With regard to his Vanity, he declareth that nothing shall ever part them. "Nature (faith he) hath amply supplied me in Vanity; a pleasure which neither the pertnefs of Wit, nor the gravity of Wisdom, will ever perfuade me to part with "." Our poet had charitably endeavoured to adminifter a cure to it: But he telleth us plainly, "My fuperiors perhaps may be mended be mended by him; but for my part I own myself incorrigible. I look upon my Follies as the best part of my Fortune." And with good reason: We fee to what they have brought him! Secondly, as to Buffoonry, "Is it (faith he) a time of day for me to leave off these fooleries, and fet up a new character? I can no more put off my Follies than my Skin; I have often tried, but they stick too close to me; nor am I fure my friends are displeased with them, for in this light I afford them frequent matter of mirth, &c. &c. *." Having then fo publickly declared himself INCORRIGIBLE, he is become dead in law, (I mean the law Epopaian) and devolveth upon the Poet; is now his property; and may be taken and dealt with like an old Egyptian Hero; that is to fay, emboweled and embalmed for Pofterity. Nothing therefore (we conceive) remaineth to hinder his own prophecy of himself from taking immediate effect. A rare felicity! and what few Prophets k Ibid. p. 17. Cibber's Life, p. 424. i Ibid. p. 19. Prophets have had the fatisfaction to fee, alive! Nor I can we conclude better than with that extraordinary one of his, which is conceived in thefe Oraculous words, MY DULNESS WILL FIND SOMEBODY TO DO IT RIGHT. Tandem PHOEBUS adeft, morfufque inferre parentem Cibber's Life, p. 243. octavo edit. Ovid, of the ferpent biting at Orpheus's head. It is difficult to fee the propriety and juftnefs of this application from Ovid. WARTON. DIET ETMO By AUTHORITY. * By virtue of the Authority in Us veled by the † A&t for fubjecting Poets to the Power of a Licenser, we have revilev this Piece; where finding the Ayle and appellation of KING to have been given to a certain Pretender, Pfeudo-Poet, or Phantom, of the name of TIBBALD; and apprehending the same may be deemed in some fort a Reflection on Majesty, or at least an infult on that Legal Authority which has bestowed on another Person the Crown of Poefy: We have ordered the said Pretender, Pfeudo-Poet, or Phantom, utterly to vanish and evaporate out of this work : And *The plodding and laborious Theobald was made by Pope the original King of the Dunces: and "that Satire," Johnson obferves, "which can be fo easily transferred from one man to another, cannot be very pointed." Cibber alfo was a very unfit Personage for the King of Dunces; and all the art of Pope, in painting the Characters, cannot reconcile us to the palpable contradiction of Cibber's real liveliness, and that heavy, sleepy stupidity that seems exclufively to belong to the chief Perfonage of this Satire, A ftroke of Satire against the act for licenfing Plays, which was opposed with equal wit and vehemence by many of our Poet's friends, and particularly by the Earl of Chesterfield. WARTON. |