With Pope this tone becomes harsher, and the merciless satirist
begins to show himself. In truth, Pope can be inimitably pungent, but he
can never be simply playful. Addison was too condescending with his
pretty pupils; but under Pope's courtesy there lurks contempt, and his
smile has a disagreeable likeness to a sneer. If Addison's manner
sometimes suggests the blandness of a don who classes women with the
inferior beings unworthy of the Latin grammar, Pope suggests the
brilliant wit whose contempt has a keener edge from his resentment
against fine ladies blinded to his genius by his personal deformity.
Even in his dedication, Pope, with unconscious impertinence, insults his
heroine for her presumable ignorance of his critical jargon. His smart
epigrams want but a slight change of tone to become satire. It is the
same writer who begins an essay on women's characters by telling a woman
that her sex is a compound of
Matter too soft a lasting mask to bear;
And best distinguished by black, brown, or fair,
and communicates to her the pleasant truth that
Every woman is at heart a rake.
Women, in short, are all frivolous beings, whose one genuine interest is
in love-making. The same sentiment is really implied in the more playful
lines in the _Rape of the Lock_. The sylphs are warned by omens that
some misfortune impends; but they don't know what.
Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,
Or some frail china jar receive a flaw;
Or stain her honour or her new brocade,
Forget her prayers or miss a masquerade;
Or lose her heart or necklace at a ball,
Or whether heaven has doom'd that Shock must fall.
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