Note 306 — QUARRELS OF AUTHORS; (continued 3)
Reading edition
Sir Richard Blackmore, in his bold attempt at writing “A Satire against Wit,” in utter defiance of it, without any, however, conveys some opinions of the times. He there paints the great critic, “crowned with applause,” seated amidst “the spoils of ruined wits:”
“Till his rude strokes had thresh’d the empty sheaf, Methought there had been something else than chaff.”
Boyle, not satisfied with the undeserved celebrity conceded to his volume, ventured to write poetry, in which no one appears to have suspected the aid of “The Bees”—
“See a fine scholar sunk by wit in Boyle! After his foolish rhymes, both friends and foes Conclude they know who did not write his prose.” A Satire against Wit.