The modesty and good nature of the successful dramatist had tamed even the malignity of faction.But literary envy, it should seem, is a fiercer passion than party spirit.It was by a zealous Whig that the fiercest attack on the Whig tragedy was made.John Dennis published Remarks on Cato, which were written with some acuteness and with much coarseness and asperity.Addison neither defended himself nor retaliated.On many points he had an excellent defence; and, nothing would have been easier than to retaliate; for Dennis had written bad odes, bad tragedies, bad comedies: he had, moreover, a larger share than most men of those infirmities and eccentricities which excite laughter; and Addison's power of turning either an absurd book or an absurd man into ridicule was unrivalled.Addison, however, serenely conscious of his superiority, looked with pity on his assailant, whose temper, naturally irritable and gloomy, had been soured by want, by controversy, and by literary failures.
But among the young candidates for Addison's favour there was one distinguished by talents from the rest, and distinguished, we fear, not less by malignity and insincerity.Pope was only twenty-five.But his powers had expanded to their full maturity;and his best poem, the Rape of the Lock, had recently been published.Of his genius, Addison had always expressed high admiration.But Addison had early discerned, what might indeed have been discerned by an eye less penetrating than his, that the diminutive, crooked, sickly boy was eager to revenge himself on society for the unkindness of nature.In the Spectator, the Essay on Criticism had been praised with cordial warmth; but a gentle hint had been added, that the writer of so excellent a poem would have done well to avoid ill-natured personalities.Pope, though evidently more galled by the censure than gratified by the praise, returned thanks for the admonition, and promised to profit by it.The two writers continued to exchange civilities, counsel, and small good offices.Addison publicly extolled Pope's miscellaneous pieces; and Pope furnished Addison with a prologue.
This did not last long.Pope hated Dennis, whom he had injured without provocation.The appearance of the Remarks on Cato gave the irritable poet an opportunity of venting his malice under the show of friendship; and such an opportunity could not but be welcome to a nature which was implacable in enmity, and which always preferred the tortuous to the straight path.He published, accordingly, the Narrative of the Frenzy of John Dennis.But Pope had mistaken his powers.He was a great master of invective and sarca**: he could dissect a character in terse and sonorous couplets, brilliant with antithesis: but of dramatic talent he was altogether destitute.If he had written a lampoon on Dennis, such as that on Atticus, or that on Sporus, the old grumbler would have been crushed.But Pope writing dialogue resembled--to borrow Horace's imagery and his own--a wolf, which, instead of biting, should take to kicking, or a monkey which should try to sting.The Narrative is utterly contemptible.Of argument there is not even the show; and the jests are such as, if they were introduced into a farce, would call forth the hisses of the shilling gallery.Dennis raves about the drama; and the nurse thinks that he is calling for a dram."There is," he cries, "no peripetia in the tragedy, no change of fortune, no change at all." "Pray, good sir, be not angry," says the old woman; "I'll fetch change." This is not exactly the pleasantry of Addison.
There can be no doubt that Addison saw through this officious zeal, and felt himself deeply aggrieved by it.So foolish and spiteful a pamphlet could do him no good, and, if he were thought to have any hand in it, must do him harm.Gifted with incomparable powers of ridicule, he had never even in self-defence, used those powers inhumanly or uncourteously; and he was not disposed to let others make his fame and his interests a pretext under which they might commit outrages from which he had himself constantly abstained.He accordingly declared that he had no concern in the Narrative, that he disapproved of it, and that if he answered the Remarks, he could answer them like a gentleman; and he took care to communicate this to Dennis.Pope was bitterly mortified; and to this transaction we are inclined to ascribe the hatred with which he ever after regarded Addison.