The Scribleriad, and The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue

In Short

This collection presents two distinct yet interconnected verse satires from 1742: The Scribleriad and The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue. Both are primary documents of the era’s "paper wars," specifically targeting the celebrated poet Alexander Pope. The Scribleriad acts as a chaotic, multifaceted assault on Pope’s literary enemies, while The Difference adopts a moralistic tone to attack Pope himself. Together, they illustrate the intense, conspiratorial, and often petty nature of Grub Street literary life, offering a rare window into the venomous disputes that defined the period.

The Story

The narrative arc of these works is one of escalating rhetorical conflict. The Scribleriad opens with a call to arms for the "dunces"—the collective of writers, playwrights, and critics who felt aggrieved by Pope’s earlier, devastating satire, The Dunciad. The poem depicts a world where professional jealousy and political corruption are inextricably linked. It presents a tableau of the London literary scene, where Colley Cibber, the Poet Laureate and frequent target of Pope’s wit, is portrayed as a mock-epic hero. He is shown reclining on the lap of Dulness, gathering his allies—including the nobleman Lord Hervey—to launch a counter-offensive against the man who had made them famous by mocking them. The poem traverses the theatrical rivalries of the day, lampooning the pantomimes at Drury Lane and Covent Garden, and criticizing the political machinations of a government struggling to maintain its footing after the fall of Robert Walpole.

The second piece, The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue, shifts the focus from the collective dunces to a direct, ideological attack on Pope. It begins with a prefatory epistle from Cibber to Pope, dripping with defiant confidence and promising to fight the poet on his own terms using the "jingling weapons" of rhyme. The poem itself is an exercise in moral condemnation. It examines famous historical figures—Horace, Seneca, and Sallust—to argue that great writers often possess an irreconcilable gap between the high virtues they praise in their work and the corrupt, self-serving lives they lead in reality. Having established this historical framework, the author turns his gaze back to Pope. He systematically dismantles Pope’s public image, contrasting the poet’s moralistic posturing against the perceived hypocrisy of his financial dealings and his treatment of those who helped him. The argument concludes by stripping away the poet’s intellectual stature, reducing him to a "scoundrel" whose only true talents are his capacity for malice and his ability to harass those who cannot defend themselves. The arc moves from the public, theatrical ridicule of The Scribleriad to a more focused, searing critique of personal character in The Difference, ending with a total rejection of the target's moral legitimacy.

How It Unfolds

The gathering of the dunces The poem opens by summoning the literary "Scriblers" to reject good sense and rally around their common cause. It establishes an atmosphere of desperate, clashing vanity where writers and politicians are indistinguishable in their pursuit of fleeting fame.

The theatrical landscape The narrative moves to the London stage, where the management of rival theatres and the rise of the popular pantomime serve as emblems of cultural decline. The author mocks the commercialization of art, suggesting that the public appetite for low entertainment mirrors the corruption of the state.

The alliance of the aggrieved Cibber and his allies are presented as a desperate coalition, their alliance born of mutual resentment rather than genuine purpose. This section frames the "paper war" as a struggle for survival, where being satirized by Pope is the only path to being remembered.

The historical indictment The Difference pivots to an intellectual critique, using the lives of ancient philosophers to set a trap for the modern poet. It argues that hypocrisy is the natural state of the "great" writer, creating a template of moral failure that the author then applies to Pope.

The final character assassination The argument concludes by attacking the man behind the pen, mocking his physical stature and coldness of heart. The final verses cement the image of the satirist as a creature defined entirely by his desire to inflict pain.

The People

Colley Cibber, the Poet Laureate, serves as the central figure of the opposition. Driven by a need to reclaim his dignity after years of public mockery, he seeks to weaponize the very medium that destroyed him. He is the "King of the Dunces," a man who views literature as a trade to be protected and a tool for social advancement.

Lord Hervey, appearing as "Narcissus," acts as the aristocratic counterpoint to Cibber. Recently dismissed from his political office, he brings an element of elite prestige to the squabble, providing the "borrowed shape" of virtue to lend the attacks an air of authority. His desire for revenge against Pope aligns him with the very writers he might otherwise look down upon.

Alexander Pope looms over both texts as the absent antagonist. He is the "sun" that gives life to the "maggots" of Grub Street—a figure whose brilliance simultaneously creates his enemies and defines their existence. He is presented by his detractors as a moral hypocrite who masks his greed and cruelty behind the facade of classical learning and poetic excellence.

In Its Own Voice

Describing the transactional nature of fame and the necessity of being targeted by a superior talent, the author writes:

"When ye deny him Fame, ye fix your own, / And to be satirized, is to be known."

Reflecting on the inevitable hypocrisy of writers who preach morality while living lives of luxury, the poem asserts:

"Few Authors tread the Paths they recommend, / Or when they shew the Road, pursue the End."

What It's Really About

These texts are fundamentally concerned with the ethics of authorship and the gap between public persona and private reality. They pose a persistent question: does a writer’s moral character invalidate the quality of their work? By invoking the "difference between verbal and practical virtue," the authors argue that the act of writing is often an exercise in hypocrisy. They view the literary world as a corrupt ecosystem where satire is not a tool for reform, but a weapon used by the vengeful to secure their own relevance. The struggle is one of power—the power to define reputation, to distribute shame, and to survive in a public sphere that thrives on the destruction of character.

Why Read It Today

Readers who enjoy the history of ideas or the darker side of literary fame will find these pieces fascinating. They provide an unvarnished look at the "paper wars" of the 1740s, stripping away the polish of literary history to reveal the messy, human, and often petty disputes that fueled the period’s most famous writers. It is not an easy read; the language is thick with dense allusions to figures, theatre managers, and political scandals that have long since faded from common memory. The tone is frequently abrasive, and the attitudes toward physical disability and social status reflect the harsh realities of the eighteenth-century public arena.

However, there is a visceral quality to this writing that remains compelling. To read these lines is to witness the sheer, kinetic energy of people fighting for their place in the record of history. You are not reading "classics" in the sense of detached, timeless wisdom; you are reading the equivalent of a high-stakes, public brawl. It stays with you because it exposes the fragility of reputation and the way in which genius—in this case, Pope’s—can be both a magnet for praise and a lightning rod for the most persistent, human hatred. It is a vital, if jagged, piece of the puzzle that was the Enlightenment.