtue's silent train:[70] supreme of these 170
Here ever shines the godlike Socrates:
He whom ungrateful Athens could expel,
At all times just, but when he signed the shell:[71]
Here his abode the martyred Phocion claims,[72]
With Agis, not the last of Spartan names:[73] 175
Unconquered Cato shows the wound he tore,[74]
And Brutus his ill Genius meets no more.[75]
But in the centre of the hallowed choir,[76]
Six pompous columns o'er the rest aspire;[77]
Around the shrine itself of Fame they stand, 180
Hold the chief honours, and the fane command.
High on the first, the mighty Homer shone;[78]
Eternal adamant composed his throne;
Father of verse! in holy fillets drest,
His silver beard waved gently o'er his breast; 185
Though blind, a boldness in his looks appears;
In years he seemed, but not impaired by years.
The wars of Troy were round the pillar seen:
Here fierce Tydides wounds the Cyprian queen;
Here Hector, glorious from Patroclus' fall, 190
Here dragged in triumph round the Trojan wall:[79]
Motion and life did ev'ry part inspire,
Bold was the work, and proved the master's fire;
A strong expression most he seemed t' affect,
And here and there disclosed a brave neglect. 195
A golden column next in rank appear'd,
On which a shrine of purest gold was rear'd;
Finished the whole, and laboured ev'ry part,
With patient touches of unwearied art:
The Mantuan there in sober triumph sate, 200
Composed his posture, and his looks sedate;[80]
On Homer still he fixed a rev'rent eye,
Great without pride, in modest majesty.[81]
In living sculpture[82] on the sides were spread
The Latian wars, and haughty Turnus dead; 205
Eliza stretched upon the fun'ral pyre,
AEneas bending with his aged sire:
Troy flamed in burning gold, and o'er the throne
"Arms and the man" in golden ciphers shone.
Four swans sustain a car of silver bright,[83] 210
With heads advanced, and pinions stretched for flight:[84]
Here, like some furious prophet, Pindar rode,
And seem'd to labour with th' inspiring god.
Across the harp a careless hand he flings,
And boldly sinks into the sounding strings.[85] 215
The figured games of Greece the column grace,
Neptune and Jove survey the rapid race.
The youths hang o'er the chariots as they run;
The fiery steeds seem starting from the stone;
The champions in distorted postures threat,[86] 220
And all appeared irregularly great.
Here happy Horace tuned th' Ausonian lyre
To sweeter sounds, and tempered Pindar's fire:
Pleased with Aleaeus' manly rage t'infuse
The softer spirit of the Sapphic muse.[87] 225
The polished pillar diff'rent sculptures grace;
A work outlasting monumental brass.
Here smiling loves and bacchanals appear,
The Julian star,[88] and great Augustus here.
The doves that round the infant poet spread 230
Myrtles and bays, hung hov'ring o'er his head.
Here in a shrine that cast a dazzling light,
Sat fixed in thought the mighty Stagirite;
His sacred head a radiant zodiac crowned,[89]
And various animals his sides surround;[90] 235
His piercing eyes, erect, appear to view
Superior worlds,[91] and look all nature through.
With equal rays immortal Tully shone,
The Roman rostra decked the consul's throne:
Gath'ring his flowing robe, he seemed to stand 240
In act to speak, and graceful stretched his hand.[92]
Behind, Rome's genius waits with civic crowns,
And the great father of his country owns.
These massy columns in a circle rise,
O'er which a pompous dome invades the skies:[93] 245
Scarce to the top I stretched my aching sight,
So large it spread, and swelled to such a height.
Full in the midst proud Fame's imperial seat[94]
With jewels blazed, magnificently great;
The vivid em'ralds there revive the eye, 250
The flaming rubies show their sanguine dye,
Bright azure rays from lively sapphires stream,
And lucid amber casts a golden gleam.
With various-coloured light the pavement shone,
And all on fire appeared the glowing throne; 255
The dome's high arch reflects the mingled blaze,
And forms a rainbow of alternate rays.
When on the goddess first I cast my sight,
Scarce seemed her stature of a cubit's height;[95]
But swelled to larger size, the more I gazed, 260
Till to the roof her tow'ring front she raised.
With her, the temple ev'ry moment grew,
And ampler vistas opened to my view:
Upward the columns shoot, the roofs ascend,
And arches widen, and long aisles extend.[96] 265
Such was her form, as ancient bards have told,
Wings raise her arms, and wings her feet infold;
A thousand busy tongues the goddess bears,
And thousand open eyes, and thousand list'ning ears.[97]
Beneath, in order ranged, the tuneful Nine 270
(Her virgin handmaids) still attend the shrine.[98]
With eyes on Fame for ever fixed, they sing;
For Fame they raise the voice, and tune the string;
With time's first birth began the heav'nly lays,
And last, eternal, through the length of days. 275
Around these wonders as I cast a look,
The trumpet sounded, and the temple shook,
And all the nations, summoned at the call,
From diff'rent quarters fill the crowded hall:
Of various tongues the mingled sounds were heard; 280
In various garbs promiscuous throngs appeared;[99]
Thick as the bees that with the spring renew
Their flow'ry toils, and sip the fragrant dew,
When the winged colonies first tempt the sky,
O'er dusky fields and shaded waters fly, 285
Or settling, seize the sweets the blossoms yield,
And a low murmur runs along the field.[100]
Millions of suppliant crowds the shrine attend,
And all degrees before the goddess bend;[101]
The poor, the rich, the valiant, and the sage, 290
And boasting youth, and narrative old age.[102]
Their pleas were diff'rent, their request the same:
For good and bad alike are fond of fame.
Some she disgraced, and some with honours crowned;[103]
Unlike successes equal merits found.[104] 295
Thus her blind sister, fickle Fortune, reigns,
And, undiscerning, scatters crowns and chains.
First at the shrine the learned world appear,
And to the goddess thus prefer their prayer.
Long have we sought t' instruct and please mankind, 300
With studies pale, with midnight vigils blind;
But thanked by few, rewarded yet by none,
We here appeal to thy superior throne:
On wit and learning the just prize bestow,
For fame is all we must expect below. 305
The goddess heard, and bade the muses raise
The golden trumpet of eternal praise:[105]
From pole to pole the winds diffuse the sound,
That fills the circuit of the world around;
Not all at once, as thunder breaks the cloud; 310
The notes at first were rather sweet than loud:
By just degrees they ev'ry moment rise,
Fill the wide earth, and gain upon the skies,
At ev'ry breath were balmy odours shed,
Which still grew sweeter as they wider spread;[106] 315
Less fragrant scents th' unfolding rose exhales,
Or spices breathing in Arabian gales.
Next these the good and just, an awful train,
Thus on their knees address the sacred fane.
Since living virtue is with envy cursed, 320
And the best men are treated like the worst,
Do thou, just goddess, call our merits forth,
And give each deed th' exact intrinsic worth.[107]
Not with bare justice shall your act be crowned,
(Said Fame,) but high above desert renowned:[108] 325
Let fuller notes th' applauding world amaze,
And the loud clarion labour in your praise.
This band dismissed, behold another crowd
Preferred the same request, and lowly bowed;
The constant tenour of whose well spent days 330
No less deserved a just return of praise.
But straight the direful trump of slander sounds;
Through the big dome the doubling thunder bounds;
Loud as the burst of cannon rends the skies,
The dire report through ev'ry region flies, 335
In ev'ry ear incessant rumours rung,
And gath'ring scandals grew on ev'ry tongue.
From the black trumpet's rusty concave broke
Sulphureous flames, and clouds of rolling smoke:[109]
The pois'nous vapour blots the purple skies, 340
And withers all before it as it flies.
A troop came next, who crowns and armour wore,
And proud defiance in their looks they bore:
For thee, (they cried,) amidst alarms and strife,
We sailed in tempests down the stream of life; 345
For thee whole nations filled with flames and blood,
And swam to empire through the purple flood.
Those ills we dared, thy inspiration own,
What virtue seemed, was done for thee alone.
Ambitious fools! (the queen replied, and frowned) 350
Be all your acts in dark oblivion drowned;
There sleep forgot, with mighty tyrants gone,
Your statues mouldered, and your names unknown![110]
A sudden cloud straight snatched them from my sight,
And each majestic phantom sunk in night. 355
Then came the smallest tribe I yet had seen;
Plain was their dress, and modest was their mien.
Great idol of mankind! we neither claim
The praise of merit, nor aspire to fame!
But safe in deserts from th' applause of men, 360
Would die unheard of, as we lived unseen;
'Tis all we beg thee, to conceal from sight
Those acts of goodness, which themselves requite.
O let us still the secret joy partake,
To follow virtue ev'n for virtue's sake.[111] 365
And live there men, who slight immortal fame?
Who then with incense shall adore our name?
But, mortals! know, 'tis still our greatest pride
To blaze those virtues, which the good would hide.
Rise! muses, rise! add all your tuneful breath, 370
These must not sleep in darkness and in death.
She said: in air the trembling music floats,
And on the winds triumphant swell the notes:[112]
So soft, though high, so loud, and yet so clear,[113]
Ev'n list'ning angels leaned from heav'n to hear: 375
To farthest shores th' ambrosial spirit flies,
Sweet to the world, and grateful to the skies.
Next these, a youthful train their vows expressed,[114]
With feathers crowned, with gay embroid'ry dress'd,
Hither, they cried, direct your eyes, and see 380
The men of pleasure, dress, and gallantry;
Ours is the place at banquets, balls, and plays,
Sprightly our nights, polite are all our days;
Courts we frequent, where 'tis our pleasing care
To pay due visits, and address the fair: 385
In fact, 'tis true, no nymph we could persuade,
But still in fancy vanquished ev'ry maid;
Of unknown duchesses lewd tales we tell,
Yet, would the world believe us, all were well.
The joy let others have, and we the name, 390
And what we want in pleasure, grant in fame.[115]
The queen assents, the trumpet rends the skies,
And at each blast a lady's honour dies.[116]
Pleased with the strange success, vast numbers pressed
Around the shrine, and made the same request: 395
What! you (she cried) unlearn'd in arts to please,
Slaves to yourselves, and ev'n fatigued with ease,[117]
Who lose a length of undeserving days,
Would you usurp the lover's dear-bought praise?
To just contempt, ye vain pretenders, fall, 400
The people's fable, and the scorn of all.
Straight the black clarion sends a horrid sound,
Loud laughs burst out, and bitter scoffs fly round,
Whispers are heard, with taunts reviling loud,
And scornful hisses run through all the crowd. 405
Last, those who boast of mighty mischiefs done,
Enslave their country, or usurp a throne;[118]
Or who their glory's dire foundation laid
On sov'reigns ruined, or on friends betrayed;[119]
Calm, thinking villains, whom no faith could fix, 410
Of crooked counsels and dark politics;
Of these a gloomy tribe surround the throne,
And beg to make th' immortal treasons known.
The trumpet roars, long flaky flames expire,
With sparks, that seemed to set the world on fire. 415
At the dread sound, pale mortals stood aghast,
And startled nature trembled with the blast.
This having heard and seen, some pow'r unknown
Straight changed the scene, and snatched me from the throne.[120]
Before my view appeared a structure fair, 420
Its site uncertain, if in earth or air;
With rapid motion turned the mansion round;
With ceaseless noise the ringing walls resound;
Not less in number were the spacious doors,
Than leaves on trees, or sands upon the shores; 425
Which still unfolded stand, by night, by day,
Pervious to winds, and open ev'ry way.
As flames by nature to the skies ascend,[121]
As weighty bodies to the centre tend,
As to the sea returning rivers roll, 430
And the touched needle trembles to the pole;
Hither, as to their proper place, arise
All various sounds from earth, and seas, and skies,
Or spoke aloud, or whispered in the ear;
Nor ever silence, rest, or peace is here. 435
As on the smooth expanse of crystal lakes
The sinking stone at first a circle makes;
The trembling surface, by the motion stirred,
Spreads in a second circle, then a third;
Wide, and more wide, the floating rings advance, 440
Fill all the wat'ry plain, and to the margin dance:
Thus ev'ry voice and sound, when first they break,
On neighb'ring air a soft impression make;
Another ambient circle then they move;
That, in its turn, impels the next above;[122] 445
Through undulating[123] air the sounds are sent,
And spread o'er all the fluid element.
There, various news I heard of love and strife,
Of peace and war, health, sickness, death, and life,
Of loss and gain, of famine, and of store, 450
Of storms at sea, and travels on the shore,
Of prodigies, and portents seen in air,
Of fires and plagues, and stars with blazing hair,
Of turns of fortune, changes in the state,
The falls of fav'rites, projects of the great, 455
Of old mismanagements, taxations new:[124]
All neither wholly false, nor wholly true.
Above, below, without, within, around,
Confused, unnumbered, multitudes are found,
Who pass, repass, advance, and glide away; 460
Hosts raised by fear, and phantoms of a day:
Astrologers, that future fates foreshew,
Projectors, quacks, and lawyers not a few;
And priests, and party-zealots, num'rous bands
With home-born lies, or tales from foreign lands; 465
Each talked aloud, or in some secret place,
And wild impatience stared in ev'ry face.[125]
The flying rumours gathered as they rolled,
Scarce any tale was sooner heard than told;
And all who told it added something new, } 470
And all who heard it, made enlargements too; }
In ev'ry ear it spread, on ev'ry tongue it grew. }
Thus flying east and west, and north and south,
News travelled with increase from mouth to mouth.
So from a spark, that kindled first by chance, 475
With gath'ring force the quick'ning flames advance;[126]
Till to the clouds their curling heads aspire,
And tow'rs and temples sink in floods of fire.
When thus ripe lies are to perfection sprung,
Full grown, and fit to grace a mortal tongue, 480
Through thousand vents, impatient, forth they flow,
And rush in millions on the world below.
Fame sits aloft,[127] and points them out their course,
Their date determines, and prescribes their force;
Some to remain, and some to perish soon; 485
Or wane and wax, alternate, like the moon.
Around, a thousand winged wonders fly,
Borne by the trumpet's blast, and scattered through the sky.
There, at one passage, oft you might survey,
A lie and truth contending for the way; 490
And long 'twas doubtful, both so closely pent,
Which first should issue through the narrow vent:
At last agreed, together out they fly,
Inseparable now, the truth and lie;[128]
The strict companions are for ever joined, 495
And this or that unmixed, no mortal e'er shall find.
While thus I stood, intent to see and hear,
One came, methought, and whisper'd in my ear:[129]
What could thus high thy rash ambition raise?
Art thou, fond youth, a candidate for praise? 500
'Tis true, said I, not void of hopes I came,
For who so fond as youthful bards of fame?
But few, alas! the casual blessing boast,
So hard to gain, so easy to be lost.[130]
How vain that second life in others' breath, 505
Th' estate which wits inherit after death![131]
Ease, health, and life, for this they must resign;
Unsure the tenure, but how vast the fine!
The great man's curse, without the gains, endure,
Be envied, wretched, and be flattered, poor; 510
All luckless wits their enemies professed,
And all successful, jealous friends at best.
Nor fame I slight, nor for her favours call;
She comes unlooked for, if she comes at all.
But if the purchase cost so dear a price, 515
As soothing folly, or exalting vice;
Oh! if the muse must flatter lawless sway,
And follow still where fortune leads the way;[132]
Or if no basis bear my rising name,
But the fall'n ruins of another's fame; 520
Then teach me, heav'n! to scorn the guilty bays;
Drive from my breast that wretched lust of praise;
Unblemished let me live, or die unknown;
Oh! grant an honest fame, or grant me none!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: This poem is introduced in the manner of the Provencal poets, whose works were for the most part visions, or pieces of imagination, and constantly descriptive. From these, Petrarch and Chaucer frequently borrow the idea of their poems. See the Trionfi of the former, and the Dream, Flower and the Leaf, &c. of the latter. The author of this therefore chose the same sort of exordium.--POPE.]

[Footnote 2: Dryden, Virg. Geor. ii. 456:

And boldly trust their buds in open air.
In this soft season.--WAKEFIELD.

Dryden's Flower and Leaf:

Where Venus from her orb descends in show'rs
To glad the ground, and paint the fields with flow'rs.]

[Footnote 3: Dryden, Geor. iii. 500:

But when the western winds with vital pow'r
Call forth the tender grass, and budding flow'r.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 4: Dryden's Flower and Leaf:

Salute the welcome sun and entertain the day.]

[Footnote 5: That admirable term "relenting" might probably be furnished by Ogilby at the beginning of the first Georgic:

And harder glebe relents with vernal winds.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 6: Dryden's Flower and Leaf:

Cares I had none to keep me from my rest,
For love had never entered in my breast.]

[Footnote 7: Morning dreams were thought the most significant. Thus Dryden, in his version of the Tale of the Nun's Priest:

Believe me, madam, morning dreams foreshow
Th' events of things, and future weal or woe.]

[Footnote 8: Cowley, in his Complaint:

In a deep vision's intellectual scene;

and Mrs. Singer's Vision:

No wild uncouth chimeras intervene
To break the perfect intellectual scene.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 9: Dryden, Ovid, Met. xii.:

Full in the midst of this created space,
Betwixt heav'n, earth, and skies, there stands a place
Confining on all three.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 10: This verse was formed from a very fine one in Paradise Lost, vii. 242:

And earth self-balanced on her center hung.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 11: Addison's translation of a passage from Ausonius:

And intermingled temples rise between.]

[Footnote 12: These verses are hinted from the following of Chaucer, book ii.:

Tho beheld I fields and plains,
And now hills, and now mountains,
Now valeys, and now forestes,
And now unnethes great bestes,
Now riveres, now citees,
Now townes, and now great trees,
Now shippes sayling in the sea.--POPE.

Dennis objected to Pope's version that "if the whole creation was open to his eyes" he must be too high "to discern such minute objects as ships and trees." But the imagination in dreams conjures up appearances which are beyond the compass of the waking powers, and it is therefore strictly natural to represent events as passing in visions, which would be unnatural in actual life. Added to this, Pope had before him Ovid's description of the house of Fame, which is endued with the property of enabling the beholder to distinguish the smallest objects however remote:

Unde quod est usquam, quamvis regionibus absit,
Inspicitur.

Or as Sandys translates it,

Where all that's done, though far removed, appears.]

[Footnote 13: Dryden's translation of Ovid's Met. book xii.:

Confused and chiding, like the hollow roar
Of tides, receding from th' insulted shore;
Or like the broken thunder heard from far
When Jove at distance drives the rolling war.

This is more poetically expressed than the same image in our author. Dryden's lines are superior to the original.--WARTON.

Pope copied Dryden's translation of Ovid, and for this reason did not quote the parallel passage from Chaucer's second book of the House of Fame, where the eagle, when they come within hearing of the swell of indistinct voices, holds a colloquy with the poet on the phenomenon:

"And what sound is it like?" quoth he.
"Peter! beating of the sea,"
Quoth I, "against the rockes hollow,
When tempest doth the shippes swallow,
Or elles like the last humbling
After the clap of a thundring."

"Peter" is an exclamation; and the sense is, "By St. Peter it is like the beating of the sea against the hollow rocks." In Pope's poem no cause is assigned for the "wild promiscuous sound." In Chaucer it is produced by the confluence of the talk upon earth, every word of which is conveyed to the House of Fame.]

[Footnote 14: Chaucer's third book of Fame:

It stood upon so high a rock,
Higher standeth none in Spayne--
What manner stone this rock was,
For it was like a lymed glass,
But that it shone full more clere;
But of what congeled matere
It was, I niste redily;
But at the last espied I,
And found that it was every dele,
A rock of ice and not of stele.--POPE.

The temple of Fame is represented on a foundation of ice, to signify the brittle nature and precarious tenure, as well as the difficult attainment of that possession, according to the poet himself below, ver. 504:

So hard to gain, so easy to be lost.--WAKEFIELD.

Having complained that it was contrary to the laws of sight to suppose that a prospect in sleep could be extended beyond the ordinary range of mortal vision, Dennis proceeds to contend that for a rock to be sustained in the air was contrary to the eternal laws of gravitation, "which," says Pope sarcastically, in a manuscript note, "no dream ought to be." The cavil of Dennis was as false in science as in criticism, for it is not more contrary to the laws of gravitation for a rock to be suspended in space than for the earth itself.]

[Footnote 15: Dryden, AEneis, vi. 193:

Smooth the descent, and easy is the way.]

[Footnote 16:

Tho saw I all the hill y-grave
With famous folkes names fele.
That had been in muchel wele
And her fames wide y-blow;
But well unneth might I know
Any letters for to rede
Their names by, for, out of drede,
They weren almost off-thawen so,
That of the letters one or two
Were molte away of every name,
So unfamous was woxe their fame;
But men said what may ever last.--POPE.]

[Footnote 17:

Tho gan I in myne harte cast,
That they were molte away for heate,
And not away with stormes beate.--POPE.]

[Footnote 18: Does not this use of the heat of the sun appear to be a puerile and far-fetched conceit? What connection is there betwixt the two sorts of excesses here mentioned? My purpose in animadverting so frequently as I have done on this species of false thoughts is to guard the reader, especially of the younger sort, from being betrayed by the authority of so correct a writer as Pope into such specious and false refinements of style.--WARTON.

Not only is the comparison defective, but the fundamental idea is unfounded, for though excess of admiration may produce a temporary reaction, the opinion of the world oscillates back to the middle line, and no instance can be quoted of an author who has finally lost his due reputation because he had once been overpraised. Chaucer makes a different use of the image. In his poem the north side of the icy mountain bears the names of the ancients which were safe from injury. The sunny side bears the names of the moderns, and he perhaps intended to intimate his opinion that the reason why their fame was less durable than that of the Greeks and Romans was that they were a more luxurious race, and did not in the same degree "scorn delights, and live laborious days" for the sake of producing immortal works.]

[Footnote 19:

For on that other side I sey
Of that hill which northward ley,
How it was written full of names
Of folke, that had afore great fames,
Of olde time, and yet they were
As fresh as men had written hem there
The self day, right or that houre
That I upon hem gan to poure:
But well I wiste what it made;
It was conserved with the shade
(All the writing that I sye)
Of the castle that stoode on high,
And stood eke in so cold a place,
That heate might it not deface.--POPE.]

[Footnote 20: Though a strict verisimilitude be not required in the descriptions of this visionary and allegorical kind of poetry, which admits of every wild object that fancy may present in a dream, and where it is sufficient if the moral meaning atone for the improbability, yet men are naturally so desirous of truth that a reader is generally pleased, in such a case, with some excuse or allusion that seems to reconcile the description to probability and nature. The simile here is of that sort, and renders it not wholly unlikely that a rock of ice should remain for ever by mentioning something like it in our northern regions agreeing with the accounts of our modern travellers.--POPE.]

[Footnote 21: "Mountains _propping_ the sky" was one of those vicious common-places of poetry which falsify natural appearances.]

[Footnote 22: A real lover of painting will not be contented with a single view and examination of this beautiful winter-piece; but will return to it again and again with fresh delight. The images are distinct, and the epithets lively and appropriate, especially the words "pale," "unfelt," "impassive," "incumbent," "gathered."--WARTON.]

[Footnote 23: This excellent line was perhaps suggested by a fine couplet in Addison's translation of an extract from Silius Italicus:

Stiff with eternal ice, and hid in snow,
That fell a thousand centuries ago.]

[Footnote 24: Dryden's Hind and Panther:

Eternal house not built with mortal hands.]

[Footnote 25: The temple is described to be square, the four fronts with open gates facing the different quarters of the world, as an intimation that all nations of the earth may alike be received into it. The western front is of Grecian architecture: the Doric order was peculiarly sacred to heroes and worthies. Those whose statues are after mentioned, were the first names of old Greece in arms and arts.--POPE.

The exterior of the Doric temples abounded in sculptured figures, which may be the reason that Pope supposes the order to have been "peculiarly sacred to heroes and worthies," but it may be doubted whether he had any good grounds for his assertion.]

[Footnote 26: The expression literally interpreted would signify that the gates were placed on the top of columns. Pope could not have had such a preposterous notion in his mind, and the meaning must be that the lofty gates were hung upon columns. He copied a couplet in Dryden's AEneis, vi. 744, where the translation misrepresents the original:

Wide is the fronting gate, and raised on high
With adamantine columns, threats the sky.]

[Footnote 27: Addison's Vision of the Table of Fame, in the Tatler: "In the midst there stood a palace of a very glorious structure; it had four great folding doors that faced the four several quarters of the world."

Charles Dryden's translation of the seventh Satire of Juvenal, ver. 245:

Behold how raised on high
A banquet house salutes the southern sky.]

[Footnote 28: Dryden, Juvenal, Sat. iii. 142:

No Thracian born,
But in that town which arms and arts adorn.]

[Footnote 29: In the early editions:

The fourfold walls in breathing statues grace.

Addison in his Letter from Italy had called the Roman statues "breathing rocks."]

[Footnote 30: Addison's Letter from Italy:

Or teach their animated rocks to live.
And emperors in Parian marble frown.]

[Footnote 31: Milton, Par. Lost, i. 714:

Doric pillars overlaid
With golden architrave, nor did there want
Cornice or frieze, with bossy sculptures graven.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 32: Dryden, Ovid's Met. book xii.:

An ample goblet stood of antique mould
And rough with figures of the rising gold.

Dryden, AEn. viii. 830:

And Roman triumphs rising on the gold.

Addison's Letter from Italy:

And pillars rough with sculpture pierce the skies.]

[Footnote 33: This legendary hero was an Athenian knight-errant who, in imitation of Hercules, went about doing battle with the scourges of mankind, both human and animal.]

[Footnote 34: Minerva presented Perseus with her shield when he undertook to kill the Gorgon, Medusa.]

[Footnote 35: This figure of Hercules is drawn with an eye to the position of the famous statue of Farnese.--POPE.

It were to be wished that our author, whose knowledge and taste of the fine arts were unquestionable, had taken more pains in describing so famous a statue as that of the Farnesian Hercules; for he has omitted the characteristical excellencies of this famous piece of Grecian workmanship; namely, the uncommon breadth of the shoulders, the knottiness and spaciousness of the chest, the firmness and protuberance of the muscles in each limb, particularly the legs, and the majestic vastness of the whole figure, undoubtedly designed by the artist to give a full idea of strength, as the Venus de Medicis of beauty. To mention the Hesperian apples, which the artist flung backwards, and almost concealed as an inconsiderable object, and which therefore scarcely appear in the statue, was below the notice of Pope.--WARTON.

Addison's Vision: "At the upper end sat Hercules, leaning an arm upon his club."]

[Footnote 36: The pause at the word "strikes" renders the verse finely descriptive of the circumstance. Milton, in Par. Lost, xi. 491, has attempted this beauty with success:

And over them triumphant Death his dart
Shook, but delayed to strike.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 37: Milton, Par. Lost, i. 710:

a fabric huge
Rose like an exhalation.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 38: "Trees," says Dennis, "starting from their roots, a mountain rolling into a wall, and a town rising like an exhalation are things that are not to be shown in sculpture." This objection, that "motion is represented as exhibited by sculpture," is said by Johnson, "to be the most reasonable of Dennis' remarks," but Dennis neutralised his own criticism when he added, that "sculpture can indeed show posture and position, and from posture and position we may conclude that the objects are in motion."]

[Footnote 39: Wakefield quotes from Milton (Par. Lost, ii. 4), the expression, "barbaric pearl and gold," and from Addison's translation of the second book of Ovid's Met. the line in which it is said that the palace of the sun

With burnished gold and flaming jewels blazed.

[Footnote 40: Cyrus was the beginning of the Persian, as Ninus was of the Assyrian monarchy.--POPE.]

[Footnote 41: The Magi and Chaldaeans (the chief of whom was Zoroaster) employed their studies upon magic and astrology, which was, in a manner, almost all the learning of the ancient Asian people. We have scarce any account of a moral philosopher, except Confucius, the great law-giver of the Chinese, who lived about two thousand years ago.--POPE.

There are several mistakes in Pope's note. Zoroaster was not a magician who "waved the circling wand" of the necromancer. "The Magians," says Plato, "teach the magic of Zoroaster, but this is the worship of the Gods." His creed was theological, and had no connexion with sorcery. Some of his nominal followers subsequently professed to be fortune-tellers. Astrology was not a general characteristic of the diverse nations who constituted the "ancient Asian people," and their learning was by no means limited to it. The Hindoos, for instance, were the precursors of Aristotle in logic, and the earliest metaphysicians whose doctrines have come down to us. "The Indian philosophy," says M. Cousin, "is so vast that all the philosophical systems are represented there, and we may literally affirm that it is an abridgment of the entire history of philosophy." Nor was Confucius the only oriental "law-giver who taught the useful science to be good." The Hindoo body of laws, which bears the name of Menu, was compiled centuries before Confucius was born, and it is eminently a moral and religious, as well as a political code.]

[Footnote 42: It was often erroneously stated that the Brahmins dwelt always in groves. By the laws of Menu the life of a Brahmin was divided into four portions, and it was during the third portion only that he was commanded to become an anchorite in the woods, to sleep on the bare ground, to feed on roots and fruit, to go clad in bark or the skin of the black antelope, and to expose himself to the drenching rain and scorching sun. The caste have ceased to conform to the primitive discipline, and the old asceticism is now confined to individual devotees. The functions which Pope ascribes to the Brahmins formed no part of their practices. They did not pretend to "stop the moon," and summon spirits to "midnight banquets." Pope copied Oldham's version of Virgil's eighth Eclogue:

Charms in her wonted course can stop the moon.]

[Footnote 43: Addison's translation of a passage in Claudian:

Thin airy shapes, that o'er the furrows rise,
A dreadful scene! and skim before his eyes.]

[Footnote 44: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

And sigils framed in planetary hours.

Dryden's Virgil, AEn. vii. 25:

That watched the moon and planetary hour.]

[Footnote 45: Confucius flourished about two thousand three hundred years ago, just before Pythagoras. He taught justice, obedience to parents, humility, and universal benevolence: and he practised these virtues when he was a first minister, and when he was reduced to poverty and exile.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 46: The learning of the old Egyptian priests consisted for the most part in geometry and astronomy: they also preserved the history of their nation. Their greatest hero upon record is Sesostris, whose actions and conquests may be seen at large in Diodorus, &c. He is said to have caused the kings he vanquished to draw him in his chariot. The posture of his statue, in these verses, is correspondent to the description which Herodotus gives of one of them, remaining in his own time.--POPE.]

[Footnote 47: The colossal statue of the celebrated Eastern tyrant is not very strongly imagined. The word "hold" is particularly feeble.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 48: Virgil's giant Bitias, AEn. ix. 958, has in Dryden's translation, quoted by Wakefield, "a coat of double mail with scales of gold."]

[Footnote 49: Two flatter lines upon such a subject cannot well be imagined.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 50: The architecture is agreeable to that part of the world.--POPE.]

[Footnote 51: The learning of the northern nations lay more obscure than that of the rest. Zamolxis was the disciple of Pythagoras, who taught the immortality of the soul to the Scythians.--POPE.

They worshipped Zamolxis, and thought they should go to him when they died. He was said by the Greeks who dwelt on the shores of the Hellespont, to have been the slave of Pythagoras before he became the instructor of his countrymen, but Herodotus believed that if Zamolxis ever existed, he was long anterior to the Greek philosopher.]

[Footnote 52: Odin, or Woden, was the great legislator and hero of the Goths. They tell us of him, that, being subject to fits, he persuaded his followers, that during those trances he received inspirations, from whence he dictated his laws. He is said to have been the inventor of the Runic characters.--POPE.]

[Footnote 53: Pope borrowed this idea from the passage he quotes at ver. 179, where Chaucer describes Statius as standing

Upon an iron pillar strong
That painted was, all endelong,
With tigers' blood in every place.]

[Footnote 54: These were the priests and poets of those people, so celebrated for their savage virtue. Those heroic barbarians accounted it a dishonour to die in their beds, and rushed on to certain death in the prospect of an after-life, and for the glory of a song from their bards in praise of their actions.--POPE.

The opinion was general among the Goths that men who died natural deaths went into vast caves underground, all dark and miry, full of noisome creatures, and there for ever grovelled in stench and misery. On the contrary, all who died in battle went to the hall of Odin, their god of war, where they were entertained at infinite tables in perpetual feasts, carousing in bowls made of the skulls of the enemies they had slain.--SIR W. TEMPLE.]

[Footnote 55:

It shone lighter than a glass,
And made well more than it was,
To semen every thing, ywis,
As kind of thinge Fames is.--POPE.]

[Footnote 56: Addison's Vision: "On a sudden the trumpet sounded; the whole fabric shook, and the doors flew open."]

[Footnote 57: Milton, Par. Lost, i. 717:

The roof was fretted gold.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 58: The exterior of Chaucer's House of Fame,

Both the castle, and the tower
And eke the hall, and every bower

was of beryl, which Pope transfers to the inside of the building. Chaucer says of the interior that

Every wall
Of it, and floor, and roof, and all
Was plated half a foote thick
Of gold.

This gold was covered, as grass clothes a meadow, with jewelled ornaments

Fine, of the finest stones fair
That men read in the Lapidaire.]

[Footnote 59: Milton, Par. Lost, i. 726:

From the arched roof
Pendent by subtle magic many a row
Of starry lamps and blazing cressets, fed
With Naptha and Asphaltus, yielded light
As from a sky.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 60: Addison's Vision: "A band of historians took their station at each door."]

[Footnote 61: Alexander the Great. The tiara was the crown peculiar to the Asian princes. His desire to be thought the son of Jupiter Ammon, caused him to wear the horns of that god, and to represent the same upon his coins, which was continued by several of his successors.--POPE.]

[Footnote 62: Dryden, Ode to St. Cecilia:

A dragon's fiery form belied the god.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 63: As a warrior and a man of letters; for skill in both capacities was supposed to be due to Minerva.]

[Footnote 64: Prior, in his Carmen Seculare, says of William III.,

How o'er himself as o'er the world he reigns.]

[Footnote 65: A concise and masterly stroke, which at once sets before us the mixture of character, which appears in that extraordinary man, Julius Caesar.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 66: "In other illustrious men you will observe that each possessed some one shining quality, which was the foundation of his fame: in Epaminondas all the virtues are found united; force of body, eloquence of expression, vigour of mind, contempt of riches, gentleness of disposition, and, what is chiefly to be regarded, courage and conduct in war."--Diodorus Siculus, lib. xv.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 67: Timoleon had saved the life of his brother Timophanes in the battle between the Argives and Corinthians; but afterwards killed him when he affected the tyranny, preferring his duty to his country to all the obligations of blood.--POPE.

Pope followed the narrative of Diodorus. Plutarch says that Timoleon did not strike the blow, but stood by weeping, and giving his passive countenance to the assassins. Some of the Corinthians applauded, and some execrated his conduct. He was soon overtaken with remorse, and shunning the haunts of men he passed years in anguish of mind.]

[Footnote 68: This triplet was not in the first edition.]

[Footnote 69: In the first edition,

Here too the wise and good their honours claim,
Much-suff'ring heroes of less noisy fame.

Pope did not perceive that in the attempt to improve the poetry he had introduced an inconsistency. He winds up the preceding group of patriots with the "wise Aurelius," whom he celebrates as an example of "unbounded virtue," and the "much-suffering heroes" could not be instances of "less guilty fame" than a man whose virtue was unbounded. The classification was probably suggested by Addison's Vision in the Tatler of the Three Roads of Life, and having his original in his mind when he composed his poem, Pope avoided the inconsistency which he subsequently imported into the passage. "The persons," says Addison, "who travelled up this great path, were such whose thoughts were bent upon doing eminent services to mankind, or promoting the good of their country. On each side of this great road were several paths. These were most of them covered walks, and received into them men of retired virtue, who proposed to themselves the same end of their journey, though they chose to make it in shade and obscurity."]

[Footnote 70: The names which follow are inappropriate examples of "fair virtue's _silent_ train." The first on the list spent his days in promulgating his philosophy, and they were all energetic public characters who made a stir in the world. When Pope originated the expression, he must have been thinking of the unobtrusive virtues of private life, and he probably added the illustrations later without observing the incongruity.]

[Footnote 71: Aristides, who for his great integrity was distinguished by the appellation of the Just. When his countrymen would have banished him by the ostracism, where it was the custom for every man to sign the name of the person he voted to exile in an oyster-shell, a peasant, who could not write, came to Aristides to do it for him, who readily signed his own name.--POPE.]

[Footnote 72: Who, when he was about to drink the hemlock, charged his son to forgive his enemies, and not to revenge his death on those Athenians who had decreed it.--WARTON.

He was condemned to death B. C. 317, at the age of 85, on the charge of treason to his country. Mistrusting the ability of Athens to maintain its independence, he connived at the dominion of the Macedonian kings. Many of those who admit his integrity contend that his policy was mistaken and unpatriotic. His party regained the ascendancy after his death, honoured his remains with a public funeral, and erected a statue of brass to his memory.]

[Footnote 73: Very unpoetically designated. Agis might as well have been left out, if all that could be said of him was that he was "not the last of Spartan names."--BOWLES.

Agis, king of Sparta, was celebrated for his attempt to restore the ancient Spartan regulations. Especially he was anxious to resume the excess of land possessed by the rich and divide it among the poor. He failed in his design, and was dethroned, and beheaded. At his execution one of the officers of justice shed tears. "Lament me not," said Agis; "I am happier than my murderers."]