ABSTRACT
Pope's Pastorals came out in a volume of miscellanies in 1709, but they had been handed about in manuscript for some years previously. One of the poet's mentors, William Walsh, provided detailed criticism in response to enquiries by Pope. The fact was that the Pastorals were deliberately intended to make Pope's name. A kind of tailpiece to the Pastorals is the 'sacred Eclogue', Messiah, which was first published in the Spectator during May 1712. The poem, just over 100 lines in length, takes a number of passages from the Book of Isaiah, but it is not in any direct sense a paraphrase. Pope is indulging both local and national piety; he uses the forest as far more than a pastoral enclave. Pope seeks to assimilate artistic standards within a wider code of good breeding. He is concerned with inculcating 'true Taste' in those who are to judge literature.
