resolution from that time never to bear another blow without
returning it, and to tire out his adversary by perseverance if he
cannot conquer him by strength.

The incessant and unappeasable malignity of Pope he imputes to a
very distant cause. After the Three Hours After Marriage had been
driven off the stage, by the offence which the mummy and crocodile
gave the audience, while the exploded scene was yet fresh in memory,
it happened that Cibber played Bayes in the Rehearsal; and, as it
had been usual to enliven the part by the mention of any recent
theatrical transactions, he said, that he once thought to have
introduced his lovers disguised in a mummy and a crocodile. "This,"
says he, "was received with loud claps, which indicated contempt for
the play." Pope, who was behind the scenes, meeting him as he left
the stage, attacked him, as he says, with all the virulence of a
"wit out of his senses;" to which he replied, "that he would take no
other notice of what was said by so particular a man, than to
declare, that as often as he played that part he would repeat the
same provocation." He shows his opinion to be that Pope was one of
the authors of the play which he so zealously defended, and adds an
idle story of Pope's behaviour at a tavern.

The pamphlet was written with little power of thought or language,
and, if suffered to remain without notice, would have been very soon
forgotten. Pope had now been enough acquainted with human life to
know, if his passion had not been too powerful for his
understanding, that, from a contention like his with Cibber, the
world seeks nothing but diversion, which is given at the expense of
the higher character. When Cibber lampooned Pope, curiosity was
excited. What Pope would say of Cibber nobody inquired, but in hope