These are exquisite lines, and have given delight to innumerable readers, but they gave no delight to Lady Mary.  In writing to her sister, the Countess of Mar, then at Paris, she says in allusion to these “most musical, most melancholy” verses—­“I stifled them here; and I beg they may die the same death at Paris.”  It is not, however, quite so easy a thing as Lady Mary seemed to think, to “stifle” such poetry as Pope’s.

Pope’s notions respecting the laying out of gardens are well expressed in the following extract from the fourth Epistle of his Moral Essays.[015] This fourth Epistle was addressed, as most readers will remember, to the accomplished Lord Burlington, who, as Walpole says, “had every quality of a genius and an artist, except envy.  Though his own designs were more chaste and classic than Kent’s, he entertained him in his house till his death, and was more studious to extend his friend’s fame than his own.”

    Something there is more needful than expense,
    And something previous e’en to taste—­’tis sense;
    Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven,
    And though no science fairly worth the seven;
    A light, which in yourself you must perceive;
    Jones and Le Notre have it not to give. 
    To build, or plant, whatever you intend,
    To rear the column or the arch to bend;
    To swell the terrace, or to sink the grot;
    In all let Nature never be forgot. 
    But treat the goddess like a modest fair,
    Nor over dress nor leave her wholly bare;
    Let not each beauty every where be spied,
    Where half the skill is decently to hide. 
    He gains all points, who pleasingly confounds,
    Surprizes, varies, and conceals the bounds.
    Consult the genius of the place in all;[016]
    That tells the waters or to rise or fall;
    Or helps the ambitious hill the heavens to scale,
    Or scoops in circling theatres the vale;
    Calls in the country, catches opening glades,
    Joins willing woods and varies shades from shades;
    Now breaks, or now directs, th’ intending lines;
    Paints as you plant, and, as you work, designs. 
    Still follow sense, of every art the soul;
    Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole,
    Spontaneous beauties all around advance,
    Start e’en from difficulty, strike from chance;
    Nature shall join you; time shall make it grow
    A work to wonder at—­perhaps a STOWE.[017]
    Without it proud Versailles![018] Thy glory falls;
    And Nero’s terraces desert their walls. 
    The vast parterres a thousand hands shall make,
    Lo!  Cobham comes and floats them with a lake;
    Or cut wide views through mountains to the plain,
    You’ll wish your hill or sheltered seat again.