Still her old Empire to restore she tries, For, born a Goddess, Dulness never dies. O Thou! whatever title please thine ear, Dean, Drapier, Bickerstaff, or Gulliver! Whether thou chuse Cervantes' serious air, Or laugh and shake in Rab'lais' easy chair, REMARKS. 20 importance of many of the characters, as well as the design of the poet. Hence it is, that some have complained, he chuses too mean a subject, and imagined he employs himself, like Domitian, in killing flies; whereas those who have the true key, will find he sports with nobler quarry, and embraces a larger compass; or, as one saith on a like occasion, "Will see his work, like Jacob's ladder, rise, Its foot in dirt, its head amid the skies." Bentl. P. Ver. 18. For, born a Goddess, Dulness never dies.] So Sloth, in the Dispensary, i. 116. "With godhead born, but curs'd that cannot die." Wakefield. Ver 20. Drapier, Bickerstaff, or Gulliver!] The several names and characters he assumed, in his ludicrous, his splenetic, or his party writings; which take in all his works. w.t Ver. 21. Cervantes' serious air,] In the Travels of Gulliver; written to decry the lying vanities of travellers, just as Don Quixote's adventures were to expose the absurdities of books of chivalry; and with the same serious and solemn air.-The laughing with Rabelais, in the next line, alludes to the Tale of a Tub, which is in the manner of the satirical and more regular parts of that famous French droll. Dr. S. Clark, in the first Edition of his Boyle's Lectures, gives this book for an example of scoffing atheism. And though I think there be neither impiety nor irreligion in the conduct of his Tale, yet surely it was impossible for a man really penetrated with a serious sense of religion, ever to prevail on himself to expose the abuses of it in the manner he has done. w.t The Travels of Gulliver were not written to decry the lying vanities of travellers, but chiefly and principally to expose the politics and measures of the English government, as well as the pride and depravity of human nature in general. Nor are they carried Or praise the Court, or magnify mankind, quires ; Here pleas'd behold her mighty wings outspread To hatch a new Saturnian age of Lead. Close to those walls where Folly holds her throne, And laughs to think Monroe would take her down, REMARKS. carried on or conceived in the manner of Cervantes. Voltaire called Swift, for writing the Tale of a Tub, Rabelais in his senses. When so many undeserving persons have been persecuted, particularly under the arbitrary government, of France, for the freedom of their opinions, it is marvellous that Rabelais, who levelled his bitter satire against so many haughty princes, and as haughty priests, could possibly escape their vengeance. Garagantua certainly meant Francis I.; Louis XII. is Grand Gousier; Henry II. Pantagruel; Charles V. Picrocole. The Monks of that time are disguised under the name of Brother John des Entomures. The genealogy of Christ is ridiculed by that of Garagantua. The Treatises of Theology were laughed at under the titles of the books found in the Library of St. Victor; such as Biga Salutis, Braguelta Juris, Pentouffle Decentorum; and by such questions as, utrum chimera in vacuo bombinans possit comedere secundas intentiones. Lord Peter's Loaf is minutely copied from Rabelais. Scarron had a master named J. Moreau, who wrote in Heroic verse a comic poem called The Pigmeid; which Scarron copied in his Gigantomachei. Had Swift ever seen these poems which bear so near a resemblance to his Liliput and Brobdignac ? Warton. After Ver. 22. in the MS. Or in the graver Gown instruct mankind, Or silent, let thy morals tell thy mind. But this was to be understood, as the Poet says, ironicè, like the 23d Verse. P.† Ver. 29, Close to those walls, &c.] In the former Edd. thus ; H 2 Where Where o'er the gates, by his fam'd father's hand, Great Cibber's brazen, brainless brothers stand; REMARKS. Ver 23. Or praise the Court, or magnify mankind,] Ironicè, alluding to Gulliver's representations of both.-The next line relates to the papers of the Drapier against the currency of Wood's copper coin in Ireland, which, upon the great discontent of the people, his Majesty was graciously pleased to recal. P. Ver. 25. From thy Baotia.] Boeotia of old lay under the raillery of the neighbouring wits, as Ireland does now; though each of those nations produced one of the greatest wits and greatest generals of their age. P. Ver. 26. Mourn not, my Swift.] Ironicè iterum. The politics of England and Ireland were at this time by some thought to be opposite, or interfering with each other. Dr. Swift, of course, was in the interest of the latter, our author of the former. P. Ver. 28. To hatch a new Saturnian age of Lead.] The ancient golden age is by poets styled Saturnian; but in the chymical language, Saturn is Lead. P. Ver. 28. To hatch a new Saturnian age of Lead.] For the old Saturnian age was of gold. So Hall, Book iii. Sat. 1. from Juvenal, vi. 1. in very polished verses for that age: "Time was, and that was term'd the time of gold, When World and Time were young, that now are old: And Pride was yet unborn, and yet unbred." Our Poet further develops this thought in the Dunciad, iv. 15. "Of dull and venal a new world to mould, And bring Saturnian days of lead and gold." Wakefield. Ver. 31. By his fam'd father's hand,] Mr. Caius Gabriel Cibber, VARIATIONS. Where wave the tatter'd ensigns of Rag-fair, A yawning ruin hangs and nods in air; Keen, hollow winds howl through the bleak recess, father Here in one bed two shiv'ring Sisters lie, The cave of Poverty and Poetry. P.t Var. Where wave the tatter'd ensigns of Rag-fair,] Rag-fair is a place near the Tower of London, where old clothes and frippery are sold. P. One cell there is, conceal'd from vulgar eye, Keen, hollow winds howl thro' the bleak recess, 35 Hence Bards, like Proteus, long in vain tied down, Escape in Monsters, and amaze the town; REMARKS. father of the Poet Laureate. The two statues of the Lunatics over the gates of Bedlam-hospital were done by him, and (as the son justly says of them) are no ill monuments of his fame as an artist. P.t Ver. 34. Poverty and Poetry.] I cannot here omit a remark that will greatly endear our author to every one, who shall attentively observe that humanity and candor, which every where appears in him towards those unhappy objects of the ridicule of all mankind, the bad poets. He here imputes all scandalous rhymes, scurrilous weekly papers, base flatteries, wretched elegies, songs, and verses, (even from those sung at Court, to ballads in the streets,) not so much to malice or servility, as to Dulness; and not so much to Dulness, as to Necessity. And thus, at the very commencement of his Satire, makes an apology for all that are to be satirized. Ver. 37. Hence Bards, like Proteus, long in vain tied down, Ovid has given us a very orderly account of these escapes; Ut tibi, complexi terram maris incola, PROTEU; Sæpe Lapis poteras." P.t Met. viii. Neither Palæphatus, Phurnutus, nor Heraclides, give us any steady light into the mythology of this mysterious fable. If I be not deceived in a part of learning which has so long exercised my pen, by Proteus must certainly be meant a hacknied Town scribbler; and by his transformation, the various disguises such a one assumes, to elude the pursuit of his natural enemy, the Bailiff. And in this light, doubtless, Horace understood the fable, where, speaking of Proteus, he says, "Quum Hence Miscellanies spring, the weekly boast Hence, Journals, Medleys, Merc'ries, Magazines; REMARKS. "Quum RAPIES in JUS malis ridentem alienis, Fiet aper," &c. Proteus is represented as one bred of the mud and slime of Egypt, the original soil of Arts and Letters; and what, I pray you, is a Town-scribbler, but a creature made up of the excrements of luxurious Science? By the change then into a Boar, is meant his character of a furious and dirty Party-writer; the Snake signifies a Libeller; and the Horns of the Bull, the Dilemmas of a Polemical Answerer. These are the three great parts he assumes; and when he has completed his circle, he sinks back again (as the last change into a Stone denotes) into his natural state of immoveable stupidity. Hence it is, that the Poet, where speaking at large of all these various Metamorphoses in the second Book, describes MOTHER OSBORNE, the great Antitype of our Proteus, in ver. 312, after all her changes, as at last quite stupified to Stone. If I may expect thanks of the learned world for this discovery, I would by no means deprive that excellent Critic of his share, who discovered before me, that in the character of Proteus was designed Sophistam, Magum, Politicum, præsertim rebus omnibus sese accommodantem. Which in English is, a political Writer, a Libeller, and a Disputer, writing indifferently for or against every party in the state, every VARIATIONS. Ver. 41. In the former Edd. Hence hymning Tyburn's elegiac Lay, Hence the soft sing-song on Cecilia's Day. sect Ver. 42. Alludes to the annual Songs composed to music on St. Cecilia's Feast. IMITATIONS. Ver. 41, 42. Hence, hymning Tyburn's—Hence, &c. Albanique patres, atque altæ monia Roma." w.t "Genus unde Latinum, VIRG. Æneid. i. P.. |