An Essay on Man; Moral Essays and Satires

Alexander Pope published a poem titled "An Essay on Man: Moral Essays and Satires" between 1733 and 1734. The opening line, "Awake, St. John," refers to Henry St. John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, which is pronounced, "Bull-en-brook." In the opening lines of Paradise Lost, John Milton claims that he will "justify the methods of God to men," and this is an attempt to "vindicate the ways of God to man...