The Rape of the Lock and Other Major Writings: Poems and Other Writings (Penguin Classics)

by Alexander Pope

  Verse cheers their leisure, verse assists their work,

  Verse prays for peace, or sings down pope and Turk.

  The silenced preacher yields to potent strain,

  And feels that grace his pray’r besought in vain;

  The blessing thrills through all the lab’ring throng,

  240 And Heav’n is won by violence of song.

  Our rural ancestors, with little blest,

  Patient of labour when the end was rest,

  Indulged the day that housed their annual grain

  With feasts, and off’rings, and a thankful strain.

  The joy their wives, their sons, and servants share,

  Ease of their toil, and partners of their care;

  The laugh, the jest, attendants on the bowl,

  Smoothed ev’ry brow, and opened ev’ry soul;

  With growing years the pleasing licence grew,

  250 And taunts alternate innocently flew.

  But times corrupt, and Nature, ill inclined,

  Produced the point that left a sting behind,

  Till friend with friend, and families at strife,

  Triumphant malice raged through private life.

  Who felt the wrong, or feared it, took th’ alarm,

  Appealed to law, and Justice lent her arm.

  At length, by wholesome dread of statutes bound,

  The poets learned to please, and not to wound.

  Most warped to flatt’ry’s side; but some, more nice,

  260 Preserved the freedom, and forbore the vice.

  Hence Satire rose, that just the medium hit,

  And heals with morals what it hurts with wit.

  We conquered France, but felt our captive’s charms;

  Her arts victorious triumphed o’er our arms;

  Britain to soft refinements less a foe,

  Wit grew polite, and numbers learned to flow.

  Waller was smooth; but Dryden taught to join

  The varying verse, the full resounding line,

  The long majestic march, and energy divine;

  270 Though still some traces of our rustic vein

  And splay-foot verse remained, and will remain.

  Late, very late, correctness grew our care,

  When the tired nation breathed from civil war;

  Exact Racine, and Corneille’s noble fire,

  Showed us that France had something to admire.

  Not but the tragic spirit was our own,

  And full in Shakespeare, fair in Otway shone;

  But Otway failed to polish or refine,

  And fluent Shakespeare scarce effaced a line.

  280 Ev’n copious Dryden wanted, or forgot,

  The last and greatest art, the art to blot.

  Some doubt if equal pains or equal fire

  The humbler muse of comedy require?

  But in known images of life I guess

  The labour greater, as th’ indulgence less.

  Observe how seldom ev’n the best succeed:

  Tell me if Congreve’s fools are fools indeed?

  What pert low dialogue has Farquhar writ!

  How Van wants grace, who never wanted wit!

  290 The stage how loosely does Astraea tread,

  Who fairly puts all characters to bed!

  And idle Cibber, how he breaks the laws,

  To make poor Pinky eat with vast applause!

  But fill their purse, our poet’s work is done,

  Alike to them, by pathos or by pun.

  O you! whom Vanity’s light bark conveys

  On Fame’s mad voyage by the wind of praise,

  With what a shifting gale your course you ply,

  Forever sunk too low, or borne too high!

  300 Who pants for glory finds but short repose;

  A breath revives him, or a breath o’erthrows.

  Farewell the stage! if just as thrives the play

  The silly bard grows fat, or falls away.

  There still remains, to mortify a wit,

  The many-headed monster of the pit:

  A senseless, worthless, and unhonoured crowd,

  Who, to disturb their betters, mighty proud,

  Clatt’ring their sticks before ten lines are spoke,

  Call for the farce, the bear, or the Black Joke.

  310 What dear delight to Britons farce affords!

  Ever the taste of mobs, but now of lords

  (Taste, that eternal wanderer, which flies

  From heads to ears, and now from ears to eyes).

  The play stands still; damn action and discourse,

  Back fly the scenes, and enter foot and horse;

  Pageants on pageants, in long order drawn,

  Peers, heralds, bishops, ermine, gold, and lawn;

  The Champion too! and, to complete the jest,

  Old Edward’s armour beams on Cibber’s breast!

  320 With laughter sure Democritus had died,

  Had he beheld an audience gape so wide.

  Let bear or elephant be e’er so white,

  The people, sure, the people are the sight!

  Ah luckless poet! stretch thy lungs and roar,

  That bear or elephant shall heed thee more;

  While all its throats the gallery extends,

  And all the thunder of the pit ascends!

  Loud as the wolves, on Orcas’ stormy steep,

  Howl to the roarings of the northern deep:

  330 Such is the shout, the long applauding note,

  At Quin’s high plume, or Oldfield’s petticoat;

  Or when from court a birthday suit bestowed

  Sinks the lost actor in the tawdry load.

  Booth enters – hark! the universal peal!

  ‘But has he spoken?’ Not a syllable.

  ‘What shook the stage, and made the people stare?’

  Cato’s long wig, flower’d gown, and lacquered chair.

  Yet lest you think I rally more than teach,

  Or praise malignly arts I cannot reach,

  Let me for once presume t’ instruct the times,

  340 To know the poet from the man of rhymes:

  ’Tis he who gives my breast a thousand pains,

  Can make me feel each passion that he feigns;

  Enrage, compose, with more than magic art,

  With pity, and with terror, tear my heart,

  And snatch me o’er the earth, or through the air,

  To Thebes, to Athens, when he will, and where.

  But not this part of the poetic state

  Alone deserves the favour of the great.

  350 Think of those authors, sir, who would rely

  More on a reader’s sense, than gazer’s eye.

  Or who shall wander where the Muses sing?

  Who climb their mountain, or who taste their spring?

  How shall we fill a library with wit,

  When Merlin’s cave is half unfurnished yet?

  My liege! why writers little claim your thought,

  I guess, and, with their leave, will tell the fault:

  We poets are (upon a poet’s word)

  Of all mankind, the creatures most absurd:

  360 The season when to come, and when to go,

  To sing, or cease to sing, we never know;

  And if we will recite nine hours in ten,

  You lose your patience, just like other men.

  Then too we hurt ourselves when, to defend

  A single verse, we quarrel with a friend;

  Repeat unasked; lament, the wit’s too fine

  For vulgar eyes, and point out ev’ry line:

  But most, when straining with too weak a wing,

  We needs will write epistles to the king;

  370 And from the moment we oblige the town,

  Expect a place or pension from the crown;

  Or dubbed historians by express command,

  T’ enrol your triumphs o’er the seas and land,

  Be called to court to plan some work d
ivine,

  As once for Louis, Boileau and Racine.

  Yet think, great sir! (so many virtues shown)

  Ah think! what poet best may make them known?

  Or choose at least some minister of grace

  Fit to bestow the laureate’s weighty place.

  380 Charles, to late times to be transmitted fair,

  Assigned his figure to Bernini’s care;

  And great Nassau to Kneller’s hand decreed

  To fix him graceful on the bounding steed;

  So well in paint and stone they judged of merit:

  But kings in wit may want discerning spirit.

  The hero William, and the martyr Charles,

  One knighted Blackmore, and one pensioned Quarles,

  Which made old Ben and surly Dennis swear

  ‘No Lord’s anointed, but a Russian bear.’

  390 Not with such majesty, such bold relief,

  The forms august of king, or conquering chief,

  E’er swelled on marble, as in verse have shined

  (In polished verse) the manners and the mind.

  Oh! could I mount on the Maeonian wing,

  Your arms, your actions, your repose to sing!

  What seas you traversed, and what fields you fought!

  Your country’s peace, how oft, how dearly bought!

  How barb’rous rage subsided at your word,

  And nations wondered while they dropped the sword!

  400 How, when you nodded, o’er the land and deep

  Peace stole her wing, and wrapped the world in sleep,

  Till earth’s extremes your mediation own,

  And Asia’s tyrants tremble at your throne –

  But verse, alas! your Majesty disdains,

  And I’m not used to panegyric strains.

  The zeal of fools offends at any time,

  But most of all, the zeal of fools in rhyme.

  Besides, a fate attends on all I write,

  That when I aim at praise they say I bite.

  A vile encomium doubly ridicules;

  410 There’s nothing blackens like the ink of fools.

  If true, a woeful likeness; and if lies,

  ‘Praise undeserved is scandal in disguise.’

  Well may he blush, who gives it, or receives;

  And when I flatter, let my dirty leaves

  (Like journals, odes, and such forgotten things,

  As Eusden, Philips, Settle, writ of kings)

  Clothe spice, line trunks, or fluttering in a row,

  Befringe the rails of Bedlam and Soho.

  Epistle, II, ii

  Ludentis speciem dabit et torquebitur.

  Dear Colonel, Cobham’s and your country’s friend!

  You love a verse; take such as I can send.

  A Frenchman comes, presents you with his boy,

  Bows and begins – ‘This lad, sir, is of Blois:

  Observe his shape how clean! his locks how curled!

  My only son, I’d have him see the world.

  His French is pure; his voice too – you shall hear –

  Sir, he’s your slave, for twenty pound a year.

  Mere wax as yet, you fashion him with ease,

  10 Your barber, cook, upholst’rer; what you please:

  A perfect genius at an opera song –

  To say too much might do my honour wrong.

  Take him with all his virtues on my word;

  His whole ambition was to serve a lord;

  But, sir, to you with what would I not part?

  Though faith, I fear ’twill break his mother’s heart.

  Once (and but once) I caught him in a lie,

  And then, unwhipped, he had the grace to cry:

  The fault he has I fairly shall reveal,

  20 (Could you o’erlook but that) – it is to steal.’

  If, after this, you took the graceless lad,

  Could you complain, my friend, he proved so bad?

  Faith, in such case, if you should prosecute,

  I think Sir Godfrey should decide the suit;

  Who sent the thief that stole the cash away,

  And punished him that put it in his way.

  Consider then, and judge me in this light;

  I told you when I went, I could not write;

  You said the same; and are you discontent

  30 With laws to which you gave your own assent?

  Nay, worse, to ask for verse at such a time!

  D’ye think me good for nothing but to rhyme?

  In Anna’s wars a soldier, poor and old,

  Had dearly earned a little purse of gold:

  Tired in a tedious march, one luckless night

  He slept, poor dog! and lost it to a doit.

  This put the man in such a desp’rate mind,

  Between revenge, and grief, and hunger joined,

  Against the foe, himself, and all mankind,

  40 He leapt the trenches, scaled a castle wall,

  Tore down a standard, took the fort and all.

  ‘Prodigious well!’ his great commander cried,

  Gave him much praise, and some reward beside.

  Next pleased his Excellence a town to batter

  (Its name I know not, and ’tis no great matter);

  ‘Go on, my friend (he cried), see yonder walls!

  Advance and conquer! go where glory calls!

  More honours, more rewards, attend the brave.’

  Don’t you remember what reply he gave?

  50 ‘D’ye think me, noble gen’ral, such a sot?

  Let him take castles who has ne’er a groat.’

  Bred up at home, full early I begun

  To read in Greek the wrath of Peleus’ son.

  Besides, my father taught me from a lad

  The better art, to know the good from bad

  (And little sure imported to remove,

  To hunt for truth in Maudlin’s learned grove).

  But knottier points we knew not half so well

  Deprived us soon of our paternal cell;

  60 And certain laws, by suff’rers thought unjust,

  Denied all posts of profit or of trust:

  Hopes after hopes of pious papists failed,

  While mighty William’s thund’ring arm prevailed.

  For right hereditary taxed and fined,

  He stuck to poverty with peace of mind;

  And me, the Muses helped to undergo it;

  Convict a papist he, and I a poet.

  But (thanks to Homer) since I live and thrive,

  Indebted to no prince or peer alive,

  70 Sure I should want the care of ten Munros,

  If I would scribble rather than repose.

  Years foll’wing years steal something ev’ry day;

  At last they steal us from ourselves away.

  In one our frolics, one amusements end,

  In one a mistress drops, in one a friend.

  This subtle thief of life, this paltry time,

  What will it leave me, if it snatch my rhyme?

  If ev’ry wheel of that unwearied mill

  That turned ten thousand verses, now stands still.

  80 But after all, what would ye have me do,

  When out of twenty I can please not two?

  When this, heroics only deigns to praise,

  Sharp satire that, and that Pindaric lays?

  One likes the pheasant’s wing, and one the leg;

  The vulgar boil, the learnèd roast an egg;

  Hard task to hit the palate of such guests,

  When Oldfield loves what Dartineuf detests!

  But grant I may relapse, for want of grace,

  Again to rhyme, can London be the place?

  90 Who there his Muse, or self, or soul attends,

  In crowds, and courts, law, business, feasts, and friends?

  My counsel sends to execute a deed;

  A poet begs me I will hear him read:

  ‘In Palace Yard at nine you’ll find
me there –

  At ten for certain, sir, in Bloomsb’ry Square –

  Before the lords at twelve my cause comes on –

  There’s a rehearsal, sir, exact at one.’ –

  ‘Oh, but a wit can study in the streets,

  And raise his mind above the mob he meets.’

  100 Not quite so well however as one ought;

  A hackney coach may chance to spoil a thought;

  And then a nodding beam, or pig of lead,

  God knows, may hurt the very ablest head.

  Have you not seen, at Guildhall’s narrow pass,

  Two aldermen dispute it with an ass?

  And peers give way, exalted as they are,

  Ev’n to their own s-r-v–nce in a car?

  Go, lofty poet! and in such a crowd

  Sing thy sonorous verse – but not aloud.

  110 Alas! to grottos and to groves we run

  To ease and silence, ev’ry Muse’s son:

  Blackmore himself, for any grand effort,

  Would drink and doze at Tooting or Earl’s Court.

  How shall I rhyme in this eternal roar?

  How match the bards whom none e’er matched before?

  The man who, stretched in Isis’ calm retreat,

  To books and study gives sev’n years complete,

  See! strewed with learnèd dust, his nightcap on,

  He walks, an object new beneath the sun!

  120 The boys flock round him, and the people stare:

  So stiff, so mute some statue you would swear,

  Stepped from its pedestal to take the air.

  And here, while town, and court, and City roars,

  With mobs, and duns, and soldiers, at their doors,

  Shall I in London act this idle part,

  Composing songs for fools to get by heart?

  The Temple late two brother sergeants saw,

  Who deemed each other oracles of law;

  With equal talents, these congenial souls,

  130 One lulled th’ Exchequer, and one stunned the Rolls;

  Each had a gravity would make you split,

  And shook his head at Murray, as a wit.

  ’Twas, ‘Sir, your law’ – and ‘Sir, your eloquence’,

  ‘Yours, Cowper’s manner’ – and ‘Yours, Talbot’s sense.’

  Thus we dispose of all poetic merit,

  Yours Milton’s genius, and mine Homer’s spirit.

  Call Tibbald Shakespeare, and he’ll swear the Nine,

  Dear Cibber! never matched one ode of thine.

  Lord! how we strut through Merlin’s cave, to see

  140 No poets there, but Stephen, you, and me.