formed me, and called out aloud, I cannot be so imposed on: I see plainly enough for whom they were designed;' and abused Pope most plentifully on the subject, though she was afterwards reconciled to him, and courted him, and gave him a thousand pounds to suppress this portrait, which he accepted, it is said, by the persuasion of Mrs. M. Blount; and after the Duchess's death it was printed in a folio sheet, 1746, and afterwards here" [i.e., in the Second Moral Essay'] "inserted with those of Philomede and Chloe."

In my Introduction to the Second Moral Essay' I discussed very fully the truth of this story. I pointed out the intrinsic improbability of Warton's statement, that Pope had received £1000 from the Duchess expressly for the purpose of suppressing the character of Atossa; I showed that the first publication of the character, and the report as to the £1000 on which Warton's narrative was partially based, were evidently the work of an enemy of Pope; and I gave my reasons for believing that it was Pope's intention when the character was published to declare it to be the portrait of Katherine, Duchess of Buckingham. The volume of this edition containing the 'Second Moral Essay' was published before the appearance of the Eighth Report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, which contained some letters between Pope and the Duchess of Marlborough, now reprinted as an appendix to the present volume. These letters not only indirectly confirm in a remarkable manner the reasoning which led me to the conclusions I have just stated, but enable me to give a more favourable account of Pope's conduct in the matter than my previous review of all the circumstances of the case had allowed me to hope possible. I concluded, contrary to the opinion of Mr. Dilke, that Pope did receive £1000 from the Duchess, and that there was some bargain between them, but that it was not of such a specific nature as Warton declares. The recently published correspondence, on the other hand, proves beyond question that the £1000 (as the favour' spoken of by Bolingbroke in his letter to Marchmont suggests) was not part of a contract, but was a free gift.

On the whole I think it may now be fairly inferred that the

facts of the case are as follows. Pope wrote the character of Atossa in 1732 when, as Bolingbroke said, 'he had some excuse; in other words while the Duchess of Marlborough, aiding Walpole with her vast wealth, was still an obnoxious person to all members of the Opposition. Powerful as she then was, he thought it best to reserve the publication of the satire till the next age. In 1739, however, the Duchess had thrown all her influence into the scale against Walpole. She allied herself closely with the leading members of the Opposition, and showed a particular desire to stand well with Pope. "The Duchess of Marlborough," writes the poet to Swift, April 28, 1739, in the last letter he sent to him, "makes great court to me, but I am too old for her, mind and body." It does not appear that she took part in the Grotto conferences, as it is evident from the correspondence that she had not visited Pope in his villa when she wrote to him her first dated letter, August 13, 1741. Later in that year, however, she was anxious to publish her papers, and Pope took some pains to procure for her the assistance of Hooke, the historian, who, from the materials she gave him, compiled his Conduct of the Duchess of Marlborough.' Under these altered circumstances, Pope bethought him that it was now no longer necessary to reserve the character of Atossa for the next age. As I have suggested in my 'Introduction,' he was naturally desirous that the world should read his striking verses. But being resolved, in the first place, to make his position secure, he read them to the Duchess as the portrait of the Duchess of Buckingham. She, it is said, penetrated the deception, and 'abused Pope plentifully;' but it is added by Warton that she was afterwards reconciled to him; and indeed it would not have been difficult for him to have shown her that the entire character, which had no doubt been considerably altered, could be made applicable to Katherine of Buckingham, while many strokes in it were inapplicable to herself.

In former days he had been an intimate friend of the Duke and Duchess of Buckinghamshire, and the latter writes to

acknowledge that she is under obligations to him.' In 1728 he appears to have purchased an annuity from the guardians. of the young Duke. Not long afterwards, according to his own account, the Duchess showed him a character of herself, written by some other hand, in which he made some trifling amendments; but she almost immediately took occasion to quarrel with him, and he saw nothing of her for five or six years. When her son died in 1735 she appears to have asked Pope to write his epitaph; and she circulated the report that the complimentary character mentioned above was his composition, an assertion which the poet flatly contradicted.❜ All these circumstances, if explained to the Duchess of Marlborough, would have made her, on reflection, inclined to credit his declaration that the character of Atossa was not intended to ridicule herself.

As her apology in the Conduct' testifies, however, she was extremely anxious that her memory should stand clear, so that she would have naturally sought to propitiate the dreaded satirist by all the means in her power. She knew perhaps that he had written, though he had not published, the satire upon her husband, a fac-simile of which has been inserted in the present edition. She begged Lord Marchmont, in 1742, to endeavour to keep him her friend. The recently published correspondence shows also beyond doubt that she pressed him incessantly to accept some considerable present; that he at first was equally persistent in refusing it, but in the end yielded to her importunity. We see them also writing to each other letters of the most friendly description, certainly as late as the summer of 1743, and probably in 1744.

With such relations existing between them, it is utterly incredible that Pope would have ventured to publish, as he was about to do, the character of Atossa in the lifetime of

1 Letter from Duchess of Buckingham to Pope, Vol. X., p. 154.

Letter from Pope to Lord Bathurst of Nov. 7, 1728.

3 Letter from Pope to Moyser, July 11, 1743. See Vol. X., pp. 216-17. 4 At the beginning of Vol. III.

the Duchess, had there either been any specific bargain on his part to suppress it, or had he even believed that she any longer supposed it to be meant for a satire on herself. He must have intended to let it be known on its appearance that its original was the Duchess of Buckingham, who had recently died. His own death prevented the explanation. Bolingbroke, who knew the intention with which the character had been originally written, who knew also of the favour' Pope had received from the Duchess of Marlborough, but who was not aware of his design of re-naming the portrait, was naturally amazed after the poet's death to find the verses prepared for publication. He concluded Pope to be guilty of inexcusable ingratitude, and afterwards, in his vindictive desire to avenge his own injuries, he sought to damage the poet's memory by causing the character to be printed on the folio sheet with the hostile note which a generation later served for the foundation of Warton's gossiping scandal. Warburton, who had been a consenting party to the suppression of the edition of the Ethic Epistles,' was of course precluded from making any direct defence of his friend, but from the note which he attached to the Character of Katherine, Duchess of Buckinghamshire,' it may be inferred, that if he had felt himself able, he would have put forward the explanation of the character of Atossa, which, coming from Pope himself, would of course have been accepted as conclusive.'

1 See Appendix IV., 'Remarks on the Character of Katherine, Duchess of Buckinghamshire.'

CHAPTER XVI.

THE PLACE OF POPE IN ENGLISH LITERATURE.

Difference between the Greek and the Mediæval Idea of Nature-Decay of the Medieval Idea-Revival of Classical Principles of Criticism-Pope's Principles of Poetical Conception and Poetical Diction-Objections to his Principles and Practice-Historical survey of the Revival of the Romantic Principle-Warton-Bowles-Controversy respecting Pope in 1819-Rise of the Lake School-Wordsworth's theory of Poetical Conception and Poetical Diction-Coleridge's opinion-Examination of the Theory of Wordsworth and Coleridge-Matthew Arnold's view of Pope's place in English Literature-Conclusion.

EVERY biography of Pope is certain to occasion a great variety of judgments. As far, indeed, as it is a record of action there is not likely to be much difference of opinion as to the merits of the hero. The life of Pope is the first example in English history of the rise of a man of letters, by literature alone, to a position not only of honourable independence, but of familiarity with the most powerful and distinguished among his contemporaries, and of influence in the political struggles of the age. This position was won in the face of extraordinary disadvantages arising out of obscure birth, feeble health, and religious prejudice. Success so achieved, by acknowledged genius united to heroic patience and industry, deserves from English society, and especially from men of letters, a tribute of generous admiration.

The character developed in this long struggle after fame naturally excites more mixed feelings. In almost every scene of Pope's eventful history we see a conflict of strangely opposing qualities. A consciousness of genius and a passionate desire for distinction were joined in him with a painful ever-present sense of the ridicule attaching to his physical infirmities. A