These leave the sense, their learning to display, You then whose judgment the right course would steer, Know well each ANCIENT'S proper COMMENTARY. character; Ver. 118. You then whose judgment, &c.] He comes next to the ancient Poets, the other and more intimate commentators of Nature, and shows [from ver. 117 to 141] that the study of these must indispensably follow that of the ancient Critics, as they furnish us with what the Critics, who only give us general rules, cannot supply: while the study of a great original Poet, in "His Fable, Subject, scope in ev'ry page: Religion, Country, genius of his Age;" will help us to those particular rules which only can conduct us safely through every considerable work we undertake to examine; and without which, we may cavil indeed, as the poet truly observes, but can never criticise. We might as well suppose that Vitruvius's book alone would make a perfect judge of architecture, without the knowledge of some great master-piece of science, such as the Rotunda at Rome, or the Temple of Minerva at Athens; as that Aristotle's should make a perfect Judge of Wit, without the study of Homer and Virgil. These therefore he principally recommends to complete the Critic in his art. But as the latter of these Poets has, by superficial judges, been considered rather as a copier of Homer, than an original from Nature, our Author obviates that common error, and shows it to have arisen (as often error does) from a truth, viz. that Homer and Nature were the same; that the ambitious young Poet, though he scorned to stoop at any thing short of Nature, when he came to understand this great truth, had the prudence to contemplate Nature in the place where she was seen to most advantage, collected in all her charms in the clear mirror of Homer. Hence it would follow, that though Virgil studied Nature, yet the vulgar reader would believe him to be a copier of Homer; and though he copied Homer, yet the judicious reader would see him to be an imitator of Nature: the finest praise which any one, who came after Homer, could receive. NOTES. d'avoir suivi les règles d'Aristote, mais je ne pardonne pas aux règles d'Aristote d'avoir fait faire une si mauvaise tragédie à l'Abbé D'Aubignac.—Warton. Ver. 119. Know well each ANCIENT's proper character;] When Perault impotently attempted to ridicule the first stanza of the first Olympic of Pindar, he was ignorant that the poet, in beginning with the praises of water, alluded to the philosophy of Thales, who taught that water was the principle of all things; and which philosophy, Empedocles the Sicilian, a contemporary of Pindar, and a subject of Hiero, to whom Pindar wrote, had adopted in his beautiful poem. Homer and the Greek tragedians have been likewise censured, the former for protracting the Iliad after the death of Hector; and the latter, for continuing the Ajax and Phonissæ, after the deaths of their respective heroes. But the censurers did not consider the importance of burial among the ancients; and that the action of the Iliad would have been imperfect, without a description of the funeral rites of Hector and Patroclus; as the two tragedies, without those of Polynices and Eteocles; for the ancients esteemed a deprivation of sepulture to be a more severe calamity than death itself. It is observable, that this circumstance did not occur to Pope, when he endeavoured to justify His fable, subject, scope in ev'ry page; Thence form your judgment, thence your bring, And trace the Muses upward to their spring. 120 125 maxims When first young Maro in his boundless mind A work t'outlast immortal Rome design'd, NOTES. 130 this conduct of Homer, by only saying, that as the anger of Achilles does "Cum canerem reges et proelia, Cynthius aurem It is a tradition preserved by Servius, that Virgil began with writing a poem of the Alban and Roman affairs; which he found above his years, and descended, first to imitate Theocritus on rural subjects, and afterwards to copy Homer in Heroic poetry.-P. “That Virgil, not only in his general plan, but in most of the subordinate parts, was a close copyist of Homer, is undeniable, whatever be thought of the supposition, that he set out with a design of drawing from the sources of Nature, and was diverted from it by the discovery that Nature and Homer were the same.' The modern idolatry of Shakspeare has elevated him to the same degree of authority among us; and critics have not been wanting, who have confidently drawn from his characters the proofs and illustrations of their theories on the human mind. But what can be more VARIATIONS. Ver. 123. Cavil you may, but never criticize.] The author, after this verse, originally inserted the following, which he has however omitted in all the editions: Zoilus, had these been known, without a name None e'er had thought his comprehensive mind When first young Maro sung of Kings and Wars, } Perhaps he seem'd above the Critic's law, And but from Nature's fountain scorn'd to draw: 135 Nature and Homer were, he found, the same. Some beauties yet no precepts can declare, COMMENTARY. 140 Ver. 141. Some beauties yet no precepts can declare, &c.] Our author, in these two general directions for studying Nature and her Commentators, having considered Poetry as it is, or may be reduced to Rule; lest this should be mistaken as sufficient to attain PERFECTION either in writing or judging, he NOTES. unworthy of the true critic and philosopher, than such an implicit reliance on any man, how exalted soever his genius, especially on those who lived in the infancy of their art? If an epic poem be a representation of Nature in a course of heroic action, it must be susceptible of as much variety as Nature herself and surely it is more desirable that a poet of original genius should give full scope to his inventive powers, under the restriction of such laws only as are founded on nature, than that he should fetter himself with rules derived from the practice of a predecessor. When Pope praises the ancient rules for composition, on the ground that they were discovered, not devised,' and were only nature methodized,' he gives a just notion of what they ought to be. But when he supposes Virgil to have properly checked in his bold design of drawing from Nature's fountains,' and in consequence, to have confined his work within rules as strict, As if the Stagyrite o'erlook'd each line ;' how can he avoid the force of his own ridicule, where a little further, in this very piece, he laughs at Dennis for Concluding all were desp'rate sots and fools Who durst depart from Aristotle's rules?' Such are the inconsistencies of a writer who sometimes utters notions derived from reading and education; sometimes, the suggestions of native good sense!" Dr. Aikin's Letters to his Son.-Warton. Ver. 138. As if the Stagyrite] According to a fine precept in the fourteenth section of Longinus, who exhorts us, when we aim at any thing elevated and sublime, to ask ourselves while we are composing, "how would Homer, or Plato, or Demosthenes, have exerted and expressed themselves on this subject? And still more, if we should continue to ask ourselves; what would Homer or Demosthenes, if they had been present, and had heard this passage, have thought of it, and how would they have been effected by it ?"-Warton. Ver. 141. Some beauties yet no precepts] Pope in this passage seems to have remembered one of the essays of Bacon, of which he is known to have been remarkably fond. "There is no excellent beauty that hath not some Music resembles Poetry; in each Are nameless graces which no methods teach, If, where the rules not far enough extend, : COMMENTARY. 145 proceeds [from ver. 140 to 201] to point up to those sublimer beauties which Rules will never reach, nor enable us either to execute or taste: beauties, which rise so high above all precept as not even to be described by it but being entirely the gift of Heaven, Art and Reason have no further share in them than just to regulate their operations. These Sublimities of Poetry (like the Mysteries of Religion, some of which are above Reason, and some contrary to it) may be divided into two sorts, such as are above Rules, and such as are contrary to them. Ver. 146. If, where the rules, &c.] The first sort our author describes [from ver. 145 to 152] and shows that where a great beauty is in the Poet's NOTES. strangeness in the proportion. A man cannot tell whether Apelles, or Albert Durer, were the more trifler: whereof the one would make a personage by geometrical proportions; the other, by taking the best parts out of divers faces to make one excellent. Such personages, I think, would please nobody but the painter that made them. Not but I think, a painter may make a better face than ever was; but he must do it by a kind of felicity, as a musician that maketh an excellent air in music, and not by rule. A man shall see faces, that if you examine them, part by part, you shall find never a good one; and yet altogether do well." "Non ratione aliquâ (says Quintilian finely) sed motû nescio an inerrabili judicatur. Neque ab hoc ullo satis explicari puto, licet multi tentaverint."-Quintil. Instit. lib. vi. In short, in poetry, we must judge by taste and sentiment, not by rules and reasoning. Different theories of philosophy, and different systems of theology, are maintained and exploded in different ages; but true and genuine pictures of nature and passion are not subject to such revolutions and changes. The doctrines of Plato, Epicurus, and Zeno; of Descartes, Hobbes, and Malebranche, and Gassendi, yield in succession to each other; but Homer, Sophocles, Terence, and Virgil, being felt and relished by all men, still retain and preserve, unaltered and undisputed, admiration and applause.-Warton. Ver. 143. Music resembles Poetry, &c.] Dr. Warton has remarked on this passage, that he had been informed by one of the best musicians of the age, that this observation was not accurate, nor agreeable to the rules of the art of music. It is not true, if applied to the rules of harmonic combinations, yet the analogy between the two arts, which Pope intended to illustrate in the lines before us, is accurate. The most scientific musician will never learn by rule to introduce those inimitable touches which are to be found in many of the oldest and most artless melodies. These can be derived from Nature alone, nor will the study of the poetical art infuse into the soul that spirit which alone can dictate its happiest efforts. But it is true of both sciences, that a master-hand, that is, the hand of one who combines science with genius, can alone reach that height of perfection which is to be obtained by directing the effusions of Nature, and reducing them within those rules which are founded on invariable principles.-Bowles. Ver. 146. If, where the rules, &c.] "Neque enim rogationibus plebisve Some lucky Licence answer to the full 150 May boldly deviate from the common track. 155 COMMENTARY. view, which no stated Rules will authorize him how to reach, there, as the purpose of rules is only to attain an end like this, a lucky Licence will supply the place of them: nor can the Critic fairly object, since this Licence, for the reason given above, has the proper force and authority of a Rule. Ver. 152. Great Wits sometimes may gloriously offend, &c.] He describes next the second sort, the beauties against rule. And even here, as he observes [from ver. 151 to 161] the offence is so glorious, and the fault so sublime, that the true Critic will not dare either to censure or reform them. Yet still the Poet is never to abandon himself to his imagination: the rules laid down for his conduct in this respect, are these; 1. That though he transgress the letter of some one particular Precept, yet that he be still careful to adhere to the end or spirit of them all; which end is the creation of one uniform perfect whole. And 2. That he have, in each instance, the authority of the dispensing power of the Ancients to plead for him. These rules observed, this licence will be seldom used, and only when he is compelled by need: which will disarm the Critic, and screen the offender from his laws. NOTES. scitis sancta sunt ista præcepta, sed hoc, quicquid est, Utilitas excogitavit. Non negabo autem sic utile esse plerumque ; verum si eadem illa nobis aliud suadebit Utilitas, hanc relictis magistrorum autoritatibus, sequemur." Quintil. lib. ii. cap. 13.-P. Our Ver. 150. Thus Pegasus, &c.] We have observed how the precepts for writing and judging are interwoven throughout the whole poem. Author first describes the sublime flight of a poet, soaring above all vulgar bounds, to snatch a grace directly which lies beyond the reach of a common adventurer and afterwards, the effect of that grace upon the true Critic: whom it penetrates with equal rapidity; going the nearest way to his heart, without passing through his judgment. By which it is not meant that it could not stand the test of judgment, but that as it was a beauty uncommon and above rule, and the judgment habituated to determine only by rule, it makes its direct appeal to the heart; which when once gained, soon brings over the judgment, whose concurrence (it being now enlarged and set above forms) is easily procured.—Warburton. PARALLEL PASSAGES. Ver. 152. gloriously offend,] Dryden's Aurengzebe: “Mean soul, and dar'st not gloriously offend!"—Stevens. |