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1 Alexander Pope (1711) 2 3 An Essay on Criticism 4 5 PART 1 6 7 'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill 8 Appear in writing or in judging ill; 9 But of the two less dangerous is the offense 10 To tire our patience than mislead our sense. 11 Some few in that, but numbers err in this, 12 Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss; 13 A fool might once himself alone expose, 14 Now one in verse makes many more in prose. 15 16 'Tis with our judgments as our watches, none 17 Go just alike, yet each believes his own. 18 In poets as true genius is but rare, 19 True taste as seldom is the critic's share; 20 Both must alike from Heaven derive their light, 21 These born to judge, as well as those to write. 22 Let such teach others who themselves excel, 23 And censure freely who have written well. 24 Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis. true, 25 But are not critics to their judgment too? 26 27 Yet if we look more closely, we shall find 28 Most have the seeds of judgment in their mind: 29 Nature affords at least a glimmering light; 30 The lines, though touched but faintly, are drawn right. 31 But as the slightest sketch, if justly traced, 32 Is by ill coloring but the more disgraced, 33 So by false learning is good sense defaced: 34 Some are bewildered in the maze of schools, 35 And some made coxcombs Nature meant but fools. 36 In search of wit these lose their common sense, 37 And then turn critics in their own defense: 38 Each burns alike, who can, or cannot write, 39 Or with a rival's or an eunuch's spite. 40 All fools have still an itching to deride, 41 And fain would be upon the laughing side. 42 If Maevius scribble in Apollo's spite, 43 There are who judge still worse than he can write. 44 45 Some have at first for wits, then poets passed, 46 Turned critics next, and proved plain fools at last. 47 Some neither can for wits nor critics pass, 48 As heavy mules are neither horse nor ass. 49 Those half-learn'd witlings, numerous in our isle, 50 As half-formed insects on the banks of Nile; 51 Unfinished things, one knows not what to call, 52 Their generation's so equivocal: 53 To tell them would a hundred tongues require, 54 Or one vain wit's, that might a hundred tire. 55 56 But you who seek to give and merit fame, 57 And justly bear a critic's noble name, 58 Be sure yourself and your own reach to know,
59 How far your genius, taste, and learning go; 60 Launch not beyond your depth, but be discreet, 61 And mark that point where sense and dullness meet. 62 63 Nature to all things fixed the limits fit, 64 As on the land while here the ocean gains, 65 In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains; 66 Thus in the soul while memory prevails, 67 The solid power of understanding fails; 68 Where beams of warm imagination play, 69 The memory's soft figures melt away. 70 One science only will one genius fit, 71 So vast is art, so narrow human wit. 72 Not only bounded to peculiar arts, 73 But oft in those confined to single parts. 74 Like kings we lose the conquests gained before, 75 By vain ambition still to make them more; 76 Each might his several province well command, 77 Would all but stoop to what they understand. 78 79 First follow Nature, and your judgment frame 80 By her just standard, which is still the same; 81 Unerring Nature, still divinely bright, 82 One clear, unchanged, and universal light, 83 Life, force, and beauty must to all impart, 84 At once the source, and end, and test of art. 85 Art from that fund each just supply provides, 86 Works without show, and without pomp presides. 87 In some fair body thus the informing soul 88 With spirits feeds, with vigor fills the whole, 89 Each motion guides, and every nerve sustains; 90 Itself unseen, but in the effects remains. 91 Some, to whom Heaven in wit has been profuse, 92 Want as much more to turn it to its use; 93 For wit and judgment often are at strife, 94 Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife. 95 'Tis more to guide than spur the Muse's steed, 96 Restrain his fury than provoke his speed; 97 The winged courser, like a generous horse, 98 Shows most true mettle when you check his course. 99 100 Those rules of old discovered, not devised, 101 Are Nature still, but Nature methodized; 102 Nature, like liberty, is but restrained 103 By the same laws which first herself ordained. 104 105 Hear how learn'd Greece her useful rules indites, 106 When to repress and when indulge our flights: 107 High on Parnassus' top her sons she showed, 108 And pointed out those arduous paths they trod; 109 Held from afar, aloft, the immortal prize, 110 And urged the rest by equal steps to rise. 111 Just precepts thus from great examples given, 112 She drew from them what they derived from Heaven. 113 The generous critic fanned the poet's fire, 114 And taught the world with reason to admire. 115 Then criticism the Muse's handmaid proved, 116 To dress her charms, and make her more beloved:
175 Great wits sometimes may gloriously offend, 176 And rise to faults true critics dare not mend; 177 But though the ancients thus their rules invade 178 (As kings dispense with laws themselves have made) 179 Moderns, beware! or if you must offend 180 Against the precept, ne'er transgress its end; 181 Let it be seldom, and compelled by need; 182 And have at least their precedent to plead. 183 The critic else proceeds without remorse, 184 Seizes your fame, and puts his laws in force. 185 186 I know there are, to whose presumptuous thoughts 187 Those freer beauties, even in them, seem faults. 188 Some figures monstrous and misshaped appear, 189 Considered singly, or beheld too near, 190 Which, but proportioned to their light or place, 191 Due distance reconciles to form and grace. 192 A prudent chief not always must display 193 His powers in equal ranks and fair array, 194 But with the occasion and the place comply, 195 Conceal his force, nay seem sometimes to fly. 196 Those oft are stratagems which errors seem, 197 Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream. 198 199 Still green with bays each ancient altar stands 200 Above the reach of sacrilegious hands, 201 Secure from flames, from envy's fiercer rage, 202 Destructive war, and all-involving age. 203 See, from each clime the learn'd their incense bring! 204 Here in all tongues consenting paeans ring! 205 In praise so just let every voice be joined, 206 And fill the general chorus of mankind. 207 Hail, bards triumphant! born in happier days, 208 Immortal heirs of universal praise! 209 Whose honors with increase of ages grow, 210 As streams roll down, enlarging as they flow; 211 Nations unborn your mighty names shall sound, 212 And worlds applaud that must not yet be found! 213 Oh, may some spark of your celestial fire, 214 The last, the meanest of your sons inspire 215 (That on weak wings, from far, pursues your flights, 216 Glows while he reads, but trembles as he writes) 217 To teach vain wits a science little known, 218 To admire superior sense, and doubt their own! 219 220 PART 2 221 222 Of all the causes which conspire to blind 223 Man's erring judgment, and misguide the mind, 224 What the weak head with strongest bias rules, 225 Is pride, the never-failing 'vice of fools. 226 Whatever Nature has in worth denied, 227 She gives in large recruits of needful pride; 228 For as in bodies, thus in souls, we find 229 What wants in blood and spirits swelled with wind: 230 Pride, where wit fails, steps in to our defense, 231 And fills up all the mighty void of sense. 232 If once right reason drives that cloud away,
233 Truth breaks upon us with resistless day. 234 Trust not yourself: but your defects to know, 235 Make use of every friend—and every foe. 236 237 A little learning is a dangerous thing; 238 Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. 239 There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, 240 And drinking largely sobers us again. 241 Fired at first sight with what the Muse imparts, 242 In fearless youth we tempt the heights of arts, 243 While from the bounded level of our mind 244 Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind; 245 But more advanced, behold with strange surprise 246 New distant scenes of endless science rise! 247 So pleased at first the towering Alps we try, 248 Mount o'er the vales, and seem to tread the sky, 249 The eternal snows appear already past, 250 And the first clouds and mountains seem the last; 251 But those attained, we tremble to survey 252 The growing labors of the lengthened way, 253 The increasing prospect tires our wandering eyes, 254 Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise! 255 256 A perfect judge will read each work of wit 257 With the same spirit that its author writ: 258 Survey the whole, nor seek slight faults to find 259 Where Nature moves, and rapture warms the mind; 260 Nor lose, for that malignant dull delight, 261 The generous pleasure to be charmed with wit. 262 But in such lays as neither ebb nor How, 263 Correctly cold, and regularly low, 264 That, shunning faults, one quiet tenor keep, 265 We cannot blame indeed—but we may sleep. 266 In wit, as nature, what affects our hearts 267 Is not the exactness of peculiar parts; 268 'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call, 269 But the joint force and full result of all. 270 Thus when we view some well-proportioned dome 271 (The world's just wonder, and even thine, 0 Rome!), 272 No single parts unequally surprise, 273 All comes united to the admiring eyes: 274 No monstrous height, or breadth, or length appear; 275 The whole at once is bold and regular. 276 277 Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see, 278 Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be. 279 In every work regard the writer's end, 280 Since none can compass more than they intend; 281 And if the means be just, the conduct true, 282 Applause, in spite of trivial faults, is due. 283 As men of breeding, sometimes men of wit, 284 To avoid great errors must the less commit, 285 Neglect the rules each verbal critic lays, 286 For not to know some trifles is a praise. 287 Most critics, fond of some subservient art, 288 Still make the whole depend upon a part: 289 They talk of principles, but notions prize, 290 And all to one loved folly sacrifice.
349 A vile conceit in pompous words expressed 350 Is like a clown in regal purple dressed: 351 For different styles with different subjects sort, 352 As several garbs with country, town, and court. 353 Some by old words to fame have made pretense, 354 Ancients in phrase, mere moderns in their sense. 355 Such labored nothings, in so strange a style, 356 Amaze the unlearn'd, and make the learned smile; 357 Unlucky as Fungoso in the play, 358 These sparks with awkward vanity display 359 What the fine gentleman wore yesterday; 360 And but so mimic ancient wits at best, 361 As apes our grandsires in their doublets dressed. 362 In words as fashions the same rule will hold, 363 Alike fantastic if too new or old: 364 Be not the first by whom the new are tried, 365 Nor yet the last to lay the old aside. 366 367 But most by numbers judge a poet's song, 368 And smooth or rough with them is right or wrong. 369 In the bright Muse though thousand charms conspire, 370 Her voice is all these tuneful fools admire, 371 Who haunt Parnassus but to please their ear, 372 Not mend their minds; as some to church repair, 373 Not for the doctrine, but the music there. 374 These equal syllables alone require, 375 Though oft the ear the open vowels tire, 376 While expletives their feeble aid do join, 377 And ten low words oft creep in one dull line: 378 While they ring round the same unvaried chimes, 379 With sure returns of still expected rhymes; 380 Where'er you find "the cooling western breeze," 381 In the next line, it "whispers through the trees"; 382 If crystal streams "with pleasing 'murmurs creep," 383 The reader's threatened (not in vain) with "sleep"; 384 Then, at the last and only couplet fraught 385 With some unmeaning thing they call a thought, 386 A needless Alexandrine ends the song 387 That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along. 388 Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and know 389 What's roundly smooth or languishingly slow; 390 And praise the easy vigor of a line 391 Where Denham's strength and Waller's sweetness join. 392 True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, 393 As those move easiest who have learned to dance. 394 'Tis not enough no harshness gives offense, 395 The sound must seem an echo to the sense. 396 Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, 397 And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows; 398 But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, 399 The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar. 400 When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, 401 The line too labors, and the words move slow; 402 Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, 403 Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main. 404 Hear how Timotheus' varied lays surprise, 405 And bid alternate passions fall and rise! 406 While at each change the son of Libyan Jove
407 Now burns with glory, and then melts with love; 408 Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow, 409 Now sighs steal out, and tears begin to flow: 410 Persians and Greeks like turns of nature found 411 And the world's victor stood subdued by sound! 412 The power of music all our hearts allow, 413 And what Timotheus was is Dryden now. 414 415 Avoid extremes; and shun the fault of such 416 Who still are pleased too little or too much. 417 At every trifle scorn to take offense: 418 That always shows great pride, or little sense. 419 Those heads, as stomachs, are not sure the best, 420 Which nauseate all, and nothing can digest. 421 Yet let not each gay turn thy rapture move; 422 For fools admire, but men of sense approve: 423 As things seem large which we through mists descry, 424 Dullness is ever apt to magnify. 425 426 Some foreign writers, some our own despise; 427 The ancients only, or the moderns prize. 428 Thus wit, like faith, by each man is applied 429 To one small sect, and all are damned beside. 430 Meanly they seek the blessing to confine, 431 And force that sun but on a part to shine, 432 Which not alone the southern wit sublimes, 433 But ripens spirits in cold northern climes; 434 Which from the first has shone on ages past, 435 Enlights the present, and shall warm the last; 436 Though each may feel increases and decays, 437 And see now clearer and now darker days. 438 Regard not then if wit be old or new, 439 But blame the false and value still the true. 440 441 Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own, 442 But catch the spreading notion of the town; 443 They reason and conclude by precedent, 444 And own stale nonsense which they ne'er invent. 445 Some judge of authors' names, not works, and then 446 Nor praise nor blame the writings, but the men. 447 Of all this servile herd the worst is he 448 That in proud dullness joins with quality, 449 A constant critic at the great man's board, 450 To fetch and carry nonsense for my lord. 451 What woeful stuff this madrigal would be 452 In some starved hackney sonneteer or me! 453 But let a lord once own the happy lines, 454 How the wit brightens! how the style refines! 455 Before his sacred name flies every fault, 456 And each exalted stanza teems with thought! 457 458 The vulgar thus through imitation err; 459 As oft the learn'd by being singular; 460 So much they scorn the crowd, that if the throng 461 By chance go right, they purposely go wrong. 462 So schismatics the plain believers quit, 463 And are but damned for having too much wit. 464 Some praise at morning what they blame at night,
523 And ready Nature waits upon his hand; 524 When the ripe colors soften and unite, 525 And sweetly melt into just shade and light; 526 When mellowing years their full perfection give, 527 And each bold figure just begins to live, 528 The treacherous colors the fair art betray, 529 And all the bright creation fades away! 530 531 Unhappy wit, like most mistaken things, 532 Atones not for that envy which it brings. 533 In youth alone its empty praise we boast, 534 But soon the short-lived vanity is lost; 535 Like some fair flower the early spring supplies, 536 That gaily blooms, but even in blooming dies, 537 What is this wit, which must our cares employ? 538 The owner's wife, that other men enjoy; 539 Then most our trouble still when most admired, 540 And still the more we give, the more required; 541 Whose fame with pains we guard, but lose with ease, 542 Sure some to vex, but never all to please; 543 'Tis what the vicious fear, the virtuous shun, 544 By fools 'tis hated, and by knaves undone! 545 546 If wit so much from ignorance undergo, 547 Ah, let not learning too commence its foe! 548 Of old those met rewards who could excel, 549 And such were praised who but endeavored well; 550 Though triumphs were to generals only due, 551 Crowns were reserved to grace the soldiers too. 552 Now they who reach Parnassus' lofty crown 553 Employ their pains to spurn some others down; 554 And while self-love each jealous writer rules, 555 Contending wits become the sport of fools; 556 But still the worst with most regret commend, 557 For each ill author is as bad a friend. 558 To what base ends, and by what abject ways, 559 Are mortals urged through sacred lust of praise! 560 Ali, ne'er so dire a thirst of glory boast, 561 Nor in the critic let the man be lost! 562 Good nature and good sense must ever join; 563 To err is human, to forgive divine. 564 565 But if in noble minds some dregs remain 566 Nor yet purged off, of spleen and sour disdain, 567 Discharge that rage on more provoking crimes, 568 Nor fear a dearth in these flagitious times. 569 No pardon vile obscenity should find, 570 Though wit and art conspire to move your mind; 571 But dullness with obscenity must prove 572 As shameful sure as impotence in love. 573 In the fat age of pleasure, wealth, and ease 574 Sprung the rank weed, and thrived with large increase: 575 When love was all an easy monarch's care, 576 Seldom at council, never in a war; 577 Jilts ruled the state, and statesmen farces writ; 578 Nay, wits had pensions, and young lords had wit; 579 The fair sat panting at a courtier's play, 580 And not a mask went unimproved away;
581 The modest fan was lifted up no more, 582 And virgins smiled at what they blushed before. 583 The following license of a foreign reign 584 Did all the dregs of bold Socinus drain; 585 Then unbelieving priests reformed the nation, 586 And taught more pleasant methods of salvation; 587 Where Heaven's free subjects might their rights dispute, 588 Lest God himself should seem too absolute; 589 Pulpits their sacred satire learned to spare, 590 And Vice admired to find a flatterer there! 591 Encouraged thus, wit's Titans braved the skies, 592 And the press groaned with licensed blasphemies. 593 These monsters, critics! with your darts engage, 594 Here point your thunder, and exhaust your rage! 595 Yet shun their fault, who, scandalously nice, 596 Will needs mistake an author into vice; 597 All seems infected that the infected spy, 598 As all looks yellow to the jaundiced eye. 599 600 PART 3 601 602 Learn then what morals critics ought to show, 603 For 'tis but half a judge's task, to know. 604 'Tis not enough, taste, judgment, learning, join; 605 In all you speak, let truth and candor shine: 606 That not alone what to your sense is due 607 All may allow; but seek your friendship too. 608 609 Be silent always when you doubt your sense; 610 And speak, though sure, with seeming diffidence: 611 Some positive, persisting fops we know, 612 Who, if once wrong, will needs be always so; 613 But you, with pleasure own your errors past, 614 And make each day a critic on the last. 615 616 'Tis not enough, your counsel still be true; 617 Blunt truths more mischief than nice falsehoods do; 618 Men must be taught as if you taught them not, 619 And things unknown proposed as things forgot. 620 Without good breeding, truth is disapproved; 621 That only makes superior sense beloved. 622 623 Be niggards of advice on no pretense; 624 For the worst avarice is that of sense. 625 With mean complacence ne'er betray your trust, 626 Nor be so civil as to prove unjust. 627 Fear not the anger of the wise to raise; 628 Those best can bear reproof, who merit praise. 629 630 'Twere well might critics still this freedom take; 631 But Appius reddens at each word you speak, 632 And stares, tremendous! with a threatening eye, 633 Like some fierce tyrant in old tapestry. 634 Fear most to tax an honorable fool, 635 Whose right it is, uncensured to be dull; 636 Such, without wit, are poets when they please, 637 As without learning they can take degrees. 638 Leave dangerous truths to unsuccessful satyrs,
697 Led by the light of the Monian star. 698 Poets, a race long unconfined, and free, 699 Still fond and proud of savage liberty, 700 Received his laws; and stood convinced 'twas fit, 701 Who conquered nature, should preside o'er wit. 702 703 Horace still charms with graceful negligence, 704 And without method talks us into sense; 705 Will, like a friend, familiarly convey 706 The truest notions in the easiest way. 707 He, who supreme in judgment, as in wit, 708 Might boldly censure, as he boldly writ, 709 Yet judged with coolness, though he sung with fire; 710 His precepts teach but what his works inspire. 711 Our critics take a contrary extreme, 712 They judge with fury, but they write with fle'me. 713 Nor suffers Horace more in wrong translations 714 By wits, than critics in as wrong quotations. 715 716 See Dionysius Homer's thoughts refine, 717 And call new beauties forth from every line! 718 719 Fancy and art in gay Petronius please, 720 The scholar's learning, with the courtier's ease. 721 722 In grave Quintilian's copious work, we find 723 The justest rules, and clearest method joined: 724 Thus useful arms in magazines we place, 725 All ranged in order, and disposed with grace, 726 But less to please the eye, than arm the hand, 727 Still fit for use, and ready at command. 728 729 Thee, bold Longinus! all the nine inspire, 730 And bless their critic with a poet's fire. 731 An ardent judge, who, zealous in his trust, 732 With warmth gives sentence, yet is always just; 733 Whose own example strengthens all his laws, 734 And is himself that great sublime he draws. 735 736 Thus long succeeding critics justly reigned, 737 License repressed, and useful laws ordained. 738 Learning and Rome alike in empire grew; 739 And arts still followed where her eagles flew; 740 From the same foes, at last, both felt their doom, 741 And the same age saw learning fall, and Rome. 742 With tyranny, then superstition joined, 743 As that the body, this enslaved the mind; 744 Much was believed, but little understood, 745 And to be dull was construed to be good; 746 A second deluge learning thus o'errun, 747 And the monks finished what the Goths begun. 748 749 At length Erasmus, that great, injured name 750 (The glory of the priesthood, and the shame!), 751 Stemmed the wild torrent Of a barb'rous age, 752 And drove those holy Vandals off the stage. 753 754 But see! each Muse, in Leo's golden days,
755 Starts from her trance, and trims her withered bays! 756 Rome's ancient Genius, o'er its ruins spread, 757 Shakes off the dust, and rears his reverend head. 758 Then sculpture and her sister-arts revive; 759 Stones leaped to form, and rocks began to live; 760 With sweeter notes each rising temple rung; 761 A Raphael painted, and a Vida sung. 762 Immortal Vida: on whose honored brow 763 The poet's bays and critic's ivy grow: 764 Cremona now shall ever boast thy name, 765 As next in place to Mantua, next in fame! 766 767 But soon by impious arms from Latium chased, 768 Their ancient bounds the banished Muses passed; 769 Thence arts o'er all the northern world advance, 770 But critic-learning flourished most in France: 771 The rules a nation, born to serve, obeys; 772 And Boileau still in right of Horace sways. 773 But we, brave Britons, foreign laws despised, 774 And kept unconquered-and uncivilized; 775 Fierce for the liberties of wit, and bold, 776 We still defied the Romans, as of old. 777 Yet some there were, among the sounder few 778 Of those who less presumed, and better knew, 779 Who durst assert the juster ancient cause, 780 And here restored wit's fundamental laws. 781 Such was the Muse, whose rules and practice tell, 782 "Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well." 783 Such was Roscommon, not more learned than good, 784 With manners gen'rous as his noble blood; 785 To him the wit of Greece and Rome was known, 786 And every author's merit, but his own. 787 Such late was Walsh—the Muse's judge and friend, 788 Who justly knew to blame or to commend; 789 To failings mild, but zealous for desert; 790 The clearest head, and the sincerest heart. 791 This humble praise, lamented shade! receive, 792 This praise at least a grateful Muse may give: 793 The Muse, whose early voice you taught to sing, 794 Prescribed her heights, and pruned her tender wing, 795 (Her guide now lost) no more attempts to rise, 796 But in low numbers short excursions tries: 797 Content, if hence the unlearned their wants may view, 798 The learned reflect on what before they knew: 799 Careless of censure, nor too fond of fame; 800 Still pleased to praise, yet not afraid to blame; 801 Averse alike to flatter, or offend; 802 Not free from faults, nor yet too vain to mend.
