92 ARTISTS AND AUTHORS Morris or Mr. Way. Few now re-echo the praises which the critics of fifty years ago gave to the " Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady " and " Eloisa to Abelard ; " nor do any but the habitual pilgrims of the by-ways of literature devote their seri- ous attention to the different versions of the " Dunciad." But there is no reason why the " Rape of the Lock " should not find as many admirers a hundred years hence as it does to-day, or why so long as men remember the poems of the friend of Maecenas the " Satires and Epistles " should fail of an audience. In these Pope's verse is as perfect as it is anywhere ; and his subject is borrowed, not from his commonplace book, but from his own experiences. He wants, it is true, the careless ease, the variety, the unemphatic grace of the Roman writer. But he has many of the qualities of his master ; and it is probable that only when men weary of hearing how Horace strolled down the Sacred Way and met an in- tolerable Bore only then, or perhaps a little earlier, will they cease to hearken how Alexander Pope bade John Searle bar the door at Twickenham against the combined inroad of Bedlam and Parnassus. VOLTAIRE* By M. C. Lockwood, D.D. (1694-1778) r N order to justly estimate the life, charac- ter, and genius of a man it is necessary to possess some knowledge of the environ- ments and heredity which generated him. Any study of Voltaire which ignores these influences will fail not only in doing him justice, but in comprehending his unique and exceptional place in history. The most careful examination of these, together with the voluminous bibliography relating to Voltaire provided by French, German, and English literature, still will leave him some- thing of an enigma. The stage properties and scenery were prepared for the great Frenchman long before he appeared, as is always the case with the famous actors in the drama of history. The time in which he was born
- Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.
