Pagina-afbeeldingen
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To reft, the Cushion and foft Dean invite,
Who never mentions Hell to ears polite.

150

But hark! the chiming Clocks to dinner call; A hundred footsteps fcrape the marble Hall: The rich Buffet well-colour'd Serpents grace, And gaping Tritons fpew to wash your face.

NOTES.

the genius of whofe fchool was to debate de quolibet ente, and never come to a determination. Without the Circle, and behind the principal figures, are a number of young faces to. denote the scholars and difciples of the feveral fects. Thefe are all before the apoftle. Behind him are two other Figures: One regarding the Apoftle's action, with his face turned upwards; in which the paffions of malicious zeal and difappointed rage are fo ftrongly marked that we needed not the red bonnet to fee he was a Jewish Rabbi. The other is a pagan pricft full of anxiety for the danger of the established Religion.

Thus has this great Mafter, in order to heighten the dignity of his fubject, brought in the heads of every fect of philofophy and religion which were moft averfe to the principles, and moft oppofed to the fuccefs of the Gofpel; fo that onc may truly esteem this carton as the greateft effort of his divine genius.

Ibid. Verrio or Laguerre.] Verrio (Antonio) painted many cielings, &c. at Windfor, Hampton-Court, &c. and Laguerre at Blenheim-caftle, and other Places. P.

VER. 150. Who never mentions Hell to cars polite.] This is a fact; a reverend Dean preaching at Court, threatned the finner with punishment in a place which he thought it not "decent to name in fo polite an affembly." P.

VER. 153. Taxes the incongruity of Ornaments (tho' fometimes practifed by the ancients) where an open mouth ejects the water into a fountain, or where the fhocking images of ferpents, &c. are introduced in Grotto's or Buffets. P.

VER. 153. The rich Buffet well colour'd Serpents grace,] The circumftances of being well-colour'd fhews this ornament

Is this a dinner? this a Genial room?

No, 'tis a Temple, and a Hecatomb.

NOTES.

155

not only to be very abfurd, but very odious too; and has a peculiar beauty, as, in one inftance of falfe Tafte, viz. an injudicious choice in imitation, he gives (in the epithet employ'd) the fuggeftion of another, which is an injudicious manner of it. For thofe difagreeable objects which, when painted, give pleafure; if coloured after nature, in relief, become fhocking, as a toad, or dead carcafe in wax-work: yet these things are the delight of all people of bad Tafte. However, the Ornament itfelf pretends to fcience, and would juftify its ufe by antiquity, tho' it betrays the moft miferable ignorance of it. The Serpent amongst the ancients, was facred, and full of venerable myfteries. Now things do not excite ideas fo much according to their own natural impreffions, as by fictitious ones, arifing from foreign and accidental combinations; confequently the view of this animal raifed in them nothing of that abhorrence which it is wont to do in us; but, on the contrary, very agreeable fenfations, correfpondent to thofe foreign affociations. Hence, and more efpecially, because the Serpent was the peculiar Symbol of health, it became an extreme proper ornament to the genial rooms of the ancients. In the mean time, we who are ftrangers to all this fuperftition, yet make ourselves liable to one much more abfurd, which is, idolizing the very fashions that arofe from it. But if thefe pretenders to Tafte can fo widely miftake, it is no wonder that thofe who pretend to none, I mean the verbal Critics, fhould a little hallucinate in this matter. I remember, when the fhort Latin infcription on Shakespear's monument was first fet up, and in the very ftyle of elegant and fimple antiquity, the News-papers were full of thefe fmall critics; in which the only obfervation that looked like learning, was founded in this ignorance of Tafte and Antiquity. One of thefe Critics objected to the word Mors (in the infcription) because the Roman writers of the pureft times fcrupled to employ it; but, in its ftead, ufed an improper, that is, a figurative word, or otherwife a circumlocution. But had he confidered that it was their Superftition of lucky and unlucky words which occafion'd this delicacy, he must have feen that a

A folemn Sacrifice, perform'd in state,
You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.
So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear
Sancho's dread Doctor and his Wand were there.
Between each Act the trembling falvers ring, 161
From foup to sweet-wine, and God bless the King.
In plenty ftarving, tantaliz'd in state,

And complaifantly help'd to all I hate,
Treated, carefs'd, and tir'd, I take my leave, 165
Sick of his civil Pride from Morn to Eve;
I curfe fuch lavish cost, and little skill,
And fwear no Day was ever past so ill.

Yet hence the Poor are cloath'd, the Hungry fed; Health to himself, and to his Infants bread 170

NOTES.

Chriftian writer, in a Chriftian infcription, acted with great judgment in avoiding so fenfeless an affectation of, what he mifcalls, claffical expreffion.

VER. 155. Is this a dinner, &c.] The proud Feftivals of fome men are here set forth to ridicule, where pride destroys the eafe, and formal regularity all the pleasurable enjoyment of the entertainment. P.

VER. 156.a Hecatomb.] Alluding to the hundred footflets before.

VER. 160. Sancho's dread Doctor] See Don Quixote, chap. xlvii. P.

VER. 169. Yet hence the Poor, &c.] The Moral of the whole, where PROVIDENCE is juftified in giving Wealth to those who squander it in this manner. A bad Tafte employs more hands, and diffufes Expence more than a good one. This recurs to what is laid down in Book I. Ep. ii. ✯ 230---7, and in the Epiftle preceding this, * 161, &c. X

VOL. III.

P.

The Lab'rer bears: What his hard Heart denies, His charitable Vanity fupplies.

Another age shall fee the golden Ear Imbrown the Slope, and nod on the Parterre, Deep Harvests bury all his pride has plann'd, 175 And laughing Ceres re-affume the land.

COMMENTARY.

VER. 173. Another age, &c.] But now a difficulty flicks with me, (anfwers an objector) this load of evil ftill remains a monument of folly to future ages; an incumbrance to the plain on which it stands; and a nuisance to the neighbourhood round about, filling it

with imitating fools.

For men are apt to take the example next at hand; and aptest of all to take a bad one. No fear of that, replies the poet, (from 172 to 177.) Nothing abfurd or wrong is exempt from the jurifdiction of Time, which is always fure to do full justice on it;

Another age fhall fee the golden Ear

Imbrown the Slope, and nod on the Parterre,
Deep Harvefts bury all his pride has plann'd,
And laughing Ceres re-affume the land,

For the prerogative of

Time fhall make it grow,

is only due to the defigns of true Tafte joined to Use: And "Tis Ufe alone that fanctifies Expence ;

and nothing but the fanctity of that can arreft the justice of Time. And thus the fecond part concludes; which confift

NOTES.

VER. 173. Another age, &c.] Had the poet lived but three years longer, he had feen his general prophecy against all illjudged magnificence fulfilled in a particular inftance.

VER. 176. And laughing Ceres re-affume the land.] The great beauty of this line is an inftance of the art peculiar to our poet; by which he has fo difpofed a trite claffical figure,

Who then shall grace, or who improve the Soil? Who plants like BATHURST, or who builds like

BOYLE.

"Tis Ufe alone that fanctifies Expence,

And fplendor borrows all her rays from Senfe. 180
His Father's Acres who enjoys in peace,
Or makes his Neighbours glad, if he encrease:

COMMENTARY.

ing of an example of false Tafte in every attempt to Magnificence, is full of concealed precepts for the true: As the first part, which contains precepts for true Tafte, is full of examples of the falfe.

III

VER. 177. Who then fhall grace, &c.] We come now to the third and laft part, (from 176 to the end) and, as in the firft, the poet had given examples of wrong judged Magnificence, in things of Tafte without Senfe; and, in the fecond, an example of others without either Senfe or Tafte; fo the third is employed in two examples of Magnificence in Planting and Building; where both Senfe and Tafte highly prevail: The one in him, to whom this Epiftle is addreffed; and the other, in the truly noble person whose amiable Character bore fo confpicuous a part in the foregoing.

Who then fhall grace, or who improve the Soil?

Who plants like BATHURST, or who builds like Boyle. Where, in the fine defcription he gives of these two species of Magnificence, he artfully infinuates, that tho', when executed in

NOTES.

as not only to make it do its vulgar office, of representing a very plentiful harvest, but alfo to allume the Image of Nature, re-eftablitning herself in her rights, and mocking the vain efforts of falfe magnificence, which would keep her out of them.

VER. 179, 180. 'Tis Ufe alone that fanctifies Expence, And Splendor lorrows all her rays from Senfe.] Here the poet, to

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