'I remember also distinctly, (though I have not for this the authority
of my journal,) that the conversation going on concerning Mr. Pope, I
took notice of a report which had been sometimes propagated that he did
not understand Greek[1221]. Lord Bathurst said to me, that he knew that
to be false; for that part of the _Iliad_ was translated by Mr. Pope in
his house in the country; and that in the mornings when they assembled
at breakfast, Mr. Pope used frequently to repeat, with great rapture,
the Greek lines which he had been translating, and then to give them his
version of them, and to compare them together.
'If these circumstances can be of any use to Dr. Johnson, you have my
full liberty to give them to him. I beg you will, at the same time,
present to him my most respectful compliments, with best wishes for his
success and fame in all his literary undertakings. I am, with great
respect, my dearest Sir,
'Your most affectionate,
'And obliged humble servant,
'HUGH BLAIR.'
'Broughton Park,
'Sept. 21, 1779.'
JOHNSON. 'Depend upon it, Sir, this is too strongly stated. Pope may
have had from Bolingbroke the philosophick _stamina_ of his Essay; and
admitting this to be true, Lord Bathurst did not intentionally falsify.
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