is the most important among the small number of directly religious poems that Alexander Pope wrote, and the closest he came to a major devotional work. Its latest editors describe the work as “a Christian super-eclogue, based on Virgil’s “prophetic” fourth eclogue spliced with, and eventually eclipsed by, the prophecy of Messiah’s coming in the book of Isaiah” (Ferraro and Baines, 331). In some ways it resembles pastoral with Old Testament roots.
The first publication came in the Spectator on 14 May 1712, with a brief introduction by Richard Steele, as the work of a friend (as Pope then was), “who is not ashamed to employ his Wit in the Praise of his Maker” (Audra and Williams, 99). No mention was made of the author’s name, but later that year in the issue of 12
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Citation: Rogers, Pat. "Messiah". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 April 2021 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=40507, accessed 21 November 2024.]
