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So sweetly mawkish, and so smoothly dull;
Heady, not strong; o'erflowing, tho' not full.
"Ah Dennis! Gildon ah! what ill-starr'd rage
Divides a friendship long confirm'd by age?

on Book ii. ver. 209.

REMARKS.

But (to be impartial) add to it the following different character of him :

Mr. Welsted had, in his youth, raised so great expectations of his future genius, that there was a kind of struggle between the most eminent in the two universities, which should have the honour of his education. To compound this, he (civilly) became a member of both, and after having passed some time at the one, he removed to the other. From thence he returned to town, where he became the darling expectation of all the polite writers, whose encour ragement he acknowledged in his occasional poems, in a manner that will make no small part of the fame of his protectors. It also appears from his works, that he was happy in the patronage of the most illustrious characters of the present age.-Encouraged by such a combination in his favour, he published a book of poems, some in the Ovidian, some in the Horatian manner, in both which the most exquisite judges pronounce he even rivalled his masters. His Love verses have rescued that way of writing from contentpt. -In his Translations, he has given us the very soul and spirit of his author. His Ode his Epistle-his Verses-his Love-tale-all, are the most perfect things in all poetry. WELSTED, of Himself, Char. of the Times, 8vo. 1728, pp. 23, 24. P.

It should not be forgot to his honour, that he received at one time the sum of 500 pounds for secret service, among the other excellent authors hired to write anonymously for the Ministry. See Report of the Secret Committee, &c. in 1742.

P.t

An ode of merit on the Duke of Marlborough by Welsted, was inserted in Dodsley's Miscellanies, at the desire of Dr. Akenside, who, I remember, much commended it. The simile of Beer is exactly copied from Addison in the Freeholder, No. 20. Warton. Ver. 172. o'erflowing, tho' not full.] It was stronger in the first Edition,

"and foaming, though not full."

Bowles.

Ver. 173. Ah Dennis! &c.] The reader who has seen, through

the

Blockheads with reason wicked wits abhor,
But fool with fool is barb'rous civil war.
Embrace, embrace, my sons! be foes no more!
Nor glad vile poets with true critics' gore.

REMARKS.

175

the course of these notes, what a constant attendance Mr. Dennis paid our author and all his works, may perhaps wonder he should be mentioned but twice, and so slightly touched, in this poem. But in truth he looked upon him with some esteem, for having (more generously than all the rest) set his name to such writings. He was also a very old man at this time. By his own account of himself in Mr. Jacob's Lives, he must have been above threescore, and happily lived many years after. So that he was senior to Mr. Durfey, who hitherto of all our poets enjoyed the longest bodily life. P.+

Ver. 173. Ah Dennis! Gildon ah!] These men became the public scorn by a mere mistake of their talents. They would needs turn critics of their own country writers (just as Aristotle and Longinus did of theirs) and discourse upon the beauties and defects of composition;

How parts relate to parts, and they to whole:
The body's harmony, the beaming soul.

Whereas had they followed the example of those microscopes of wit, Kuster, Wasse, Burman, and their followers, in verbal criticism on the learned languages, their acuteness and industry might have raised them a name equal to the most famous of the Scholiasts. w.t

Ver. 177. Embrace, embrace, my sons! be foes no more!
Nor glad vile poets with true critics' gore.]

This much resembles the beginning of Lucan's Pharsalia:
quæ tanta licentia ferri

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Gentibus invisis Latium præbere cruorem?"
Say, Romans, whence so dire a fury rose

To glut with Latian blood your barbarous foes?" Rowe, But the language of the former verse is more closely modelled from Dryden's version of the verses in the Eneid, expressly parodied :

"Embrace again, my sons; be foes no more,

Nor stain your country with her children's gore.

Wakefield.

Behold yon pair, in strict embraces join'd; How like in manners, and how like in mind;

REMARKS.

180

Ver. 179. Behold yon pair, &c.] One of these was author of a weekly paper called The Grumbler, as the other was concerned in another called Pasquin, in which Mr. Pope was abused with the Duke of Buckingham, and Bishop of Rochester. They also joined in a piece against his first undertaking to translate the Iliad, intitled Homerides, by Sir Iliad Doggrel, printed 1715.

Of the other works of these gentlemen the world has heard no more than it would of Mr. Pope's, had their united laudable endeavours discouraged him from pursuing his studies. How few good works had ever appeared (since men of true merit are always the least presuming) had there been always such champions to stifle them in their conception! And were it not better for the public, that a million of monsters should come into the world, which are sure to die as soon as born, than that the serpents should strangle one Hercules in his cradle?

The union of these two authors gave occasion to this epigram, "Burnet and Duckit, friends in spite,

Came hissing out in verse;

Both were so forward, each would write,

So dull, each hung an a—.

IMITATIONS.

Thus

Ver. 177. Embrace, embrace, my sons! be foes no more!] Virg.

Æneid. vi.

86

Ne tanta animis assuescite bella,

Neu patriæ validas in viscera vertite vires :
Tuque prior, tu parce-sanguis meus!"

P.

Ver. 179. Behold yon pair, in strict embraces join'd;] Virg. Æneid. vi.

"Illæ autem paribus quas fulgere cernis in armis,
Concordes animæ."-

And in the fifth.

"Euryalus formâ insignis viridique juventâ,
Nisus amore pio pueri."

P.

Equal in wit, and equally polite,

Shall this a Pasquin, that a Grumbler write;

REMARKS.

Thus Amphisbona, I have read,

At either end assails;

None knows which leads or which is led,

For both heads are but tails."

After many editions of this poem, the author thought fit to omit the names of these two persons, whose injury to him was of so old a date. In the verses he omitted, it was said that one of them had a pious passion for the other. It was a literal translation of Virgil, Nisus amore pio pueri-and there, as in the original, applied to friendship. That between Nisus and Euryalus is allowed to make one of the most amiable episodes in the world, and surely was never interpreted in a perverse sense. But it will astonish the reader to hear, that, on no other occasion than this line, a Dedication was written to that gentleman to induce him to think something further. "Sir, you are known to have all that affection for the beautiful part of the creation which God and Nature designed -Sir, you have a very fine lady-and, Sir, you have eight very fine children,"-&c. [Dedic. to Dennis's Rem. on the Rape of the Lock.] The truth is, the poor Dedicator's brain was turned upon this article. He had taken into his head, that ever since some books were written against the stage, and since the Italian Opera had prevailed, the nation was infected with a vice not fit to be named. He went so far as to print upon the subject, and concludes his argument with this remark, "That he cannot help thinking the obscenity of Plays excusable at this juncture; since, when that execrable sin is spread so wide, it may be of use to the reducing men's minds to the natural desire of women," Dennis, Stage defended against Mr. Law, p. 20. Our author solemnly declared, he never heard any creature but the Dedicator mention that vice and this gentleman together. P.

Settle, for we must remember that it is he that is still speaking, passes from character to character in a very abrupt, incoherent

Fam'd for good-nature, Burnet, and for truth;
Duckit, for pious passion to the youth.

manner.

Like are their merits, like rewards they share';
That shines a Consul, this, Commissioner.

185

"But who is he, in closet close y-pent, Of sober face, with learned dust besprent? Right well mine eyes arede the myster wight, On parchment scraps y-fed, and Wormius hight.

REMARKS.

manner. Surely not in the manner in which Virgil proceeds in the vision pointed out in the notes, from the 6th Book of the Æneid. The Pasquin, mentioned in line 182, was a weekly Paper, and not the comedy written by Fielding, full of humour, pleasantry, and satire, on the ministry; and which occasioned the act of parliament for licensing plays, an act that met with a very powerful opposition at the time. Warton.

Ver. 179. Behold yon pair,] Meaning Thomas Burnet, third son of the famed Bishop of Salisbury; and Colonel Duckit.

Wakefield.

Burnet, the youngest son of the famous Bishop Burnet. He was bred to the Bar, and was made a Judge. I know not how he conducted himself in that station; but his writings give us no favourable idea of his taste or genius.

Duckit lived at Hartham near Corsham, Wilts. He was concerned with Edmund Smith in an infamous attempt to discredit Lord Clarendon's History, by charging the University of Oxford with making interpolations; unless we suppose that the whole story, as related by Oldmixon, was a forgery of that writer, which, considering his character, is far from being improbable.

BANNISTER. Bowles.

Ver. 184. That shines a Consul, this, Commissioner.] Such places were given at this time to such sort of writers.

P.t

Ver. 186. Of sober face, with learned dust besprent?] So Gay, in

his Epistle to our Poet, stanza 18.

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"O Wanley, whence com'st thou with shorten'd hair,
And visage from thy shelves with dust besprent."

Wakefield.

Ver. 187. arede] Read, or peruse; though sometimes used for "READE THY READ, take thy Counsaile. Thomas Stern

counsel.

hold

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