Note 171 — QUARRELS OF AUTHORS;

In a rough attack on Warburton, respecting Pope’s privately printing 1500 copies of the “Patriot King” of Bolingbroke, which I conceive to have been written by Mallet, I find a particular account of the manner in which the “Essay on Man” was written, over which Johnson seems to throw great doubts.

The writer of this angry epistle, in addressing Warburton, says: “If you were as intimate with Mr. Pope as you pretend, you must know the truth of a fact which several others, as well as I, who never had the honour of a personal acquaintance with Lord Bolingbroke or Mr. Pope, have heard. The fact was related to me by a certain Senior Fellow of one of our Universities, who was very intimate with Mr. Pope. He started some objections, one day, at Mr. Pope’s house, to the doctrine contained in the Ethic Epistles: upon which Mr. Pope told him that he would soon convince him of the truth of it, by laying the argument at large before him; for which purpose he gave him a large prose manuscript to peruse, telling him, at the same time, the author’s name. From this perusal, whatever other conviction the doctor might receive, he collected at least this: that Mr. Pope had from his friend not only the doctrine, but even the finest and strongest ornaments of his Ethics. Now, if this fact be true (as I question not but you know it to be so), I believe no man of candour will attribute such merit to Mr. Pope as you would insinuate, for acknowledging the wisdom and the friendship of the man who was his instructor in philosophy; nor consequently that this acknowledgment, and the dedication of his own system, put into a poetical dress by Mr. Pope, laid his lordship under the necessity of never resenting any injury done to him by the poet afterwards. Mr. Pope told no more than literal truth, in calling Lord Bolingbroke his guide, philosopher, and friend.” The existence of this very manuscript volume was authenticated by Lord Bathurst, in a conversation with Dr. Blair and others, where he said, “he had read the MS. in Lord Bolingbroke’s handwriting, and was at a loss whether most to admire the elegance of Lord Bolingbroke’s prose, or the beauty of Mr. Pope’s verse.”—See the letter of Dr. Blair in “Boswell’s Life of Johnson.”