ent speculation
upon human life: much labour has been bestowed upon them, and Pope very
seldom laboured in vain. That his excellence may be properly estimated,
I recommend a comparison of his Characters of Women with Boileau's
Satire; it will then be seen with how much more perspicacity female
nature is investigated, and female excellence selected; and he surely is
no mean writer to whom Boileau shall be found inferiour. The Characters
of Men, however, are written with more, if not with deeper, thought, and
exhibit many passages exquisitely beautiful. The Gem and the Flower will
not easily be equalled. In the women's part are some defects: the
character of Atossa is not so neatly finished as that of Clodio; and
some of the female characters may be found, perhaps, more frequently
among men; what is said of Philomede was true of Prior.

In the epistles to lord Bathurst and lord Burlington, Dr. Warburton has
endeavoured to find a train of thought which was never in the writer's
head, and, to support his hypothesis, has printed that first which was
published last. In one, the most valuable passage is, perhaps, the Elogy
on good Sense; and the other, the End of the Duke of Buckingham.

The epistle to Arbuthnot, now arbitrarily called the Prologue to the
Satires, is a performance consisting, as it seems, of many fragments
wrought into one design, which, by this union of scattered beauties,
contains more striking paragraphs than could, probably, have been
brought together into an occasional work. As there is no stronger
motive to exertion than self-defence, no part has more elegance, spirit,
or dignity, than the poet's vindication of his own character. The
meanest passage is the satire upon Sporus.

Of the two poems which derived their names from the year, and which are
called the Epilogue to the Satires, it was very justly remarked by
Savage, that the second was, in the whole, more strongly conceived, and
more equally supported, but that it had no single passages equal to the
contention in the first for the dignity of vice, and the celebration of
the triumph of corruption.

The imitations of Horace seem to have been written as relaxations of his
genius. This employment became his favourite by its facility; the plan
was ready to his hand, and nothing was required but to accommodate, as
he could, the sentiments of an old author, to recent facts or familiar
images; but what is easy is seldom excellent; such imitations cannot