As the views of Pope before referred to represent something like those of many others, and they may not be altogether devoid of interest in the present day, I append them, with Forbes’ sweeping animadversions thereon.  The lines which have been published as original (or without acknowledgment) by more than one chess writer in modern magazines, are as follows: 

“When and where chess was invented is a problem which we believe never will be solved.  The origin of the game recedes every day further back into the regions of the past and unknown.  Individuals deep in antiquarian lore have very praiseworthily puzzled themselves and their readers in vain, in their endeavours to ascertain to their satisfaction how this wonderful pastime sprang into existence.

“Whether it was the product of some peaceful age, when science and philosophy reigned supreme, or whether it was nurtured amid the tented field of the warrior, are questions which it is equally futile and unnecessary now to ask.  Sufficient for us that the game exists, and that it has been sung of by Homer, that it has been the delight of kings, scholars, and philosophers in almost every age; that it is now on the flood tide of success, and is going on its way gathering fresh votaries at every step, and that it seems destined to go down to succeeding ages as an imperishable monument of the genius and skill of its unknown founder.”

Forbes introduces this article by observing:  “Pope has much to answer for as the originator of a vast deal of rhetorical rubbish upon us in chess lectures and chess articles in periodicals.  Here (he says), for example, is a fair stereotype specimen of this sort,” and he concludes:  “We recommend the above eloquent moreceaux, taken from a chess periodical now defunct, to the attention of chessmen at chess reunions, chess lectures, and those who are ambitious to do a spicy article for a chess periodical.”

This appears somewhat severe on Pope, even if it be reasonable and consistent, which may be doubted; for Forbes himself, writing to the “Chess Player’s Chronicle,” in 1853, about 120 years after Pope, and seven years before the appearance of his own “History of Chess,” thus expressed himself: 

“In the present day it is impossible to trace the game of chess with moral certainty back to its source amidst the dark shades of antiquity, but I am quite ready to prove that the claim of the Hindoos as the inventors, is far more satisfactory than that of any other people.”

Pope needs no defenders.  There are writers of more recent date, who have inflicted what Forbes would probably call more rhetorical rubbish upon chess readers.  Here is one other example, which appeared in 1865: