In 1712, in a volume of Lintot’s _Miscellanies_, appeared _The Rape of the Lock_, one of the most brilliant poems in the language. The occasion of it was trivial enough. A Lord Petre had offended a Miss Fermor by cutting off a lock of her hair; dissensions between the families had followed, and Pope set about to laugh both parties back into good-humor. He makes of the incident a mock-heroic poem, and, rather unwisely, invents elaborate machinery of sylphs, gnomes, and other airy beings that take part in the mortals’ misdemeanors. The length becomes disproportionate to the theme, but the effect is quite dazzling. The style is highly artificial and mannered; but we must remember that Pope is jocular all through, and that he is purposely pitching his style as high as the subject permits. It abounds in rhetorical devices, such as climax, antithesis, and apostrophe. The effect produced is like that of a crackle of colored fireworks; smart epigrams explode in almost every line, and conceits dazzle with their brilliance. Yet so great an artist is Pope that by sheer skill he prevents the work from being flashy or vulgar: the workmanship is too delicate and precise. But when to mischief mortals bend their will, How soon they find fit instruments of ill! Just then, Clarissa drew, with tempting grace, A two-edged weapon from her shining case; So ladies, in romance, assist their knight, Present the spear, and arm him for the fight. He takes the gift with reverence, and extends The little engine on his fingers’ ends; This just behind Belinda’s neck he spread, As o’er the fragrant steams she bent her head. Swift to the lock a thousand sprites repair, A thousand wings, by turns, blow back the hair! And thrice they twitched the diamond in her ear; Thrice she looked back, and thrice the foe drew near. Just in that instant, anxious Ariel sought The close recesses of the virgin’s thought: As on the nosegay in her breast reclined, He watched the ideas rising in her mind, Sudden he viewed, in spite of all her art, An earthly lover lurking at her heart. Amazed, confused, he found his power expired, Resigned to fate, and with a sigh retired. The peer now spreads the glittering forfex wide To enclose the lock; now joins it, to divide. E’en then, before the fatal engine closed, A wretched sylph too fondly interposed; Fate urged the shears, and cut the sylph in twain (But airy substance soon unites again), The meeting points the sacred hair dissever From the fair head, for ever, and for ever!