n the
best words what we all know and feel, but cannot express, and has made
that classical which in weaker hands would be commonplace. His
sensibility to the claims of his art is exquisite, the adaptation of his
style to his subject shows the hand of a master, and if these are not
the highest gifts of a poet, they are gifts to which none but a poet can
lay claim.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] Some qualification may be made to these statements. Pope took
pleasure in landscape gardening on the English plan, as opposed to the
formality of the French and Dutch systems, and the design of the Prince
of Wales's garden is said to have been copied from the poet's at
Twickenham.

[12] Elwin and Courthope's _Pope_, vol. ii. p. 160.

[13] See the Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot.

[14] Elwin and Courthope's _Pope_, vol. v., p. 195.

[15] 'Lady Mary,' says Byron, 'was greatly to blame in that quarrel for
having encouraged Pope.... She should have remembered her own line,

'"He comes too near who comes to be denied."'

[16] _Studies in English Literature_, p. 47.--_Stanford._

[17] Quin (1693-1766) was the famous actor, and Patterson was Thomson's
deputy in the surveyor-generalship of the Leeward Isles, and ultimately
his successor.

[18] The Earl of Peterborough, the meteor-like brilliancy of whose
actions forms one of the most striking chapters in the history of his
time.

[19] _Life of Pope_, p. 216.

[20] 'Pope and Swift,' says Dr. Johnson, 'had an unnatural delight in
ideas physically impure, such as every other tongue utters with
unwillingness, and of which every ear shrinks from the mention.'

[21] Clarendon Press, Oxford.

[22] No doubt many distinguished foreigners who appreciated the beauty
of the poem had read it in the original.

[23] Stephen's _Pope_, p. 163.

[24] _Lectures on Art_, p. 70, Oxford.

CHAPTER II.

PRIOR, GAY, YOUNG, BLAIR, THOMSON.

[Sidenote: Matthew Prior (1664-1721).]

The ease with which the Queen Anne wits obtained office and rose to
posts of high trust through the pleasant art of verse-making, is
conspicuous in the career of Prior. His parents are unknown, the place
of his birth is somewhat doubtful, although he is claimed by
Wimborne-Minster, in Dorsetshire, and the first trustworthy facts
recorded of his early career are that he was a Westminster scholar when
the famous Dr. Busby, whose discipline was physical as well as mental,
presided over the school. His father died, and