SOURCE: “‘Some Strange Comfort’: Construction and Deconstruction in An Essay on Man,” in Quests of Difference: Reading Pope's Poems, University Press of Kentucky, 1986, pp. 39-65.

In the following essay, Atkins explains the theodicy of An Essay on Man in relation to Pope's notion of “the ‘proper,’” deconstructing the poem's central opposition between divine impartiality and human expectation.

Many of the concerns that structure An Essay on Criticism continue in An Essay on Man. Whereas the earlier poem reveals Pope's commitment to certain distinctions and oppositions, his theodicy revolves around his commitment to the notion of the “proper.” This complex idea is itself related to Pope's central argument in An Essay on Man concerning God's impartiality, which runs counter to the human desire for and expectation of preferential—and differentiating—treatment. The work of difference in this later poem, in both Pope's declarations and the textual description, is more...