Alexander Pope

Alexander Pope, who lived from 1688-1744, was an English poet who modeled himself after great poets of the classical past. Verse translations, moral and critical essays, satires, and the development of the heroic couplet, made him the leading poet of his age. Pope, born in London, was the son of a cloth merchant. His parents were Roman Catholics, which automatically barred him from England's Protestant universities. Until he was 12 years old, he was educated mainly …

…such as man. He displays this in saying “Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul; reason’s comparing balance rules the world. Man, but not for that, no action could attend, and, but for this, were active to no end” (II, 59-62). Pope’s assertion of reason derive from his intention to show that man is a functioning part of a massive system, and should remain part of his “state and place”(White p.76).