Alexander Pope | Page 2

Murray to Mr. Whitwell Elwin, whose
own researches have greatly extended our knowledge, and who had
also the advantage of Mr. Dilke's advice. Mr. Elwin began, in 1871, the
publication of the long-promised edition. It was to have occupied ten
volumes--five of poems and five of correspondence, the latter of which
was to include a very large proportion of previously unpublished matter.
Unfortunately for all students of English literature, only two volumes
of poetry and three of correspondence have appeared. The notes and
prefaces, however, contain a vast amount of information, which clears
up many previously disputed points in the poet's career; and it is to be
hoped that the materials collected for the remaining volumes will not
be ultimately lost. It is easy to dispute some of Mr. Elwin's critical
opinions, but it would be impossible to speak too highly of the value of
his investigations of facts. Without a study of his work, no adequate
knowledge of Pope is attainable.
The ideal biographer of Pope, if he ever appears, must be endowed with
the qualities of an acute critic and a patient antiquarian; and it would
take years of labour to work out all the minute problems connected
with the subject. All that I can profess to have done is to have given a
short summary of the obvious facts, and of the main conclusions
established by the evidence given at length in the writings of Mr. Dilke
and Mr. Elwin. I have added such criticisms as seemed desirable in a
work of this kind, and I must beg pardon by anticipation if I have fallen
into inaccuracies in relating a story so full of pitfalls for the unwary.
L. S.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PAGE
EARLY YEARS 1
CHAPTER II.
FIRST PERIOD OF POPE'S LITERARY CAREER 21
CHAPTER III.
POPE'S HOMER 61
CHAPTER IV.
POPE AT TWICKENHAM 81
CHAPTER V.
THE WAR WITH THE DUNCES 111
CHAPTER VI.
CORRESPONDENCE 137
CHAPTER VII.
THE ESSAY ON MAN 159
CHAPTER VIII.
EPISTLES AND SATIRES 181
CHAPTER IX.

THE END 206

POPE.
CHAPTER I.
EARLY YEARS.
The father of Alexander Pope was a London merchant, a devout
Catholic, and not improbably a convert to Catholicism. His mother was
one of seventeen children of William Turner, of York; one of her sisters
was the wife of Cooper, the well-known portrait-painter. Mrs. Cooper
was the poet's godmother; she died when he was five years old, leaving
to her sister, Mrs. Pope, a "grinding-stone and muller," and their
mother's "picture in limning;" and to her nephew, the little Alexander,
all her "books, pictures, and medals set in gold or otherwise."
In after-life the poet made some progress in acquiring the art of
painting; and the bequest suggests the possibility that the precocious
child had already given some indications of artistic taste. Affectionate
eyes were certainly on the watch for any symptoms of developing talent.
Pope was born on May 21st, 1688--the annus mirabilis which
introduced a new political era in England, and was fatal to the hopes of
ardent Catholics. About the same time, partly, perhaps, in consequence
of the catastrophe, Pope's father retired from business, and settled at
Binfield--a village two miles from Wokingham and nine from Windsor.
It is near Bracknell, one of Shelley's brief perching places, and in such
a region as poets might love, if poetic praises of rustic seclusion are to
be taken seriously. To the east were the "forests and green retreats" of
Windsor, and the wild heaths of Bagshot, Chobham and Aldershot
stretched for miles to the South. Some twelve miles off in that direction,
one may remark, lay Moor Park, where the sturdy pedestrian, Swift,
was living with Sir W. Temple during great part of Pope's childhood;
but it does not appear that his walks ever took him to Pope's
neighbourhood, nor did he see, till some years later, the lad with whom
he was to form one of the most famous of literary friendships. The little

household was presumably a very quiet one, and remained fixed at
Binfield for twenty-seven years, till the son had grown to manhood and
celebrity. From the earliest period he seems to have been a domestic
idol. He was not an only child, for he had a half-sister by his father's
side, who must have been considerably older than himself, as her
mother died nine years before the poet's birth. But he was the only child
of his mother, and his parents concentrated upon him an affection
which he returned with touching ardour and persistence. They were
both forty-six in the year of his birth. He inherited headaches from his
mother, and a crooked figure from his father. A nurse who shared their
care, lived with him for many years, and was buried by him, with an
affectionate epitaph, in 1725. The