The Works of Alexander Pope Part 40

[Footnote 99:

I heard a noise approchen blive, That fared as bees done in a hive, Against their time of out flying; Right such a manere murmering, For all the world it seemed me.

Tho gan I look about and see That there came entring into th' hall, A right great company withal; And that of sundry regions, Of all kind of conditions, &c.--POPE.]

[Footnote 100: This description is varied with improvements from Dryden, aeneis, vi. 958.

About the boughs an airy nation flew Thick as the humming bees that hunt the golden dew: The winged army roams the field around, The rivers and the rocks remurmer to the sound.--WAKEFIELD.

He was a.s.sisted by another pa.s.sage in Dryden's Flower and Leaf:

Thick as the college of the bees in May, When swarming o'er the dusky fields they fly, Now to the flow'rs, and intercept the sky.]

[Footnote 101: So in Chaucer all degrees, "poor and rich" fall down on their knees before Fame and beg her to grant them their pet.i.tion.]

[Footnote 102: "The tattling quality of age which, as Sir William Davenant says, is always narrative." Dryden's Dedication of Juvenal.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 103:

And some of them she granted sone, And some she warned well and fair, And some she granted the contrair-- Right as her sister dame Fortune Is wont to serven in commune.--POPE.

Chaucer and Pope describe Fame as bestowing reputation upon some, and traducing others, when their deserts were equal, but neither Pope nor Chaucer touch upon the truth that the same person is commonly both lauded and denounced. This is finely expressed by Milton, Samson Agonistes, ver. 971:--

Fame if not double-faced is double-mouthed, And with contrary blast proclaims most deeds; On both his wings, one black, the other white, Bears greatest names in his wild aery flight.]

[Footnote 104: The idea is from Chaucer:

They hadde good fame each deserved Although they were diversely served.

Besides the pa.s.sage in Chaucer, Pope evidently recalled Creech's translation of Juvenal, Sat. xiii. 132.

ev'ry age relates That equal crimes have met unequal fates; That sins alike, unlike rewards have found, And whilst this villain's crucified the other's crowned.]

[Footnote 105: In Chaucer, Fame sends for Eolus, who comes with two trumpets, a golden trumpet, from which he gives forth praises, and a black trumpet of bra.s.s, from which he sends forth blasts of slander. In Pope the golden trumpet is blown by the muses, and the trump of slander sounds without the mention of any agent.]

[Footnote 106:

Tho came the thirde companye, And gan up to the dees to hye, And down on knees they fell anone, And saiden: We ben everichone Folke that han full truely Deserved fame rightfully, And prayen you it might be knowe Right as it is, and forthe blowe.

I grant, quoth she, for now me list That your good works shall be wist.

And yet ye shall have better loos, Right in despite of all your foos, Than worthy is, and that anone.

Let now (quoth she) thy trumpe gone-- And certes all the breath that went Out of his trumpes mouthe smel'd As men a pot of baume held Among a basket full of roses.--POPE.]

[Footnote 107: Prior, Carmen Seculare:

In comely rank call ev'ry merit forth, Imprint on ev'ry act its standard worth.]

[Footnote 108: The whole tribe of the "good and just," who obtain any fame at all, are said by Pope to get more than they deserve. For this notion there is certainly no foundation, unless he meant that the fact of desiring reputation deprived virtue of the t.i.tle to it.]

[Footnote 109:

Therewithal there came anone Another huge companye, Of good folke-- What did this Eolus, but he Took out his black trump of bra.s.s, That fouler than the devil was: And gan this trumpe for to blowe, As all the world should overthrowe.

Throughout every regione Went this foule trumpes soune, As swift as pellet out of gunne, When fire is in the powder runne.

And such a smoke gan oute wende, Out of the foule trumpes ende, &c.--POPE.]

[Footnote 110: In his account of the reception given by Fame to her various suppliants, Pope is detailing the manner in which praise and blame are dispensed in this world, and it is a departure from reality to consign the entire race of conquerors to oblivion. However little they may deserve fame, they at least obtain it. The inconsistency is the more glaring that when he describes the temple in the opening of the poem, he tells us that,

Within stood heroes, who through loud alarms, In b.l.o.o.d.y fields pursued renown in arms.

[Footnote 111:

I saw anone the fifth route, That to this lady gan loute, And down on knees anone to fall, And to her they besoughten all, To hiden their good workes eke, And said, they yeven not a leke For no fame ne such renowne; For they for contemplacyoune, And G.o.ddes love hadde ywrought, Ne of fame would they ought.--POPE.]

[Footnote 112:

What, quoth she, and be ye wood?

And wene ye for to do good, And for to have of it no fame?

Have ye despite to have my name?

Nay, ye shall lien everichone: Blowe they trump, and that anone (Quoth she) thou Eolus yhote, And ring these folkes works be note, That all the world may of it hear; And he gan blow their loos so cleare, In his golden clarioune, Through the world went the soune, All so kenely, and eke so soft, That their fame was blowen aloft.--POPE.

Pope makes everybody obtain fame who seeks to avoid it, which is absurd.

Chaucer keeps to truth. The first company came,

And saiden, Certes, lady bright, We have done well with all out might, But we ne kepen have for fame, Hide our workes and our name.

"I grant you all your asking," she replies; "let your works be dead."

The second company arrive immediately afterwards, and prefer the same request in the lines versified by Pope, when Fame, with her usual capriciousness, refuses their prayer, and orders Eolus to sound their praises.]

[Footnote 113: An obvious imitation of a well-known verse in Denham:

Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not dull.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 114: The reader might compare these twenty-eight lines following, which contain the same matter, with eighty-four of Chaucer, beginning thus:

Tho came the sixthe companye, And gan faste to Fame cry, &c.,

being too prolix to be here inserted.--POPE.]

[Footnote 115: "A pretty fame," says Dennis, "when the very smartest of these c.o.xcombs is sure to have his name rotten before his carcase. When the author introduced these fellows into the temple of Fame, he ought to have made the chocolate-house, and the side-box, part of it." The criticism was just. The contemptible creatures who buzzed their profligate falsehoods for the hour, and were heard of no more, should have been introduced, if at all, into the Temple of Rumour, and not into the Temple of Fame. Pope followed Chaucer.]

[Footnote 116: Strokes of pleasantry and humour, and satirical reflections on the foibles of common life, are unsuited to so grave and majestic a poem. They appear as unnatural and out of place as one of the burlesque scenes of Heemskirk would do in a solemn landscape of Poussin.

When I see such a line as

And at each blast a lady's honour dies

in the Temple of Fame, I lament as much to find it placed there as to see shops and sheds and cottages erected among the ruins of Diocletian's baths.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 117: Pope places the temple of Fame on a precipitous rock of ice, and Dennis charges him with departing from his allegory when he describes the self-indulgent mult.i.tude, who are "even fatigued with ease," as having toiled up the "steep and slippery ascent" to present themselves before the G.o.ddess. There is the same defect in Chaucer.]

[Footnote 118: