"Receive(he said) these robes, which once were mine, "Dulness is sacred in a sound divine."

He ceas'd, and spread the robe; the crow'd confess
The rev'rend flamen in his lengthen'd dress.
Around him wide a sable army stand,

355

A low-born, cell-bred, selfish, servile band,
Prompt or to guard or stab, to saint, or damn,
Heav'n's Swiss, who fight for any god, or man.
Through Lud's fam'd gates, along the well-known
Rolls the black troop, and overshades the street, [Fleet,
Till show'rs of sermons, characters, essays,
In circling fleeces whiten all the ways:

361

So clouds replenish'd from some bog below,
Mount in dark volumes, and descend in snow.
Here stopt the Goddess; and in pomp proclims 365
A gentler exercise to close the games.

"Ye Critics! in whose heads, as equal scales,

"I weigh what author's heaviness prevails;

"Which most conduce to sooth the soul in slumbers, "My H---ley's periods, or my Blackmore's numbers; "Attend the trial we propose to make:

374

"If there be man who o'er such works can wake,
"Sleep's all-subduing charms who dares defy,
"And boasts Ulysses' ear with Argus' eye;
"To him we grant our amplest pow'rs to sit
"Judge of all present, past, and future wit;

375

REMARKS.

were intolerable. His manner of writing has a great resemblance with that of the gentlemen of the Dunciad against our Author, as will be seen in the parallel of Mr. Dryden and him.

"To cavil, censure, dictate, right or wrong, "Full and eternal privilege of tongue."

Three college sophs, and three pert Templars came, The same their talents, and their tastes the same; Each prompt to query, answer, and debate, And smit with love of poesy and prate.

381

The pond'rous books two gentle readers bring;
The heroes sit, the vulgar form a ring.

The clam'rous crowd is hush'd with mugs of mum,
Till all tun'd equal send a gen'ral hum.

Then mount the clerks, and in one lazy tone
Through the long, heavy, painful page drawl on;
Soft creeping, words on words, the sense compose,
At ev'ry line they stretch, they yawn, they doze.
As to soft gales top-heavy pines bow low
Their heads, and lift them as they cease to blow;
Thus, oft they rear, and oft the head decline,
As breathe, or pause, by fits, the airs divine.
And now to this side, now to that they nod,
As verse, or prose, infuse the drowsy god.
Thrice Budgel aim'd to speak, but thrice supprest
By potent Arthur, knock'd his chin and breast.

REMARKS.

386

391

395

v. 397. Thrice Budgel aim'd to speak.] Famous for his speeches on many occasions about the South-sea scheme, &c. "He is a very ingenious gentleman, and "hath written some excellent Epilogues to plays, and one small piece on Love, which is very pretty." Jacob, Lives of Poets, vol. II. p. 289. But this gentle

IMITATIONS.

v. 380, 381. The same their talents---Each prompt, &c.] Ambo florentes ætatibus, Arcades ambo.

"Et certare pares, et respondere parati." Virg. Ecl. vi.

Toland and Tindal, prompt at priests to jeer,

Yet silent bow'd to Christ's no kingdom here.

Who sat the nearest, by the words o'ercome,

Slept first; the distant nodded to the hum;

400

405

Then down are roll'd the books; stretch'd o'er 'em lies
Each gentle clerk, and mutt'ring seals his eyes.
As what a Dutchman plumps into the lakes,
One circle first, and then a second makes;
What dulness dropt among her sons imprest,
Like motion from one circle to the rest:

So from the midmost the nutation spreads,

Round and more round, o'er all the sea of beads. 410

REMARKS.

man since made himself much more eminent, and personally well known to the greatest statesmen of all parties, as well as to all the courts of law in this nation.

v. 399. Toland and Tindal.] Two persons, not so hap py as to be obscure, who writ against the religion_of their county. Toland, the author of the Atheist's Liturgy, called Pantheisticon, was a spy in pay to Lord Oxford. Tindal was author of the Rights of the Christian Church, and Christianity as old as the Creation

VARIATIONS.

v. 399. In the first edition it was,

v.

Collins and Tindal, prompt at priests to jeer.

IMITATIONS.

382. And smit with love of poesy and prate.]
Smit with the love of sacred song---

Milton.

v. 384. The beroes sit, the vulgar form a ring.] Consedere duces, et vulg. stante corona."

Ovid. Met. XIII.

v. 410. O'er all the sea of heads.]
"A waving sea of heads was round me spread,
"And still fresh streams the gazing deluge fed.'

"

Blackm. Job.

At last Centlivre felt her voice to fail,

Motteux himself unfinish'd left his tale.

Boyer the state, and Law the stage gave o'er,
Morgan and Mandeville could prate no more;
Norton from Daniel and Ostroea sprung,

415

Bless'd with his father's front and mother's tongue, Hung silent down his never-blushing head,

And all was hush'd, as Folly's self lay dead.

REMARKS.

He also wrote an abusive pamphlet against Earl S---, which was suppresed while yet in MS. by an eminent person, then out of the ministry, to whom he shewed it, expecting his approbation. This Doctor afterwards published the same piece, mutatis mutandis, against that very person.

v. 411. Centlivre.] Mrs. Susanna Centlivre, wife to Mr. Centlivre, Yeoman of the Mouth to his Majesty. She writ many plays, and a song (says Mr. Jacob, vol. I. p. 32.) before she was seven years old. She also writ a ballad against Mr. Pope's Homer, before he began it.

v. 413. Boyer the state, and Law the stage gave o'er.] A Boyer, a voluminous compiler of annals, political collections, &c. William Law, A. M. wrote with great zeal against the stage; Mr. Dennis answered with as great. Their books were printed in 1726.

v. 414. Morgan.] A writer against religion, distinguished no otherwise from the rabble of his tribe than by the pompousness of his title; for having stolen his morality from Tindal, and his philosophy from Spino

VARIATIONS.

v. 413. In the first edition it was,

T--s and T-- the church and state gave o'er,
Nor** talk'd, nor S--- whisper'd more.

IMITATIONS.

v. 418. And all was hush'd, as Folly's self lay dead. Alludes to Dryden's verse in the Indian Emperor: "All thing's are hush'd, as Nature's self lay dead."

Thus the soft gifts of Sleep conclude the day, And stretch'd on bulks, as usual, poets lay. Why should I sing what bards the nightly Muse Did slumb'ring visit, and convey to stews; Who prouder march'd, with magistrates in state, To some fam'd round-house, ever-open gate! How Henley lay inspir'd beside a sink,

And to mere mortals seem'd a priest in drink : While others, timely, to the neighb'ring Fleet (Haunt of the Muses) made their safe retreat?

REMARKS.

420

425

za, he calls himself by the courtesy of England, a Moral Philosopher.

Ibid. Mandeville.] This writer, who prided himself as much in the reputation of an immoral philosopher, was author of a famous book called The Fable of the Bees: written to prove, That moral virtue is the invention of knaves, and Christian virtue the imposition of fools; and that vice is necessary, and alone sufficient to render society flourishing and happy.

v. 415. Norton, Norton de Foe, offspring of the famous Daniel; Fortes creantur fortibus: one of the Authors of the Flying Post, in which well-bred work Mr. P. had sometiine the honour to be abused with his betters, and of many hired scurrilities, and daily papers, to which he never set his name.