In speaking of his mother or his pursuits he forgets to wear his mask.

He feels a genuine enthusiasm about his friends; he believes with almost pathetic earnestness in the amazing talents of Bolingbroke, and the patriotic devotion of the younger men who are rising up to overthrow the corruptions of Walpole; he takes the affectation of his friends as seriously as a simple-minded man who has never fairly realized the possibility of deliberate hypocrisy; and he utters sentiments about human life and its objects which, if a little tainted with commonplace, have yet a certain ring of sincerity and, as we may believe, were really sincere for the time.

At such moments we seem to see the man behind the veil--the really loveable nature which could know as well as simulate feeling.

And, indeed, it is this quality which makes Pope endurable.

He was--if we must speak bluntly--a liar and a hypocrite; but the foundation of his character was not selfish or grovelling.