Search -
The Works of Alexander Pope, With Notes and Illustrations, by Himself and Others. to Which Are Added, a New Life of the Author
The Works of Alexander Pope With Notes and Illustrations by Himself and Others to Which Are Added a New Life of the Author Author:Alexander Pope General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1847 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: EPISTLE ME. ADDISON. OCCASIONED BY HIS DIALOGUES ON MEDALS. See the wild Waste of all-devouring years! How Rome her own sad Sepulchre appears ! NOTES. Mr. Addison. This was originally written in the year 1715, when Mr. Addison intended to publish his book of Medals ; it was some time before he was Secretary of State ; but not published till Mr. Tickell's Edition of his works : at which time the verses on Mr. Craggs, which conclude the poem, were added, viz. in 1720. -- P. Notwithstanding the foregoing note is ascribed to Pope, the information it contains is certainly erroneous, as Mr. Addison died on the seventeenth day of June, 1719 ; and consequently Pope could not, in the year 1720, request to share with him in the friendship of Craggs. The fact is, that the six last lines, which afterwards formed the epitaph on Craggs, appear in the epistle to Addison, not as obituary, but as an inscription on a supposed medal of Craggs, and were consequently written whilst both Addison and Craggs were living. Dialogues On Medals.] This treatise on Medals was written by Addison in that pleasing form of composition, so unsuccessfully attempted by many modern authors, Dialogues. In no one species of writing nave the Ancients so indisputable a superiority over us. The dialogues of Plato and Cicero, especially the former, are perfect dramas ; where the characters are supported with consistency and nature, and the reasoning suited to the characters. " There are in English three dialogues, and but three," says a learned and ingenious author', who has himself practised this agreeable way of writing, "that deser...« less