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In the prologue to his Satires, having occasion to notice the lampooners of the times, who had represented his father as "a mechanic, a hatter, a farmer, nay a bankrupt," he feels himself called upon to state the truth about his parents; and naturally much more so at a time when the low scurrilities of these obscure libellers had been adopted, accredited, and diffused by persons so distinguished in all points of personal accomplishment and rank as Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and Lord Harvey: "hard as thy heart" was one of the lines in their joint pasquinade, " hard as thy heart, and as thy birth obscure."
But when Tragedy and Comedy came to light, the two classes of poets still followed their natural bent: the lampooners became writers of Comedy, and the Epic poets were succeeded by Tragedians, since the drama was a larger and higher form of art.
This, sir, is a frequent practice, not only with those who have no other employment, but, as I have sufficient reasons to believe, among some gentlemen who have seats in this house; gentlemen, whose abilities and knowledge qualify them to serve the publick in characters much superiour to that of lampooners of the government. Mr.
In Comedy this is already apparent: for here the poet first constructs the plot on the lines of probability, and then inserts characteristic names; unlike the lampooners who write about particular individuals.
It is a remarkable feature, though not perhaps a singular one, in the character of this great comic writer, that he was one of the most serious of men, and even of a melancholic temperament. One of his lampooners wrote a satirical comedy on the comic poet, where he figures as "Molière hypochondre." Boileau, who knew him intimately, happily characterised Molière as le Contemplateur.
She even went so far that certain authors declared she gave more than mere good-will to the gallant Cardinal de Lorraine; and the lampooners of the time made the following quatrain on Henri II: "Sire, if you're weak and let your will relax Till Diane and Lorraine do govern you, Pound, knead and mould, re-melt and model you, Sire, you are nothing nothing else than wax."
It was picked up by an inquisitive soul, reached the hands of the "lampooners," and appeared in biting verse in the next issue of the News Letter. When the king complained to Frances of her ill-treatment of his note, she declared, with a great show of astonishment, that she had not seen it, which was literally true, since she had only felt it.
I suppose the lampooners will get hold of the story and will set every one laughing at me. Kidnapped the wrong woman and lost her! Odds fish! But you're a pair of wise ones. I see I shall have to find me a new Lord High Kidnapper." The king was right concerning the lampooners, for soon they had the story, and he became the laughing-stock of London, though Frances's name was not mentioned.
He was very sensible to the annoyance of the periodical critics, which Gray was too philosophical or too proud to regard otherwise than as matter of amusement. He was the butt for a long line of satirists or lampooners. Churchill, Lloyd, Colman, the author of the Probationary Odes, and, if I remember right, Paul Whitehead and Wolcot, all levelled their shafts at him in turn.
All those whom Horace in his satires, and Persius and Juvenal have mentioned in theirs with a brand of infamy, are wholly such. It is an action of virtue to make examples of vicious men. The first reason was only an excuse for revenge; but this second is absolutely of a poet's office to perform. But how few lampooners are there now living who are capable of this duty!
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