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Now lap-dogs give themselves the roufing fhake, 15 And fleepless lovers, juft at twelve, awake:

Thrice rung the bell, the flipper knock'd the ground, And the prefs'd watch return'd a filver found. Belinda ftill her downy pillow preft,

Her guardian SYLPH prolong'd the balmy reft: 20 "Twas He had fummon'd to her filent bed The morning dream that hover'd o'er her head,

VER. 22. Belinda ftill, etc.] All the verfes from hence to the end of this Canto were added afterwards.

VER. 20. Her Guardian Sylph] When Mr. Pope had projected to give this Poem its prefent form, he was obliged to find it with its Machinery. For as the fubject of the Epic Poem confifts of two parts, the metaphyfical and the civil, fo this mock epic, which is of the fatiric kind, and receives its grace from a ludicrous imitation of the other's pomp and folemnity, was to have the fame divifion of the subject. And, as the civil part is intentionally debafed by the choice of an infignificant action: fo fhould the metaphysical, by the use of some very extravagant fyftem. A rule, which tho' neither Boileau nor Garth have been careful enough to attend to, our Author's good fenfe would not fuffer him to overlook. And that fort of Machinery which his judgment taught him was only fit for his ufe, his admirable invention fupplied. There was but one Syftem in all nature which was to his purpose, the Roficrufian Philofophy; and this, by the well directed effort of his imagination, he presently seized upon. The fanatic Alchemifts, in their fearch after the great secret, had invented a means altogether proportioned to their end. It was a kind of Theological-Philosophy, made up of almost equal mixtures of Pagan Platonifm, Chriftian Quietism, and the Jewish Cabbala; a compofition enough to fright Reafon from human commerce,

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This general fyftem, he tells us, he took

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A Youth more glitt'ring than a Birth-night Beau,
(That ev'n in flumber caus'd her cheek to glow)
Seem'd to her ear his winning lips to lay,
And thus in whispers faid, or feem'd to say.
Fairest of mortals, thou distinguish'd care
Of thousand bright Inhabitants of Air!
If e'er one Vision touch thy infant thought,
Of all the Nurfe and all the Priest have taught; 30
Of airy Elves by moonlight fhadows feen,
The filver token, and the circled green,

Or virgins vifited by Angel-pow'rs,

With golden crowns and wreaths of heav'nly flow'rs;

as he found it in a little French tract called, Le Comte de Gabalis. This book is written in Dialogue, and is a delicate and very ingenious piece of raillery of the Abbe Villiers, upon that invifible fect, of which the ftories that went about at that time, made a great deal of noise at Paris. But, as in this fatirical Dialogue, Mr. P. found several whimfies, of a very high mysterious kind, told of the nature of these elementary beings, which were very unfit to come into the machinery of such a fort of poem, he has with great judgment omitted them; and in their stead, made use of the Legendary ftories of Guardian Angels, and the Nursery Tales of the Fairies; which he has artfully accommodated to the rest of the Roficrusian Syftem. And to this, (unless we will be fo uncharitable to believe he intended to give a needless scandal) we must suppose he referred, in these two lines,

If c'er one Vision touch'd thy infant thought,

Of all the nurse, and all the priest have taught.

Thus, by the most beautiful invention imaginable, he has contrived, that, as in the serious Epic, the popular belief supports the Machinery; fo, in his mock Epic, the Machinery should be contrived to difmount philofophic pride and arrogance.

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Hear and believe! thy own importance know, 35
Nor bound thy narrow views to things below.
Some fecret truths, from learned pride conceal'd,
To Maids alone and Children are reveal'd:
What tho' no credit doubting Wits may give?
The Fair and Innocent shall still believe.
Know then, unnumber'd Spirits round thee fly,
The light Militia of the lower fky:
Thefe, tho' unfeen, are ever on the wing,
Hang o'er the Box, and hover round the Ring.
Think what an equipage thou haft in Air,
And view with scorn two Pages and a Chair.
As now your own, our beings were of old,
And once inclos'd in Woman's beauteous mould;
Thence, by a foft tranfition, we repair

From earthly Vehicles to thefe of air.

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Think not, when Woman's tranfient breath is

fled,

That all her vanities at once are dead;

Succeeding vanities the ftill regards,

And tho' fhe plays no more, o'erlooks the cards.

VER. 47. As now your own, etc.] He here forfakes the Roficrufian fyftem; which, in this part, is too extravagant even for Poetry; and gives a beautiful fiction of his own, on the Platonic Theology of the continuance of the paffions in another ftate, when the mind, before its leaving this, has not been purged and purified by philofophy; which furnishes an occafion for much ufeful fatire.

Her joy in gilded chariots, when alive,
And love of Ombre, after death furvive.
For when the Fair in all their pride expire,
To their first Elements their Souls retire:
The Sprites of fiery Termagants in Flame
Mount up and take a Salamander's name.
Soft yielding minds to Water glide away,
And fip, with Nymphs, their elemental Tea.
The graver Prude finks downward to a Gnome,
In fearch of mifchief ftill on Earth to roam.
The light Coquettes in Sylphs aloft repair,
And fport and flutter in the fields of Air.

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60

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Know farther yet; whoever fair and chaste Rejects mankind, is by fome Sylph embrac'd: For Spirits, freed from mortal laws, with ease Affume what fexes and what fhapes they please. 70 What guards the purity of melting Maids, In courtly balls, and midnight masquerades, Safe from the treach'rous friend, the daring spark, The glance by day, the whisper in the dark,

VER. 68. is by fome Sylph embrac'd:] Here again the Author refumes a tenet peculiar to the Roficrusian system. But the principle, on which it is founded, was by no means fit to be employed in iuch a fort of poem.

IMITATIONS.

VER. 54, 55.

Quæ gratia currûm

Armorumque fuit vivis, quae cura nitentes
Pafcere equos, eadem fequitur tellure repoftos.

Virg. Æn, vi,

When kind occafion prompts their warm defires, 75
When music foftens, and when dancing fires?
'Tis but their Sylph, the wife Celestials know,
Tho' Honour is the word with Men below.

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Some nymphs there are, too confcious of their face,
For life predeftin'd to the Gnome's embrace.
These fwell their profpects and exalt their pride,
When offers are difdain'd, and love deny'd :
Then gay Ideas croud the vacant brain,

While Peers, and Dukes, and all their sweeping train,
And Garters, Stars, and Coronets appear, 85
And in foft founds, Your Grace falutes their ear.
"Tis these that early taint the female foul,
Inftruct the eyes of young Coquettes to roll,
Teach infant-cheeks a bidden blush to know,
And little hearts to flutter at a Beau.

Oft, when the world imagine women stray,
The Sylphs thro' myftic mazes guide their way,
Thro' all the giddy circle they pursue,

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And old impertinence expel by new.
What tender maid but muft a victim fall
To one man's treat, but for another's ball?
When Florio fpeaks, what virgin could withstand,
If gentle Damon did not squeeze her hand?
With varying vanities, from ev'ry part,

They shift the moving Toyshop of their heart; 100 Where wigs with wigs, with fword-knots fwordknots strive,

Beaux banish beaux, and coaches coaches drive.

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