ADDISON AND POPE 
‘¢ Addison, 
Thou polished sage, or shall I call thee bard, 
I see thee come: around thy temples play 
The lambent flames of humour, bright’ning mild 
Thy judgment into smiles; gracious thou com’st 
With Satire at thy side, who checks her frown, 
But not her secret sting.” —Mason. 
‘¢ With bolder rage 
Pope next advances; his indignant arm 
Waves the poetic brand o’er Timon’s shades, 
And lights them to destruction ; the fierce blaze 
Sweeps through each kindred vista, groves to groves 
Nod their fraternal farewell and expire.” —Mason. 
A.ttTHouGH Addison and Pope were contemporaries it 
was the former who led the crusade against formal 
gardening in general and the art of Topiary in particu- 
lar. Less satirical than his one-time friend, Addison 
nevertheless pointed out with remarkable clearness that 
the gardens of the early part of the eighteenth century 
were not nearly so beautiful as they might have been, 
owing to the excessive use of clipped trees and the 
extreme care which the gardeners of that time took to 
secure the utmost regularity in their planting and 
uniformity in design. 
Addison was counted one of the most brilliant of the 
Essayists of his time, and among the numerous con- 
tributions made by him to the Spectator is a lengthy one 
‘¢On the Pleasures of the Imagination.” This took the 
form of eleven Papers, or epistles, published in regular 
order from June 21, to July 2, 1712. , tascam me 
fourth paper that he deals more particularly with 
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