The "Memoirs of Scriblerus," published about this time, extend only
to the first book of a work projected in concert by Pope, Swift, and
Arbuthnot, who used to meet on the time of Queen Anne, and
denominated themselves the "Scriblerus Club." Their purpose was to
censure the abuses of learning by a fictitious life of an infatuated
scholar. They were dispersed; the design was never completed, and
Warburton laments its miscarriage as an event very disastrous to
polite letters. If the whole may be estimated by this specimen,
which seems to be the production of Arbuthnot, with a few touches
perhaps by Pope, the want of more will not be much lamented; for the
follies which the writer ridicules are so little practised that they
are not known; nor can the satire be understood but by the learned.
He raises phantoms of absurdity, and then drives them away. He
cures diseases that were never felt. For this reason this joint
production of three great writers has never obtained any notice from
mankind. It has been little read, or when read has been forgotten,
as no man could be wiser, better, or merrier, by remembering it.
The design cannot boast of much originality; for, besides its
general resemblance to "Don Quixote," there will be found in it
particular imitations of the "History of Mr. Ouffle."

Swift carried so much of it into Ireland as supplied him with hints
for his "Travels;" and with those the world might have been
contented, though the rest had been suppressed.

Pope had sought for images and sentiments in a region not known to
have been explored by many other of the English writers. He had
consulted the modern writers of Latin poetry, a class of authors
whom Boileau endeavoured to bring into contempt, and who are too
generally neglected. Pope, however, was not ashamed of their