An Essay on Man; In Four Epistles to H. St. John, Lord Bolingbroke by Alexander Pope

Author:Alexander Pope
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: English poetry, lit_guide
ISBN: 9781407727448
Publisher: HardPress
Published: 2012-01-10T00:00:00+00:00

SATIRES AND EPISTLES OF HORACE IMITATED.

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The occasion of publishing these Imitations was the clamour raised on some of my Epistles. An answer from Horace was both more full, and of more dignity, than any I could have made in my own person; and the example of much greater freedom in so eminent a divine as Dr. Donne, seemed a proof with what indignation and contempt a Christian may treat vice or folly, in ever so low, or ever so high a station. Both these authors were acceptable to the princes and ministers under whom they lived. The Satires of Dr. Donne I versified, at the desire of the Earl of Oxford while he was Lord Treasurer, and of the Duke of Shrewsbury who had been Secretary of State, neither of whom looked upon a satire on vicious courts as any reflection on those they served in. And indeed there is not in the world a greater error, than that which fools are so apt to fall into, and knaves with good reason to encourage, the mistaking a satirist for a libeller; whereas to a true satirist nothing is so odious as a libeller, for the same reason as to a man truly virtuous nothing is so hateful as a hypocrite.

Uni aequus Virtuti atque ejus Amicis. P.

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