and he had fuch power of words and numbers as fitted him for tranflation; but, in his original works, recollection feems to have been his business more than invention. His imitations are fo apparent, that it is part of his reader's employment to recall the verses of some former poet. Sometimes he copies the most popular writers, for he feems fcarcely to endeavour at concealment; and fometimes he picks up fragments in obfcure corners. His lines to Fenton, Serene, the fting of pain thy thoughts beguile, brought to my mind fome lines on the death of Queen Mary, written by Barnes, of whom I should not have expected to find an imitator; But thou, O Mufe! whofe fweet nepenthean tongue To detect his imitations were tedious and useless. What he takes he feldom makes worfe; and he cannot be justly thought a mean man, whom Pope chofe for an affociate, and whofe co-operation was confidered by Pope's enemies as fo important, that he was attacked by Henley with this ludicrous diftich: Pope came off clean with Homer; but they fay POPE. 4 ALEXANDER POPE was born in London, May. 22, 1688, of parents whofe rank or ftation was never afcertained: we are informed that they were of "gentle blood;" that his father was of a family of which the Earl of Downe was the head; and that his mother was the daughter of William Turner, Efquire, of York, who had likewife three fons, one of whom had the honour of being killed, and the other of dying, in the fervice of Charles the Firft; the third was made a general officer in Spain, from whom the fifter inherited what fequeftrations and forfeitures had left in the family. This, and this only, is told by Pope; who is more willing, as I have heard obferved, to fhew what his father was not, than what he was. It is allowed that he grew rich by trade; but whether in a fhop or on the Exchange was never difcovered till Mr. Tyers told, on the authority of Mrs. Racket, that he was a linen-draper in the Strand. Both parents were papists. Pope Pope was from his birth of a conftitution tender and delicate; but is faid to have fhewn remarkable gentleness and sweetness of difpofition. The weaknefs of his body continued through his life *; but the mildness of his mind perhaps ended with his childhood. His voice, when he was young, was fo pleafing, that he was called in fondness "the "little Nightingale." Being not fent early to fchool, he was taught to read by an aunt; and when he was feven or eight years old, became a lover of books. He firft learned to write by imitating printed books; a fpecies of penmanship in which he retained great excellence through his whole life, though his ordinary hand was not elegant. When he was about eight, he was placed in Hampshire under Taverner, a Romish prieft, who, by a method very rarely practifed, taught him the Greek and Latin rudiments together. He was now firft regularly initiated in poetry by the perufal of "Ogilby's Homer," and "Sandys' Ovid." Ogilby's affiftance he never repaid with any praise; but of Sandys he declared, in his notes to the "Iliad,” that English poetry owed much of its beauty to his tranflations. Sandys very rarely attempted original compofition. From the care of Taverner, under whom his proficiency was confiderable, he was removed to a school * This weakness was fo great that he conftantly wore ftays, as I have been affured by a waterman at Twickenham, who, in lifting him into his boat, had often felt them. His method of taking the air on the water was to have a fedan chair in the boat, in which he fat with the glaffes down. H. at Twyford near Winchester, and again to another fchool about Hyde-park Corner; from which he ufed fometimes to ftroll to the playhouse; and was fo delighted with theatrical exhibitions, that he formed a kind of play from "Ogilby's Iliad," with fome verfes of his own intermixed, which he perfuaded his fchool-fellows to act, with the addition of his master's gardener, who perfonated Ajax. At the two last schools he used to represent himself as having loft part of what Taverner had taught him; and on his mafter at Twyford he had already exercifed his poetry in a lampoon. Yet under those mafters he tranflated more than a fourth part of the "Metamorphofes." If he kept the fame proportion in his other exercifes, it cannot be thought that his lofs was great, He tells of himself, in his poems, that "he lifp'd "in numbers ;" and used to say that he could not remember the time when he began to make verses. In the ftyle of fiction it might have been faid of him as of Pindar, that, when he lay in his cradle, "the "bees fwarmed about his mouth." About the time of the Revolution, his father, who was undoubtedly difappointed by the fudden blast of Popish profperity, quitted his trade, and retired to Binfield in Windfor Foreft, with about twenty thousand pounds; for which, being confcientioufly determined not to entruft it to the government, he found no better ufe than that of locking it up in a cheft, and taking from it what his expences required; and his life was long enough to confume a great part of it, before his fon came to the inheritance. To To Binfield Pope was called by his father when he was about twelve years old; and there he had for a few months the affiftance of one Deane, another priest, of whom he learned only to conftrue a little of "Tully's Offices." How Mr. Deane could spend, with a boy who had tranflated so much of " Ovid,” fome months over a fmall part of "Tully's Offices," it is now vain to enquire. Of a youth fo fuccefsfully employed, and fo confpicuoufly improved, a minute account must be naturally defired; but curiofity must be contented with confufed, imperfect, and fometimes improbable intelligence. Pope, finding little advantage from external help, resolved thenceforward to direct himself, and at twelve formed a plan of study, which he completed with little other incitement than the defire of excellence. His primary and principal purpose was to be a poet, with which his father accidentally concurred, by propofing subjects, and obliging him to correct his performances by many revifals; after which the old gentleman, when he was fatisfied, would fay, "these are good rhymes." In his perufal of the English poets he foon diftinguished the verfification of Dryden, which he confidered as the model to be ftudied, and was impreffed with fuch veneration for his inftructor, that he perfuaded fome friends to take him to the coffee-houfe which Dryden frequented, and pleafed himself with having feen him. Dryden died May 1, 1701, fome days before Pope was twelve; fo early muft he therefore have felt the power of harmony, and the zeal of genius. Who |