Bleft with each talent and each art to please, And born to write, converse, and live with ease: NOTES. 195 View Letters) in their clamours against him as a Tory and Jacobite, who had affifted in writing the Examiners; and, under an affected care for the Government, would have hid, even from himself, the true grounds of his difguft. But his jealoufy foon broke out, and discovered itself, firft to Mr. Pope, and, not long after, to all the world. The Rape of the Lock had been written in a very hafly manner, and printed in a collection of Mifcellanies. The fuccefs it met with encouraged the Author to revife and enlarge it, and give it a more important air; which was done by advancing it into a mock-epic poem. In order to this it was to have its Machinery; which, by the happiest invention, he took from the Roficrucian Syftem. Full of this noble conception, he communicated his scheme to Mr. Addifon; who, he imagined, would have been equally delighted with the improvement. On the contrary, he had the mortification to fee his friend receive it coldly; and even to advise him against any alteration; for that the poem, in its original ftate, was a delicious little thing, and, as he expreffed it, merum fal. Mr. Pope was fhocked for his friend; and then first began to open his eyes to his Character. Soon after this, a tranflation of the first book of the Iliad appeared under the name of Mr. Tickell; which coming out at a critical juncture, when Mr. Pope was in the midst of his engagements on the fame fubject, and by a creature of Mr. Addison's, made him fufpect this to be another fhaft from the fame quiver : And after a diligent enquiry, and laying many odd circumftances together, he was fully convinced that it was not only published with Mr. Addifon's participation, but was indeed his own performance. And Sir R. Steele, in the ninth Edition of the Drummer (which Tickell had omitted to infert amongst Addison's Works) in a long epiftle to Congreve, affirms very intelligibly, that Addison, and not Tickell, was the tranflator of the first book of the Iliad, to which the latter had fet his name. Mr. Pope, in his firft refentment of this ufage, was refolved to expofe this new View him with fcornful, yet with jealous eyes, NOTES. 200 Damn new Verfion in a fevere critique upon it. I have now by me the Copy he had marked for this purpofe; in which he has claffed the feveral faults in tranflation, language, and numbers, under their proper heads. But the growing fplendor of his own works fo eclipfed the faint efforts of this opposition, that he trusted to its own weakness and malignity for the juftice due unto it. About this time, Mr. Addifon's fon-in-law, the E. of Warwick, told Mr. Pope, that it was in vain to think of being well with his Father, who was naturally a jealous man; that Mr. Pope's talents in poetry had hurt him; and to fuch a degree, that he had underhand encouraged Gildon to write a thing about Wycherley; in which he had fcurrilously abused Mr. Pope and his family; and for this fervice he had given Gildon ten guineas, after the pam phlet was printed. The very next day, Mr. Pope, in great heat, wrote Mr. Addison a Letter, wherein he told him, he was no ftranger to his behaviour; which, however, he should not imitate: But that what he thought faulty in him, he would tell him fairly to his face; and what deserved praise he would not deny him to the world: and, as a proof of this difpofition towards him, he had fent him the inclosed; which was the CHARACTER, first published feparately, and afterwards inferted in this place of the Epift. to Dr. Arbuthnot. This plain dealing had no ill effect. Mr. Addifon treated Mr Pope with civility, and, as Mr. Pope be lieved, with juftice, from this time to his death; which happened about three years after. It appears, from a collection of Swift's Letters lately publifhed, that Mr. Addifon, when party was at its height, used Swift much better than he had ufed Pope, on that account, though It is faid that " Addifon ufed Swift much better than he ufed Pope." Addifon's conduct to Swift was generous and noble: They were of different parties: Addifon was required to give up his acquaintance, but he conftantly refufed; he treated him with refpect and kindnefs, though, by fo doing, he dif obliged Lord Sunderland. Damn with faint praise, affent with civil leer, 205 Like VARIATIONS. After Ver. 208. in the MS. Who, if two Wits on rival themes conteft, Approves of each, but likes the worft the beft. Alluding to Mr. P.'s and Tickell's Tranflation of the first Book of the Iliad. NOTES. though he had been more roughly treated by Swift than Pope's nature would fuffer him to treat any one. But the reafon is plain. Swift was Addison's rival only in politics: Pope was his rival in poetry; an oppofition lefs tolerable, as more perfonal. However Addifon's focial talents, in the entertainment and enjoyment of his intimate friends, charmed both Pope and Swift alike; as a quality far fuperior to any thing that was to be found in any other man. WARBURTON. VER. 193. But were there One whofe fires, &c.] The strokes in this Character are highly finished. Atterbury fo well understood the force of them, that in one of his letters to Mr. Pope he says, "Since you now know where your Strength lies, I hope you will not fuffer that talent to lie unemployed." He did not; and, by that means, brought fatiric poetry to its perfection. WARBURTON. He declared that he would not give up Swift, to be made chief governor of the kingdom; and indeed fo high was his character, that Swift himself fays of him: "Mr. Addifon's election has paffed eafy and undifputed, and I believe, if he had a mind to be chofen King, he would hardly be refused." Why should he be jealous and fplenetic, only, when Pope was concerned? Like Cato, give his little Senate laws, And fit attentive to his own applause; While Wits and Templars ev'ry fentence raise, And wonder with a foolish face of praise 210 Who NOTES. VER. 193. Bear, like the Turk,] This is from Bacon de Aug. Scient. lib. 3. p. 180. And the thought was also used by Ld. Orrery, and by Denham. WARTON. VER. 209. Like Cato, give] In the fecond volume of the Biographia Britannica is a vindication of Addifon, by a writer who, to a confummate knowledge of the laws and history of his country, added a moft exquifite tafte in literature, I mean Sir William Blackstone; who thus concludes this vindication: "Nothing furely could juttify fo deep a refentment, unless the story be true of the commerce between Addison and Gildon; which will require to be very fully proved, before it can be believed of a gentleman who was fo amiable in his moral character, and who (in his own cafe) had two years before exprefsly disapproved of a perfonal abuse of Mr. Dennis. The person, indeed, from whom Mr. Pope feems to have received this anecdote, about the time of his writing the character, (viz. about July 1715,) was no other than the Earl of Warwick, fon in-law to Mr. Addison himself: and the fomething about Wycherley (in which the story supposes that Addifon hired Gildon to abufe Pope and his family) is explained by a note on the Dunciad, to mean a pamphlet containing Mr. Wycherley's Life. Now it happens, that in July 1715, the Earl of Warwick (who died at the age of twenty-three, in Auguft 1721) was only a boy of seventeen, and not likely to be entrusted with fuch a fecret, by a statesman between forty and fifty, with whom it does not appear he was any way connected or acquainted; for Mr. Addison was not married to his mother, the Countess of Warwick, till the following year 1716: nor would Gildon have been employed in July 1715 to write Mr. Wycherley's Life, who lived till the December following. As therefore fo many inconfiftencies are evident in the story itself, which never found its way into print till near fixty years after it is faid to have happened, it will be no breach of charity to fuppofe that the whole of it was founded D 4 Who but must laugh, if fuch a man there be? Who would not weep, if ATTICUS were he? NOTES. What founded on fome mifapprehenfion in either Mr. Pope or the Earl; and unlefs better proof can be given, we fhall readily acquit Mr. Addifon of this moft odious part of the charge." I beg leave to add, that as to the other accufation, Dr. Young, Lord Bathurst, Mr. Harte, and Lord Lyttelton, each of them affured me that Addison himself certainly translated the first Book of Homer. An able vindication of Addison was written by Mr. Jeremiah Markland, then a young man, and afterwards the celebrated Critic. Both were printed together, by Curll, fo early as 1717. And perhaps this circumftance may furnish a clue to what has been fo ably difcuffed by Judge Blackftone, in the "Biographia Britannica," under the article Addifon. The epistle to Arbuthnot was not publifhed till January 1735; that to Auguftus, with fome others, appeared in 1738.—" I have feen Mr. Pope's best performances, and find that he pleases the town moft when he is most out of humour with the court. He has made very free with his gracious majefty, in the Epistle to Auguftus. But he had loft his favourite bill; even my Lord Harvey had carried a point against him; and while he is angry, he will never be idle. In this laft Epiftle he feems to have recanted all he had before faid of Addifon," viz. "(Excufe fome courtly ftains) "No whiter page than Addison remains," &c. From a manufcript letter of Mr. Clarke, who wrote on Ancient Coins, to his learned printer and friend Mr. Bowyer; July 6, 1738. WARTON. VER. 214. Who would not weep, if ATTICUS were he?] But when we come to know it belongs to Atticus, i. e. to one whofe more obvious qualities had before engaged our love or efteem, then friendship, in fpite of ridicule, will make a feparation; our old impreffions will get the better of our new; or, at leaft, fuffer themfelves to be no further impaired than by the admiffion of a mixture of pity and concern. WARBURTON.. VER. 214. if ATTICUS were he?] I have fuffered Warburton's note to remain entire, that it may not be faid any thing has been |