imitation of Milton's style, as burlesque as the person may be, he deserves for such a judgment of "Splendid Shilling." These two writers (for Cow-Midas, that "the nail" which Mr. Bowles has hit per is no poet) come into comparison in one great in the head should be driven through his own ears; work-the translation of Homer. Now, with all the I am sure that they are long enough. great, and manifest, and manifold, and reproved, and The attention of the poetical populace of the presacknowledged, and uncontroverted faults of Pope's ent day to obtain an ostracism against Pope is as translation, and all the scholarship, and pains, and easily accounted for as the Athenian's shell against time, and trouble, and blank verse of the other, Aristides; they are tired of hearing him always who can ever read Cowper? and who will ever lay called "the Just." They are also fighting for life; down Pope, unless for the original? Pope's was for if he maintains his station, they will reach their "not Homer, it was Spondanus;" but Cowper's is own falling. They have raised a mosque by the not Homer, either, it is not even Cowper. As a side of a Grecian temple of the purest architecture; child I first read Pope's Homer with a rapture and, more barbarous than the barbarians from whose which no subsequent work could ever offord; and practice I have borrowed the figure, they are not chlidren are not the worst judges of their language. contented with their own grotesque edifice, unless As a boy I read Homer in the original, as we have they destroy the prior and purely beautiful fabrie all done, some of us by force, and a few by favor; which preceded, and which shames them and theirs under which description I come is nothing to the for ever and ever. I shall be told that amongst purpose, it is enough that I read him. As a man I those I have been (or it may be still am) conspicuhave tried to read Cowper's version, and I found it ous-true, and I am ashamed of it. I have been impossible. Has any human reader ever succeeded? among the builders of this Babel, attended by a con And now that we have heard the Catholic re- fusion of tongues, but never among the envious proached with envy, duplicity, licentiousness, destroyers of the classic temple of our predecessor. avarice-what was the Calvinist? He attempted I have loved and honored the fame and name of that the most atrocious of crimes in the Christian code, illustrious and unrivalled man, far more than my viz., suicide-and why? Because he was to be own paltry renown, and the trashy gingle of the examined whether he was fit for an office which he crowd of schools" and upstarts, who pretend to seems to wish to have made a sinecure. His con- rival, or even surpass him. Sooner than a single nexion with Mrs. Unwin was pure enough, for the leaf should be torn from his laurel, it were better old lady was devout, and he was deranged; but that all which these men, and I, as one of their set, why then is the infirm and then elderly Pope to be have ever written, should reproved for his connexion with Martha Blount? Cowper was the almoner of Mrs. Throgmorton; but Pope's charities were his own, and they were noble and extensive, far beyond his fortune's warrant. There are those who will believe this, and those Pope was the tolerant yet steady adherent of the who will not. You, sir, know how far I am sinmost bigoted of sects; and Cowper the most bigoted cere, and whether my opinion, not only in the short and despondent sectary that ever anticipated dam-work intended for publication, and in private letters nation to himself or others. Is this harsh ? which can never be published, has or has not been know it is, and I do not assert it as my opinion of I look upon this as the declining age of Cowper personally, but to show what might be said, English poetry; no regard for others, no selfish with just as great an appearance of truth and feeling can prevent me from seeing this, and excandor, as all the odium which has been accumu- pressing the truth. There can be no worse sign for lated upon Pope in similar speculations. Cowper the taste of the times than the depreciation of Pope. was a good man, and lived at a fortunate time for It would be better to receive for proof Mr. Cobbet's rough but strong attack upon Shakspeare and MilMr. Bowles, apparently not relying entirely upon dermining of the reputation of the most perfect of ton, than to allow this smooth and "candid his own arguments, has, in person or by proxy, brought forward the names of Southey and Moore. our poets and the purest of our moralists. Of his Mr. Southey "agrees entirely with Mr. Bowles in power in the passions, in description, in the mockhis invariable principles of poetry." The least that heroic, I leave others to descant. I take him on Mr. Bowles can do in return is to approve the his strong ground, as an ethical poet: in the former "invariable principles of Mr. Southey.' I should none excel, in the mock-heroic and the ethical none have thought that the word "invariable might equal him; and, in my mind, the latter is the highhave stuck in Southey's throat, like Macbeth's est of all poetry, because it does that in rere, "Amen!" I am sure it did in mine, and I am not which the greatest of men have wished to accom the least consistent of the two, at least as a voter.ie, throw it to the dogs, or banish it from your replish in prose. If the essence of poetry must be a Moore (et tu Brute!) also approves, and a Mr. J. Scott. There is a letter also of two lines from a public, as Plato would have done. He who can gentleman in asterisks, who, it seems, is a poet of reconcile poetry with truth and wisdom, is the only the highest rank "-who can this be? not my creator"-why must this mean the "liar," the true "poet" in its real sense; "the maker,” “the friend, Sir Walter, surely. Campbell it can't be; Rogers it won't be. feigner," "the tale-teller?" A man may make and create better things than these. his works. "" "You have hit the nail in the head, and *** [Pope, I presume) on the bead also." 1 remain, yours, affectionately, (Four Asterisks.) And in asterisks let him remain. Whoever this any thing in marble like this marble, excepting the Venus? Can there be more poetry gathered into existence than in that wonderful creation of perfect beauty? But the poetry of this bust is in no respect derived from nature, nor from any association of moral exaltedness; for what is there in common with inoral nature and the male minion of Adrian? The very execution is not natural, but supernatural, or rather super-artificial, for nature has never don: so much. the same. "Line trunks, clothe spice, or, fluttering in a row, I shall not presume to say that Pope is as high a poet as Shakspeare and Milton, though his enemy, Warton, places him immediately under them. would no more say this than I would assert in the mosque, (once St. Sophia's,) that Socrates was a greater man than Mahomet. But if I say that he is very near them, it is no more than has been asserted of Burns, who is supposed "To rival all but Shakspeare's name below," I say nothing against this opinion. But of what "order," according to the poetical aristocracy, are Away, then, with this cant about nature and "invariable principles of po- Burns's poems? These are his opus magna, etry!" A great artist will make a block of stone as sublime as a mountain, Tam O'Shanter," a tale; the "Cotter's Saturday and a good poet can imbue a pack of cards with more poetry than inhabita the forests of America. It is the business and the proof of a poet to give the lie to the proverb, and sometimes to "make a silken puree out of a so' per;" and to conclude with another homely proverb, "a good workman will not find faul with his tools." Night," a descriptive sketch; some others in the same style; the rest are songs. So much for the rank of his productions; the rank of Burns is the very first of his art. Of Pope I have expressed my opinion elsewhere, as also of the effect which the and, as I have been publicly educated also, I can present attempts at poetry have had upon our lite- sympathize with his predilection. When we were rature. If any great national or natural convulsion in the third form even, had we pleaded on the Moncould or should overwhelm your country, in such day morning, that we had not brought up the Satsort as to sweep Great Britain from the kingdoms of urday's exercise because "we had forgotten it," the earth, and leave only that, after all the most what would have been the reply? And is an excuse, living of human things, a dead language, to be which would not be pardoned to a schoolboy, to pass studied and read, and imitated, by the wise of fu- current in a matter which so nearly concerns the ture and far generations upon foreign shores; if fame of the first poet of his age, if not of his coun your literature should become the learning of man- try? If Mr. Bowles so readily forgets the virtues of kind, divested of party cabals, temporary fashions, others, why complain so grievously that others have and national pride and prejudice; an Englishman, a better memory for his own faults? They are but anxious that the posterity of strangers should know the faults of an author; while the virtues he omitthat there had been such a thing as a British Epic ted from his catalogue are essential to the justice and Tragedy, might wish for the preservation of due to a man. Shakspeare and Milton; but the surviving world Mr. Bowles appears, indeed, to be susceptible would snatch Pope from the wreck, and let the rest beyond the privilege of authorship. There is a sink with the people. He is the moral poet of all plaintive dedication to Mr. Gifford, in which he is civilization, and, as such, let us hope that he will made responsible for all the articles of the Quarterone day be the national poet of mankind. He is ly. Mr. Southey, it seems, "the most able and elothe only poet that never shocks; the only poet quent writer in that Review," approves of Mr. whose faultlessness has been made his reproach. Bowles's publication. Now, it seems to me the Cast your eye over his productions; consider their more impartial, that notwithstanding that the great extent, and contemplate their variety:-pastoral, writer of the Quarterly entertains opinions opposite passion, mock-heroic, translation, satire, ethics, to the able article on Spence, nevertheless that essay all excellent, and often perfect. If his great charm was permitted to appear." Is a review to be devoted be his melody, how comes it that foreigners adore to the opinions of any one man? Must it not vary him even in their diluted translation? But I according to circumstances, and according to the have made this letter too long. Give my compli- subjects to be criticised? I fear that writers must ments to Mr. Bowles. Yours ever, very truly, BYRON. "And, thinks to Homer, since I live and thrive, Indebted to no prince or peer alive-" take the sweets and bitters of the public journals as they occur, and an author of so long a standing as Mr. Bowles might have become accustomed to such To J. Murray, Esq. incidents; he might be angry, but not astonished. I Post scriptum.-Long as this letter has grown, I have been reviewed in the Quarterly almost as often find it necessary to append a postscript,-if possi- as Mr. Bowles, and have had as pleasant things ble, a short one. Mr. Bowles denies that he has said, and some as unpleasant, as could well be proaccused Pope of "a sordid money-getting passion;"nounced. In the review of "The Fall of Jerusabut he adds "if I had ever done so, I should be glad lem," it is stated that I have devoted "my powers, to find any testimoy that might show me he was etc., to the worst parts of manicheism," which, being not so." This testimony he may find to his heart's interpreted, means that I worship the devil. Now, content in Spence and elsewhere. First, there is I have neither written a reply, nor complained to Martha Blount, who, Mr. Bowles charitably says, Gifford. I believe that I observed in a letter to you, "probably thought he did not save enough for her that I thought "that the critic might have praised as legatee." Whatever she thought upon this point, Milman without finding it necessary to abuse me; her words are in Pope's favor. Then there is Alder- but I did not add at the same time, or soon after, man Barber-see Spence's Anecdotes. There is (apropos, of the note in the book of travels,) that I would not, if it were even in my power, have a Pope's cold answer to Halifax, when he proposed a pension; his behavior to Craggs and to Addison single line cancelled on my account in that or in any other publication? Of course, I reserve to myupon like occasions; and his own two linesself the privilege of response when necessary. Mr. Bowles seems in a whimsical state about the article on Spence. You know very well that I am not in written when princes would have been proud to your confidence, nor in that of the conductor of the pension, and peers to promote him, and when the journal. The moment I saw that article, I was whole army of dunces were in array against him, morally certain that I knew the author "by his and would have been but too happy to deprive him style." You will tell me that I do not know him: of this boast of independence. But there is some- that is all as it should be: keep the secret; so shall thing a little more serious in Mr. Bowles's declara- I, though no one has ever intrusted it to me. He is tion, that he "would have spoken " of his "noble not the person whom Mr. Bowles denounces. Mr. generosity to the outcast, Richard Savage," and Bowles's extreme sensibility reminds me of a cirother instances of a compassionate and generous cumstance which occurred on board of a frigate, in heart, "had they occurred to his recollection when which I was a passenger and guest of the captain's he wrote." What! is it come to this? Does Mr. for a considerable time. The surgeon on board, a Bowles sit down to write a minute and labored life very gentlemanly young man, and remarkably able and edition of a great poet? Does he anatomize in his profession, wore a wig. Upon this ornament his character, moral and political? Does he present he was extremely tenacious. As naval jests are us with his faults and with his foibles? Does he sometimes a little rough, his brother officers made sneer at his feelings, and doubt of his sincerity? occasional allusions to this delicate appendage to Does he unfold his vanity and duplicity? and then the doctor's person. One day a young lieutenant, omit the good qualities which might, in part, have in the course of a facetious discussion, said, "Sup"covered this multitude of sins?" and then plead pose, now, doctor, I should take off your hat. that "they did not occur to his recollection? Is Sir," replied the doctor, "I shall talk no longer this the frame of mind and of memory with which with you; you grow scurrilous." He would not the illustrious dead are to be reproached? If Mr. even admit so near an approach as to the hat which Bowles, who must have had access to all the means protected it. In like manner, if any body approaches of refreshing his memory, did not recollect these Mr. Bowles's laurels, even in his outside capacity of facts, he is unfit for his task; but if he did recollect, an editor, "they grow scurrilous." You say that and omit them, I know not what he is fit for, but I you are about to prepare an edition of Pope; you 'know what would be fit for him. Is the plea of cannot do better for your own credit as a publisher, "not recollecting" such prominent facts to be ad- nor for the redemption of Pope from Mr. Bowles. mitted? Mr. Bowles has been at a public school, and of the public taste from rapid degeneracy. 1. NOTES. The Italians, with the most poetical language, and the most fastidious taste in Europe, possess now five great poets, they say, Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, Tasso, and lastly Alfieri. Page 1042. once Dryden, and since Walter Scott; now Corneille, and now Racine; now Crebillon, now Vol taire. The Homerists and Virgilians in France disputed for half a century. Not fifty years ago the Italians neglected Dante-Bettinelli reproved Monti for reading "that barbarian;" at present they Of these there is one ranked with the others for adore him. Shakspeare and Milton have had their his SONNETS, and two for compositions which be- rise, and they will have their decline. Already they long to no class at all! Where is Dante? His have more than once fluctuated, as must be the poem is not an epic; then what is it? He himself case with all the dramatists and poets of a living calls it a "divine comedy;" and why? This is language. This does not depend upon their merits, more than all his thousand commentators have been but upon the ordinary vicissitudes of human opinable to explain. Ariosto's is not an epic poem; and ions. Schlegel and Madame de Staël have enif poets are to be classed according to the genus of deavored also to reduce poetry to two systems, clas their poetry, where is he to be placed? Of these sical and romantic. The effect is only beginning. five, Tasso and Alfieri only come within Aristotle's arrangement, and Mr. Bowles's class-book. But 2. the whole position is false. Poets are classed by I shall not presume to say that Pope is as high a the power of their performance, and not according poet as Shakspeare and Milton, though his enemy, to its rank in a gradus. In the contrary case, the Warton, places him immediately under them. forgotten epic poets of all countries would rank Page 1044. above Petrarch, Dante, Ariosto, Burns, Gray, Dry- If the opinions cited by Mr. Bowles, of Dr. Johnden, and the highest names of various countries. son against Pope, are to be taken as decisive auMr. Bowles's title of "invariable principles of po- thority, they will also hold good against Gray, Miletry," is, perhaps, the most arrogant ever prefixed ton, Swift, Thomson, and Dryden: in that case to a volume. So far are the principles of poetry what becomes of Gray's poetical and Milton's moral from being "invariable," that they never were nor character? even of Milton's poetical character, or, never will be settled. These "principles" mean indeed, of English poetry in general? for Johnson nothing more than the predilections of a particular strips many a leaf from every laurel. Still Johnage; and every age has its own, and a different from son's is the finest critical work extant, and can its predecessor. It is now Homer and now Virgil; never be read without instruction and delight. OBSERVATIONS UPON "OBSERVATIONS." A SECOND LETTER TO JOHN MURRAY, ESQ. ON THE REV. W. L. BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF POPE. DEAR SIR, Ravenna, March 25, 1821. &c.; and that he is the more persuaded of this by the "exaggerations of his opponents." This is all IN the further "Observations" of Mr. Bowles, in very well, and highly natural and sincere. Nobody rejoinder to the charges brought against his edition ever expected that either Mr. Bowles or any other of Pope, it is to be regretted that he has lost his author, would be convinced of human fallibility in temper. Whatever the language of his antagonists their own persons. But it is nothing to the purpose may have been, I fear that his replies have afforded for it is not what Mr. Bowles thinks, but what is more pleasure to them than to the public. That Mr. to be thought of Pope-that is the question. It is Bowles should not be pleased is natural, whether what he has asserted or insinuated against a name right or wrong; but à temperate defence would which is the patrimony of posterity, that is to be have answered his purpose in the former case-and, tried; and Mr. Bowles, as a party, can be no judge. in the latter, no defence, however violent, can tend The more he is persuaded, the better for himself, if to any thing but his discomfiture. I have read over it give him any pleasure; but he can only persuade this third pamphlet, which you have been so oblig- others by the proofs brought out in his defence. ing as to send ine, and shall venture a few observa- After these prefatory remarks of "conviction,” tions, in addition to those upon the previous &c., Mr. Bowles proceeds to Mr. Gilchrist; whom controversy. he charges with "slang" and "slander," besides a Mr. Bowles sets out with repeating his "confirmed small subsidiary indictment of "abuse, ignorance, sonviction," that "what he said of the moral part malice," and so forth. Mr. Gilchrist has, indeed, of Pope's character, was, generally speaking, true; shown some anger; but it is an honest indignation, and that the principles of poetical criticism which which rises up in defence of the illustrious dead. It he has laid down are invariable and invulnerable," is a generous rage which interposes between our shes and their disturbers. There appears also to than Mr. Bowles's prose at the beginning of this have been some slight personal provocation. Mr. pamphlet, and his verse at the end of it. In page Gilchrist, with a chivalrous disdain of the fury of 4, he speaks of "those most respectable characters an incensed poet, put his name to a letter avowing who have the direction, &c., of the periodical press," the production of a former essay in defence of Pope, and in page 10, we find "Ye dark inquisitors, a monk-like band, Who o'er some shrinking victim-author stand, and consequently of an attack upon Mr. Bowles. Mr. Bowles appears to be angry with Mr. Gilchrist for four reasons:-firstly, because he wrote an article in " The London Magazine;" secondly, because he afterwards avowed it: thirdly, because he was the author of a still more extended article in "The And so on-to "bloody law" and "red scourges," Quarterly Review;" and, fourthly, because he was with other similar phrases, which may not be alto NOT the author of the said Quarterly article, and gether agreeable to the above-mentioned "most had the audacity to disown it-for no earthly reason respectable characters." Mr. Bowles goes on, "I but because he had Nor written it. concluded my observations in the last Pamphleteer Mr. Bowles declares, that "he will not enter into with feelings not unkind towards Mr. Gilchrist, or a particular examination of the pamphlet," which by [it should be nor] "to the author of the review of a misnomer is called "Gilchrist's Answer to Bowles," Spence, be he whom he might."-"I was in hope, when it should have been called "Gilchrist's Abuse as I have always been ready to admit any errors I of Bowles." On this error in the baptism of Mr. might have been led into, or prejudice I might have Gilchrist's pamphlet, it may be observed, that an entertained, that even Mr. Gilchrist might be disanswer may be abusive and yet no less an answer, posed to a more amicable mode of discussing what I though indisputably a temperate one might be the had advanced in regard to Pope's moral character." better of the two; but if abuse is to cancel all pre- As Major Sturgeon observes, "There never was a tensions to reply, what becomes of Mr. Bowles's set of more amicable officers-with the exception of answers to Mr. Gilchrist? a boxing-bout between Captain Shears and the Colonel." over it. Mr. Bowles continues,-"But as Mr. Gilchrist derides my peculiar sensitiveness to criticism, before A page and a half-nay only a page before-Mr. I show how destitute of truth is this representation, Bowles reaffirms his conviction, that "what he has I will here explicitly declare the only grounds," said of Pope's moral character is (generally speak&c., &c., &c.-Mr. Bowles's sensibility in denying ing) true, and that his "poetical principles are his "sensitiveness to criticism" proves perhaps too invariable and invulnerable.” He has also pubmuch. But if he has been so charged, and truly-lished three pamphlets,-ay, four of the same tenor, what then? There is no moral turpitude in such and yet, with this declaration and these declamaacuteness of feeling: it has been, and may be, com- tions staring him and his adversaries in the face, he bined with many good and great qualities. Is Mr. speaks of his "readiness to admit errors or to abanBowles a poet, or is he not? If he be, he must, don prejudices!!!" His use of the word "amicafrom his very essence, be sensitive to criticism; ble" reminds me of the Irish Institution (which and even if he be not, he need not be ashamed of I have somewhere heard or read of) called the the common repugnance to being attacked. All" Friendly Society," where the president always that is to be wished is, that he had considered how carried pistols in his pocket, so that when one amidisagreeable a thing it is, before he assailed the cable gentleman knocked down another, the differgreatest moral poet of any age, or in any language. ence might be adjusted on the spot, at the harmoPope himself "sleeps well,"-nothing can touch nious distance of twelve paces. him further; but those who love the honor of their But Mr. Bowles "has since read a publication by country, the perfection of her literature, the glory him (Mr. Gilchrist) containing such vulgar slander, of her language-are not to be expected to permit affecting private life and character," &c., &c.; and an atom of his dust to be stirred in his tomb, or a Mr. Gilchrist has also had the advantage of reading leaf to be stripped from the laurel which grows a publication by Mr. Bowles sufficiently imbued with personality; for one of the first and principal Mr. Bowles assigns several reasons why and when topics of reproach is that he is a grocer, that he has "an author is justified in appealing to every upright a "pipe in his mouth, ledger-book, green canisters, and honorable mind in the kingdom." If Mr. Bowles dingy shop-boy, half a hogshead of brown treacle,' limits the perusal of his defence to the "upright &c. Nay, the same delicate raillery is upon the and honorable" only, I greatly fear that it will not very title-page. When controversy has once combe extensively circulated. I should rather hope menced upon this footing, as Dr. Johnson said to that some of the downright and dishonest will read Dr. Percy, "Sir, there is an end of politeness-we and be converted, or convicted. But the whole of are to be as rude as we please-Sir, you said that I his reasoning is here superfluous-"an author is was short-sighted." As a man's profession is genejustified in appealing," &c., when and why he rally no more in his own power than his personpleases. Let him make out a tolerable case, and both having been made out for him-it is hard that few of his readers will quarrel with his motives. he should be reproached with either, and still more Mr. Bowles "will now plainly set before the lite- that an honest calling should be made a reproach. rary public all the circumstances which have led If there is any thing more honorable to Mr. Gilto his name and Mr. Gilchrist's being brought to-christ than another it is, that being engaged in gether," &c. Courtesy requires, in speaking of others commerce he had the taste, and found the leisure, and ourselves, that we should place the name of the to become so able a proficient in the higher literaformer first-and not "Ego et Rex meus." Mr. ture of his own and other countries. Mr. Bowles, Bowles should have written "Mr. Gilchrist's name who will be proud to own Glover, Chatterton, Burns, and his." and Bloomfield for his peers, should hardly have This point he wishes "particularly to address to quarrelled with Mr. Gilchrist for his critic. Mr. those most respectable characters, who have the di- Gilchrist's station, however, which might conduct rection and management of the periodical critical him to the highest civic honors, and to boundless press." That the press may be, in some instances, wealth, has nothing to require apology; but even if conducted by respectable characters is probable it had, such a reproach was not very gracious on enough; but if they are so, there is no occasion to the part of a clergyman, nor graceful on that of a tell them of it; and if they are not, it is a base gentleman. The allusion to "Christian criticism" adulation. In either case, it looks like a kind of is not particularly happy, especially where Mr. Gilflattery, by which those gentry are not very likely christ is accused of having "set the first example of to be softened; since it would be difficult to find this mode in Europe." What Pagan criticism may two passages in fifteen pages more at variance, have been we know but little: the names of Zoilus BYRON'S WORKS. and Aristarchus survive, and the works of Aristotle, I would not, however, recommend this rigor to plain institution in the person of their respectable and Marechal Luxembourg (who had precisely Pope's "Lumine Acon dextro, capta est Leonilla sinistro, Et potis est forma vincere uterque Deos; Wilkes, with his ugliness, used to say that "he "Vanesca, aged scarce a score, To me it appears of no very great consequence whether Martha Blount was or was not Pope's mistress, though I could have wished him a better. She appears to have been a cold-hearted, interested, was but a quarter of an hour behind the handsomest ignorant, disagreeable woman, upon whom the ten-man in England;" and this vaunt of his is said not derness of Pope's heart in the desolation of his to have been disproved by circumstances. Swift, latter days was cast away, not knowing whither to when neither young, nor handsome, nor rich, nor turn, as he drew towards his premature old age, even amiable, inspired the two most extraordinary childless and lonely,-like the needle which, ap- passions upon record-Vanessa's and Stella's. proaching within a certain distance of the pole, becomes helpless and useless, and, ceasing to tremble, rusts. She seems to have been so totally unworthy of tenderness, that it is an additional proof] of the kindness of Pope's heart to have been able broken the heart of the one, and worn out that of to love such a being. But we must love something. the other; and he had his reward, for he died a soliHe requited them bitterly; for he seems to have I agree with Mr. B. that she "could at no time tary idiot in the hands of servants. have regarded Pope personally with attachment," because she was incapable of attachment; but I nias, that success in love depends upon Fortune. deny that Pope could not be regarded with personal "They particularly renounce Celestial Venus, into For my own part, I am of the opinion of Pausaattachment by a worthier woman. It is not proba- whose temple, &c., &c., &c. ble, indeed, that a woman would have fallen in love have seen a building in Egina in which there is a with him as he walked along the Mall, or in a box statue of Fortune, holding a horn of Amalthea; at the opera, nor from a balcony, nor in a ball-room; and near her there is a winged Love. The meaning I remember, too, to but in society he seems to have been as amiable as of this is, that the success of men in love affairs unassuming, and, with the greatest disadvantages depends more on the assistance of Fortune than the of figure, his head and face were remarkably hand- charms of beauty. I am persuaded, too, with Pinsome, especially his eyes. He was adored by his dar (to whose opinion I submit in other particulars), friends-friends of the most opposite dispositions, that Fortune is one of the Fates, and that in a cerages, and talents-by the old and wayward Wycher-tain respect she is more powerful than her sisters." ley, by the cynical Swift, the rough Atterbury, the-See Pausanias, Achaics, book vii., chap. xxvi., p. gentle Spence, the stern attorney-bishop Warbur- 256. Taylor's "Translation." ton, the virtuous Berkeley, and the, cankered Bolingbroke." child; and Spence's description of his last moments sean. Bolingbroke wept over him like a ferent destinies of the younger Crebillon and RousGrimm has a remark of the same kind on the difis at least as edifying as the more ostentatious young English girl of some fortune and family (a account of the death-bed of Addison. The soldier Miss Stratford) runs away, and crosses the sea to The former writes a licentious novel, and a Peterborough and the poet Gay, the witty Congreve marry him; while Rousseau, the most tender and and the laughing Rowe, the eccentric Cromwell and passionate of lovers, is obliged to espouse his chamthe steady Bathurst, were all his intimates. The bermaid. If I recollect rightly, this remark was also man who could conciliate so many men of the most repeated in the Edinburgh Review of Grimm's coropposite description, not one of whom but was a respondence, seven or eight years ago. remarkable or a celebrated character, might well have pretended to all the attachment which a rea- and sometimes profane levity, which his conduct sonable man would desire of an amiable woman. In regard to the strange mixture of indecent, Pope, in fact, wherever he got it, appears to have shocks Mr. Bowles, I object to the indefinite word understood the sex well. Bolingbroke, "a judge "often;" and in extenuation of the occasional ocand language often exhibited," and which so much of the subject," says Warton, thought his " on the Characters of Women And even with respect to the grosser passion, which the time. With the exception of the correspondence "his "master-piece." that it was less the tone of Pope, than the tone of Epistle currence of such language it is to be recollected, takes occasionally the name of "romantic," ac- of Pope and his friends, not many private letters of cordingly as the degree of sentiment elevates it the period have come down to us; but those, such above the definition of love by Buffon, it may be as they are-a few scattered scraps from Farquhar remarked, that it does not always depend upon and others-are more indecent and coarse than any personal appearance, even in a woman. Cottin was a plain woman, and might have been Vanbrugh, Farquhar, Cibber, &c., which naturally Madame thing in Pope's letters. The comedies of Congrere, virtuous, it may be presumed, without much inter- attempted to represent the manners and conversaruption. Virtuous she was, and the consequences tion of private life, are decisive upon this point; as of this inveterate virtue were that two different are also some of Steele's papers, and even Addi admirers (one an elderly gentleman) killed them- son's. We all know what the conversation of Sir selves in despair (see Lady Morgan's "France.")| R. Walpole, for seventeen years the prime minister |