Foreign her air, her robe's discordant pride
In patch-work fluttering, and her head aside;
By singing peers upheld on either hand,

She tripp'd and laugh'd, too pretty much to stand, 50
Cast on the prostrate Nine a scornful look,
Then thus in quaint recitativo spoke :

'O Cara! Cara! silence all that train:

Joy to great Chaos! let division reign:
Chromatic tortures soon shall drive them hence,
Break all their nerves and fritter all their sense;
One trill shall harmonize joy, grief, and rage,
Wake the dull church, and lull the ranting stage;
To the same notes thy sons shall hum, or snore,
And all thy yawning daughters cry, encore.
Another Phœbus, thy own Phœbus, reigns,
Joys in my jigs, and dances in my chains.
But soon, ah soon! rebellion will commence,
If music meanly borrows aid from sense:
Strong in new arms, lo! giant Handel stands,
Like bold Briareus, with a hundred hands:
To stir, to rouse, to shake the soul he comes,
And Jove's own thunders follow Mars's drums.
Arrest him, empress, or you sleep no more-'
She heard, and drove him to the Hibernian shore.
And now had Fame's posterior trumpet blown,
And all the nations summon'd to the throne.

60

70

REMARKS.

'Already Opera prepares the way,

The sure forerunner of her gentle sway.'

Ver. 54. Let division reign:] Alluding to the false taste of playing tricks in music with numberless divisions, to the ne glect of that harmony which conforms to the sense, and applies to the passions. Mr. Handel had introduced a great number of hands, and more variety of instruments into the orchestra, and employed even drums and cannon to make a fuller chorus; which proved so much too manly for the fine gentlemen of his age, that he was obliged to remove his mu sic into Ireland. After which they were reduced, for want of composers, to practice the patch-work above-mentioned

The young, the old, who feel her inward sway,
One instinct seizes, and transports away.
None need a guide, by sure attraction led,
And strong impulsive gravity of head:
None want a place, for all their centre found
Hung to the goddess, and coher'd around.
Not closer, orb in orb, conglob'd are seen
The buzzing bees about their dusky queen.

The gathering number, as it moves along,
Involves a vast involuntary throng,
Who, gently drawn, and struggling less and less,
Roll in her vortex, and her pow'r confess :
Not those alone who passive own her laws,
But who, weak rebels, more advance her cause.
Whate'er of Dunce in college or in town
Sneers at another, in toupee or gown;
Whate'er of mongrel no one class admits,
A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.

Nor absent they, no members of her state,
Who pay her homage in her sons, the great;
Who, false to Phoebus, bow the knee to Baal,
Or impious, preach his word without a call;
Patrons, who sneak from living worth to dead,
Withhold the pension, and set up the head;
Or vest dull flattery in the sacred gown,
Or give from fool to fool the laurel crown:
And (last and worst) with all the cant of wit,
Without the soul, the muse's hypocrite.

REMARKS.

90

1003

Ver. 76 to 101. It ought to be observed that here are three classes in this assembly. The first, of men absolutely and avowedly dull, who naturally adhere to the goddess, and are imaged in the simile of the bees about their queen. The second involuntarily drawn to her, though not caring to own her influence; from ver. 81 to 90. The third, of such as, though not members of her state, yet advance her service by flattering Dulness, cultivating mistaken talents, patronising vile scribblers, discouraging living merit, or setting up for wits, and men of taste in arts they understand not; from er. 91 to 101.

There march'd the bard and blockhead side by

side,

Who rhym'd for hire, and patroniz'd for pride.
Narcissus, prais'd with all a parson's power,
Look'd a white lily sunk beneath a shower
There mov'd Montalto with superior air;
His stretch'd-out arm display'd a volume fair;
Courtiers and patriots in two ranks divide,

Through both he pass'd, and bow'd from side to side';

But as in graceful act, with awful eye,

Compos'd he stood, bold Benson thrust him by : 110
On two unequal crutches propt he came,

Milton's on this, on that one Johnston's name
The decent knight retir'd with sober rage,
Withdrew his hand, and clos'd the pompous page;
But (happy for him as the times went then)
Appear'd Apollo's mayor and aldermen,

On whom three hundred gold-capt youths await,
To lug the ponderous volume off in state.

When Dulness, smiling-Thus revive the wits!
But murder first, and mince them all to bits;

120

REMARKS.

Ver. 108. -bow'd from side to side:] As being of no one party.

Ver. 110. Bold Benson.] This man endeavoured to raise himself to fame by erecting monuments, striking coins, setting up heads, and procuring translations of Milton; and afterwards by as great a passion for Arthur Johnston, a Scotch physician's Version of the Psalms, of which he printed many fine editions. See more of him, Book iii. ver. 325.

Ver. 113. The decent knight.] An eminent person who was about to publish a very pompous edition of a great author at his own expense.

Ver. 115, &c.] These four lines were printed in a separate leaf by Mr. Pope in the last edition, which he himself gave, of the Dunciad, with directions to the printer, to put this leaf into its place as soon as Sir T. H.'s Shakspeare should be published.

Ver. 119. Thus revive,' &c.] The goddess applauds the practice of tacking the obscure names of persons not eminent in any branch of learning, to those of the most distinguished writers; either by printing editions of their works

As erst Medea (cruel, so to save!)

A new edition of old son gave;

Let standard authors thus, like trophies borne,
Appear more glorious as more hack'd and torn
And you, my critics! in the chequer'd shade,
Admire new light thro' holes yourselves have made.
Leave not a foot of verse, a foot of stone,

A page, a grave, that they can call their own;
But spread, my sons, your glory thin or thick,
On passive paper, or on solid brick;
So by each bard an alderman shall sit,
A heavy lord shall hang at every wit,

And while on Fame's triumphant car they ride,
Some slave of mine be pinion'd to their side.'

130

Now crowds on crowds around the goddess press,

Each eager to present the first address.

Dunce scorning dunce behold the next advance,
But fop shows fop superior complaisance.

REMARKS.

with impertinent alterations of their text, as in former instances; or by setting up monuments disgraced with their own vile names and inscriptions, as in the latter.

Ver. 128. A page, a grave,] For what less than a grave can be granted to a dead author! or what less than a page can be allowed a living one?

Ibid. A page,] Pagina, not pedissequus. A page of a book, not a servant, follower, or attendant; no poet having had a page since the death of Mr. Thomas Durfey. Scribl. Ver. 131. So by each bard an alderman, &c.] Vide the Tombs of the Poets, editio Westmonasteriensis.

Ibid. an alderman shall sit,] Alluding to the monu ment erected for Butler by alderman Barber.

Ver. 132. A heavy lord shall hang at every wit,] How unnatural an image, and how ill supported! saith Aristarchus. Had it been,

A heavy wit shall hang at every lord

something might have been said, in an age so listinguished for well-judging patrons. For lord, then, read load; that is, of debts here, and of commentaries hereafter. To this purpose, conspicuous is the case of the poor author of Hudibras, whose body, long since weighed down to the grave by a load of debts, has lately had a more unmerciful load of commen

140

When lo! a spectre rose, whose index-hand
Held forth the virtue of the dreadful wand;
His beaver'd brow a birchen garland wears,
Dropping with infants' blood and mothers' tears.
O'er every vein a shuddering horror runs;
Eton and Winton shake through all their sons.
All flesh is humbled, Westminster's bold race
Shrink, and confess the Genius of the place :
The pale boy-senator yet tingling stands,
And holds his breeches close with both his hands.
Then thus: Since man from beast by words s
known,

Words are man's province, words we teach alone. 150
When reason, doubtful, like the Samian letter,
Points him two ways, the narrower is the better.

REMARKS.

taries laid upon his spirit; wherein the editor has achieved more than Virgil himself, when he turned critic, could boast of, which was only, that he had picked gold out of another man's dung; whereas the editor has picked it out of his Scribl. Aristarchus thinks the common reading right: and that the author himself had been struggling, and but just shaken off his load, when he wrote the following epigram:

own.

My lord complains, that Pope, stark mad with gardens, Has lopp'd three trees, the value of three farthings:

But he's my neighbour, cries the peer polite,

And if he 'Il visit me, I'll wave my right.
What! on compulsion? and against my will,
A lord's acquaintance? Let him file his bill."
Ver. 137, 138.

Dunce scorning dunce behold the next advance,
But fop shows fop superior complaisance.]

This is not to be ascribed so much to the different manner of a court and college, as to the different effects which a pretence to learning and a pretence to wit, have on blockheads. For as judgment consists in finding out the differences in things, and wit in finding out their likenesses, so the dunce is all discord and dissension, and constantly busied in reproving, examining, confuting, &c. while the fop flourishes in peace, with songs and hymns of praise, addresses, characters, epithalamiums, &c.

Ver. 140. The dreadful wand;] A cane usually borne by schoolmasters, which drives the poor souls about like the wand of Mercury. Scribl. Ver. 151. Like the Samian letter.] The letter Y used