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The Reader must consider that this was writ in the Year 1729; at which Time the Poet was not apprehensive that Spain would soon become tremendous to us. 1740.

This Word is taken from a pretty Story-Book of Dr. Swift's, called Gulliver's Travels. I mention this, because that Book is not so well known now as it was when the last Edition of the Battel of the Poets was published. 1740.

See the Treatise on the Profund; in which the Qualitys of various Animals are set forth, and applyed to several Persons as Writers, and to most without any Analogy.

This Gentleman dyed since the last Edition of this Poem: from the Character which I have always heared of him, he never made an Enemy by his Conduct, nor deserved a Censure. Some of his Writings have great Merit, tho he was far from an Author of the first Class. 1741.

Ambrose Philips; besides whom, and the late Mr. John Philips, I never heared of any of the Name who were Poets, or indeed who could write, tho several of the same Name have printed Verses, and other Things. 1740.

Here an Observation may not be improper, that among all the commendatory Copys of Verses, which have yet appeared before the Works of Mr. Pope, not one, not the best, is a tolerable Performance.

In the Beginning of the third Book of the Ilias the Poet judiciously compares the Trojan Army to the clamorous Flight of Cranes; which Similitude strengthens the Contrast betwixt the Tumult of the Trojans and the orderly Disposition of the Greeks marching to Battel. Mr. Pope has injured his Author by adding the Word Order, which is not signifyed in the Original, to his Translation of this Simile. Says he,

This Error he endeavours to justify in a Note, by insisting on the Truth of their flying in Order; but, had Homer been sensible of this as a Fact, he would have took no Notice of it; because his Design was to oppose the noisy and unskillful Management of the Trojans to the harmonious and artful Discipline of the Greeks.

I should not have mentioned Æschylus, a Translation of which Author Mr. Theobald has happyly accomplished, had not Mr. Pope, in the first Book of the Dunciad, introduced it, I fear, with a malevolent Tendency; for since the Public cannot judge of the Equity of the Praise or Censure of a Work not published, with what View can any one condemn it, but to prejudice such as are influenced by his Judgement against the Proposals which are made for printing it? Such as have seen the Specimen of this Translation from the Tragedy of Prometheus, and are capable of judging, will be convinced that Mr. Pope is either no Judge, or, to speak in the mildest Terms, a partial Man. Mr. Theobald is treated in so unhandsome, foolish, and petulant, a Manner, thro the Dunciad, that we must think the Author much altered in his Opinion, since he wrote the following Lines; which, I believe, the Reader will think could never be more properly quoted than in a Satire on the Author.

Essay on Criticism.

Mr. Theobald has, since the last Edition of this Poem, published an Edition of Shakespeare's Plays, which has been well received: he had before published a Specimen of the Work. 1740.

He dyed since the last Edition of this Poem: he was a Man of Genius, and has left some few Monuments of it behind him. 1740.

Mr. Tickell favoured the Public with a Translation of the first Book of the Ilias.

This Prophecy indeed was not fulfilled: however, the Death of this young Gentleman has, in some Measure, saved my Credit.

Virg. 1740.

In the Year 1729 some Persons, who herded among the Witlings and Poetasters of those Times, were remarkable for their comic Faces, and always raised a Laugh in Company when they spoke, tho what they uttered would have passed unheeded from any other Person: such was the Effect of a comic Phiz! 1740.

This Gentleman wrote an excellent Poem called Calpe or Gibraltar; in which we are delighted with the Description and History of that Place, and in a Language truly poetical. We are obliged to him for several other Pieces, which have each their Merit. The Fate of this Writer, as a Poet, is enough to deter the finest Genius, who has no View but Fame, and no Recommendation to the World but Merit, from his Pursuit. He dyed not long since; and I never heared of his being more than a travelling Tutor, or Governour, to a young Nobleman; which is a Station that of late Years is grown much into Contempt, not from any real Dishonour that it would be to a Person of small Fortune equal to the Trust, but from those who [OMITTED]

This Gentleman was Poet-Laureat when these Lines were first printed in the folio Edition of the Battel of the Poets, and when the Edition in Octavo was printed. He and Sir Richard Blackmore are both dead since. 1740.

What Degree of Merit can we attribute to any one who immoderately vents his Rage on an Author, who had before been humbled by Dryden, Garth, and other their Contemporarys?

This Gentleman, since dead, had the Mortification to survive most of his Writings; yet he long lived the Terror of modern Poets. He is introduced here as a Machine in the Hands of Apollo, as an Executioner of the Sentence supposed to be passed by Apollo and the Muses. 1740.

The common Characteristic of this Poet is that of a good Versifyer. I know not how this Opinion prevailed, but none was ever more falsely grounded; for his Versification is mostly as faulty as his Sentiment; and in this Poem a nice Ear can not distinguish fifty Lines which please. This Judgement I shall not depart from, tho I may, in the Opinion of some, incur Part of the following Censure.

Essay on Criticism.

The Game in the Dunciad to which this Passage alludes is so foolish and very obscene, that no Person can detect all the Absurditys in it, without offending against Modesty. The Author, in his Preface, would have us to understand that he imitated Virgil in that extraordinary Performance; and he has really imitated him, but as a Monkey does a Man. To imitate Virgil is not to have Games, and those beastly and unnatural, because Virgil has noble and reasonable Games, but to preserve a Purity of Manners, Propriety of Conduct founded on Nature, a Beauty and Exactness of Stile, and a continued Harmony of Verse concording with the Sense. If Mr. Pope's End was Satire in this, how is it answered by representing Curll and Chetwood pissing for Mrs. Haywood? If Satire was not his End, the Reader will easyly perceive how much he has erred in his Notion of Wit or Humour. I must here give another Instance of this Poet, or Critic, wandering from his own Precepts.

We must here observe that the Poet frequently gives Things different Appellations from what the Nature of them requires. We will instance the Rainbow; which the Author of the Dunciad first calls a Bow, and in the same Verse a watry Round, so that it is a Bow and it is not a Bow. I know not what poetical Licence he may pretend to have for this Custom, but I am sure his Master Homer, whom he serves very ill, even in one of his Slumbers, would not have called a Semicircle a whole Circle.

In later Editions of the Dunciad the Name of Chetwood is left out, and another inserted.

The Reader must observe that the Author of this Poem alludes to none of Mr. Pope's Writings since the first Publication of the Dunciad, either in Commendation or Censure; but he is very sensible that Mr. Pope has since published what are Objects of both in a high Degree. 1740.

Homer, in his Character of Thersites, does not represent him as a ridiculous Person only, but as one of an evil Disposition; by which we may justly believe the Poet thought it not reasonable to expose him as an Object of Ridicule, without his being guilty of some Vice, which may justify his public Censure of him.

Mr. Pope seems to have had the same Person in his Eye, where, speaking of himself, he says

Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot.

Mr. Pope, speaking of himself, in the Preface to the Dunciad, says, of all those Men who have received Pleasure from his Writings (which by modest Computation may be about a hundred thousand in these Kingdoms of England and Ireland, not to mention Jersey, Guernsey, the Orcades, those in the new World, and Foreigners who have translated him into their Languages,) of all this Number, not a Man hath stood up to say one Word in his Defence. This is the most unreasonable Author that ever I read. He is not contented that the Public should buy, read, and be pleas'd with, his Works, but he is angry because they do not defend them. I hope he is sensible, by this Time, that he has passed no great Compliment on himself; for such of his Readers as have received Pleasure from his Writings seem to have no Power, or at least no Inclination, to say one Word in his Defence; and perhaps the most considerate of them have deserted him.

Mrs. Haywood, one of the Heroines of the Dunciad; whose Life and Writings seem alike conducted for the Promotion of Virtue in her own Sex. I know not whether this Lady is living or dead. 1740.