“HENCE SATIRE ROSE, THAT JUST THE MEDIUM HIT, AND HEALS WITH MORALS WHAT IT HURTS WITH WIT”: ALEXANDER POPE’S IMITATIONS OF HORACE

(HORACE) POPE, Alexander. The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace, Imitated. London: T. Cooper, 1737. BOUND WITH: The Second Epistle of the Second Book of Horace, Imitated. London: R. Dodsley, 1737. Two imprints in one. Slim folio, modern half tan calf gilt, red morocco spine label, marbled boards; pp. 23; pp. 19.

First editions, first states, of Pope’s imitations of Horace’s epistles, considering the place and prospects of poetry in Augustan England.

The classical poetry of Horace, along with that of Virgil and Ovid, was a touchstone for cultivated English readers in the eighteenth century. Boswell notes that Horace’s odes were the works in which Samuel Johnson “took most delight,” while a scene in Fanny Burney’s bestselling Evelina depicts a challenge to a group of aristocratic gamblers: “suppose, for the good of your own memories, and the entertainment and surprise of the company, the thousand pounds should fall to the share of him who can repeat by heart the longest ode of Horace?”

Alexander Pope’s celebrated imitations did much to sustain interest in the classical poet and his sensibility, as Pope used the model of Horace to critique English life and letters under George II. Pope states his purpose in the Advertisement to the First Epistle: “The Reflections of Horace . . . seem’d so seasonable to the present Times, that I could not help applying them to the use of my own Country.” In his first epistle, Pope recasts Horace’s original letter to Augustus, in which Horace derided those who mindlessly elevated ancient poets over modern ones, as a letter to George II: “I lose my patience, and I own it too, / When works are censur’d, not as bad, but new.” In the second epistle, Pope takes up Horace’s apology for no longer writing poetry in an ungrateful time, offering advice to old poets like himself: “Walk sober off; before a sprightlier Age / Comes titt’ring on, and shoves you from the stage.” First state of the First Epistle, with the superscript footnote “37” appearing three times on page 21 (once in the catchword). First state of the Second Epistle, with footnote 15 misnumbered “16” on page 12 and all subsequent footnotes misnumbered in suit. Griffith 458 and 467; 447.

Early paper repair to first title page (not affecting text). Near-fine.