POPE. 361 



The speech of Thalestris, too, with its droll climax, is 

 equally good : 



&quot; Methinks already I your tears survey, 

 Already hear the horrid things they say, 

 Already see you a degraded toast, 

 And all your honour in a whisper lost ! 

 How shall I then your helpless fame defend ? 

 Twill then be infamy to seem your friend ! 

 And shall this prize, the inestimable prize, 

 Exposed through crystal to the gazing eyes, 

 And heightened by the diamond s circling rays, 

 On that rapacious hand for ever blaze ? 

 Sooner shall grass in Hyde Park Circus grow, 

 And wits take lodging in the sound of Bow ; 

 Sooner let earth, air, sea, in chaos fall, 

 Men, monkeys, lapdogs, parrots, perish all ! &quot; 



So also Belinda s account of the morning omens : 



&quot; Twas this the morning omens seemed to tell ; 

 Thrice from my trembling hand the patch-box fell ; 

 The tottering china shook without a wind ; 

 Nay, Poll sat mute, and Shock was most unkind.&quot; 



The idea of the goddess of Spleen, and of her palace 

 where 



&quot; The dreaded East is all the wind that blows,&quot; 



was a very happy one. In short, the whole poem more 

 truly deserves the name of a creation than anything Pope 

 ever wrote. The action is confined to a world of his own, 

 the supernatural agency is wholly of his own contrivance, 

 and nothing is allowed to overstep the limitations of the 

 subject. It ranks by itself as one of the purest works of 

 human fancy ; whether that fancy be strictly poetical or 

 not is another matter. If we compare it with the &quot; Mid 

 summer Night s Dream,&quot; an uncomfortable doubt is 

 suggested. The perfection of form in the &quot; Rape of the 

 Lock &quot; is to me conclusive evidence that in it the natural 

 genius of Pope found fuller and freer expression than in any 

 other of his poems. The others are aggregates of brilliant 

 passages rather than harmonious wholes. 



It is a droll illustration of the inconsistencies of human 



