THE FIRST EPISTLE

OF THE

FIRST BOOK OF HORACE.

EPISTLE I.

To LORD BOLINGBROKE1.

[HORACE'S Epistle is addressed to Maecenas; and explains the causes why he had relinquished lyrical poetry in order to study philosophy as an eclectic after the fashion of Aristippus. It then proceeds to show that true happiness depends upon virtue and wisdom, to which that study leads, and not upon the external comforts of life.]

ST

T. JOHN, whose love indulg'd my labours past,
Matures my present, and shall bound my last!

Why will you break the Sabbath of my days 2?
Now sick alike of Envy and of Praise.

Public too long, ah let me hide my Age!

See, Modest Cibber now has left the Stage3:
Our Gen'rals now, retir'd to their Estates,
Hang their old Trophies o'er the Garden gates*,
In Life's cool Ev'ning satiate of Applause,

Nor fond of bleeding, ev'n in BRUNSWICK'S cause 5.
A Voice there is, that whispers in my ear,
('Tis Reason's voice, which sometimes one can hear)
"Friend Pope! be prudent, let your Muse take breath,
"And never gallop Pegasus to death;

"Lest stiff, and stately, void of fire or force,

"You limp, like Blackmore on a Lord Mayor's horse "."
Farewell then Verse, and Love, and ev'ry Toy,

The Rhymes and Rattles of the Man or Boy;
What right, what true, what fit we justly call,
Let this be all my care-for this is All:
To lay this harvest up, and hoard with haste
What ev'ry day will want, and most, the last.
But ask not, to what Doctors I apply?
Sworn to no Master, of no Sect am I:

[Cf. note to Essay on Man, Ep. 1.] 2 Sabbath of my days?] i.e. The 49th year, the age of the Author. Warburton.

3 [Colley Cibber retired from the stage after a histrionic career of more than 40 years in 1733; but returned in 1734 and did not make his 'positively last appearance' till 1745.]

[Warburton compares Moral Essays, Ep. IV. v. 30. Pope is said by Warton to allude to the entrance of Lord Peterborough's Lawn at Bevismount near Southampton.]

5 Ev'n in Brunswick's cause.] In the former

5

ΙΟ

15

20

As drives the storm, at any door I knock:

25

And house with Montaigne now, or now with Locke'.

Sometimes a Patriot, active in debate,

Mix with the World, and battle for the State,

Free as young Lyttelton, her Cause pursue,
Still true to Virtue, and as warm as true 2:
Sometimes with Aristippus, or St. Paul,
Indulge my candor, and grow all to all;
Back to my native Moderation slide,
And win my way by yielding to the tide.

Long, as to him who works for debt, the day,
Long as the Night to her whose Love's away,
Long as the Year's dull circle seems to run,
When the brisk Minor pants for twenty-one :
So slow th' unprofitable moments roll,
That lock up all the Functions of my soul;
That keep me from myself; and still delay
Life's instant business to a future day:
That task, which as we follow, or despise,
The eldest is a fool, the youngest wise;
Which done, the poorest can no wants endure;
And which not done, the richest must be poor.

Late as it is, I put myself to school,
And feel some comfort, not to be a fool.
Weak tho' I am of limb, and short of sight,
Far from a Lynx, and not a Giant quite;
I'll do what Mead and Cheselden advise,
To keep these limbs, and to preserve these eyes.
Not to go back, is somewhat to advance,
And men must walk at least before they dance.
Say, does thy blood rebel, thy bosom move
With wretched Av'rice, or as wretched Love?

Know, there are Words, and Spells, which can control
Between the Fits this Fever of the soul:
Know, there are Rhymes, which fresh and fresh apply'd
Will cure the arrant'st Puppy of his Pride.

бо

1. And house with Montaigne now, and now with Locke.] i.e. Choose either an active or a contemplative life, as is most fitted to the season and circumstances. For he regarded these Writers as the best Schools to form a man for the world; or to give him a knowledge of himself: Montaigne excelling in his observations on social and civil life; and Locke, in developing the faculties, and explaining the operations of the human mind. Warburton. [Pope appears to have read Locke at an early age; and to have recurred to him in his later and equally desultory philosophical studies.]

2 [George Lord Lyttelton, author of the Dialogues of the Dead, besides poems (Pastorals) and theological and historical works, was a correspondent of Pape's.]

3 Omnis Aristippum decuit color, et status,

et res. P. There is an impropriety and indecorum, in joining the name of the most profligate parasite of the Court of Dionysius with that of an apostle. In a few lines before, the name of Montaigne is not sufficiently contrasted by the name of Locke. Warton.

A can no wants endure;] i.e. Can want nothing. Badly expressed. Warburton. 5 [Mead: v. Moral Essays, Ep. IV. v. 10.] 6 [In answer to Swift's enquiry who 'this Cheselden was, Pope informed him that C. was 'the most noted and most deserving man in the whole profession of chirurgery and had saved the lives of thousands' by his skill. There is an amusing letter from Pope to Cheselden in Roscoe's Life ad ann. 1737; speaking of the cataract to which v. 52 appears to allude.]

30

See him, with pains of body, pangs of soul,

Burn through, the Tropic, freeze beneath the Pole!
Wilt thou do nothing for a nobler end,
Nothing, to make Philosophy thy friend?
To stop thy foolish views, thy long desires,
And ease thy heart of all that it admires?

75

Here, Wisdom calls: "Seek Virtue first, be bold!
"As Gold to Silver, Virtue is to Gold1."
There, London's voice: "Get Money, Money still!
"And then let Virtue follow, if she will."
This, this the saving doctrine, preach'd to all,
From low St. James's up to high St. Paul2;

80

From him whose quills stand quiver'd at his ear3,

To him who notches sticks at Westminster*.
Barnard in spirit, sense, and truth abounds 5;

85

"Pray then, what wants he?" Fourscore thousand pounds;

A Pension, or such Harness for a slave

As Bug now has, and Dorimant would have.
Barnard, thou art a Cit, with all thy worth;

But Bug and D1, Their Honours, and so forth.
Yet ev'ry child another song will sing:

90

"Virtue, brave boys! 'tis Virtue makes a King."
True, conscious Honour is to feel no sin,
He's arm'd without that's innocent within;

Be this thy Screen, and this thy wall of Brass7;
Compar'd to this, a Minister's an Ass.

And say, to which shall our applause belong,
This new Court jargon, or the good old song?
The modern language of corrupted Peers,
Or what was spoke at CRESSY and POITIERS?
Who counsels best? who whispers, "Be but great,
"With Praise or Infamy leave that to fate;
"Get Place and Wealth, if possible, with grace;
"If not, by any means get Wealth and Place-"

1 [Warburton points that this line gives the meaning neither of Pope nor of the Horatian: 'Vilius est auro argentum, virtutibus aurum.']

[Referring to the opposite schools of theology in favour at court and in the metropolitan Chapter.]

3[i.e. a scrivener with his pen in his ear:] 4 [i.e. Exchequer tallies. Warburton.]

For what? to have a Box where Eunuchs sing1,
And foremost in the Circle eye a King.

}

Or he, who bids thee face with steady view
Proud Fortune, and look shallow Greatness thro':
And, while he bids thee, sets th' Example too?
If such a Doctrine, in St. James's air,
Shou'd chance to make the well-drest Rabble stare;
If honest Sz2 take scandal at a Spark,
That less admires the Palace than the Park:
Faith I shall give the answer Reynard gave:
"I cannot like, dread Sir, your Royal Cave:
"Because I see, by all the tracks about,

"Full many a Beast goes in, but none come out."
Adieu to Virtue, if you're once a Slave:

Send her to Court, you send her to her grave.

Well, if a King's a Lion, at the least

The People are a many-headed Beast:
Can they direct what measures to pursue,
Who know themselves so little what to do?

Alike in nothing but one Lust of Gold,

Just half the land would buy, and half be sold:
Their Country's wealth our mightier Misers drain,
Or cross, to plunder Provinces, the Main;

125

The rest, some farm the Poor-box5, some the Pews;
Some keep Assemblies, and would keep the Stews;
Some with fat Bucks on childless dotards fawn;
Some win rich Widows by their Chine and Brawn;
While with the silent growth of ten per cent,
In dirt and darkness, hundreds stink content.
Of all these ways, if each pursues his own,
Satire be kind, and let the wretch alone:
But shew me one who has it in his pow'r
To act consistent with himself an hour.

130

135

Sir Job sail'd forth, the ev'ning bright and still,

"No place on earth (he cry'd) like Greenwich hill!"
Up starts a Palace; lo, th' obedient base

Slopes at its foot, the woods its sides embrace,
The silver Thames reflects its marble face.
Now let some whimsy, or that Dev'l within

}

140

Which guides all those who know not what they mean,
But give the Knight (or give his Lady) spleen;

145

Away, away! take all your scaffolds down,

66

"For Snug's the word: My dear! we'll live in Town."
At am'rous Flavio is the stocking thrown?

[The Italian Opera, with singers like Senesino and Farinelli, and Cuzzoni and Faustina, was at the zenith of its reputation in London in the reign of George II.]

2 [Augustus Schutz, who held court offices near the person of George II. both before and after his accession to the throne. Carruthers.] 3 Quia me vestigia terrent

Hor. [from Aesop's well-known fable.]

4 Their Country's wealth our mightier Misers drain,] The undertakers for advancing Loans to the Public on the funds. Warburton.

5 Alluding most probably to a Society calling itself the 'Charitable Corporation;' by which thousands were cheated and ruined. Bowles. [V. Pope's note to Moral Essays, Ep. 111. v.

Omnia te adversum spectantia, nulla retrorsum. 100.]

That very night he longs to lie alone.

The Fool, whose Wife elopes some thrice a quarter,
For matrimonial solace dies a martyr.

150

Did ever Proteus, Merlin, any witch,

Transform themselves so strangely as the Rich?
Well, but the Poor-The Poor have the same itch;
They change their weekly Barber, weekly News,
Prefer a new Japanner to their shoes,
Discharge their Garrets, move their beds, and run
(They know not whither) in a Chaise and one;
They hire their sculler, and when once aboard,
Grow sick, and damn the climate-like a Lord.
You laugh, half Beau, half Sloven if I stand,
My wig all powder, and all snuff my band;
You laugh, if coat and breeches strangely vary,
White gloves, and linen worthy Lady Mary!
But when no Prelate's Lawn with hair-shirt lin❜d,
Is half so incoherent as my Mind,

When (each opinion with the next at strife,
One ebb and flow of follies all my life)

155

160

165

I plant, root up; I build, and then confound;

Turn round to square, and square again to round;

170

You never change one muscle of your face,
You think this Madness but a common case,
Nor once to Chanc'ry, nor to Hale1 apply;
Yet hang your lip, to see a Seam awry!
Careless how ill I with myself agree,
Kind to my dress, my figure, not to Me.
Is this my Guide, Philosopher, and Friend??

175

This, he who loves me, and who ought to mend?

Who ought to make me (what he can, or none,)
That Man divine whom Wisdom calls her own;
Great without Title, without Fortune bless'd;
Rich ev'n when plunder'd, honour'd while oppress'd;
Lov'd without youth, and follow'd without pow'r;
At home, tho' exil'd; free, tho' in the Tower;
In short, that reas'ning, high, immortal Thing,
Just less than Jove, and much above a King,
Nay, half in heav'n-except (what's mighty odd)
A Fit of Vapours clouds this Demi-God.

180

185

1 Dr Hale, of Lincoln's Inn Fields, a physician employed in cases of insanity. Carruthers.

2 [The titles by which Pope addresses Bolingbroke in the Essay on Man, Ep. IV. v. 390.]