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Warn'd by the Sylph, oh pious maid, beware! / This to disclose is all thy guardian can: / Beware of all, but most beware of Man!
Ariel gives Belinda this warning in Canto 1 as she sleeps. He warns her of an impending calamity but is unable to explain more than that. This dramatic but rather useless prophecy enhances the poem’s mock epic tone. Many epic poems include a cryptic prophecy that nevertheless cannot prevent impending tragedy. Here, the prophecy is so vague as to be useless. Not only is “beware of all,” incredibly general, “beware of Man,” could be short for mankind, referring to all humankind. The contrast between Ariel’s serious tone and the ridiculousness of his statement is emblematic of the poem’s humor.
With hairy springes we the birds betray, / Slight lines of hair surprise the finny prey, / Fair tresses man's imperial race ensnare, / And beauty draws us with a single hair.
This comment comes from the description of Belinda’s hair in Canto 2 just before the narrator introduces the Baron’s desire to steal Belinda’s locks. Here the narrator metaphorically compares Belinda’s curls to springes, a snare to catch small birds, to describe their effect on men. The poem portrays Belinda’s beauty as a trap used to entice men like the Baron, overthrowing their reason and making them behave irrationally. This weapon imagery also dovetails with how Belinda’s toilette is described in a manner like a hero in Homer’s epics preparing for battle.
Fate urg'd 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!
This quote comes from Canto 3 at the climactic moment where the Baron cuts off Belinda’s favorite curl, maiming one of her sylphs in the process. This quotation is full of bathetic humor, which is the contrast between the epic and ordinary. The narrator undercuts the drama of the moment with a parenthetical that assures us the sylph isn’t truly dead. In addition, the repetition of “for ever, and for ever” emphasizes the phrase, drawing attention to the reality that while this particular curl is truly severed from Belinda’s head forever, much like the sylph, it will grow back.
Since painted, or not painted, all shall fade, / And she who scorns a man, must die a maid; / What then remains but well our pow'r to use, / And keep good-humour still whate'er we lose? / And trust me, dear! good-humour can prevail, / When airs, and flights, and screams, and scolding fail. / Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; / Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
Clarissa makes this speech in Canto 5, counseling everyone around her to calm down because beauty is transient and temporary in comparison to a person’s personality or behavior. This speech serves as the single voice of reason in the poem, emphasizing the extreme silliness of everyone else’s behavior in treating Belinda’s hair as either a monument to be conquered or a loss to be mourned. However, as Clarissa is the guest who provides the Baron with the scissors, it’s also possible to read her as insincere or even jealous. Thus, Pope undercuts even his own moral with humor.
For, after all the murders of your eye, / When, after millions slain, yourself shall die: / When those fair suns shall set, as set they must, / And all those tresses shall be laid in dust, / This Lock, the Muse shall consecrate to fame, / And 'midst the stars inscribe Belinda's name.
At the conclusion of Canto 5, the narrator proclaims that Belinda’s lock has been immortalized as a constellation like the heroes of Greek mythology. This conclusion follows the poem’s mock epic tone, placing hair aside heroes to emphasize the silliness of society’s adoration of beauty. However, one can also read compassion in the preservation of the lock, which would have otherwise aged with Belinda. In giving it such a kind fate, the poem acknowledges the inherent sadness of beauty’s transience. Additionally, this poem places Arabella Fermor, the real-life victim’s, hair in the stars, preserving it in literary history.
