"
He was seldom able to bring a humorous sketch to the close without
something a little objectionable. Often inclined to err on the side of
severity, he was one of those instances in which we find acrimonious
feeling associated with physical infirmity. "The Dunciad" is the
principal example of this, but we have many others--such as the epigram:
"You beat your pate and fancy wit will come,
Knock as you please, there's nobody at home."
At one time he was constantly extolling the charms of Lady Wortley
Montagu in every strain of excessive adulation. He wrote sonnets upon
her, and told her she had robbed the whole tree of knowledge. But when
the ungrateful fair rejected her little crooked admirer, he completely
changed his tone, and descended to lampoon of this kind--
"Lady Mary said to me, and in her own house,
I do not care for you three skips of a louse;
I forgive the dear creature for what she has said,
For ladies will talk of what runs in their head."
He is supposed to have attacked Addison under the name of Atticus. He
says that "like the Turk he would bear no brother near the throne," but
that he would
"View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes,
And hate for arts that caused himself to rise,
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And with our sneering teach the rest to sneer;
Willing to wound and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint a fault and hesitate dislike,
Alike reserved to blame or to commend,
A tim'rous foe, and a suspicious friend,
Dreading e'en fools, by flatterers besieged,
And so obleeging that he ne'er obleeged.
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