The Dunciad: Book I. Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFGGHHIIJK LLHHMNHHOPHHQRSTPPHH UVWWOOXXYYZA2B2B2DDH HQQHHC2C2D2D2E2E2WWH HNNF2F2G2G2F2F2H2H2I 2I2J2 GGH2H2KK2HHDDH2H2H2H 2L2L2LLM2M2N2N2HHH2H 2H2H2HHHHHHLLHHHHHHZ ZO2O2JHK2K2P2P2HHOOH HQ2KR2P2OL2HHS2S2H2H 2H2H2H2H2H2H2KQ2HHHH H2H2ZZT2T2HHHO2| The Mighty Mother and her son who brings | A |
| The Smithfield muses to the ear of kings | A |
| I sing Say you her instruments the great | B |
| Called to this work by Dulness Jove and Fate | B |
| You by whose care in vain decried and cursed | C |
| Still Dunce the second reigns like Dunce the first | C |
| Say how the Goddess bade Britannia sleep | D |
| And poured her spirit o er the land and deep | D |
| In eldest time e er mortals writ or read | E |
| E er Pallas issued from the Thunderer s head | E |
| Dulness o er all possessed her ancient right | F |
| Daughter of Chaos and eternal Night | F |
| Fate in their dotage this fair idiot gave | G |
| Gross as her sire and as her mother grave | G |
| Laborious heavy busy bold and blind | H |
| She ruled in native anarchy the mind | H |
| Still her old empire to restore she tries | I |
| For born a goddess Dulness never dies | I |
| O thou whatever title please thine ear | J |
| Dean Drapier Bickerstaff or Gulliver | K |
| Whether thou choose Cervantes serious air | L |
| Or laugh and shake in Rabelais easy chair | L |
| Or praise the court or magnify mankind | H |
| Or thy grieved country s copper chains unbind | H |
| From thy Boeotia though her power retires | M |
| Mourn not my SWIFT at ought our realm acquires | N |
| Here pleased behold her mighty wings out spread | H |
| To hatch a new Saturnian age of lead | H |
| Close to those walls where Folly holds her throne | O |
| And laughs to think Monroe would take her down | P |
| Where o er the gates by his famed by father s hand | H |
| Great Cibber s brazen brainless brothers stand | H |
| One cell there is concealed from vulgar eye | Q |
| The cave of poverty and poetry | R |
| Keen hollow winds howl through the bleak recess | S |
| Emblem of music caused by emptiness | T |
| Hence bards like Proteus long in vain tied down | P |
| Escape in monsters and amaze the town | P |
| Hence miscellanies spring the weekly boast | H |
| Of Curll s chaste press and Lintot s rubric post | H |
| Hence hymning Tyburn s elegiac lines | U |
| Hence Journals Medleys Merc ries Magazines | V |
| Sepulchral lies our holy walls to grace | W |
| And new Year odes and all the Grub Street race | W |
| In clouded majesty here Dulness shone | O |
| Four guardian virtues round support her throne | O |
| Fierce champion Fortitude that knows no fears | X |
| Of hisses blows or want or loss of ears | X |
| Calm Temperance whose blessings those partake | Y |
| Who hunger and who thirst for scribbling sake | Y |
| Prudence whose glass presents th approaching goal | Z |
| Poetic justice with her lifted scale | A2 |
| Where in nice balance truth with gold she weighs | B2 |
| And solid pudding against empty praise | B2 |
| Here she beholds the chaos dark and deep | D |
| Where nameless somethings in their causes sleep | D |
| Till genial Jacob or a warm third day | H |
| Call forth each mass a poem or a play | H |
| How hints like spawn scarce quick in embryo lie | Q |
| How new born nonsense first is taught to cry | Q |
| Maggots half formed in rhyme exactly meet | H |
| And learn to crawl upon poetic feet | H |
| Here one poor word an hundred clenches makes | C2 |
| And ductile dullness new meanders takes | C2 |
| There motley images her fancy strike | D2 |
| Figures ill paired and similes unlike | D2 |
| She sees a mob of metaphors advance | E2 |
| Pleased with the madness of the mazy dance | E2 |
| How tragedy and comedy embrace | W |
| How farce and epic get a jumbled race | W |
| How time himself stands still at her command | H |
| Realms shift their place and ocean turns to land | H |
| Here gay description Egypt glads with showers | N |
| Or gives to Zembla fruits to Barca flowers | N |
| Glittering with ice here hoary hills are seen | F2 |
| There painted valleys of eternal green | F2 |
| In cold December fragrant chaplets blow | G2 |
| And heavy harvests nod beneath the snow | G2 |
| All these and more the cloud compelling Queen | F2 |
| Beholds through fogs that magnify the scene | F2 |
| She tinselled o er in robes of varying hues | H2 |
| With self applause her wild creation views | H2 |
| Sees momentary monsters rise and fall | I2 |
| And with her own fools colours gilds them all | I2 |
| Twas on the day when | J2 |
| - | |
| rich and grave | G |
| Like Cimon triumphed both on land and wave | G |
| Pomps without guilt of bloodless swords and maces | H2 |
| Glad chains warm furs broad banners and broad faces | H2 |
| Now night descending the proud scene was o er | K |
| But lived in Settle s numbers one day more | K2 |
| Now mayors and shrieves all hushed and satiate lay | H |
| Yet eat in dreams the custard of the day | H |
| While pensive poets painful vigils keep | D |
| Sleepless themselves to give their readers sleep | D |
| Much to the mindful Queen the feast recalls | H2 |
| What city swans once sung within the walls | H2 |
| Much she revolves their arts their ancient praise | H2 |
| And sure succession down from Heywood s days | H2 |
| She saw with joy the line immortal run | L2 |
| Each sire impressed and glaring in his son | L2 |
| So watchful Bruin forms with plastic care | L |
| Each growing lump and brings it to a bear | L |
| She saw old Prynne in restless Daniel shine | M2 |
| And Eusden eke out Blackmore s endless line | M2 |
| She saw slow Philips creep like Tate s poor page | N2 |
| And all the mighty mad in Dennis rage | N2 |
| In each she marks her image full expressed | H |
| But chief in BAY S monster breeding breast | H |
| Bays formed by nature stage and town to bless | H2 |
| And act and be a coxcomb with success | H2 |
| Dulness with transport eyes the lively dunce | H2 |
| Remembering she herself was pertness once | H2 |
| Now shame to fortune an ill run at play | H |
| Blanked his bold visage and a thin third day | H |
| Swearing and supperless the hero sate | H |
| Blasphemed his gods the dice and damned his fate | H |
| Then gnawed his pen then dashed it on the ground | H |
| Sinking from thought to thought a vast profound | H |
| Plunged for his sense but found no bottom there | L |
| Yet wrote and floundered on in mere despair | L |
| Round him much embryo much abortion lay | H |
| Much future ode and abdicated play | H |
| Nonsense precipitate like running lead | H |
| That slipped through cracks and zigzags of the head | H |
| All that on folly frenzy could beget | H |
| Fruits of dull heat and sooterkins of wit | H |
| Next o er his books his eyes began to roll | Z |
| In pleasing memory of all he stole | Z |
| How here he sipped how there he plundered snug | O2 |
| And sucked all o er like an industrious bug | O2 |
| Here lay poor Fletcher s half eat scenes and here | J |
| The frippery of crucified Moli re | H |
| There hapless Shakespeare yet of Tibbald sore | K2 |
| Wished he had blotted for himself before | K2 |
| The rest on outside merit but presume | P2 |
| Or serve like other fools to fill a room | P2 |
| Such with their shelves as due proportion hold | H |
| Or their fond parents dressed in red and gold | H |
| Or where the pictures for the page atone | O |
| And Quarles is saved by beauties not his own | O |
| Here swells the shelf with Ogibly the great | H |
| There stamped with arms Newcastle shines complete | H |
| Here all his suffering brotherhood retire | Q2 |
| And scape the martyrdom of jakes and fire | K |
| A Gothic library Of Greece and Rome | R2 |
| Well purged and worthy Settle Banks and Broome | P2 |
| But high above more solid learning shone | O |
| The classics of an age that heard of none | L2 |
| There Caxton slept with Wynkyn at his side | H |
| One clasped in wood and one in strong cow hide | H |
| There saved by spice like mummies many a year | S2 |
| Dry bodies of divinity appear | S2 |
| De Lyra there a dreadful front extends | H2 |
| And here the groaning shelves Philemon bends | H2 |
| Of these twelve volumes twelve of amplest size | H2 |
| Redeemed from tapers and defrauded pies | H2 |
| Inspired he seizes these an altar raise | H2 |
| An hetatomb of pure unsullied lays | H2 |
| That altar crowns a folio commonplace | H2 |
| Founds the whole pile of all his works the base | H2 |
| Quartos octavos shape the lessening pyre | K |
| A twisted birthday ode completes the spire | Q2 |
| Then he Great tamer of all human art | H |
| First in my care and ever at my heart | H |
| Dulness Whose good old cause I yet defend | H |
| With whom my muse began with whom shall end | H |
| E er since Sir Fopling s periwig was praise | H2 |
| To the last honours of the butt and bays | H2 |
| O thou of business the directing soul | Z |
| To this our head like bias to the bowl | Z |
| Which as more ponderous made its aim more true | T2 |
| Obliquely waddling to the mark in view | T2 |
| O ever gracias to perplexed mankind | H |
| Still spread a healing mist before the mind | H |
| And lest we err by wit s wild dancing light | H |
| Secu | O2 |
Alexander Pope
(1)
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About The Dunciad: Book I.
The Dunciad: Book I. is a poem by Alexander Pope. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
