But, high above, more folid Learning fhone, The Claffics of an age that heard of none; There Caxton flept, with Wynkyn at his fide,

One clafp'd in wood, and one in ftrong cow-hide; 150 There, fav'd by fpice, like Mummies, many a year, Dry Bodies of Divinity appear:

VARIATION.

Ver. 152. Old Bodies of Philofophy appear.

REMARKS.

De

was his rival in Tragedy (though more fuccefsful) in one of his Tragedies, the Earl of Effex, which is yet alive Anna Boleyn, the Queen of Scots, and Cyrus the Great, are dead and gone. Thefe he dreft in a fort of Beggar's Velvet, or a happy mixture of the thick Fuftian and thin Profaic; exactly imitated in Perolla, and Ifidora, Cæfar in Egypt, and the Heroic Daughter. 3. Broome was a ferving-man of Ben Jonfon, who once picked up a Comedy from his Betters, or from fome cast Icenes of his Mafter, not entirely contemptible.

Ver. 147. More folid Learning] Some have objected, that books of this fort fuit not fo well the library of our Bays, which they imagined confifted of Novels, Plays, and obfcene books; but they are to confider, that he furnished his fhelves only for ornament, and read these books no more than the Dry bodies of Divinity, which, no doubt, were purchased by his Father when he defigned him for the Gown. See the note on ver. 200.

Ver. 149. Caxton] A Printer in the time of Edw. IV. Rich. III. and Hen. VII; Wynkyn de Word, his fucceffor, in that of Hen. VII. and VIII. The former tranflated into profe Virgil's neis, as a hiftory; of which he speaks, in his proeme, in a very fingular manner, as of a book hardly known. Tibbald quotes a rare paffage from him in Mift's Journal of March 16, 1728, concerning a ftraunge and marvayllouse beafte

called.

De Lyra there a dreadful front extends,

And here the groaning shelves Philemon bends.

Of these twelve volumes, twelve of ampleft fize, 155 Redeem'd from tapers and defrauded pies,

Inspir'd he seizes: These an altar raise :

An hecatomb of pure unfully'd lays

That altar crowns: A folio Common-place

Founds the whole pile, of all his works the base:
Quartos, octavos, fhape the leffening pyre;

160

A twifted Birth-day Ode completes the fpire.
Then he Great Tamer of all human art!

Firft in my care, and ever at my heart;
Dulness! whose good old cause I yet defend,

165

E'er

With whom my Muse began, with whom shall end,

VARIATIONS.

Ver. 162. A twifted, &c.] In the former Edit.
And laft, a little Ajax tips the fpire.

Var. a little Ajax] in duodecimo, tranflated from
Sophocles by Tibbald.

REMARKS.

called Sagittarye, which he would have Shakespeare to mean rather than Teucer, the Archer celebrated by Homer.

Ver. 153. Nich. de Lyra, or Harpsfield, a very voluminous commentator, whofe works, in five vast folios, were printed in 1472.

Ver. 154. Philemon Holland, Doctor in Phyfic. "He "tranflated fo many books, that a man would think he "had done nothing else; infomuch that he might be "called Tranflator general of his age. The books "alone of his turning into English are fufficient to "make a Country Gentleman a compleat Library" WINSTANLY.

H 2

389252A

E'er fince Sir Fopling's Periwig was Praise,
To the last honours of the Butt and Bays:
O thou! of Bufinefs the directing foul!
To this our head like byass to the bowl,
Which, as more ponderous, made its aim more true,
Obliquely waddling to the mark in view:
O! ever gracious to perplex'd mankind,
Still spread a healing mift before the mind;

VARIATIONS.

Ver. 167, 168. Not in the first editions.
Ver. 170. To human heads, &c.
Ver. 171. Makes their aim.

REMARKS.

170

And,

Ver. 167. E'er fince Sir Fopling's Periwig] The first vifible caufe of the paffion of the Town for our Hero, was a fair flaxen full-bottomed Periwig, which, he tells us, he wore in his firft play of the Fool in Fashion. It attracted, in a particular manner, the Friendship of Col. Brett, who wanted to purchase it. "Whatever con

tempt (fays he) Philofophers may have for a fine "Periwig, my friend, who was not to defpife the world "but live in it, knew very well that fo material an ar"ticle of drefs upon the head of a man of fenfe, if it "became him, could never fail of drawing to him a "more partial Regard and Benevolence, than could pof.<< fibly be hoped for in an ill-made one. This, perhaps, 66 may foften the grave cenfure, which fo youthful a pur"chafe might otherwife have laid upon him. În a "word, he made his attack upon this Periwig, as your "young fellows generally do upon a lady of pleasure, "firft by a few familiar praises of her perfon, and then a "civil inquiry into the price of it; and we finished our "bargain that night over a bottle." See Life, octavo, P.. 303. This remarkable Periwig ufually made its entrance upon the stage in a sedan, brought in by two chairmen, with infinite approbation of the audience.

And, left we err by Wit's wild dancing light,
Secure us kindly in our native night.
Or, if to Wit a Coxcomb make pretence,
Guard the fure barrier between that and Sense;

VARIATIONS.

175

Ver. 177. Or, if to Wit, &c.] In the former Ed.
Ah! ftill o'er Britain ftretch that peaceful wand,
Which lulls th' Helvetian and Batavian land;
Where rebel to thy throne if Science rife,
She does but fhow her coward face and dies:
There thy good Scholiafts with unwearied pains
Make Horace flat, and humble Maro's ftrains :
Here ftudious I unlucky moderns fave,
Nor fleeps one error in its father's grave,
Old puns reftore, loft blunders nicely feek,
And crucify poor Shakespeare once a week.
For thee I dim thefe eyes, and ftuff this head,
With all fuch reading as was never read;
For thee fupplying, in the worst of days,
Notes to dull books, and prologues to dull plays;
For thee explain a thing till all men doubt it,
And write about it, Goddefs, and about it,
So fpins the Silkworm fmall its flender ftore,
And labours, till it clouds itfelf all o'er.
Not that my quill to critiques was confin'd,
My verfe gave ampler leffons to mankind;
So graveft precepts may fuccefslefs prove,
But fad examples never fail to move.
As, forc'd from wind-guns, &c.

Or

Var. Nor fleeps one error-Old puns restore, loft blunders, &c.] As where he [Tibbald] laboured to prove Shakespeare guilty of terrible Anachronifms, or low Conundrums, which Time had covered; and converfant in fuch authors as Caxton and Wynkyn, rather than in Homer or Chaucer. Nay fo far had he loft his reve

H 3

rence

Or quite unravel all the reas'ning thread,
And hang fome curious cobweb in its stead!
As, forc'd from wind-guns, lead itself can fly,
And ponderous flugs cut fwiftly through the sky;

VARIATIONS.

180

As

rence to this incomparable author, as to fay in print, He deferved to be whipt. An infolence which nothing fure can parallel! but that of Dennis, who can be proved to have declared before company, that Shakespeare was a Rafcal. O Tempora! Mores!

Var. And crucify poor Shakespeare once a week.] For fome time, once a week or fortnight he printed in Mift's Journal a fingle remark or poor conjecture on fome word or pointing of Shakespeare, either in his own name, or in letters to himself, as from others, without name. Upon these somebody made this Epigram:

"'Tis generous, Tibbald! in thee and thy brothers, "To help us thus to read the works of others: "Never for this can juft returns be shown; "For who will help us e'er to read thy own ?”

Var. Notes to dull books, and prologues to dull plays;] As to Cook's Hefiod, where fometimes a note, and fometimes even half a note, are carefully owned by him: And to Moore's Comedy of the Rival Modes, and other authors of the fame rank: These were people who writ about the year 1726.

REMARKS.

Ver. 178, 179. Guard the fure barrier-Or quite unravel, &c.] For Wit or Reafoning are never greatly hurtful to Dulness, but when the firft is founded in Truth, and the other in Usefulness.

Ver. 181. As, forc'd from wind-guns, &c.] The thought of these four verfes is founded in a poem of our Author's of a very early date (namely written at fourteen years old, and foon after printed) to the Author of a poem called Succeffio.