Ver. 1096. On pious structures, &c.] He here, I presume, alludes to Christ's Hospital, &c. &c. JOHN Warton. Ver. 1097.

By which to heaven they did affect the way, Ere faith in churchmen without works was heard.] This passage is a sarcasm upon those who reduce all principles of religion to the single article of faith, which, according to some, is sufficient for salvation, exclusive of every other tenet. DERRICK.

Ver. 1107. flames peep'd in,] In censuring some seeming blemishes in this piece, such as the above lines, I should be mortified to be placed among those idle and petty objectors who mistake cavilling for criticising; such as he who blamed Tasso for making Erminia cut off her hair, to bind up Tancred's wounds, with a sword, as a sword will not cut hair; or he who thought Raphaël had made the boat too little to receive the miraculous capture of fish; or he who objected to the figure of Laocoon being represented as naked when he was in the act of sacrificing. I shall for ever read the Seasons of Thomson with delight and admiration, though I cannot forbear objecting to the two last as a conceit, alluding to his subject:

"The storms of wintry Time will quickly pass, And one unbounded Spring encircle all." The verse below about God's taking an extinguisher is an absurdity of the most glaring kind. (Verse 1129.) Dr. J. WARTON.

Ver. 1126. And eager flames drive on] The original edition erroneously reads give. TODD.

But so may he live long, that town to sway, Which by his auspice they will nobler make, As he will hatch their ashes by his stay,

And not their humble ruins now forsake.*

CCLXXXIX.

1155

They have not lost their loyalty by fire;
Nor is their courage or their wealth so low, 1160

Ver. 1140. A kindly thaw unlocks it with mild rain;] Original edition. Certainly the genuine reading. Derrick's "cold rain" must be discarded. Todd.

Ver. 1147. The father of the people open'd wide

His stores, and all the poor with plenty fed;] The poor people that were burned out built huts and sheds of boards for shelter in Moorfields, and other outlets of the city; and the King was often seen among them, inquiring into their wants, and doing every thing in his power to comfort them. He moreover ordered the justices of the peace to see them supplied with food, and to be careful of preventing forestallers from taking advantage of their distresses; besides which, he commanded that the biscuits and other provisions, laid up in the Tower for the use of his army and navy, should be carried out and distributed among them. Enjoying such benefits from his royal presence, we are not to wonder at the citizens begging him not to leave them, when it was supposed he was going into the country. Vide stanza 288. DERRICK.

* City's request to the King not to leave them. Original edition.

Ver. 1175. Methinks already,] A prophecy most fortunately fulfilled! No city was ever more improved by the wideness and commodiousness, and consequent healthiness and cleanliness, of its streets, and magnificence of its buildings, than London after this calamitous fire.

"Merses profundo, pulchrior evenit!"

And of later years more attention has been paid to the circumstances above mentioned than in any metropolis of The Europe. The stanzas 295, 296, 297, are beautiful. 298th stanza concludes with a puerile conceit. Dr. J. WARTON.

Mexico. Original edition. Ver. 1183. august,] Augusta, the old name of London. Original edition

Ver. 1219. Thus to the eastern] If he had never written any other poem than this Aunus Mirabilis, he never could have been ranked among our greatest English poets. Dr. J. WARTON. Ver. 1220.

the Cape once doubled, fear no more: A constant trade-wind will securely blow.] Sailors generally imagine themselves out of danger on an East-India voyage, when they double the Cape of Good Hope, because then they get into the trade-winds, or monsoons, that always blow in a certain direction. DERRICK. Ver. 1221. A constant] A frigid conceit drawn from the nature of the trade-wind. Dr. J. WARTON.

Ver. 1222. And gently lay us, &c.] From these lines Pope has formed one of his most melodious couplets: "Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow, And softly lay me ou the waves below."-Sappho to Phaon. JOHN WARTOS.

How dull, and how insensible a beast

Is man, who yet would lord it o'er the rest?
Philosophers and poets vainly strove

In every age the lumpish mass to move:
But those were pedants, when compared with these,
Who know not only to instruct but please.
Poets alone found the delightful way,
Mysterious morals gently to convey

In charming numbers; so that as men grew
Pleased with their poems, they grew wiser too.
Satire has always shone among the rest,
And is the boldest way, if not the best,
To tell men freely of their foulest faults;

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10

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20

To laugh at their vain deeds, and vainer thoughts.
In satire too the wise took different ways,
To each deserving its peculiar praise.
Some did all folly with just sharpness blame,
Whilst others laugh'd and scorn'd them into shame.
But of these two, the last succeeded best,
As men aim rightest when they shoot in jest.
Yet, if we may presume to blame our guides,
And censure those who censure all besides;
In other things they justly are preferr'd;
In this alone methinks the ancients err'd;
Against the grossest follies they declaim;
Hard they pursue, but hunt ignoble game.
Nothing is easier than such blots to hit,
And 'tis the talent of each vulgar wit.
Besides 'tis labour lost; for who would preach
Morals to Armstrong, or dull Aston teach?

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30

* This piece was written in 1679, and handed about in manuscript, some time before it made its appearance in print. It is supposed to have occasioned the beating Mr. Dryden received in Rose-street, Covent-garden, of which notice is taken in his Life. The Earl of Musgrave's name has been always joined with Dryden's, as concerned in the composition; and that nobleman somewhere takes notice, that Dryden

"Was praised and beaten for another's rhymes." It is not improbable that Rochester's character was drawn by his lordship, who held him in high contempt, after his behaving in a very dastardly manner when he challenged him. How, indeed, Lord Mulgrave came to subscribe to so disagreeable a picture of himself, is hard to divine. DEBRICK.

Ver. 1. How dull,] This satire is claimed by the Earl of Mulgrave, and perhaps ought not to have a place in our poet's works. But quare? Dr. J. WARTON.

Ver.30. Morals to Armstrong, or dull Aston teach] Sir Thomas Armstrong had been knighted by King Charles II. for some services received from him during the protectorship, he having been sent over to his majesty, when in Holland, with a sum of money, raised among some of his faithful subjects, for his royal use. He afterwards bore a lieutenantcolonel's commission in the first troop of horse-guards, and was appointed gentleman of horse to the king. Being a man of a loose immoral character, and of no fixed principles, either in religion or politics, he joined in the Ryehouse Plot, and then escaped into Holland. Five hundred pounds were offered as a reward for taking him. Louis XIV,, out of compliment to King Charles, offered five hundred pounds to any one who should secure him in the dominions of France.

'Tis being devout at play, wise at a ball,
Or bringing wit and friendship to Whitehall.
But with sharp eyes those nicer faults to find,
Which lie obscurely in the wisest mind;

That little speck which all the rest does spoil, 35
To wash off that would be a noble toil;

Beyond the loose writ libels of this age,

Or the forced scenes of our declining stage;
Above all censure too, each little wit

Will be so glad to see the greater hit;

Who judging better, though concern'd the most Of such correction will have cause to boast.

40

In such a satire all would seek a share,
And every fool will fancy he is there.
Old story-tellers too must pine and die,
To see their antiquated wit laid by;
Like her who miss'd her name in a lampoon,
And grieved to find herself decay'd so soon.
No common coxcomb must be mention'd here:
Nor the dull train of dancing sparks appear:
Nor fluttering officers who never fight;
Of such a wretched rabble who would write?
Much less half wits: that's more against our rules;
For they are fops, the others are but fools.
Who would not be as silly as Dunbar?

As dull as Monmouth, rather than Sir Carr?

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55

He was at length seized at Leyden, brought over to England, and condemned to die by Judge Jefferies, who treated him in a very unbecoming manner.

Bishop Burnet observes, that he died with great meekness and resignation, expressing a hearty repentance for his past profligate life. King Charles, about the time of Sir Thomas's execution, told several people, that he had been lately assured Sir Thomas had been suborned by Cromwell to take away his life, when he waited on him in Holland, but he found no opportunity of perpetrating his crime; for failing in which, the Protector imprisoned him on his return home. Though this story came from a royal mouth few people believed it; yet it is certain that Cromwell kept him a year in prison.

He was hanged at Tyburn, on the 20th of June, 1684: his head was fixed upon Westminster Hall, between those of Cromwell and Bradshaw, and his quarters upon Temple Bar, Aldgate, Aldersgate, and the town-wall of Stafford. It is said he was a native of Nimeguen, a city of Guelderland, and would have claimed from the States-General the protection of a native, if he had not been carried away as soon as he was arrested.

I find, in Wood's Fasti, mention made of one James Aston, a divine, of whom no more is said than that he was a zealous loyalist, and about this time well beneficed. It is not unlikely, that it is the same person whom we find here celebrated for dulness; for, had he excelled in anything else, Wood would not have failed to remark it. DERRICK. Ver. 55. Who would not be as silly as Dunbar ↑

As dull as Monmouth, rather than Sir Carr?] There was a Lord Viscount Dunbar, and a colonel of the same name, about this time, at court; but to which to apply this character I cannot tell, as I never met with any of their private history.

Monmouth is said to have been brave, soft, gentle, and sincere, open to the grossest adulation, and strongly

With whom each rhyming fool keeps such a pother,

They are as common that way as the other:
Yet sauntering Charles between his beastly brace,
Meets with dissembling still in either place,
Affected humour or a painted face.

In loyal libels we have often told him,
How one has jilted him, the other sold him:
How that affects to laugh, how this to weep;
But who can rail so long as he can sleep?
Was ever prince by two at once misled,
False, foolish, old, ill-natured, and ill-bred?
Earnely and Aylesbury, with all that race

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70

Of busy blockheads, shall have here no place; 75

addicted to his pleasures: he was, upon the whole, a man of very weak parts, graceful in his person, and of an endearing placid deportment. See the notes upon Absalom and Achitophel.

Sir Carr Scrope is the third person in this verse: he was the son of Sir Adrian Scrope, a Lincolnshire knight, and bred at Oxford, where he took a master's degree, in 1664; and in 1666 he was created a baronet. He was intimate with the most celebrated geniuses of King Charles's court, had a very pretty turn for poetry, and was certainly something more than a half-wit. His translation of Sappho to Phaon, among the epistles of Ovid, is in some estimation; and many loose satires, handed about in manuscript, were set down to his account. He is mentioned thus in the first volume of State Poems, p. 200:

Sir Carr, that knight of wither'd face, Who, for reversion of a poet's place, Waits on Melpomene, and soothes her grace. That angry miss alone he strives to please, For fear the rest should teach him wit and ease, And make him quit his loved laborious walks, When sad or silent o'er the room he stalks, And strives to write as wisely as he talks." And again, in the third volume, Part I. p. 148: no man can compare

แ

For carriage, youth, and beauty, with Sir Carr." He died at his house in St. Martin's-fields, Westminster, in the latter end of the year 1680. DERRICK.

Ver. 61. Nor shall the royal mistresses be named,] About the time of the writing this poem, the king, if we may rely upon Bishop Burnet's authority, divided all his spare time between the Duchess of Portsmouth and Nell Gwin. DERRICK.

Ver. 74. Earnely and Aylesbury, with all that race Of busy blockheads, shall have here no place; At council set as foils on Danby's score,] Sir John Earnely was bred to the law: he was Chancellor of the Exchequer in the year 1686, and made one of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, in the room of the Lord Treasurer Hyde, Earl of Rochester.

Robert, the first Earl of Aylesbury, was the son of Thomas Bruce, Earl of Elgin, in Scotland, and created, by King Charles, Lord Bruce, in England. In 1685 he succeeded the Earl of Arlington as Lord Chamberlain of the king's household, and died a few months afterwards. Wood gives him the character of a man of learning, a benefactor to the clergy, a great antiquarian, and says he was well skilled in the history of his own country.

Thomas, Earl of Danby, ancestor to the present Duke of Leeds, came out of Yorkshire, and was very zealous in forwarding the Restoration; for which special service he was made Treasurer of the Navy, then a Privy Counsellor, and, in 1673, Lord High Treasurer of England. He enjoyed a great share of the royal favour, which, perhaps, promoted his being impeached by the Commons, for monopoly and mismanagement. He was pardoned by the king, which occasioned much discontent; was zealous in procuring a match between the Prince of Orange and Lady Mary, afterwards king and queen of England; a principal actor in the Revolution, and chairman of that committee of the whole

At council set as foils on Danby's score,
To make that great false jewel shine the more;
Who all that while was thought exceeding wise,
Only for taking pains and telling lies.
But there's no meddling with such nauseous men;
Their very names have tired my lazy pen:
"Tis time to quit their company, and choose
Some fitter subject for a sharper muse.

First, let's behold the merriest man alive
Against his careless genius vainly strive;
Quit his dear ease some deep design to lay,
'Gainst a set time, and then forget the day:
Yet he will laugh at his best friends, and be
Just as good company as Nokes and Lee.
But when he aims at reason or at rule,

He turns himself the best to ridicule.
Let him at business ne'er so earnest sit,

B

Show him but mirth, and bait that mirth with wit;

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100

That shadow of a jest shall be enjoy'd,
Though he left all mankind to be destroy'd
So cat transform'd sat gravely and demure,
Till mouse appear'd and thought himself secure ;
But soon the lady had him in her eye,
And from her friend did just as oddly fly.
Reaching above our nature does no good;
We must fall back to our old flesh and blood;
As by our little Machiavel we find
That nimblest creature of the busy kind,
His limbs are crippled, and his body shakes;
Yet his hard mind, which all this bustle makes,
No pity of its poor companion takes.
What gravity can hold from laughing out,
To see him drag his feeble legs about,
Like hounds ill-coupled? Jowler lugs him still
Through hedges, ditches, and through all that's ill
"Twere crime in any man but him alone,
To use a body so, though 'tis one's own:
Yet this false comfort never gives him o'er,
That whilst he creeps his vigorous thoughts can

soar:

106

house, which, on King James's flight, voted an abdication and advanced William to the throne; wherefore he was made President of the Council, and raised to the dignity of Marquis of Carmarthen and Duke of Leeds, about three years afterwards. He died in the year 1712, aged eightyone. DERRICK.

Ver. 84. First, let's behold the merriest man alive] This character is so strongly and so justly marked, that it is impossible to mistake its being intended for Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury: "a man of little steadiness, but such uncommon talents, that he acquired great weight with every party he espoused: he was turbolent, restless, ambitious, subtle, and enterprising: he had conquered all sense of shame, was restrained oy no fears, and influenced by no principles."--Smollett's History. In the first volume of the State Poems, p. 140, he is mentioned thus:

"A little bobtail'd lord, urchin of state,

A praise-god-bare-bone peer, whom all men hate; Amphibious animal-half fool, half knave." DERRICE Ver. 89. as Nokes and Lee.] These were two celebrated comedians in Charles the Second's reign DERRICK.

Ver. 96. So cat transform'd, &c.] Alluding to the fable of a cat's being turned into a woman, at the intercession of a young man that loved it; but, forgetting herself, she ran after a mouse, and was reduced to her pristine shape DERRICK.

As the new earl with parts deserving praise,
And wit enough to laugh at his own ways;
Yet loses all soft days and sensual nights,
Kind nature checks and kinder fortune slights;
Striving against his quiet all he can,
For the fine notion of a busy man.

And what is that at best, but one, whose mind
Is made to tire himself and all mankind?
For Ireland he would go; faith, let him reign;
For if some odd fantastic lord would fain
Carry in trunks, and all my drudgery do,
I'll not only pay him, but admire him too.
But is there any other beast that lives,
Who his own harm so wittingly contrives?
Will any dog that has his teeth and stones,
Refinedly leave his bitches and his bones,
To turn a wheel? and bark to be employ'd,
While Venus is by rival dogs enjoy'd?
Yet this fond man, to get a statesman's name,
Forfeits his friends, his freedom, and his fame.

Though satire nicely writ with humour stings
But those who merit praise in other things;
Yet we must needs this one exception make,
And break our rules for silly Tropos' sake;
Who was too much despised to be accused,
And therefore scarce deserves to be abused;
Raised only by his mercenary tongue,
For railing smoothly, and for reasoning wrong.
As boys on holy-days let loose to play,
Lay waggish traps for girls that pass that way;

Ver. 120. As the new earl with parts deserving praise, And wit enough to laugh at his own ways; Yet loses all, &c.]

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125

130

135

141

145

This character was well known to be drawn for Arthur, Earl of Essex, son to the Lord Capel, who was put to death by the regicides; but wherefore he should be called the new earl, I cannot see, since we find in Collins's Peerage that he was created Earl of Essex in the year 1661, eighteen years before the publication of this piece. He was very fond of the lieutenancy of Ireland, which he had held from July, 1672, to 1677; and though the Duke of Ormond was much fitter for that important post, as being better acquainted with the genius and polity of the nation, and more agreeable to the people; yet he did every thing in his power to undermine that nobleman, with a view of again obtaining his government. He afterwards opposed the court, piqued perhaps because he was not gratified in all his desires, and perhaps from the republican principles which he seemed to cherish, though so different from those of his unfortunate father. He was taken into custody and committed to the Tower, for being concerned in the Rye-house Plot; and he was found in his apartment there, with his throat cut from ear to ear, on the very morning of Lord Russell's execution. Lord Essex was a man of indifferent abilities, but what the world calls cunning; his education had been neglected in the civil wars, but he had a smattering of Latin, knew something of mathematics, and had a little knowledge of the law; he aspired at being something greater than either nature or education had fitted him for, and his disappointment perhaps gave him an atrabilarious sourness, that ended in suicide, for which he was a professed advocate. DERRICK.

Ver. 143. for silly Tropos' sake;] Sir William Scroggs is meant by Tropos. He was Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and a violent prosecutor of the persons supposed to be concerned in the Popish plot; but when he found that Shaftesbury had, in reality, no interest at court, he quitted that party, and acted as much as possibly he could against it. This occasioned an accusation to be preferred against him by Oates and Bedloe, but it was never supported, his weight not being thought worth removing. He was resolute and penetrating, had a good deal of wit, and spoke fluently and boldly; but he often over-reached himself by being warm. He seems not to have been a man of much estimation, and Roger North, in his Examen, says his course of life was scandalous. DERRICK.

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Then shout to see in dirt and deep distress
Some silly cit in her flower'd foolish dress:
So have I mighty satisfaction found,
To see his tinsel reason on the ground:
To see the florid fool despised, and know it,
By some who scarce have words enough to show it:
For sense sits silent, and condemns for weaker
The sinner, nay sometimes the wittiest speaker:
But 'tis prodigious so much eloquence
Should be acquired by such little sense;
For words and wit did anciently agree,
And Tully was no fool though this man be:
At bar abusive, on the bench unable,
Knave on the woolsack, fop at council-table.
These are the grievances of such fools as would
Be rather wise than honest, great than good.

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165

Some other kind of wits must be made known,
Whose harmless errors hurt themselves alone;
Excess of luxury they think can please,
And laziness call loving of their ease:

To live dissolved in pleasures still they feign, 170
Though their whole life's but intermitting pain:
So much of surfeits, headaches, claps are seen,
We scarce perceive the little time between:
Well-meaning men who make this gross mistake,
And pleasure lose only for pleasure's sake;
Each pleasure has its price, and when we pay
Too much of pain, we squander life away.

Thus Dorset, purring like a thoughtful cat,
Married, but wiser puss ne'er thought of that:

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Ver. 178. Thus Dorset, purring like, &c.] Charles, Earf of Dorset, about this time forty years of age, was one of the best bred men of his time. He was a lord of the bedchamber, and sent several times with compliments, or on short embassies, to France, for the king could not bear to be long without him: he was a most munificent patron; learning and genius were sure of his protection; and when our author was deprived of the bays, he allowed him the lau reat's annual stipend out of his own private purse. Arthur Manwaring, Mr. Prior, and many other men of abilities, owed to him their being advanced and provided for. Nor was he less brave than polite and learned; for he attended the Duke of York as a volunteer in the first Dutch war, and by his coolness, courage, and conduct, showed himself a worthy representative of his many illustrious ancestors. The night before the famous battle in which the Dutch admiral Opdam was blown up, he made a celebrated song, with the greatest composure, beginning,

"To you fair ladies now at land,
We men at sea indite," &c.

No man had more ease or good-humour; his conversation was refined and sprightly; he had studied books and men deeply, and to good purpose. He was an excellent critic and good poet, with a strong turn to satire, for which he is thus highly complimented in the State Poems, vol. i. p. 200.

}

"Dorset writes satire too, and writes so well, O great Apollo! let him still rebel. Pardon a muse which does, like his, excel, Pardon a muse which does, with art, support Some drowsy wit in our unthinking court." He wrote with severity, but that severity was always justly pointed; and Lord Rochester calls him,

"The best good man, with the worst-natured muse." His first wife, the Countess Dowager of Falmouth, had proved a barren wife. Of her having been a teeming widow I am ignorant. His second wife, whom he married in 1685, was daughter to the Earl of Northampton, and mother to the present Duke of Dorset. He was principally concerned in bringing about the Revolution; was Lord Chamberlain to King William and Queen Mary; chosen a Knight of the Garter in 1691, and several times appointed one of the regents, when the affairs of Europe demanded the absence of the king. He died at Bath in 1706, aged sixty-nine, lamented by every class of people, and the most opposite parties. Mr. Pope gives him these lines. "Dorset, the grace of courts, the muse's pride,

Patron of arts, and judge of nature, died." DERRICK.