THE

LIFE

OF

ALEXANDER POPE, ESQ.

A

LEXANDER POPE was born, according to Mr. Spence, in Lombard-street, London, on May 22d, 1688, in the house of his father, who was fo eminent a linen-draper, and traded fo fuccessfully, that he gained a fortune of twenty thousand pounds. His mother was daughter of William Turner, Efq. of York, two of whofe fons died in the fervice of Charles the First, and the other became a general officer in Spain.

The feebleness and delicacy of his conftitution naturally engaged the attention of his parents and relations; and he was ftill more endeared to them by the uncommon mildness and fweetness of temper, which he difplayed in his childhood: And perhaps his father might fay, as did the father of Boileau, "This child, if he lives, will never speak ill of any "perfon." His voice, too, was fo marvellously melo

VOL. I.

a

dious,

dious, that they used to call him the little nightingale. He was taught to read by an aunt that was particularly fond of him, and learnt to write by copying printed books, which he did with exquifite skill and dexterity. He was placed, at eight years old, under the care of Taverner, a Romish priest, (as his father and mother were rigid Catholics,) who taught him the rudiments of the Greek and Latin languages at the fame time. Perhaps it may be wished that, for the promotion of true taste and literature, Greek was always taught in great fchools before Latin, according to a hint of Erafmus. Having made confiderable improvements under Taverner, he was removed to a celebrated feminary of Catholics at Twyford, a pleasant village on the banks of the Itchin near Winchefter; a circumftance that used frequently to be mentioned by the scholars of the neighbouring college, in their youthful compofitions. Having written a lampoon on his mafter at Twyford, one of his first efforts in poetry, he was removed from thence to a school kept near Hyde-park Corner. Before this removal, he had been delighted with a perufal of Ogilby's Homer, and Sandys's Ovid; he frequently spoke, in the latter part of his life, of the exquifite pleasure which the perufal of these two writers gave him. And having now an opportunity of fometimes frequenting the play-houfes, our young bard was fo delighted with theatrical performances, that he turned the chief events of the Iliad into a kind of drama, made

up

up of a number of fpeeches from Ogilby's tranflation, connected with verfes of his own. He per fuaded fome of the upper boys to act this piece, which, as an uncommon curiofity, one would have been glad to have beheld. The master's gardener represented the character of Ajax; and the actors were dreffed after the pictures of his favourite Ogilby; which were indeed defigned and engraved by artists of note. At twelve At twelve years of age, our young bard retired with his father to Binfield near Oakingham; who, unwilling to truft the money he had gained in trade to government fecurity, lived on the principal, which gradually was confumed before he was aware. Another private tutor was now fought out for his fon; this was another priest, named Dean; from whom his pupil deriving very little advantage, he at laft determined to ftudy on a plan of his own; which he did with great diligence and perfeverance; devouring all books that he could procure, especially poetical works. To indulge this darling paffion, he left no calling nor profeffion, as fo many eminent poets and painters appear to have done: He was invariably and folely a poet, from the beginning of his life to the end. And it was now he first perused the writings of Waller, of Spenfer, and of Dryden, in the order here mentioned. Spenfer is faid to have made a poet of Cowley; that Ogilby should give our author his firft poetic pleafures, is a remarkable circumstance. But Dryden foon became his chief favourite, and his model. And

as a defire to fee eminent men is one of the first marks of a mind eager to excel, he entreated a friend to carry him to Button's coffee-house, which Dryden frequented, that he might gratify himself with the bare fight of a man whom he fo much admired.

I have heard, that among works of profe, he was most fond of the second part of Sir William Temple's Miscellanies. How very early he began to write, cannot now be exactly ascertained; but his father frequently propofed familiar fubjects to him, and after many corrections would fay, "Thefe are now good

"rhymes."

age,

Though the Ode to Solitude, written at twelve years of is faid to be his earliest production, yet DodЛley, who was honoured with his intimacy, had seen several pieces of a ftill earlier date. It is remarkable that, precifely at the fame age, Voltaire produced his firft copy of verses on record. They were written at the request of an old invalid, to be prefented, in his name, to the only fon of Louis XIV. If it should be urged, that too much is faid of the childish performances of thefe two great men, let it be remembered that it is amusing to trace the fountain of the Nile.

... Cowley and Milton had written pieces of equal value at as early an age, and Tafso still earlier. Milton's Paraphrafes of the 114th and 136th Pfalins, made I when he was only fifteen years old, are very poetical

and