Rape of the Lock and Other Poems | Page 9

was personal satire which cut like a whip and left a brand like a
hot iron. And if at times, as in the case of Addison, Pope was mistaken
in his object and assaulted one who was in no sense his enemy, the
fault lies not so much in his alleged malice as in the unhappy state of
warfare in which he lived.
Over against the faults of Pope we may set more than one noble
characteristic. The sensitive heart and impulsive temper that led him so
often into bitter warfare, made him also most susceptible to kindness
and quick to pity suffering. He was essentially of a tender and loving
nature, a devoted son, and a loyal friend, unwearied in acts of kindness
and generosity. His ruling passion, to use his own phrase, was a
devotion to letters, and he determined as early and worked as diligently
to make himself a poet as ever Milton did. His wretched body was
dominated by a high and eager mind, and he combined in an
unparalleled degree the fiery energy of the born poet with the tireless
patience of the trained artist.
But perhaps the most remarkable characteristic of Pope is his manly
independence. In an age when almost without exception his
fellow-writers stooped to accept a great man's patronage or sold their
talents into the slavery of politics, Pope stood aloof from patron and
from party. He repeatedly declined offers of money that were made him,
even when no condition was attached. He refused to change his religion,
though he was far from being a devout Catholic, in order to secure a
comfortable place. He relied upon his genius alone for his support, and
his genius gave him all that he asked, a modest competency. His

relations with his rich and powerful friends were marked by the same
independent spirit. He never cringed or flattered, but met them on even
terms, and raised himself by merit alone from his position as the
unknown son of an humble shopkeeper to be the friend and associate of
the greatest fortunes and most powerful minds in England. It is not too
much to say that the career of a man of letters as we know it to-day, a
career at once honorable and independent, takes its rise from the life
and work of Alexander Pope.
The long controversies that have raged about Pope's rank as a poet
seem at last to be drawing to a close; and it has become possible to
strike a balance between the exaggerated praise of his contemporaries
and the reckless depreciation of romantic critics. That he is not a poet
of the first order is plain, if for no other reason than that he never
produced a work in any of the greatest forms of poetry. The drama, the
epic, the lyric, were all outside his range. On the other hand, unless a
definition of poetry be framed--and Dr. Johnson has well remarked that
"to circumscribe poetry by a definition will only show the narrowness
of the definer"--which shall exclude all gnomic and satiric verse, and so
debar the claims of Hesiod, Juvenal, and Boileau, it is impossible to
deny that Pope is a true poet. Certain qualities of the highest poet Pope
no doubt lacked, lofty imagination, intense passion, wide human
sympathy. But within the narrow field which he marked out for his own
he approaches perfection as nearly as any English poet, and Pope's
merit consists not merely in the smoothness of his verse or the polish of
separate epigrams, as is so often stated, but quite as much in the vigor
of his conceptions and the unity and careful proportion of each poem as
a whole. It is not too much to say that 'The Rape of the Lock' is one of
the best-planned poems in any language. It is as symmetrical and
exquisitely finished as a Grecian temple.
Historically Pope represents the fullest embodiment of that spirit which
began to appear in English literature about the middle of the
seventeenth century, and which we are accustomed to call the
"classical" spirit. In essence this movement was a protest against the
irregularity and individual license of earlier poets. Instead of
far-fetched wit and fanciful diction, the classical school erected the

standards of common sense in conception and directness in expression.
And in so doing they restored poetry which had become the diversion
of the few to the possession of the many. Pope, for example, is
preeminently the poet of his time. He dealt with topics that were of
general interest to the society in which he lived; he pictured life as he
saw it about him. And this accounts for his prompt and general
acceptance by the world of his day.
For the student of English literature Pope's