No More Learning

'328 Fungoso:'

a character in Ben Jonson's 'Every Man out of his Humour'. He is the son
of a miserly farmer, and tries hard, though all in vain, to imitate the
dress and manners of a fine gentleman.

'329 These sparks:'

these would-be dandies.


'337 Numbers:'

rhythm, meter.


'341 haunt Parnassus:

read poetry. --ear:' note that in Pope's day this word rhymed with
"repair" and "there. "


'344 These:'

critics who care for the meter only in poetry insist on the proper
number of syllables in a line, no matter what sort of sound or sense
results. For instance, they do not object to a series of "open vowels,"
'i. e. ' hiatuses caused by the juxtaposition of such words as "tho" and
"oft," "the" and "ear. " Line 345 is composed especially to show how
feeble a rhythm results from such a succession of "open vowels. " They do
not object to bolstering up a line with "expletives," such as "do" in l.
346, nor to using ten "low words," 'i. e. ' short, monosyllabic words to
make up a line.
'347'

With this line Pope passes unconsciously from speaking of bad critics to
denouncing some of the errors of bad poets, who keep on using hackneyed
phrases and worn-out metrical devices.


'356 Alexandrine:'

a line of six iambic feet, such as l. 357, written especially to
illustrate this form. Why does Pope use the adjective "needless" here?


'361 Denham's strength . . . Waller's sweetness:'

Waller and Denham were poets of the century before Pope; they are almost
forgotten to-day, but were extravagantly admired in his time. Waller
began and Denham continued the fashion of writing in "closed" heroic
couplets, 'i. e. ' in verses where the sense is for the most part
contained within one couplet and does not run over into the next as had
been the fashion in earlier verse. Dryden said that "the excellence and
dignity of rhyme were never fully known till Mr. Waller taught it," and
the same critic spoke of Denham's poetry as "majestic and correct. "


'370 Ajax:'

one of the heroes of the 'Iliad'. He is represented more than once as
hurling huge stones at his enemies. Note that Pope has endeavored in
this and the following line to convey the sense of effort and struggle.