folio; which he has treated in so masterly a way, as to have almost exhausted the subject. I never saw this very amiable old nobleman, whose wit, vivacity, sense, and integrity are well known; but he repeatedly expressed his disgust, and his surprise, at finding, in later editions, this Epistle awkwardly converted into a Dialogue, in which he has but little to And I remember he once remarked, "that say. this line, "P. But you are tir'd. I'll tell a tale. B. Agreed ;was insupportably insipid and flat." Pope almost annually visited, and frequently praised, his fine improvements, and many plantations, at Cirencester. It was in this year also, 17327, that, determined to wait in secret the opinion of the public, he published, what he had for eight years at least been revolving in his mind, the First Epistle of his Essay on Man; the Second followed in the same year; the Third in 1733; and the Fourth in 1734. 8 He enjoyed in private the various suspicious surmises of those who pretended to point out the right author, and once punished the vanity and petulance of Mallet, who, being asked by him what new publication there was, answered, "Only an insignificant ? About this time died Gay, for whom he appears to have felt the truest tenderness and affection. And Swift was so affected at the news of Gay's death, that he delayed to open a letter, which he thought contained the affecting intelligence, for many days. In the edition in 12mo. 1735, by Dodsley, they were called, Ethic Epistles, the First Book; and not Essay on Man; and the four Epistles to Lord Burlington, &c. were called, Ethic Epistles, the Second Book, thing, called, An Essay on Man;" on which Pope struck him dumb, and filled him with confusion, by saying, "I wrote it." The nature, the merits, the tendency of this work, are so much enlarged upon in the Notes to this Edition1, that to them the reader must be referred; observing only, that up and down were scattered so many splendid and striking sentiments of religion and virtue, that for many years it was not, till Crousaz attacked it, suspected to contain tenets hostile to the Christian revelation, though not to natural religion. That Pope himself, some years afterward, wished it might be otherwise inter 'After the noble panegyric our Poet has bestowed on his guide Bolingbroke at the end of this Essay, his conduct in clandestinely printing the Patriot King may seem indefensible. On considering coolly and impartially the circumstances that attended this improper Publication, I am inclined to think, that he did not print 1500 copies of that Treatise from avarice or treachery; but from too eager a desire to spread, as he thought, the reputation of his friend, whom he idolized. 2 Warburton, who, in the early part of his life, was a censurer of Pope, and had said, in a letter to Concanen, with whom he was intimate, that Pope borrowed by necessity, and who had assisted Theobald in his Notes on Shakspeare, now stepped forth with a vigorous defence of the Doctrines of the Essay on Man, against the objections of Crousaz; which defence was first published in a Monthly Literary Journal, but was afterward collected into a volume, and dedicated to Mr. Allen of Bath; with remarks on Fate and Free-will, of which poor Allen could understand little. With this vindication Pope was so delighted that he eagerly sought the acquaintance of Warburton, and told him, he understood his opinions better than he did himself; which acquaintance made the fortune of Warburton, and ultimately got him a wife and a bishoprick. Bolingbroke reproached Pope with this new connexion, and said, "You have at your elbow a foul-mouthed and dogmatical critic." It is asserted, that, some years before, Warburton, in a literary club held at Newark, produced and read a dissertation against the Doctrines of the Essay on Man. preted, may appear, from a curious Letter to Racine the Son, who had accused him of infidelity, here inserted. LETTRE DE M. POPE À M. RACINE. "J'AUROIS eu l'honneur, Monsieur, de répondre plutôt à votre lettre, si je n'avois pas toujours attendu le beau présent dont vous m'avez honoré. J'ai reçu enfin votre Poëme sur la Religion. Le plaisir que me causa cette lecture eût été sans mélange, si je n'avois eu le chagrin de voir que vous m'imputiez des principes que j'abhorre. Je ne m'en suis consolé qu'en lisant l'endroit de votre avertissement ou vous déclarez que n'entendant pas l'original Anglois vous ne pouvez pas juger de l'Essai sur l'Homme par vous même; et que vous n'attaque pas mes principes, mais les fausses conséquences qu'on en a tirées, et les dangereuses maximes que quelques personnes ont cru y trouver. Cet aveu est une preuve éclatante de votre candeur, de votre prudence, et de votre charité. "Je puis vous assurer, Monsieur, que votre entière ignorance de notre Langue, m'a été beaucoup moins fatale que la connoissance imparfaite qu'en avoient mes traducteurs, qui les a empêché de penétrer mes véritables sentimens. Toutes les beautés de la versification de M. D. R... ont été moins honorables à mon Poëme, que ses méprises continuelles sur mes raisonnemens et sur ma doctrine ne lui ont été préjudiciables. Vous verrez ces méprises relevées et réfutées dans l'ouvrage Anglois que j'ai l'honneur de vous envoyer. Cet ouvrage est un commentaire cri tique et philosophique par le sçavant Auteur de la Divine Légation de Moise. "Je me flatte que le Chevalier de Ramsay, rempli comme l'est d'un zele ardent pour la vérité, voudra bien vous en expliquer le contenu. Alors je m'en rapporterai à votre justice, et je me flatte que tous vos soupçons seront dissipés. "En attendant ces éclaircissemens, je ne sçaurois me refuser le plaisir de répondre nettement à ce que vous desirez sçavoir de moi. "Je déclare donc hautement et très-sincèrement, que mes sentimens sont diamétralement opposés à ceux de Spinoza et même à ceux de Leibnitz, puisqu'ils sont parfaitement conformés à ceux de M. Pascal et de M. l'Archevêque de Fenelon, et que je serois gloire d'imiter la docilité du dernier, en soumettant toujours toutes mes opinions particulières aux décisions de l'Eglise. "A LONDRES, "le 1 Septembre 1742.” "Je suis, avec, &c. Voltaire has affirmed, "that Pope, to his knowledge, had not skill enough in the French language to have been able to have written this Letter to Racine; and that if he really wrote it, he must suddenly have been blessed with a gift of tongues, as a reward for writing so admirable a work as the Essay on Man." "If you would read," says Metastasio, "this poem without scruple, I recommend to you the excellent translation in terza rima, lately published, 1770, by Count Gius. Ferrero di Lauriano. In the judicious, Christian, and learned notes with which he has illus trated the work, you will see the innocence of the original evidently proved. You will find in Pope a great poet and a deep philosopher; but not such axioms as are necessary to support his own system." Few pieces can be found that, for depth of thought, and penetration into the human mind and heart, excel the Epistle to Lord Cobham, first published 1733. This nobleman appears to have been much courted by the wits and writers of his time. Congreve addressed two Epistles in a pleasing and flowing style to him, and in a manner very Horatian. The most laboured of the two ends with a thought much censured by Swift; "that men have been always the same:" "That virtue now is neither more nor less, Among the many inscriptions at Stowe, that to the memory 3 3 of Congreve is expressed with a particular warmth of affection. Cobham being dismissed from the command of his regiment, by a pretty violent act of the Minister, against whose measures he had voted, particularly on the excise bill, became a popular character among the patriots. To him Glover inscribed his Leonidas, a poem much read and celebrated at its first publication; as to a person highly distinguished by his disinterested zeal, and unshaken 3 Dr. Young once expressed himself to me in very harsh terms, of what he termed the vanity of Congreve, in bequeathing by his will ten thousand pounds to the Dutchess of Marlborough, and nothing to Mrs. Bracegirdle, who had been long his favourite, and to whom he had many obligations. |