Wycherley ended by demanding the return of his manuscripts, in
a letter showing his annoyance under a veil of civility; and Pope sent
them back with a smart reply, recommending Wycherley to adopt a previous
suggestion and turn his poetry into maxims after the manner of
Rochefoucauld. The "old scribbler," says Johnson, "was angry to see his
pages defaced, and felt more pain from the criticism than content from
the amendment of his faults." The story is told at length, and with his
usual brilliance, by Macaulay, and has hitherto passed muster with all
Pope's biographers; and, indeed, it is so natural a story, and is so far
confirmed by other statements of Pope, that it seems a pity to spoil it.
And yet it must be at least modified, for we have already reached one of
those perplexities which force a biographer of Pope to be constantly
looking to his footsteps. So numerous are the contradictions which
surround almost every incident of the poet's career, that one is
constantly in danger of stumbling into some pitfall, or bound to cross
it in gingerly fashion on the stepping-stone of a cautious "perhaps."
The letters which are the authority for this story have undergone a
manipulation from Pope himself, under circumstances to be hereafter
noticed; and recent researches have shown that a very false colouring
has been put upon this as upon other passages. The nature of this
strange perversion is a curious illustration of Pope's absorbing vanity.
Pope, in fact, was evidently ashamed of the attitude which he had not
unnaturally adopted to his correspondent.
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