cation
of truly knowing thyself is a sufficient atonement for thy former
presumption.

DIALOGUE XIV.

BOILEAU--POPE.

_Boileau_.--Mr. Pope, you have done me great honour. I am told that you
made me your model in poetry, and walked on Parnassus in the same paths
which I had trod.

_Pope_.--We both followed Horace, but in our manner of imitation, and in
the turn of our natural genius, there was, I believe, much resemblance.
We both were too irritable and too easily hurt by offences, even from the
lowest of men. The keen edge of our wit was frequently turned against
those whom it was more a shame to contend with than an honour to
vanquish.

_Boileau_.--Yes. But in general we were the champions of good morals,
good sense, and good learning. If our love of these was sometimes heated
into anger against those who offended them no less than us, is that anger
to be blamed?

_Pope_.--It would have been nobler if we had not been parties in the
quarrel. Our enemies observe that neither our censure nor our praise was
always impartial.

_Boileau_.--It might perhaps have been better if in some instances we had
not praised or blamed so much. But in panegyric and satire moderation is
insipid.

_Pope_.--Moderation is a cold unpoetical virtue. Mere historical truth
is better written in prose. And, therefore, I think you did judiciously
when you threw into the fire your history of Louis le Grand, and trusted
his fame to your poems.

_Boileau_.--When those poems were published that monarch was the idol of
the French nation. If you and I had not known, in our occasional
compositions, how to speak to the passions, as well as to the sober
reason of mankind, we should not have acquired that despotic authority in
the empire of wit which made us so formidable to all the inferior tribe
of poets in England and France. Besides, sharp satirists want great
patrons.

_Pope_.--All the praise which my friends received from me was unbought.
In this, at least, I may boast a superiority over the pensioned Boileau.

_Boileau_.--A pension in France was an honourable distinction. Had you
been a Frenchman you would have ambitiously sought it; had I been an
Englishman I should have proudly declined it. If our merit in other
respects be not unequal, this difference will not set me much below you
in the temple of virtue or of fame.

_Pope_.--It is not for me to draw a comparison between our works. But,
if I may believe the best