not published or written, one fyllable of, or to either of you; never hitch'd your names in a Verfe, or trifled with your good names in company. Can I be honeftly charged with any other crime but an Omiffion (for the word Neglect, which I us'd before, flip'd my pen unguardedly) to continue my admiration of you all my life, and ftill to contemplate, face to face, your many excellencies and perfections? I am perfuaded you can reproach me truly with no great Faults, except my natural ones, which I am as rea-· dy to own, as to do all juftice to the contrary Beauties in you. It is true, my Lord, I am fhort, not well fhap'd, generally ill-drefs'd, if not fometimes dirty: Your LordThip and Ladyfhip are ftill in bloom; your Figures fuch, as rival the Apello of Belvedere, and the Venus of Medicis ; and your faces fo finifh'd, that neither fickness or paífion can deprive them of Colour; I will allow your own in particular to be the fineft that ever Man was bleft with: preferve it, my Lord, and reflect, that to be a Critic, would coft it too many frowns, and to be a Statefiman, too many wrinkles! I further confefs, I am now fomewhat old; but fo your Lordship and this excellent Lady, with all your beauty, will (I hope) one day be. I know your Genius and hers fo perfectly tally, that you cannot but join in admiring each other, and by confequence in the contempt of all fuch as myfelf. You have both, in my regard, been like-(Your Lordfhip, I know, loves a Simile, and it will be one fuitable to your Quality) you have been like Two Princes, and I like a poor Animal facrificed between them to cement a lafting League: I hope I have not bled in vain; but that fuch an amity may endure for ever For tho' it be what common understandings would hardly conceive, Two Wits however may be perfuaded, that it is in Friendship as in Enmity, The more danger, the more` bonour.

!

Give me the liberty, my Lord, to tell you, why I never replied to thofe Verfes on the Imitator of Horace? They regarded nothing but my Figure, which I fet no value upon; and my Morals, which, I knew, needed no defence: Any honeft man has the pleasure to be confcious, that it is out of the power of the Wittielt, nay the Greatest Perfon in the Kingdom, to leffen him that way, but at the expence of his own Truth, Honour, or Justice.

But tho' I declined to explain myself juft at the time when I was fillily threaten'd, I fhall now give your Lordfhip a frank account of the offence you imagined to be meant to you. Fanny (my Lord) is the plain English of

Hh 2

Fannius,

Fannius, a real perfon, who was a foolish Critic, and an enemy of Horace: perhaps a Noble one, for fo (if your Latin be gone in earneft *) I muft acquaint you, the word Beatus may be conftrued.

Beatus Fannius! ultro.

Delatis capfis et imagine.

This Fannius was, it feems, extremely fond both of his Poetry and his Perfon, which appears by the pictures and Statues he caufed to be made of himself, and by his great diligence to propagate bad Verfes at Court, and get them admitted into the library of Auguflus. He was moreover of a delicate or effeminate complexion, and conftant at the Affemblies and Operas of thofe days, where he took it in, to his head to flander poor Horace.

Ineptus

Fannius, Hermogenis laedat conviva Tigelli.

till it provoked him at laft juft to name him, give him a lash, and fend him whimpering to the Ladies,

Difcipularum inter jubeo plorare cathedras,

So much for Fanny, my Lord. The word fpins (as Dr. Freind, or even Dr. Sherwin could affure you) was the literal tranflation of deduci; a metaphor taken from a Silkworm, my Lord, to fignify any flight, filken, or (as your Lordship and the Ladies call it) + flimzy piece of work. Į prefume your Lordship has enough of this, to convince you there was nothing personal but to that Fannius, who (with all his fine accomplishments) had never been heard of, but for that Horace he injur'd.

In regard to the right honourable Lady, your Lordfhip's friend, I was far from defigning a perfon of her condition by a name fo derogatory to her, as that of Sappho ; a name prostituted to every infamous Creature that ever wrote Verfe or Novels. I proteft I never apply'd that name to her in any verfe of mine, public or private; and (I firmly believe) not in any Letter or Converfation. Whoever could invent a Falfehood to fupport an accufation, I pity; and whoever can believe fuch a Character to be theirs, I pity * all I learn'd from Dr. Freind at fchool, Has quite deferted this poor John Trot-bead, And left plain native English in its ftead. Epift. p. 2. Weak texture of bis flimzy brain, p. 6.

till more. God forbid the Court or Town fhould have the complaifance to join in that opinion! Certainly I meant it only of fuch modern Sapphos, as imitate much more the Lewdness than the Genius of the ancient one; and upon whom their wretched brethren frequently beftow both the Name and the Qualification there mentioned *.

There was another reason why I was filent as to that paper-I took it for a Lady's (on the printer's word in the title-page) and thought it too prefuming, as well as indecent, to contend with one of that Sex in altercation: For I never was fo mean a creature as to commit my Anger againft a Lady to paper, tho' but in a private Letter. But foon after, her denial of it was brought to me by a Noble person of real Honour and Truth. Your Lordship indeed faid you had it from a Lady, and the Lady faid it was your Lordship's; fome thought the beautiful by-blow had Two Fathers, or (if one of them will hardly be allow'd a man) Two Mothers; indeed I think both Sexes had a fhare in it, but which was uppermost, I know not. I pretend not to determine the exact method of this Witty Fornication: and, if I call it Yours, my Lord, 'tis only because, whoever got it, you brought it forth,

Here, my Lord, allow me to obferve the different proceeding of the Ignoble Poet, and his Noble Enemies. What he has written of Fanny, Adonis, Sappho, or who you will, he own'd, he publifh'd, he fet his name to: What they have publish'd of him, they have deny'd to have written; and what they have written of him, they have denied to have publish'd. One of thefe was the cafe in the past Libel, and the other in the prefent. For tho' the parent has owned it to a few choice friends, it is fuch as he has been obliged to deny in the moft particular terms, to the great Perfon whofe opinion concern'd him moft.

Yet, my Lord, this Epiftle was a piece not written in hafte, or in a paffion, but many months after all pretended provocation; when you was at full leifure at HamptonCourt, and I the object fingled, like a Deer out of Seajon, for fo ill-timed, and ill-placed a diverfion. It was a deliberate work, directed to a Reverend Perfon †, of the most serious and facred character, with whom you are known to cultivate a ftri correfpondence, and to whom it will not be doubted, but you open your fecret Sentiments, and deliver

From furious Sappho scarce a milder fate, Pox'd by her love, or libell'd by her hate. + Dr. S.

2 Sat. B. ii. HOR.

your

your real judgment of men and things. This, I fay, my Lord, with fubmiffion, could not but awaken all my Reflection and Attention. Your Lordship's opinion of me as a Poet, I cannot help; it is yours, my Lord, and that were enought to mortify a poor man; but it is not yours alone, you must be content to fhare it with the Gentlemen of the Dunciad, and (it may be) with many more innocent and ingenious men. If your Lordship deftroy's my poetical character, they will claim their part in the glory; but, give me leave to fay, if my moral character be ruin'd, it must be wholly the work of your Lordship; and will be hard even for you to do, unless I myself co-operate.

How can you talk (my moft worthy Lord) of all Pope's Works as fo many Libels, affirm, that he has no invention but în Defamation, and charge him with felling another man's labours printed with his own name + Fye, my Lord, you forget yourfelf. He printed not his name before a line of the perfon's you mention; that perfon himself has told you and all the world in the book itself, what part he had in it, as may be feen at the conclufion of his notes to the Odyffey. I can only fuppofe your Lordship (not having at that time forgot your Greek) defpis'd to look upon the Tranflation; and ever fince entertain❜d too mean an Opinion of the Tranflator to caft an eye upon it. Befides, my. Lord, when you faid he fold another man's works, you ought in justice to have added that he bought them, which very much alters the Cafe. What he gave him was five hundred pounds; his receipt can be produced to your Lordfhip. I dare not affirm he was as well paid as fome Writers (much his inferiors) have been fince; but your Lordship will reflect that I am no man of Quality, either to buy or fell fcribling fo high: and that I have neither Place, Penfan, nor Power to reward for fecret Services. It cannot be, that one of your rank can have the leaft Envy to such an author as I; but were that poffible, it were much better gratify'd by employing not your own, but fome of those low and ignoble pens to do you this mean office. I dare engage you'll have them for less than I gave Mr. Broom, if your friends have not rais'd the market: Let them drive the bargain for you, my Lord; and you may depend on seeing, every day in the week, as many (and now and then as pret ty) Verfes, as thefe of your Lordship.

to his eternal shame,

Prev'd be can re'er invent but to defame.

And fold Broom's labours printed with Pope's Name. p. 7.

And

And would it not be full as well, that my poor perfon fhould be abus'd by them, as by one of your rank and quality? Cannot Curl do the fame? nay has he not done it before your Lordship, in the fame kind of Language, and almoft the fame words? I cannot but think, the worthy and difcreet Clergyman himself will agree, it is improper, nay unchristian, to expose the perfonal defects of our brother: that both fuch perfect forms as yours, and fuch unfortunate ones as mine, proceed from the hand of the fame Maker; who fashioneth his Veffels as he pleaseth, and that it is not from their shape we can tell whether they were made for bonour or dishonour. In a word, he would teach you Charity to your greateft enemies; of which number, my Lord, I cannot be reckon'd, fince, tho' a Poet, I was never your flatterer.

Next, my Lord, as to the Obfcurity of my Birth, (a reflection copy'd alfo from Mr. Curl and his brethren) I am forry to be obliged to fuch a prefumption as to name my Family in the fame leaf with your Lordship's: but my Father had the honour in one inftance to refeinble you, for he was a younger Broth r. He did not indeed think it a Happinefs to bury his elder Brother, tho' he had one, who wanted fome of thofe good qualities which yours poffeft. How fincerely glad could I be, to pay to that young Nobleman's memory the debt I owed to his friendship, whose carly death depriv'd your family of as much Wit and Honour as he left behind him in any branch of it. But as to my Father, I could affure you, my Lord, that he was no Mechanic (neither a hatter, nor, which might please your Lordship yet better, a Cobler) but in truth, of a very tolerable family: And my Mother of an ancient one, as well born and educated as that Lady, whom your Lordship made choice of to be the Mother of your own Children; whofe merit, beauty, and vivacity (if tranfmitted to your pofterity) will be a better prefent than even the noble blood they derive only from you. A Mother, on whom I was never oblig'd fo far to reflect, as to fay, the spoiled me +. And a Father, who never found himself obliged to say of me, that he disapprov'd my Conduct. In a word, my Lord, I think it enough, that my Parents, fuch as they were, never coft me a Blush; and that their Son, fuch as he is, never coft them a Tear.

*Hard as thy Heart, and as thy Birth obfcure.
Anuble Faber's heir spol d by bis M ther.

His Lordihip's account of himself, p. 7.