very grossly. Lord Warwick himself
told me one day, that it was in vain for me to endeavour to be well with
Mr. Addison; that his jealous temper would never admit of a settled
friendship between us; and, to convince me of what he had said, assured
me, that Addison had encouraged Gildon to publish those scandals, and
had given him ten guineas after they were published. The next day, while
I was heated with what I had heard, I wrote a letter to Mr. Addison, to
let him know that I was not unacquainted with this behaviour of his;
that if I was to speak severely of him in return for it, it should be
not in such a dirty way; that I should rather tell him, himself, fairly
of his faults, and allow his good qualities; and, that it should be
something in the following manner: I then adjoined the first sketch of
what has since been called my satire on Addison. Mr. Addison used me
very civilly ever after[126]."

The verses on Addison, when they were sent to Atterbury, were considered
by him as the most excellent of Pope's performances; and the writer was
advised, since he knew where his strength lay, not to suffer it to
remain unemployed.

This year, 1715, being, by the subscription, enabled to live more by
choice, having persuaded his father to sell their estate at Binfield, he
purchased, I think, only for his life, that house at Twickenham, to
which his residence afterwards procured so much celebration, and
removed thither with his father and mother.

Here he planted the vines and the quincunx which his verses mention;
and, being under the necessity of making a subterraneous passage to a
garden on the other side of the road, he adorned it with fossile bodies,
and dignified it with the title of a grotto, a place of silence and
retreat, from which he endeavoured to persuade his friends and himself
that cares and passions could be excluded.

A grotto is not often the wish or pleasure of an Englishman, who has
more frequent need to solicit than exclude the sun; but Pope's
excavation was requisite as an entrance to his garden, and, as some men
try to be proud of their defects, he extracted an ornament from an
inconvenience, and vanity produced a grotto where necessity enforced a
passage. It may be frequently remarked of the studious and speculative,
that they are proud of trifles, and that their amusements seem frivolous
and childish; whether it be that men, conscious of great reputation,
think themselves above the reach of censu