Alexander Pope: Selected Poetry and Prose

recognize the greatest poetic talent. Dryden had
money difficulties for much of his life. At his death
Halifax proposed to erect a monument to him in
Westminister Abbey.
250 Bavius May every bad poet be matched by a bad
patron.
256 Gay John Gay, friend of Pope whose epitaph was
written by Pope (see p. 151) and whose patron was
the Duke of Queensberry.
276 Balbus Viscount Dupplin who had a reputation for
small talk. Balbus in Latin means stutterer.
280 Sir Will Sir William Yonge, politician and poetaster,
held in general contempt.
299 dean and silver bell a reference to the chapel
described in Timon’s villa (‘Epistle to Burlington’,
lines 141–50). Gossip wrongly associated the villa
with the Duke of Chandos’s estate, Cannons.
305 Sporus John, Lord Hervey, favourite courtier of
Queen Caroline (here Eve) and Walpole who had
quarrelled with Pope and attacked him in pamphlets
and poems. A Roman historian records that the
Emperor Nero had gone through a marriage
ceremony with a eunuch called Sporus. Hervey was
noted for the soft beauty of his features.
306 ass’s milk prescribed as a tonic for the delicate.
319 at the ear of Eve See Paradise Lost, IV, 800, where
Satan is ‘squat like a toad, close at the ear of Eve’
(here Queen Caroline).
familiar as in familiar spirit or demon, supposedly in
the command of a witch (here the queen).
330 Rabbins rabbis, interpreters of scripture.
331 cherub’s face a reference to Hervey’s beauty and to
the depiction of the tempting serpent with an
attractive human face in paintings.
341 stooped as a falcon is said to stoop to its prey.
Appropriate here where Pope is talking of his change
to satire.
353 The libelled person attacks upon his deformity.
356 The whisper of Lord Hervey, intimate confidant of
the court.