ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE

FIRST PUBLICATION OF THIS EPISTLE.

THIS paper is a fort of bill of complaint, begun

many years fince, and drawn up by fnatches, as the feveral occafions offered. I had no thoughts of publishing it, till it pleafed fome Perfons of Rank and Fortune [the Authors of Verfes to the Imitator of Horace, and of an Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a Nobleman at Hampton-Court] to attack, in a very extraordinary manner, not only my Writings (of which, being public, the Public is judge) but my Perfon, Morals, and Family, whereof, to thofe who know me not, a truer information may be requifite. Being divided between the neceffity to fay fomething of my felf,and my own lazinefs to undertake fo aukward a talk, I thought it the fhorteft way to put the laft hand to this Epifle. If it have any thing pleafing, it will be that by which I am moft defirous to please, the Truth and the Sentiment; and if any thing offenfive, it will be only to those I am leaft forry to offend, the vicious or the ungenerous.

Many will know their own pictures in it, there being not a circumfiancebut what is true;but I bave for the moft part spared their Names, and they may efcape being laughed at, if they please.

I would have fome of them know, it was owing to the request of the learned and candid Friend to whom it is infcribed, that I make not as free use of theirs, as they have done of mine. However, I fhall have this advantage, and honour, on my fide, that whereas, by their proceeding, any abufe may be directed at any man,no injury can poffibly be done by

mine, fince a nameless Character can never be found out, but by its truth and likeness.

P.

Lady Wortly Montague begins her Addrefs to Mr. Pope, on his Imitation of the 1ft Satire of the Second Book of Horace, in these words:

In two large columns, on thy motly page,
Where Roman wit is ftrip'd with English rage;
Where ribaldry to fatire makes pretence,
And modern fcandal rolls with an'ient fense:
Whilft on one fide we fee how Horace thought,
And on the other how he never wrote:
Who can believe, who view the bad and good,
That the dull copyift better underflood
That fpirit he pretends to imitate,

Than heretofore the Greek he did tranflate?
Thine is juft fuch an image of his pen
As thou thyself art of the fons of men;
Where our own fpecies in burlesque we trace,
A fign-poft likeness of the noble race,
That is at once refemblance and difgrace.
Horace can laugh, is delicate, is clear;
You only coarfely rail, or darkly fneer;
His ftyle is elegant, his diction pure,
Whilft none thy crabbed numbers can endure,
Hard as thy heart, and as thy birth obfcure.
If he has thorns, they all on roles grow;
Thine like rude thistles and mean brambles show,
With this exception, that though rank the foil,
Weeds, as they are, they feem produc'd by toil.
Satire fhould, like a polifh'd razor keen,
Wound with a touch that's scarcely felt or feen.
Thine is an oyfter-knife, that hacks and hews.
The rage, but not the talent of abuse ;
Aud is in hate what love is in the ftews;
'Tis the grofs luft of hate, that fill annoys
Without diftin&dion, as grofs love enjoys:
Neither to folly, nor to vice confin'd;
The objed of thy spleen is human-kind:
It preys on all, who yield or who refift;
To thee 'tis provocation to exift.
But if thou fee'ft a great and gen'rous heart,
Thy bow is doubly bent to force a dart.
Nor only juftice vainly we demand,
But even benefits can't rein thy hand:
To this or that alike in vain we truft,
Nor find thee lefs ungrateful than unjuft."

EPISTLE

то

DR. ARBUTHNOT,

BEING THE

PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES.

P.SHUT, fhut the door, good John! fatigu'd I said,

Tye up the knocker, fay I'm fick, I'm dead.
The Dog-flar rages! nay, 'its past a doubt,
All Bedlam, or Parnaffus, is let out:

5

Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand,
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.
What walls can guard me, or what fhades can hide?
They pierce my Thickets, through my Grot they
glide,

VER. 1. Shut, Shut the door, good John !] John Searl, his old and faithful fervant; whom he has remembered, under that chara&er, in his Will: of whose fidelity Dodsley, from his own observation, used to mention many pleafing inftances. His wife was living at Ecclefhall, 1783, ninety years old, and knew many anecdotes of Pope.

VER. 1. Shut, shut the door,] This abrupt exordium is animated and dramatic. Our Poet, wearied with the impertinence and flander of a multitude of mean fcriblers that attacked him, fuddenly breaks out with this spirited complaint of the ill-ufage he had fuftained. This piece was published in the year 1734, in the form of an Epiftle to Dr. Arbuthnot: It is now given as a Dialogue, in which a very small fhare indeed is allotted to his friend. Arbuthnot was a man of con. fummate probity, integrity, and fweetnefs of temper; he had infinitely more learning than Pope or Swift, and as much wit and humour as either of them. He was an excellent mathematician and physician, of which his letter on the Usefulness of Mathematical Learning, and bis Treatife on Air and Aliment, are fufficient proofs. His tables of

By land, by water, they renew the charge,

They ftop the chariot, and they board the barge. 10

NOTES.

antient coins, weights, and measures, are the work of a man inti, mately acquainted with antient history and literature,and are enlivened with many curious and interefting particulars of the manners and ways of living of the autients. The Hiftory of John Bull, the best parts of the Memoirs of Scriblerus, the Art of Political Lying, the Freeholder's Catechism, It cannot rain but it pours, &c, abound in strokes of the moft exquifite humour. It is known that he gave numberless hints to Swift, and Pope, and Gay, of fome of the most fuking parts of their works. He was fo negle&ful of his writings that his childien tore his manufcripts and made paper-kites of them. Few letters in the English language are fo interefting, and contain fuch marks of Chriftian refignation and calmness of mind, as one that he wrote to Swift a little before his death, and is inferted in the third volume of Letters, p. 157. He frequently, and ably, and warmly, in many converfations, defended the cause of revelation against the attacks of Bolingbroke and Chefter. field.

The frokes of fatire, in many parts of this Epiftle, have fuch an extraordinary energy and poignancy, that our Author's want of temper has been much cenfured; and I know not whether it will be a fufficient juftification to fay, that thefe malevolent fcriblers, however impotent and infignificant, attacked his perfon, morals, and family. If Boileau ridicules and rallies vile writers with more feening pleafantry and good-humour, we ought to recolle& that Boileau was the aggreffor, and had received no previous abufe, when be fell upon Cotin, De Pure, Quinault, St. Amand, Colletet, Chapelain, and Theophyle. It was on this account that the Duke de Montaufier, a man of rigid virtue, fo much condemned Boileau, that it was with great difficulty he was brought to read his Works, and be reconciled to him. The authors that Pope profcribed were in truth to mean and contemptible, that Swift said, "Give me a fhilling and I will infure you that pofterity fhall never know you had a fingle enemy, excepting those whofe memory you have preferved."

Laiffez mourir un fat dans fon obfcurité,
Un auteur ne peut-il pourrir en fûreté ?
Le Jonas inconnu fèche dans la pruffière,
Le David imprimé n'a point vu la lumière,
Le Moïfe commence à moifir par les bords.

Quel mal cela fait-il? Ceux qui font morts font morts.

Le tombeau contre vous ne peut-il les défendre,

Et qu'ont fait tant d'auteurs pour remuer leur cendre?