The Works of Alexander Pope Part 8

THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

The clearness, the closeness, and the elegance of style with which this preface is written, render it one of the best pieces of prose in our language. It abounds in strong good sense, and profound knowledge of life. It is written with such simplicity that scarcely a single metaphor is to be found in it.--WARTON.

This preface first appeared in the Works of Pope, 4to, 1717. The poet submitted the ma.n.u.script to Atterbury, and the bishop thus replied in December, 1716: "I return the preface, which I have read twice with pleasure. The modesty and good sense there is in it, must please every one that reads it. And since there is, as I said, nothing that can offend, I see not why you should balance a moment about printing it, always provided that there is nothing said there which you have occasion to unsay hereafter, of which you yourself are the best, and the only judge. This is my sincere opinion, which I give, because you ask it, and which I would not give, though asked, but to a man I value as much as I do you, being sensible how improper it is, on many accounts, for me to interpose in things of this nature, which I never understood well, and now understand somewhat less than ever I did." The suspicion which Atterbury hinted to his friend, that some of the sentiments expressed in the preface might hereafter be quoted against him, probably referred to the vaunts in the concluding paragraphs. The poet paid no regard to the warning, and lived to violate nearly all his professions. Johnson says that the preface is "written with great sprightliness and elegance," but the praise of Warton is hyperbolical when he terms it "one of the best pieces of prose in our language." The style is often faulty, and never rises to any extraordinary pitch of excellence; the "knowledge of life,"

which Warton calls "profound," is such as a little experience would supply; and the "strong good sense" is interspersed with obvious thoughts and erroneous maxims. The language of Atterbury is sober, and even in writing to the author he was not betrayed by the partiality of friends.h.i.+p into the exaggerations of Warton.

THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

I am inclined to think that both the writers of books, and the readers of them, are generally not a little unreasonable in their expectations.

The first seem to fancy that the world must approve whatever they produce, and the latter to imagine that authors are obliged to please them at any rate. Methinks, as on the one hand, no single man is born with a right of controlling the opinions of all the rest; so on the other, the world has no t.i.tle to demand, that the whole care and time of any particular person should be sacrificed to its entertainment.

Therefore I cannot but believe that writers and readers are under equal obligations for as much fame, or pleasure, as each affords the other.

Every one acknowledges, it would be a wild notion to expect perfection in any work of man: and yet one would think the contrary was taken for granted, by the judgment commonly pa.s.sed upon poems. A critic supposes he has done his part if he proves a writer to have failed in an expression, or erred in any particular point: and can it then be wondered at if the poets in general seem resolved not to own themselves in any error? For as long as one side will make no allowances, the other will be brought to no acknowledgments.[1]

I am afraid this extreme zeal on both sides is ill-placed; poetry and criticism being by no means the universal concern of the world, but only the affair of idle men who write in their closets, and of idle men who read there. Yet sure, upon the whole, a bad author deserves better usage than a bad critic: for a writer's endeavour, for the most part, is to please his readers, and he fails merely through the misfortune of an ill judgment; but such a critic's is to put them out of humour; a design he could never go upon without both that and an ill temper.[2]

I think a good deal may be said to extenuate the fault of bad poets.

What we call a genius, is hard to be distinguished by a man himself, from a strong inclination: and if his genius be ever so great, he cannot at first discover it any other way than by giving way to that prevalent propensity which renders him the more liable to be mistaken. The only method he has is to make the experiment by writing, and appealing to the judgment of others. Now if he happens to write ill, which is certainly no sin in itself, he is immediately made an object of ridicule. I wish we had the humanity to reflect that even the worst authors might, in their endeavour to please us, deserve something at our hands. We have no cause to quarrel with them but for their obstinacy in persisting to write; and this too may admit of alleviating circ.u.mstances. Their particular friends may be either ignorant or insincere; and the rest of the world in general is too well-bred to shock them with a truth, which generally their booksellers are the first that inform them of. This happens not till they have spent too much of their time to apply to any profession which might better fit their talents; and till such talents as they have are so far discredited as to be but of small service to them. For, what is the hardest case imaginable, the reputation of a man generally depends upon the first steps he makes in the world; and people will establish their opinion of us, from what we do at that season when we have least judgment to direct us.

On the other hand, a good poet no sooner communicates his works with the same desire of information, but it is imagined he is a vain young creature given up to the ambition of fame, when perhaps the poor man is all the while trembling with the fear of being ridiculous. If he is made to hope he may please the world, he falls under very unlucky circ.u.mstances: for, from the moment he prints, he must expect to hear no more truth than if he were a prince or a beauty. If he has not very good sense (and indeed there are twenty men of wit for one man of sense) his living thus in a course of flattery may put him in no small danger of becoming a c.o.xcomb: if he has, he will consequently have so much diffidence as not to reap any great satisfaction from his praise: since, if it be given to his face, it can scarce be distinguished from flattery, and if in his absence, it is hard to be certain of it. Were he sure to be commended by the best and most knowing, he is as sure of being envied by the worst and most ignorant, which are the majority;[3]

for it is with a fine genius as with a fine fas.h.i.+on, all those are displeased at it who are not able to follow it: and it is to be feared that esteem will seldom do any man so much good, as ill-will does him harm. Then there is a third cla.s.s of people, who make the largest part of mankind,--those of ordinary or indifferent capacities--; and these, to a man, will hate or suspect him: a hundred honest gentlemen will dread him as a wit, and a hundred innocent women as a satirist. In a word, whatever be his fate in poetry, it is ten to one but he must give up all the reasonable aims of life for it. There are indeed some advantages accruing from a genius to poetry, and they are all I can think of,--the agreeable power of self-amus.e.m.e.nt when a man is idle or alone; the privilege of being admitted into the best company; and the freedom of saying as many careless things as other people, without being so severely remarked upon.[4]

[5]I believe if any one, early in his life, should contemplate the dangerous fate of authors, he would scarce be of their number on any consideration. The life of a wit is a warfare upon earth; and the present spirit of the learned world is such, that to attempt to serve it any way one must have the constancy of a martyr, and a resolution to suffer for its sake. 'I could wish people would believe, what I am pretty certain they will not, that I have been much less concerned about fame than I durst declare till this occasion, when methinks I should find more credit than I could heretofore: since my writings have had their fate already, and it is too late to think of prepossessing the reader in their favour. I would plead it as some merit in me, that the world has never been prepared for these trifles by prefaces,[6] bia.s.sed by recommendations, dazzled with the names of great patrons,[7] wheedled with fine reasons and pretences, or troubled with excuses.'[8] I confess it was want of consideration that made me an author; I writ because it amused me; I corrected because it was as pleasant to me to correct as to write; and I published because I was told I might please such as it was a credit to please. To what degree I have done this, I am really ignorant. I had too much fondness for my productions to judge of them at first, and too much judgment to be pleased with them at last. But I have reason to think they can have no reputation which will continue long, or which deserves to do so:[9] for they have always fallen short not only of what I read of others, but even of my own ideas of poetry.

If any one should imagine I am not in earnest, I desire him to reflect, that the ancients, to say the least of them, had as much genius as we; and that to take more pains, and employ more time, cannot fail to produce more complete pieces. They constantly applied themselves not only to that art, but to that single branch of an art, to which their talent was most powerfully bent; and it was the business of their lives to correct and finish their works for posterity.[10] If we can pretend to have used the same industry, let us expect the same immortality: though, if we took the same care, we should still lie under a further misfortune: they writ in languages that became universal and everlasting, while ours are extremely limited both in extent and in duration. A mighty foundation for our pride! when the utmost we can hope,[11] is but to be read in one island, and to be thrown aside at the end of one age.

All that is left us is to recommend our productions by the imitation of the ancients;[12] and it will be found true, that in every age, the highest character for sense and learning has been obtained by those who have been most indebted to them. For, to say truth, whatever is very good sense, must have been common sense in all times; and what we call learning, is but the knowledge of the sense of our predecessors.

Therefore they who say our thoughts are not our own, because they resemble the ancients, may as well say our faces are not our own, because they are like our fathers: and, indeed, it is very unreasonable that people should expect us to be scholars, and yet be angry to find us so.[13]

I fairly confess that I have served myself all I could by reading; that I made use of the judgment of authors dead and living; that I omitted no means in my power to be informed of my errors, both by my friends and enemies:[14] but the true reason these pieces are not more correct, is owing to the consideration how short a time they, and I, have to live.[15] One may be ashamed to consume half one's days in bringing sense and rhyme together: and what critic can be so unreasonable, as not to leave a man time enough for any more serious employment, or more agreeable amus.e.m.e.nt?

The only plea I shall use for the favour of the public, is, that I have as great a respect for it as most authors have for themselves; and that I have sacrificed much of my own self-love for its sake, in preventing not only many mean things from seeing the light, but many which I thought tolerable. 'I would not be like those authors, who forgive themselves some particular lines for the sake of a whole poem, and _vice versa_ a whole poem for the sake of some particular lines.'[16] I believe no one qualification is so likely to make a good writer as the power of rejecting his own thoughts; and it must be this, if any thing, that can give me a chance to be one. For what I have published I can only hope to be pardoned; but for what I have burned I deserve to be praised. On this account the world is under some obligation to me, and owes me the justice in return to look upon no verses as mine that are not inserted in this collection.[17] And perhaps nothing could make it worth my while to own what are really so, but to avoid the imputation of so many dull and immoral things, as partly by malice, and partly by ignorance, have been ascribed to me. I must further acquit myself of the presumption of having lent my name to recommend any Miscellanies,[18]

or works of other men;[19] a thing I never thought becoming a person who has hardly credit enough to answer for his own.

In this office of collecting my pieces, I am altogether uncertain whether to look upon myself as a man building a monument,[20] or burying the dead. If time shall make it the former, may these poems, as long as they last, remain as a testimony, that their author never made his talents subservient to the mean and unworthy ends of party or self-interest; the gratification of public prejudices or private pa.s.sions; the flattery of the undeserving, or the insult of the unfortunate. If I have written well, let it be considered that it is what no man can do without good sense, a quality that not only renders one capable of being a good writer, but a good man. And if I have made any acquisition in the opinion of any one under the notion of the former, let it be continued to me under no other t.i.tle than that of the latter.[21]

But if this publication be only a more solemn funeral of my remains, I desire it may be known that I die in charity, and in my senses, without any murmurs against the justice of this age, or any mad appeals to posterity. I declare I shall think the world in the right, and quietly submit to every truth which time shall discover to the prejudice of these writings; not so much as wis.h.i.+ng so irrational a thing as that every body should be deceived merely for my credit. However, I desire it may then be considered, that there are very few things in this collection which were not written under the age of five-and-twenty, so that my youth may be made, as it never fails to be in executions, a case of compa.s.sion; that I was never so concerned about my works as to vindicate them in print, believing if any thing was good it would defend itself, and what was bad could never be defended; that I used no artifice to raise or continue a reputation, depreciated no dead author I was obliged to, bribed no living one with unjust praise, insulted no adversary with ill language,[22] or, when I could not attack a rival's works, encouraged reports against his morals. To conclude, if this volume perish, let it serve as a warning to the critics not to take too much pains for the future to destroy such things as will die of themselves; and a _memento mori_ to some of my vain contemporaries the poets, to teach them that when real merit is wanting, it avails nothing to have been encouraged by the great, commended by the eminent, and favoured by the public in general.[23]

_Nov. 10, 1716._

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: In all editions till that of Warburton it was thus: "For as long as one side despises a well meant endeavour, the other will not be satisfied with a moderate approbation." The first sentence of the next paragraph is expanded in the ma.n.u.script: "Indeed they both proceed in such a manner as if they really believed that poetry was immediate inspiration. It were to be wished they would reflect that this extraordinary zeal and fury is ill placed, poetry and criticism being by no means the universal concern of the world. I do not say this to imitate those people who make a merit of undervaluing the arts and qualifications without which they had never been taken notice of. I think poetry as useful as any other art, because it is as entertaining, and therefore as well deserving of mankind."]

[Footnote 2: Until the edition of Warburton the reading was slightly different: "Yet sure upon the whole a bad author deserves better usage than a bad critic; a man may be the former merely through the misfortune of an ill judgment, but he cannot be the latter without both that and an ill temper."]

[Footnote 3: The instance of Pope himself is a refutation of his theory that the world was almost exclusively composed of flatterers and detractors, and chiefly of the last. Where he could count the deniers of his genius by tens he could number his admirers by thousands.]

[Footnote 4: What is here said of the privileges of the poetic character will not, I believe, bear the test of truth and experience. Surely a poet is not particularly allowed "the freedom of saying careless things," and his moral character and manners are to be estimated, as well as his talents, before he is ent.i.tled to a certain station in society.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 5: In the MS. it followed thus: "For my part, I confess, had I seen things in this view at first, the public had never been troubled either with my writings, or with this apology for them. I am sensible how difficult it is to speak of one's self with decency: but when a man must speak of himself, the best way is to speak truth of himself, or, he may depend upon it, others will do it for him. I will therefore make this preface a general confession of all my thoughts of my own poetry, resolving with the same freedom to expose myself, as it is in the power of any other to expose them. In the first place, I thank G.o.d and nature that I was born with a love to poetry; for nothing more conduces to fill up all the intervals of our time, or, if rightly used, to make the whole course of life entertaining: _Cantantes licet usque (minus via laedet)._ It is a vast happiness to possess the pleasures of the head, the only pleasures in which a man is sufficient to himself, and the only part of him which, to his satisfaction, he can employ all day long. The muses are _amicae omnium horarum_; and, like our gay acquaintance, the best company in the world as long as one expects no real service from them. I confess there was a time when I was in love with myself, and my first productions were the children of self-love upon innocence. I had made an epic poem, and panegyrics on all the princes in Europe, and thought myself the greatest genius that ever was. I cannot but regret those delightful visions of my childhood, which, like the fine colours we see when our eyes are shut, are vanished for ever. Many trials and sad experience have so undeceived me by degrees, that I am utterly at a loss at what rate to value myself. As for fame, I shall be glad of any I can get, and not repine at any I miss; and as for vanity, I have enough to keep me from hanging myself, or even from wis.h.i.+ng those hanged who would take it away. It was this that made me write. The sense of my faults made me correct: besides that it was as pleasant to me to correct as to write."--WARBURTON.

Spence relates that Pope said to Mr. Saville: "If I was to begin the world again, and knew just what I do now, I would never write a verse."

In the pa.s.sage from his ma.n.u.script preface, he intimates that he would have amused himself by writing poetry, but would have forborne to publish what he wrote. Either he was not honest in the opinion, or he was self-deceived. He valued his fame above all things, and left no means untried to protect and promote it.]

[Footnote 6: As was the practice of his master Dryden, who is severely lashed for this in the Tale of a Tub.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 7: Pope was not justified in his boast. He dropped the practice of fulsome dedications, but he made the most of his distinguished friends in the body of his pieces, and though no "names of great patrons" are given in this preface, he could not abstain from announcing in the final sentence how much they had countenanced him.

This, moreover, was to proclaim the "recommendations" he repudiated, and in every issue of his works the preface, which contained the inconsistency, was followed in addition by a series of Recommendatory Poems.]

[Footnote 8: The pa.s.sage in inverted commas was first added in 1736.]

[Footnote 9: One of Pope's favourite topics is contempt for his own poetry. For this, if it had been real, he would deserve no commendation; and in this he was certainly not sincere, for his value of himself was sufficiently observed; and of what could he be proud but of his poetry?

He writes, he says, when "he has just nothing else to do;" yet Swift complains that he was never at leisure for conversation, because he "had always some poetical scheme in his head." It was punctually required that his writing-box should be set upon his bed before he rose; and Lord Oxford's domestic related that in the dreadful winter of 1740, she was called from her bed by him four times in one night to supply him with paper lest he should lose a thought.--DR. JOHNSON.]

[Footnote 10: For the next sentence the ma.n.u.script has this pa.s.sage: "But I fear it is far otherwise with modern poets. We must bring our wit to the press, as gardeners do their flowers to the market, which if they cannot vend in the morning are sure to die before night. Were we animated by the same n.o.ble ambition, and ready to prosecute it with equal ardour, our languages are not only confined to a narrow extent of country, but are in a perpetual flux, not so much as fixed by an acknowledged grammar, while theirs were such as time and fate conspired to make universal and everlasting."]

[Footnote 11: In place of the remainder of the sentence he had written in the ma.n.u.script, "is but to live twenty years longer than Quarles, or Withers, or Dennis." The doctrine of Pope was unworthy the countryman of Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, and Milton. The first three had not been "thrown aside at the end of one age," and no one who was capable of comprehending the last could seriously believe that his reputation would be ephemeral. The hypothesis, that the writers in a dead tongue can alone secure a worthy audience, is altogether chimerical. The literature of living languages has the ascendancy, and Shakespeare is more read, and better appreciated, than aeschylus and Sophocles.]

[Footnote 12: I have frequently heard Dr. Young speak with great disapprobation of the doctrine contained in this pa.s.sage, with a view to which he wrote his discourse on Original Composition.--WARTON.

The a.s.sertion of Pope is in the face of the facts. All the greatest names in modern literature have a marked originality, and those authors who have imitated the ancients, except in subordinate circ.u.mstances, have usually produced tame and lifeless compositions, which were speedily forgotten.]

[Footnote 13: The sophistry is transparent. A man may be a scholar without being a plagiarist or an imitator.]

[Footnote 14: Here followed in the first edition, "and that I expect not to be excused in any negligence on account of youth, want of leisure, or any other idle allegations." This was inconsistent with his request, at the conclusion of his preface, that those who condemned his poems would remember his youth when he composed them. After the omitted sentence he had added in the ma.n.u.script, "I have ever been fearful of making an ill present to the world, for which I have as much respect as most poets have for themselves. What I thought incorrect I suppressed; and what I thought most finished I never published but with fear and trembling."]

[Footnote 15: From hence to the end of the paragraph the ma.n.u.script continues thus: "A man that can expect but sixty years may be ashamed to employ thirty in measuring syllables, and bringing sense and rhyme together. We spend our youth in the pursuit of riches or fame in hopes to enjoy them when we are old, and when we are old we find it is too late to enjoy anything. I have got over the mistake pretty early. I therefore hope the wits will pardon me if I leave myself time enough to save my soul, and some wise men will be of my opinion even if I should think a part of it better spent in the enjoyment of life than in pleasing the critics."]

[Footnote 16: This sentence was in the ma.n.u.script, but Pope omitted it in the edition of 1717, and restored it in 1736.]

[Footnote 17: In the ma.n.u.script he added, "which indeed was my chief view in making it, for in the present liberty of the press, a man is forced to appear as bad as he is, not to be thought worse." The a.s.sertion is qualified in the text, but he could not entirely abandon the affectation of pretending that he collected his works to escape the disgrace of the pieces which were falsely attributed to him, and not to obtain credit from his own performances.]

[Footnote 18: "I am always highly delighted," said Addison in the Spectator, No. 523, Oct. 30, 1712, "with the discovery of any rising genius among my countrymen. For this reason I have read over, with great pleasure, the late Miscellany published by Mr. Pope, in which there are many excellent compositions of that ingenious gentleman." The announcement referred to the first edition of Lintot's Miscellany, and from the literary intercourse which existed between Addison, Steele, and Pope at the time, the compilation was not likely to have been ascribed to the latter in the Spectator without sufficient authority. The language of Pope seems carefully selected to avoid the direct denial that he was the editor. The work was published anonymously, and he only a.s.serts that he had "never lent his _name_ to recommend any miscellanies." The disclaimer was probably directed against the device adopted by Lintot in the second edition, 1 vol. 8vo, 1714, which bore this t.i.tle, "Miscellaneous Poems and Translations. By several hands.

Particularly, etc." Here followed a list of Pope's contributions, and his alone. Underneath the list a line was drawn across the page, and below this line was printed in capital letters, "By Mr. Pope." The complete separation between the list of pieces and the name of the poet disconnected them to the eye, and left the impression that Pope was the editor of the entire work. The same plan was continued till the fifth edition, 2 vols. 12mo, 1727, when Lintot grew bolder, and inserted b.a.s.t.a.r.d t.i.tle-pages with the words, "Mr. Pope's Miscellany." The poet, who corrected the proofs of his own pieces for the fifth edition, a.s.sured Christopher Pitt, in a letter of July 23, 1726, that he had never had anything to do with the remainder of the work; but the private a.s.surance, after many years, of a man who had no regard for truth does not outweigh the a.s.sertion in the Spectator, when coupled with the peculiar wording by which he evaded the public contradiction of the statement.]

[Footnote 19: In 1721 he broke through his rule by recommending the poems of Parnell to Lord Oxford in an Epistle in verse.--CUNNINGHAM.]

[Footnote 20: A few sentences before he had said, "for what I have published I can only hope to be pardoned," and already he has forgotten his mock modesty, and admits he has a hope that his works may prove "a monument."]