A Key to the Lock. Or, A Treatise Proving, Beyond All Contradiction, the Dangerous Tendency of a Late Poem, Entituled, The Rape of the Lock, to Government and Religion/Epistle Dedicatory
THE
Epistle Dedicatory,
TO
Mr. POPE.
THough it may seem foreign to my Profession, which is that of making up and dispensing salutary Medicines to his Majesty's Subjects, (I might say my Fellow-Subjects, since I have had the Advantage of being naturalized) yet cannot I think it unbecoming me to furnish an Antidote against the Poyson which hath been so artfully distilled through your Quill, and convey'd to the World through the pleasing Vehicle of your Numbers. Nor is my Profession as an Apothecary so abhorrent from yours as a Poet, since the Antients have thought fit to make the same God the Patron of Both. I have, not without some Pleasure, observ'd the mystical Arms of our Company, wherein is represented Apollo killing the fell Monster Python; this in some measure admonishes me of my Duty, to trample upon and destroy, as much as in me lies, that Dragon, or baneful Serpent, Popery.
I must take leave to make you my Patient, whether you will or no; though out of the Respect I have for you, I should rather chuse to apply Lenitive than Corrosive Medicines, happy, if they may prove an Emetic sufficient to make you cast up those Errors, which you have imbibed in your Education, and which, I hope, I shall never live to see this Nation digest.
Sir, I cannot but lament, that a Gentleman of your acute Wit, rectified Understanding, and sublimated Imagination, should misapply those Talents to raise ill Humours in the Constitution of the Body Politick, of which your self are a Member, and upon the Health whereof your own Preservation depends. Give me leave to say, such Principles as yours would again reduce us to the fatal Necessity of the Phlebotomy of War, or the Causticks of Persecution.
In order to inform you of this, I have sought your Acquaintance and Conversation with the utmost diligence; for I hoped in Person to persuade you to a publick Confession of your Fault, and a Recantation of these dangerous Tenets. But finding all my Endeavours ineffectual, and being satisfied with the Conscience of having done all that became a Man of an honest Heart and honourable Intention; I could no longer omit my Duty in opening the Eyes of the World by the Publication of this Discourse. It was indeed written some Months since, but seems not the less proper at this Juncture, when I find so universal an Encouragement given by both Parties, to the Author of a libellous Work that is designed equally to prejudice them both. The uncommon Sale of this Book (for above 6000 of 'em have been already vended) was also a farther Reason that call'd aloud upon me to put a stop to its further Progress, and to preserve his Majesty's Subjects by exposing the whole Artifice of your Poem in publick.
Sir, to address my self to so florid a Writer as you, without collecting all the Flowers of Rhetorick, would be an unpardonable Indecorum; but when I speak to the World, as I do in the following Treatise, I must use a simple Stile, since it would be absurd to prescribe an universal Medicine, or Catholicon, in a Language not universally understood.
As I have always professed to have a particular Esteem for Men of Learning, and more especially for your self, nothing but the Love of Truth should have engaged me in a Design of this Nature. Amicus Plato, Amicus Socrates, sed magis Amica Veritas. I am
Your most Sincere Friend,
and Humble Servant,
E. Barnivelt.