JOHNSON AND POPE.•
Da. JOHNSON'S Life of Pope is almost a model biography of a poet, and on that ground alone a new edition is to be welcomed. The tendency of modern " Lives '' is to be far too long. The facilities for research are so continually increased that, as the work of each critic is piled on that of his predecessor, the mass of detail becomes so unwieldy that it is apt to topple over at last and bury the reader in a cloud of biographical duet that obscures the true significance of the central figure. To borrow Rupert Itrooke's paradox, critic and reader alike are in danger of being " blinded by their eyes." And surely, after all, Johnson tells us all that we need to know of the personal history of Pope, and he certainly gives us far more criticism than we often get in contemporary Lives. That is the really important thing. And in weighing Johnson's criticisms of poetry it must always be remem- bered to his honour that lie was one of the first in the field of English literary criticism to take his duties seriously, to attempt to fulfil his own ideal of" the critic without malevolence, who thought it as much his ditty to display beauties as to expose faults ; who censured with respect and praised with alacrity." He was the first great critic to note the reaction of circumstance and condition on literary achievement, and allow such considerations to influence his jadeenents. Johnson wrote his Liven of the Pools in what has been called " the sturdy vernacular of English prose style," and, as he himself said, he did not write only for "poets and philosophers." That is one reason why the average Englishman always feels at home with his Johnson, and why we shall never be able to afford to disregard the bulk of his literary opinion, even though time may have reversed a few of his judgments and modified many of his estimates. As Johnson naively remarks, unconsciously disarming future criticism of himself, " Surely to think differently at different times of poetical merit may be easily allowed."
There is one respect, however, in which Johnson's Life of Pope does undoubtedly suffer by comparison with a modern biography. Any man of equal genius writing now of a contemporary poet would con- trive to give us much more of a picture of his subject than we get here of Pope. This was, of course, the defect of Johnson's age ; but it is unusually tantalizing in his case, because when he does condescend to daily with a descriptive passage the effect is most extraordinarily vivid. Take as an example the description he gives of a meeting between Pope and Martha Blount, which took place when Pops was practically a dying man. It is the last glimpse we get of the little great man, "strays ambitious of splendid acquaintance," holding his court to the end
"While be was yet capable of amueement and conversation, as ha was one day sitting in the air with Lord Bolingbroke and Lord Marchmont, ho saw his favourite Martha Blount at the bottom of
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Johnson: Life of Pope. Edited by a. R. Weekes, MA. Leaden. W. B. Clive. 12a. net.]
the terrace, and asked Lord Bolingbroke to go and hand her up. Bolingbroke, not liking his errand, crowed his legs and eat still : but Lord Marelimont, who was younger and- ess captious, waited on the lady, who, when he came to her, asked, 'What,, is he not dead yet ? ' "
Could anything be more condensed, and at the IRMO time more wonderfully descriptive ? Not a word is needed to complete the picture. We are only left to wonder again over the strange enigma of Pope's character, the waepish strain which spoiled his happiest intercourse, so that the man of whom his biographer recorded that in the duties of friendship he was zealous and constant," and who said with almost his last breath that "there is nothing meritorious but virtue and friendship," should yet have been one of the best-hated men of his day Befere passing on, and with apologies to the great shade of Dr. Johnson, it might be interesting to supplement this lack of personal description by quoting here an account of Pope left to us by Sir Joshua Reynolds. The story is not often quoted, and is therefore probably little known, but it is especially interesting as giving a very good idea of the tremendous reputation which Pope enjoyed during his lifetime. We will give it as it occurs in Mr. Pope
When Reynolds first came to London he was the pupil of Hudson. by whom he was sent one day to a sale of pictures. While standing near the auctioneer the boy heard a bustle at the other end of the crowded room, and thought someone had fainted. However. he soon hoard the name of 'Mr. Pope ! " Mr. Pope ' echoed front every mouth, and all the people, as the poet passed, held out their hands for him to take. Reynolds, though not in the front row, stretched out his hand under the arra of a man who stood before him, and Pope took it in his, and this he did to all who passed. The boy used his eyes to advantage. In later years he described the poet in the following terms He was about four feet six high, very humpbacked and deformed. He had a very large and a very fine eye, and a long handsome nose ; his mouth had those peculiar marks which are always found in the mouths okerooked persons, and the muscles which ran across the cheeks were so strongly marked as to appear like small cords.'" It is probably inevitable that when a great writer has an equally great biographer the attention of the reader should be perpetually (liveried from the one to the other. In this instance, Johnson and Pope may be said to divide the stage fairly equally. While Johnson is loudly proclaiming the excellences of "the shell.like epigram, the rocketing and dazzling antithesis by which the little invalid kept in terror his encompassing cloud of enemies," our own ear is caught and held by the slower moving, but equally musical and sonorous, antithesis of Pope's great biographer. At the same film our minds are captivated by the terseness of his epigram and by the intense vigour of his thought.
Though it is to be hoped that this re-editing of Johnson's Life of Pope will encourage many readers to renew their acquaintance with both poet and lexicographer in the fresh light of Mr. Weekes's interesting monograph and notes, we cannot forbear to refresh their minds and ours by the citation here of a few of Dr. Johnson's good things. Their great merit mint be their own apology for unduly prolonging this review. A few observations about Pope himself,
" Pope never set genius tussle"; " was in haste to teach what he had not learned " ; is not very likely that he overflowed with Greek " ; Pope was less eager of money than Halifax of praise " ; "Vanity produced a grotto where necessity enforced a passage." The following occurs in the course of criticism of the "Verses to an Unfortunate Lady"; "Poetry has not often been worse employed than in dignifying the amorous fury of a raving girl." Or," White- head, who hung loose upon society, skulked and escaped." This by way of epigram "He that runs against time lies an antagonist not subject to casualties." Take finally some general moral re- flections, which are as good in style as in sense "Judgment is forced upon us by experience " ; He that asks a subscription soon finds that lie has enemies. All who do not encourage him defame him. He that wants money will rather be thought angry than poor; and he that wishes to save his money con- ceals his, avarice by his malice"; "Of the gradual abatement of kindness between friends, the beginning is often scarcely discernible to themselves, and the process is continued by potty provocations, and incivilities sometimes peevishly returned, and sometimes contemptuously neglected, which would escape all attention but that of pride, and drop from any memqry but that of resentment" ; " Let fiction at least cease with lifeend let us be serious over the grave."
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