Anything like sustained reasoning was beyond his reach. Pope felt
and thought by shocks and electric flashes. He could only obtain a
continuous effect when working clearly upon lines already provided for
him, or simulate one by fitting together fragments struck out at
intervals. The defect was aggravated or caused by the physical
infirmities which put sustained intellectual labour out of the question.
The laborious and patient meditation which brings a converging series of
arguments to bear upon a single point, was to him as impossible as the
power of devising an elaborate strategical combination to a dashing
Prince Rupert. The reasonings in the Essay are confused, contradictory,
and often childish. He was equally far from having assimilated any
definite system of thought. Brought up as a Catholic, he had gradually
swung into vague deistic belief. But he had never studied any philosophy
or theology whatever, and he accepts in perfect unconsciousness
fragments of the most heterogeneous systems.
Swift, in verses from which I have already quoted, describes his method
of composition, which is characteristic of Pope's habits of work.
Now backs of letters, though design'd
For those who more will need 'em,
Are fill'd with hints and interlined,
Himself can scarcely read 'em.
Each atom by some other struck
All turns and motions tries;
Till in a lump together stuck
Behold a poem rise!
It was strange enough that any poem should arise by such means; but it
would have been miraculous if a poem so constructed had been at once a
demonstration and an exposition of a harmonious philosophical system.
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