Cibber once, he mentioned him afterwards contemptuoufly in one of his Satires, and again in his Epiftle to Arbuthnot; and in the fourth book of the Dunciad attacked him with acrimony, to which the provocation is not eafily discoverable. Perhaps he imagined that in ridiculing the Laureat, he fatirifed thofe by whom the laurel had been given, and gratified that ambitious petulance with which he affected to infult

the great.

The severity of this fatire left Cibber no longer any patience. He had confidence enough in his own powers to believe that he could difturb the quiet of his adverfary, and doubtlefs did not want inftigators, who, without any care about.

the

the victory, defired to amuse themselves by looking on the conteft. He there-

fore

gave the town a pamphlet, in which he declares his refolution from that time never to bear another blow without returning it, and to tire out his adversary by perfeverance, if he cannot conquer him by ftrength.

The inceffant and unappeafable malignity of Pope he imputes to a very diftant caufe. After the Three Hours

after Marriage had been driven off the ftage, by the offence which the mummy and crocodile gave the audience, while the exploded fcene was yet fresh in memory, it happened that Cibber played Bays in the Rehearful; and, as it had been usual to enliven the part by the

men

mention of any recent theatrical tranfactions, he faid, that he once thought to have introduced his lovers disguised in a Mummy and a Crocodile. "This," fays he, " was received with loud "claps, which indicated contempt of the "play." Pope, who was behind the fcenes, meeting him as he left the stage, attacked him, as he fays, with all the virulence of a Wit out of his fenfes; to which he replied, "that he would take "no other notice of what was said by "fo particular a man than to declare, "that, as often as he played that part, "he would repeat the fame provoca❝tion."

He fhews his opinion to be, that Pope was one of the authors of the play which

he

he so zealously defended; and adds an idle ftory of Pope's behaviour at a ta

vern.

The pamphlet was written with little power of thought or language, and, if fuffered to remain without notice, would have been very foon forgotten. Pope had now been enough acquainted with human life to know, if his paffion had not been too powerful for his underftanding, that, from a contention like his with Cibber, the world seeks nothing but diverfion, which is given at the expence of the higher character. When Cibber lampooned Pope, curiofity was excited; what Pope would fay of Cibber nobody enquired, but in hope that Pope's

afpe

afperity might betray his pain and leffen

his dignity..

He fhould therefore have fuffered the pamphlet to flutter and die, without confeffing that it ftung him. The dif honour of being fhewn as Cibber's antagonift could never be compenfated by the victory. Cibber had nothing to lose; when Pope had exhaufted all his malignity upon him, he would rife in the efteem both of his friends and his enemies. Silence only could have made him defpicable; the blow which did. not appear to be felt, would have been ftruck in vain.

But Pope's irrafcibility prevailed, and he refolved to tell the whole English world. that he was at war with Cibber;

and