which would show him by an easy computation, the termination of his
labour. His own diffidence was not his only vexation. He that asks
a subscription soon finds that he has enemies. All who do not
encourage him defame him. He that wants money would rather be
thought angry than poor; and he that wishes to save his money
conceals his avarice by his malice. Addison had hinted his
suspicion that Pope was too much a Tory; and some of the Tories
suspected his principles because he had contributed to the Guardian,
which was carried on by Steele.

To those who censured his politics were added enemies more
dangerous, who called in question his knowledge of Greek, and his
qualifications for a translator of "Homer." To these he made no
public opposition, but in one of his letters escapes from them as
well as he can. At an age like his, for he was not more than
twenty-five, with an irregular education and a course of life of
which much seems to have passed in conversation, it is not very
likely that he overflowed with Greek. But when he felt himself
deficient he sought assistance, and what man of learning would
refuse to help him? Minute inquiries into the force of words are
less necessary in translating Homer than other poets, because his
positions are general, and his representations natural, with very
little dependence on local or temporary customs, on those changeable
scenes of artificial life, which, by mingling original with
accidental notions and crowding the mind with images which time
effaces, produces ambiguity in dictation and obscurity in books. To
this open display of unadulterated nature it must be ascribed that
Homer has fewer passages of doubtful meaning than any other poet
either in the learned or in modern languages. I have read of a man
who, being by his ignorance of Greek compelled to gratify his