CATALOGUE OF THE SURREPTITIOUS AND INCORRECT EDITIONS OF MR. POPE'S LETTERS. I. FAMILIAR LETTERS to Henry Cromwell, Esq., by Mr. Pope, 12mo. Printed for Edmund Curll, 1727. [In this are verses, &c. ascribed to Mr. P. which are not his.] : II. Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence for Thirty Years from 1704 to 1734. Being a Collection of Letters which passed between him and several eminent Persons. Volume the First. London: Printed for E. Curll in Rose-street, Covent-Garden, 1735. Two Editions. The same in duodecimo, with cuts. The third Edition. [These contain several letters not genuine.] N.B. There are letters attributed to Pope in this volume, (which is the volume which Curll is supposed to have published with the concurrence, and by the instigation of Pope,) which no person of common decency would have avowed, much less permitted to be published in his own name. III. Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence. Volume the Second, with Letters to and from Lord Somers, Lord Harrington, Lord Parker, Bishop Atterbury, Judge Powis, Mr. Dryden, Mr. Secretary Harley, Mr. Secretary Addison, Matthew Prior, Esq., Mr. Steele, &c. London Printed for E. Curll, &c. 1735. : [In this volume are no letters of Mr. Pope's, but a few of those to Mr. Cromwell reprinted: nor any to him but one, said to be Bishop Atterbury's, and another in that bishop's name, certainly not his; one or two Letters from St. Omer's, advertised of Mr. Pope, but which proved only to be concerning him; some scandalous reflections of one Le Neve, on the Legislature, Courts of Justice, and Church of England, p. 116, 117, and the Divinity of Christ expressly denied, in page 123, 124. With some scandalous Anecdotes, and a Narrative.] N.B. This Volume opens with an Address to the Reader, in which Curll declares himself to be the SOLE EDITOR, and that Mr. Pope, E. P. P. T. and R. S. are all out of the question. This is followed by an abusive Epistle to Mr. Pope, in which he charges him with having given him a pint of Canary, at the Swan Tavern in Fleet Street, antimonially prepared. (See Life of Pope, vol. i. p. 361.)—And then follow the Narrative of the Method by which Mr. Pope's Letters have been published, and the Initial Correspondence, as given in the Appendix to the Life of Pope in the present Edition. Curl has also printed in this volume several gross and indecent copies of verses, some of which he has attributed to Pope. IV. Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence. Volume the Third. With Letters to and from the Duke of Shrewsbury, Lord Lansdowne, Bishop of St. Asaph, Sir Berkeley Lucy, William Walsh, Esq., Lady Chudleigh, Mrs. Manley, Mrs. Thomas, &c. London: Printed for E. Curll, at Pope's Head, in Rose-street, 1735. N.B. [In this is only one Letter by Mr. Pope to the Duchess of Buckingham, which the publisher some way procured and printed against her order. It also contains four Letters, intitled, Mr. Pope's to Miss Blount, which are literally taken from an old translation of Voiture's to Madame Rambouillet.] This heterogeneous Collection is preceded by several abusive addresses respecting Mr. Pope, and an assertion of Curll's, that he has exhibited a bill in Chancery against R. Smythe, to hold him to his contract of delivering to him six hundred Printed Copies of the First Volume of the Letters. V. Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence. Volume the Fourth. With Letters, &c., to and from Mr. Addison, Bishop Atterbury, Bishop Barlow, Bishop Fleetwood, Bishop Smalridge, Sir Berkely Lucy, King Henry VIII. to Anne Boleyn. To which are added, Muscovian Letters. London, printed for E. Curll, at Pope's Head, &c. 1736. [Contains not one letter of this author.] VI. Mr. Pope's Literary Correspondence. Volume the Fifth. With Letters of Lord Bolingbroke, Lord Lansdowne, Sir Samuel Garth, Mrs. Eliza Justice, William Bromley, Esq., Pieces of Mr. Walsh. London, printed for E. Curll, at Pope's Head, &c. 1737. [Containing only one letter of Mr. P., and another of the Lord B., with a scandalous preface of Curll's, how he could come at more of their letters.] SURREPTITIOUS AND INCORRECT EDITIONS, &c. 9 N.B. The foregoing account of this volume is very incorrect. It opens with an address from Curll to " His SUBSCRIBERS encore," in which he asserts, "he has several other valuable originals in his custody, which with these, were transmitted from Ireland;" and, that "it will be closed with whatever additional letters Mr. Pope shall think fit to insert in his works in Prose, now printing, in quarto, price a guinea." Accordingly it commences with a letter from Pope, and another from Lord Bolingbroke to Swift, being the letter referred to by Lord Orrery (v. Life of Pope, vol. i. p. 370). But, besides these letters, this volume contains many letters of Pope, Swift, Arbuthnot, Atterbury, Mr. Blount, Mr. Digby, Lord Peterborough, Mr. Gay, &c., all of which are pirated from the genuine edition, and which Curll concludes with some doggrel verses of his own addressed to Pope. VII. Dean Swift's Literary Correspondence, for twenty-four years; from 1714 to 1738. Consisting of original letters to and from Mr. Pope, Dr. Swift, Mr. Gay, Lord Bolingbroke, Dr. Arbuthnot, Dr. Wotton, Bishop Atterbury, Duke and Duchess of Queensbury. London : Printed for E. Curll at Pope's Head, in Rose-street, Covent Garden, 1741. N.B. This is the impression pirated by Curll from the Dublin Edition, for which it appears Pope filed a bill against Curll, and obtained an injunction, (v. Life of Pope, ante, vol. i. p. 372.) VIII. Letters of Mr. Pope and several eminent Persons. Vol. I. From 1705 to 1711. Printed and sold by the booksellers of London and Westminster, 8vo. 1735. The same. Vol. II. From 1711, &c. Printed and sold by the booksellers of London and Westminster, 8vo. 1735. The same in 12mo. with a Narrative. N.B. These appear to have been published subsequent to the IX. Letters of Mr. Pope and several eminent Persons, from 1705 to 1735. Printed and sold by the booksellers of London and Westminster, 12mo. 1735. [This Edition is said in the title to contain more Letters than any other; but contains only Two, said to be the Bishop of Rochester's, and printed before by Curll.] X. Letters of Mr. Pope and several eminent Persons, from the year 1705 to 1713. Vol. I. and Vol. II. Printed for T. Cooper at the Globe, in Paternoster-row, 1735, 12mo. [In this was inserted the forged Letter from the Bishop of Rochester, and some other things unknown to Mr. Pope.] |