upon the Frenzy J. D
. Addison then, through Steele, wrote to Pope's publisher of this 'manner of treating Mr. Dennis,' that he 'could not be privy' to it, and 'was sorry to hear of it.' In 1715, when Pope issued to subscribers the first volume of Homer, Tickell's translation of the first book of the Iliad appeared in the same week, and had particular praise at Button's from Addison, Tickell's friend and patron. Pope was now indignant, and expressed his irritation in the famous satire first printed in 1723, and, finally, with the name of Addison transformed to Atticus, embodied in the Epistle to Arbuthnot published in 1735. Here, while seeing in Addison a man
Blest with each talent and each art to please, And born to live, converse, and write with ease,
he said that should he, jealous of his own supremacy, 'damn with faint praise,' as one
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint the fault and hesitate dislike,
Who when two wits on rival themes contest,
Approves of both, but likes the worse the best:
Like Cato, give his little Senate laws,
And sits attentive to his own applause;
While wits and templars every sentence raise:
And wonder with a foolish face of praise:
Who would not laugh if such a man there be?
Who would not weep if Addison were he?
But in this
Spectator
paper young Pope's
Essay on Criticism
certainly was not damned with faint praise by the man most able to give it a firm standing in the world.