A KEY TO THE LOCK.

DENNIS, who early distinguished himself as the enemy of Pope's reputation, and might be therefore said to have drawn upon himself the severity with which the satirist uniformly treated him, was desirous, as is not unusual for such critics, to involve the author's religious and political opinions in the discussion of his literary merits. Being himself a strenuous Protestant and whig, the ancient Aristarch was unwilling that the world should be seduced by the strains of an acknowleged Catholic and presumed Jacobite. In his remarks on the Rape of the Lock, and particularly in the preface, p. xii., Dennis treats Pope as an open and mortal enemy to his country and the commonwealth of learning. In order to expose the absurdity of accusations, which connected the religious principles of the author with his lightest attempts in literature, Pope published this little piece, in which the art of extracting wire-drawn allusions to politics and controfrom the most remote and slightest coincidences, is ridiculed with admirable effect.

The raillery had not, however, the effect of shaming dulness and malignity out of a resource so easy and so popular; in 1715, one Griffin a player published a Key to the What d'ye call it, in which he proved it to be a parody upon Addison's Cato, by arguments pretty similar to those adduced in the following piece.

A KEY TO THE LOCK.

SINCE this unhappy division of our nation into parties, it is not to be imagined how many artifices have been made use of by writers to obscure the truth, and cover designs which may be detrimental to the public. In particular, it has been their custom of late to vent their political spleen in allegory and fable. If an honest believing nation is to be made a jest of, we have a story of "John Bull and his wife:" if a treasurer is to be glanced at, an ant with a white straw is introduced; if a treaty of commerce is to be ridiculed, it is immediately metamorphosed into a tale of "Count Tariff."*

But if any of these malevolents have a small talent in rhyme, they principally delight to convey their malice in that pleasing way; as it were gilding the pill, and concealing the poison under the sweetness of numbers.

It is the duty of every well-designing subject to prevent, as far as he can, the ill-consequences of such pernicious treatises; and I hold it mine to warn the public of a late poem, entitled "The Rape of the Lock;" which I shall demonstrate to be of this nature.

It is a common and just observation, that, when

Arbuthnot's History of John Bull is quoted on the one side, and on the other, a paper of Steele's Guardian, in which some political insinuations are couched, under the allegory of a colony of ants. The satire, entitled The Trial of Count Tariff, was written in ridicule of the commercial treaty with France.

the meaning of any thing is dubious, one can no way better judge of the true intent of it, than by considering who is the author, what is his character in general, and his disposition in particular.

Now that the author of this poem is a reputed Papist is well known; and that a genius so capable of doing service to that cause may have been corrupted in the course of his education by Jesuits or others, is justly very much to be suspected; notwithstanding that seeming coolness and moderation, which he has been (perhaps artfully) reproached with by those of his own persuasion. They are sensible, that this nation is secured by good and wholesome laws to prevent all evil practices of the church of Rome; particularly the publication of books that may in any sort propagate that doctrine : their authors are therefore obliged to couch their designs the deeper; and though I cannot aver the intention of this gentleman was directly to spread Popish doctrines, yet it comes to the same point if he touch the government: for the court of Rome knows very well, that the church at this time is so firmly founded on the state, that the only way to shake the one, is, by attacking the other.

What confirms me in this opinion, is an accidental discovery I made, of a very artful piece of management among his Popish friends and abettors, to hide his whole design upon the government, by taking all the characters upon themselves.

Upon the day that this poem was published, it was my fortune to step into the Cocoa-tree, where a certain gentleman was railing very liberally at the author, with a passion extremely well counterfeited, for having (as he said) reflected upon him in the character of Sir Plume. Upon his going out, I inquired who he was, and they told me he was a Roman catholic knight."