Dunciad,' which the many surreptitious ones have rendered so necessary;
and it is yet with more, that I am informed it will be attended with a
commentary; a work so requisite, that I cannot think the author himself
would have omitted it, had he approved of the first appearance of this
poem.
Such notes as have occurred to me I herewith send you: you will oblige
me by inserting them amongst those which are, or will be, transmitted to
you by others; since not only the author's friends but even strangers
appear engaged by humanity, to take some care of an orphan of so much
genius and spirit, which its parent seems to have abandoned from the
very beginning, and suffered to step into the world naked, unguarded,
and unattended.
It was upon reading some of the abusive papers lately published, that my
great regard to a person, whose friendship I esteem as one of the chief
honours of my life, and a much greater respect to truth, than to him or
any man living, engaged me in inquiries, of which the enclosed notes are
the fruit.
I perceived that most of these authors had been (doubtless very wisely)
the first aggressors. They had tried till they were weary, what was to
be got by railing at each other; nobody was either concerned or
surprised, if this or that scribbler was proved a dunce. But every one
was curious to read what could be said to prove Mr Pope one, and was
ready to pay something for such a discovery; a stratagem which, would
they fairly own it, might not only reconcile them to me, but screen them
from the resentment of their lawful superiors, whom they daily abuse,
only (as I charitably hope) to get that _by_ them, which they cannot get
_from_ them.
I found this was not all. Ill success in that had transported them to
personal abuse, either of himself, or (what I think he could less
forgive) of his friends. They had called men of virtue and honour bad
men, long before he had either leisure or inclination to call them bad
writers; and some had been such old offenders, that he had quite
forgotten their persons as well as their slanders, till they were
pleased to revive them.
Now what had Mr Pope done before to incense them? He had published those
works which are in the hands of everybody, in which not the least
mention is made of any of them. And what has he done since? He has
laughed, and written 'The Dunciad.' What has that said of them? A very
serious truth, which the public had said before, that they were dull;
and what it had no sooner said, but they themselves were at great pains
to procure, or even purchase, room in the prints to testify under their
hands to the truth of it.
I should still have been silent, if either I had seen any inclination in
my friend to be serious with such accusers, or if they had only meddled
with his writings; since whoever publishes, puts himself on his trial by
his country. But when his moral character was attacked, and in a manner
from which neither truth nor virtue can secure the most innocent; in a
manner which, though it annihilates the credit of the accusation with
the just and impartial, yet aggravates very much the guilt of the
accusers; I mean by authors without names; then I thought, since the
danger was common to all, the concern ought to be so; and that it was an
act of justice to detect the authors, not only on this account, but as
many of them are the same who, for several years past, have made free
with the greatest names in Church and State, exposed to the world the
private misfortunes of families, abused all, even to women, and whose
prostituted papers (for one or other party, in the unhappy divisions of
their country) have insulted the fallen, the friendless, the exiled, and
the dead.
Besides this, which I take to be a public concern, I have already
confessed I had a private one. I am one of that number who have long
loved and esteemed Mr Pope; and had often declared it was not his
capacity or writings (which we ever thought the least valuable part of
his character), but the honest, open, and beneficent man, that we most
esteemed, and loved in him. Now if what these people say were believed,
I must appear to all my friends either a fool, or a knave; either
imposed on myself, or imposing on them; so that I am as much interested
in the confutation of these calumnies as he is himself.
I am no author, and consequently not to be suspected either of jealousy
or resentment against any of the men, of whom scarce one is known to me
by sight; and as for their writings, I have sought them (on this one
occasion) in vain, in the closets and libraries of all my acquaintance.
I had still been in the dark if a gentleman had not procured me (I
suppose from some of themselves, for they are generally much more
dangerous friends than enemies) the passages I send you. I solemnly
protest I have added nothing to the malice or absurdity of them; which
it behoves me to declare, since the vouchers themselves will be so soon
and so irrecoverably lost. You may in some measure prevent it, by
preserving at least their titles, and discovering (as far as you can
depend on the truth of your information) the names of the concealed
authors.
The first objection I have heard made to the poem is, that the persons
are too obscure for satire. The persons themselves, rather than allow
the objection, would forgive the satire; and if one could be tempted to
afford it a serious answer, were not all assassinates, popular
insurrections, the insolence of the rabble without doors, and of
domestics within, most wrongfully chastised, if the meanness of
offenders indemnified them from punishment? On the contrary, obscurity
renders them more dangerous, as less thought of: law can pronounce
judgment only on open facts; morality alone can pass censure on
intentions of mischief; so that for secret calumny, or the arrow flying
in the dark, there is no public punishment left, but what a good writer
inflicts.
The next objection is, that these sort of authors are poor. That might
be pleaded as an excuse at the Old Bailey for lesser crimes than
defamation (for 'tis the case of almost all who are tried there), but
sure it can be none: for who will pretend that the robbing another of
his reputation supplies the want of it in himself? I question not but
such authors are poor, and heartily wish the objection were removed by
any honest livelihood. But poverty is here the accident, not the
subject: he who describes malice and villany to be pale and meagre,
expresses not the least anger against paleness or leanness, but against
malice and villany. The apothecary in Romeo and Juliet is poor; but is
he therefore justified in vending poison? Not but poverty itself becomes
a just subject of satire, when it is the consequence of vice,
prodigality, or neglect of one's lawful calling; for then it increases
the public burden, fills the streets and highways with robbers, and the
garrets with clippers, coiners, and weekly journalists.
But admitting that two or three of these offend less in their morals
than in their writings, must poverty make nonsense sacred? If so, the
fame of bad authors would be much better consulted than that of all the
good ones in the world; and not one of a hundred had ever been called by
his right name.
They mistake the whole matter: it is not charity to encourage them in
the way they follow, but to get them out of it; for men are not bunglers
because they are poor, but they are poor because they are bunglers.
Is it not pleasant enough to hear our authors crying out on the one
hand, as if their persons and characters were too sacred for satire; and
the public objecting on the other, that they are too mean even for
ridicule? But whether bread or fame be their end, it must be allowed,
our author, by and in this poem, has mercifully given them a little of
both.
There are two or three who, by their rank and fortune, have no benefit
from the former objections, supposing them good; and these I was sorry
to see in such company. But if, without any provocation, two or three
gentlemen will fall upon one, in an affair wherein his interest and
reputation are equally embarked, they cannot, certainly, after they have
been content to print themselves his enemies, complain of being put into
the number of them.
Others, I am told, pretend to have been once his friends. Surely they
are their enemies who say so, since nothing can be more odious than to
treat a friend as they have done. But of this I cannot persuade myself,
when I consider the constant and eternal aversion of all bad writers to
a good one.
Such as claim a merit from being his admirers, I would gladly ask, if it
lays him under a personal obligation? At that rate, he would be the most
obliged humble servant in the world. I dare swear for these in
particular, he never desired them to be his admirers, nor promised in
return to be theirs: that had truly been a sign he was of their
acquaintance; but would not the malicious world have suspected such an
approbation of some motive worse than ignorance in the author of the
Essay on Criticism? Be it as it will, the reasons of their admiration
and of his contempt are equally subsisting, for his works and theirs are
the very same that they were.
One, therefore, of their assertions I believe may be true--'That he has
a contempt for their writings.' And there is another, which would
probably be sooner allowed by himself than by any good judge beside--
'That his own have found too much success with the public.' But as it
cannot consist with his modesty to claim this as justice, it lies not on
him, but entirely on the public, to defend its own judgment.
There remains what in my opinion might seem a better plea for these
people than any they have made use of. If obscurity or poverty were to
exempt a man from satire, much more should folly or dulness, which are
still more involuntary; nay, as much so as personal deformity. But even
this will not help them: deformity becomes an object of ridicule when a
man sets up for being handsome; and so must dulness when he sets up for
a wit. They are not ridiculed because ridicule in itself is, or ought to
be, a pleasure, but because it is just to undeceive and vindicate the
honest and unpretending part of mankind from imposition, because
particular interest ought to yield to general, and a great number who
are not naturally fools ought never to be made so, in complaisance to a
few who are. Accordingly we find that in all ages, all vain pretenders,
were they ever so poor or ever so dull, have been constantly the topics
of the most candid satirists, from the Codrus of Juvenal to the Damon of
Boileau.
Having mentioned Boileau, the greatest poet and most judicious critic of
his age and country, admirable for his talents, and yet perhaps more
admirable for his judgment in the proper application of them, I cannot
help remarking the resemblance betwixt him and our author, in qualities,
fame, and fortune, in the distinctions shown them by their superiors, in
the general esteem of their equals, and in their extended reputation
amongst foreigners; in the latter of which ours has met with the better
fate, as he has had for his translators persons of the most eminent rank
and abilities in their respective nations. But the resemblance holds in
nothing more than in their being equally abused by the ignorant
pretenders to poetry of their times, of which not the least memory will
remain but in their own writings, and in the notes made upon them. What
Boileau has done in almost all his poems, our author has only in this: I
dare answer for him he will do it in no more; and on this principle, of
attacking few but who had slandered him, he could not have done it at
all, had he been confined from censuring obscure and worthless persons,
for scarce any other were his enemies. However, as the parity is so
remarkable, I hope it will continue to the last; and if ever he shall
give us an edition of this poem himself, I may see some of them treated
as gently, on their repentance or better merit, as Perrault and Quinault
were at last by Boileau.
In one point I must be allowed to think the character of our English
poet the more amiable. He has not been a follower of fortune or success;
he has lived with the great without flattery--been a friend to men in
power, without pensions, from whom, as he asked, so he received no
favour but what was done him in his friends. As his satires were the
more just for being delayed, so were his panegyrics; bestowed only on
such persons as he had familiarly known, only for such virtues as he had
long observed in them, and only at such times as others cease to praise,
if not begin to calumniate them--I mean, when out of power or out of
fashion. A satire, therefore, on writers so notorious for the contrary
practice, became no man so well as himself; as none, it is plain, was so
little in their friendships, or so much in that of those whom they had
most abused--namely, the greatest and best of all parties. Let me add a
further reason, that, though engaged in their friendships, he never
espoused their animosities; and can almost singly challenge this honour,
not to have written a line of any man, which, through guilt, through
shame, or through fear, through variety of fortune, or change of
interests, he was ever unwilling to own.
I shall conclude with remarking, what a pleasure it must be to every
reader of humanity to see all along, that our author in his very
laughter is not indulging his own ill-nature, but only punishing that of
others. As to his poem, those alone are capable of doing it justice,
who, to use the words of a great writer, know how hard it is (with
regard both to his subject and his manner) _vetustis dare novitatem,
obsoletis nitorem, obscuris lucem, fastiditis gratiam_.--I am
Your most humble servant,
WILLIAM CLELAND.[133]
ST JAMES'S, _Dec_. 22, 1728.
MARTINUS SCRIBLERUS HIS PROLEGOMENA AND ILLUSTRATIONS TO THE DUNCIAD:
WITH THE HYPERCRITICS OF ARISTARCHUS.
DENNIS, REMARKS ON PR. ARTHUR.
I cannot but think it the most reasonable thing in the world to
distinguish good writers, by discouraging the bad. Nor is it an
ill-natured thing, in relation even to the very persons upon whom the
reflections are made. It is true, it may deprive them, a little the
sooner, of a short profit and a transitory reputation; but then it may
have a good effect, and oblige them (before it be too late) to decline
that for which they are so very unfit, and to have recourse to something
in which they may be more successful.
CHARACTER OF MR P., 1716.
The persons whom Boileau has attacked in his writings have been for the
most part authors, and most of those authors, poets: and the censures he
hath passed upon them have been confirmed by all Europe.
GILDON, PREF. TO HIS NEW REHEARSAL.
It is the common cry of the poetasters of the town, and their fautors,
that it is an ill-natured thing to expose the pretenders to wit and
poetry. The judges and magistrates may, with full as good reason, be
reproached with ill-nature for putting the laws in execution against a
thief or impostor. The same will hold in the republic of letters, if the
critics and judges will let every ignorant pretender to scribbling pass
on the world.
THEOBALD, LETTER TO MIST, JUNE 22, 1728.
Attacks may be levelled either against failures in genius, or against
the pretensions of writing without one.
CONCANEN, DED. TO THE AUTHOR OF THE DUNCIAD.
A satire upon dulness is a thing that has been used and allowed in all
ages.
Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, wicked scribbler.
TESTIMONIES OF AUTHORS
CONCERNING OUR POET AND HIS WORKS.
M. SCRIBLERUS LECTORI S.
Before we present thee with our exercitations on this most delectable
poem (drawn from the many volumes of our Adversaria on modern authors)
we shall here, according to the laudable usage of editors, collect the
various judgments of the learned concerning our Poet: various indeed,
not only of different authors, but of the same author at different
seasons. Nor shall we gather only the testimonies of such eminent wits
as would of course descend to posterity, and consequently be read
without our collection; but we shall likewise, with incredible labour,
seek out for divers others, which, but for this our diligence, could
never, at the distance of a few months, appear to the eye of the most
curious. Hereby thou may'st not only receive the delectation of variety,
but also arrive at a more certain judgment, by a grave and circumspect
comparison of the witnesses with each other, or of each with himself.
Hence also, thou wilt be enabled to draw reflections, not only of a
critical, but a moral nature, by being let into many particulars of the
person as well as genius, and of the fortune as well as merit, of our
author: in which, if I relate some things of little concern peradventure
to thee, and some of as little even to him, I entreat thee to consider
how minutely all true critics and commentators are wont to insist upon
such, and how material they seem to themselves, if to none other.
Forgive me, gentle reader, if (following learned example) I ever and
anon become tedious: allow me to take the same pains to find whether my
author were good or bad, well or ill-natured, modest or arrogant; as
another, whether his author was fair or brown, short or tall, or whether
he wore a coat or a cassock.
We purposed to begin with his life, parentage, and education: but as to
these, even his cotemporaries do exceedingly differ. One saith,[134] he
was educated at home; another,[135] that he was bred at St Omer's by
Jesuits; a third,[136] not at St Omer's, but at Oxford; a fourth,[137]
that he had no University education at all. Those who allow him to be
bred at home differ as much concerning his tutor: one saith,[138] he was
kept by his father on purpose; a second,[139] that he was an itinerant
priest; a third,[140] that he was a parson; one[141] calleth him a
secular clergyman of the Church of Rome; another,[142] a monk. As little
do they agree about his father, whom one[143] supposeth, like the father
of Hesiod, a tradesman or merchant; another,[144] a husbandman;
another,[145] a hatter, &c. Nor has an author been wanting to give our
Poet such a father as Apuleius hath to Plato, Jamblichus to Pythagoras,
and divers to Homer, namely, a demon: For thus Mr Gildon[146]: 'Certain
it is, that his original is not from Adam, but the Devil; and that he
wanteth nothing but horns and tail to be the exact resemblance of his
infernal Father.' Finding, therefore, such contrariety of opinions, and
(whatever be ours of this sort of generation) not being fond to enter
into controversy, we shall defer writing the life of our Poet, till
authors can determine among themselves what parents or education he had,
or whether he had any education or parents at all.
Proceed we to what is more certain, his Works, though not less uncertain
the judgments concerning them; beginning with his Essay on Criticism, of
which hear first the most ancient of critics--
MR JOHN DENNIS.
'His precepts are false or trivial, or both; his thoughts are crude and
abortive, his expressions absurd, his numbers harsh and unmusical, his
rhymes trivial and common:--instead of majesty, we have something that
is very mean; instead of gravity, something that is very boyish; and
instead of perspicuity and lucid order, we have but too often obscurity
and confusion.' And in another place: 'What rare numbers are here! Would
not one swear that this youngster had espoused some antiquated Muse, who
had sued out a divorce from some superannuated sinner, upon account of
impotence, and who, being poxed by her former spouse, has got the gout
in her decrepid age, which makes her hobble so damnably.'[147]
No less peremptory is the censure of our hypercritical historian,
MR OLDMIXON.
'I dare not say anything of the Essay on Criticism in verse; but if any
more curious reader has discovered in it something new which is not in
Dryden's prefaces, dedications, and his Essay on Dramatic Poetry, not to
mention the French critics, I should be very glad to have the benefit of
the discovery.'[148]
He is followed (as in fame, so in judgment) by the modest and
simple-minded
MR LEONARD WELSTED,
who, out of great respect to our poet not naming him, doth yet glance at
his essay, together with the Duke of Buckingham's, and the criticisms of
Dryden, and of Horace, which he more openly taxeth: 'As to the numerous
treatises, essays, arts, &c., both in verse and prose, that have been
written by the moderns on this ground-work, they do but hackney the same
thoughts over again, making them still more trite. Most of their pieces
are nothing but a pert, insipid heap of common-place. Horace has even,
in his Art of Poetry, thrown out several things which plainly shew he
thought an Art of Poetry was of no use, even while he was writing
one.'[149]
To all which great authorities, we can only oppose that of
MR ADDISON.
'The Art of Criticism (saith he), which was published some months since,
is a master-piece in its kind. The observations follow one another, like
those in Horace's Art of Poetry, without that methodical regularity
which would have been requisite in a prose writer. They are some of them
uncommon, but such as the reader must assent to, when he sees them
explained with that ease and perspicuity in which they are delivered. As
for those which are the most known and the most received, they are
placed in so beautiful a light, and illustrated with such apt allusions,
that they have in them all the graces of novelty, and make the reader,
who was before acquainted with them, still more convinced of their truth
and solidity. And here give me leave to mention what Monsieur Boileau
has so well enlarged upon in the preface to his works--that wit and fine
writing doth not consist so much in advancing things that are new, as in
giving things that are known an agreeable turn. It is impossible for us,
who live in the latter ages of the world, to make observations in
criticism, morality, or any art or science, which have not been touched
upon by others; we have little else left us but to represent the common
sense of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more uncommon
lights. If a reader examines Horace's Art of Poetry, he will find but
few precepts in it which he may not meet with in Aristotle, and which
were not commonly known by all the poets of the Augustan age. His way of
expressing and applying them, not his invention of them, is what we are
chiefly to admire.'
'Longinus, in his Reflections, has given us the same kind of sublime
which he observes in the several passages that occasioned them: I cannot
but take notice that our English author has, after the same manner,
exemplified several of the precepts in the very precepts themselves.' He
then produces some instances of a particular beauty in the numbers, and
concludes with saying, 'that there are three poems in our tongue of the
same nature, and each a master-piece in its kind--the Essay on
Translated Verse, the Essay on the Art of Poetry, and the Essay on
Criticism.'[150]
Of WINDSOR FOREST, positive is the judgment of the affirmative
MR JOHN DENNIS,
'That it is a wretched rhapsody, impudently writ in emulation of the
Cooper's Hill of Sir John Denham.[151] The author of it is obscure, is
ambiguous, is affected, is temerarious, is barbarous.'[152]
But the author of the Dispensary,
DR GARTH,
in the preface to his poem of Claremont, differs from this opinion:
'Those who have seen these two excellent poems of Cooper's Hill and
Windsor Forest--the one written by Sir John Denham, the other by Mr
Pope--will shew a great deal of candour if they approve of this.'
Of the Epistle of ELOISA, we are told by the obscure writer of a poem
called Sawney, 'That because Prior's Henry and Emma charmed the finest
tastes, our author writ his Eloise in opposition to it, but forgot
innocence and virtue: if you take away her tender thoughts and her
fierce desires, all the rest is of no value.' In which, methinks, his
judgment resembleth that of a French tailor on a villa and gardens by
the Thames: 'All this is very fine, but take away the river and it is
good for nothing.'
But very contrary hereunto was the opinion of
MR PRIOR
himself, saying in his Alma--