The cobler apron'd, and the parfon gown'd, The frier hooded, and the monarch crown'd. "What differ more (you cry) than crown and " cowl ?" 200 I'll tell you, friend! a wife man and a fool. 204 Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with strings, That thou may'st be by kings, or whores of kings, Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race, In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece: But by your fathers' worth if your's you rate, Count me those only who were good and great. 210 VARIATIONS. VER. 207. Boaft the pure blood, &c.] In the MS. thus, The richest blood, right-honourably old, NOTES. Go! allotted to him; and fince higher faculties and greater degrees of knowledge would on one hand increase his prefumption, and yet on the other would rather excite than fate his curiofity, by fhewing him more clearly the extent of his ignorance." VER. 208. From Lucrece to Lucrece :] A bad rhyme to the preceding word race. It is taken from Boileau, vol. 85. Satire 5. "Et fi leur fang tout pur, ainfi que leur nobleffe, Eft paffé jufqu'à vous de Lucrece en Lucrece." VER. 210. Count me thofe] The following comment is taken from the manufcripts of James Harris, Efq. Go! if your ancient, but ignoble blood Has crept through fcoundrels ever fince the flood, Nor own, your fathers have been fools fo long. Look next on Greatness; fay where Greatness lies? NOTES. 220 The "If thou art ever touched with the admiration of family, remember that thou too hadít a progenitor in the time of the Holy War, as much as either the Courteneys, the Greys, or the Howards. The difference is no more than that in those wife expeditions thy forefathers were corporals, while theirs were captains: That their forefathers had wealth enough to be benefactors to monkery; while the poverty of thine, if ever they had fuch intentions, moft happily prevented them from making their folly confpicuous." Pope seems to have been reading Peter Charron's fevere Animadverfions on Natural and Perfonal Nobility, in book i. of Wisdom, p. 499. VER. 220. From Macedonia's] He has fallen into the common cant about Alexander the Great. Think of the feene in Darius's tent; of the foundation of the city of Alexandria, and the extent of its commerce; of the many colonies he established; of his refufing to treat the Perfians as flaves; of the grief expressed by the Perfians at his death; of the encouragement he gave to arts, both ufeful and elegant; and of his affistance to Aristotle his master, in making experiments and promoting fcience: The encomiums beflowed on him by two such judges of men as Bacon and Montefquieu, outweigh the cenfures of Boileau and Pope. Charles XII. deferved not to be joined with him: Charles XII. tore out the leaf in which Boileau had cenfured Alexander. Robertfon, in his Difquifitions on India, has given a fine and comprehensive view of the very grand design which Alexander had formed to annex that extenfive and opulent country to his empire. Section 1. Appendix. The whole strange purpose of their lives to find Not one looks backward, onward ftill he goes, 225 All fly flow things, with circumfpective eyes: Men in their loofe unguarded hours they take, Not that themselves are wife, but others weak. But grant that those can conquer, these can cheat; 'Tis phrase abfurd to call a Villain Great: Who wickedly is wife, or madly brave, 230 Is but the more a fool, the more a knave. 235 What's Fame, à fancied life in other's breath, A thing beyond us, ev'n before our death. NOTES. Juft VER. 222. An enemy of all mankind!] Had all nations, with regard to their heroes, been of the humour with the Normans, who called Robert II. the greatest of their Dukes, by the name of ROBERT THE DEVIL, the Races of heroes might have been lefs numerous, or, however, lefs mifchievous. W. VER. 235. Or bleed-like Socrates,] Confidering the manner in which Socrates was put to death, the word "bleed" feems to be improperly ufed. Cudworth has remarked, that it is a common mistake to affert that Socrates was condemned for afferting the doctrine of one Supreme Deity; for he alfo acknowledged the exiftence of inferior created gods; but he was punished for expofing and ridiculing the common fabulous poetic accounts of these inferior and fubordinate gods, which accounts were held facred by the people. It was hence he was accused of impiety. VER. 237. What's Fame,] It is the fate of many philofophical reflections, that, in the fame proportion with which they diminish VOL. III. and Just what you hear, you have, and what's unknown In the small circle of our foes or friends; Alike or when, or where, they fhone, or fhine, 245 A Wit's a feather, and a Chief a rod; An honeft Man's the nobleft work of God. Fame but from death a villain's name can fave, 250 Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart: NOTES. One and destroy vicious paffions and purfuits, they alfo diminish and destroy fuch as are virtuous and reasonable, and by degrees render the mind callous, indifferent, and inactive: Just as when Fontenelle fays, that the true fyftem of aftronomy ought to extinguish ambition;" for what a poor thing is the conqueft of the whole globe in comparison of the infinite extent of Nature?" Such a reflection would extinguish patriotism as well as ambition. Perhaps our Author, in these fine lines, has carried the matter too far, as Mr. Wollafton has certainly done : "The man is not known ever the more to pofterity, because his name is transmitted to them. He doth not live because his name docs. Since Pompey is as little known as Cæfar, all that is faid of their conquefts amounts to this, Somebody conquered fomebody." The reader may be highly gratified if he will perufe a very fine speech on this subject, in a poem too much neglected, the Paradise Regained of Milton, book iii. v. 45. Is expofing and depreciating the paffion for fame confiftent with the doctrine before advanced, that "Not a vanity is giv'n in vain ?” VER. 248. An honeft Man's] Plato fays, alwv ieparatov iri ἄνθρωπος ὁ ἀγαθὸς. One felf-approving hour whole years outweighs 255 In Parts fuperior what advantage lies? Tell (for You can) what is it to be wife? 260 'Tis NOTES. VER. 257. Marcellus exil'd] " Brutus," faid he, " perished untimely, and Cæfar did no more.-'Twas thus, as I remember, not long fince, you were expreffing yourself: And yet, suppose their fortunes to have been exactly parallel, which would you have preferred? Would you have been Cæfar or Brutus ?" "Brutus," replied I, "beyond all controverfy." He asked me, "Why? where was the difference, when their fortunes, as we now fuppofed them, were confidered as the fame ?" "There feems," faid I, "abftract from their fortunes, fomething, I know not what, intrinfically preferable in the life and character of Brutus." "If that," said he, "be true, then must we derive it, not from the fuccefs of his endeavours, but from their truth and rectitude. He had the comfort to be confcious that his caufe was a just one. 'Twas impoffible the other fhould have any fuch feeling." "I believe," faid I, "you have explained it." Harris's Discourse on Happiness, v. 1. Cicero's fine oration to Cæfar on behalf of Marcellus, is fufficiently known. Middleton has given an elegant account of his enmity to Cæfar, and of his being ftabbed by Magius, and his funeral rites. at Athens, vol. ii. 286. By Marcellus, Pope was said to mean the Duke of Ormond. VER. 259. In Parts fuperior] To a person that was praising Dr. Balguy's admirable Discourses on the Vanity and Vexation of our Pursuits after Knowledge, he replied, "I borrowed the whole from ten lines of the Effay on Man, at ver. 259. ; and I only enlarged and commented upon what the Poet had expressed with such marvellous conciseness, penetration, and precision." He particularly admired verse 266. "Men value themselves," fays Fontenelle, "for having wit, and genius, and talents, more than for the gifts of fortune, riches, and birth, as not depending on hazard. L 2 But |