not powerful gods like those in The Iliad or Paradise Lost Instead they are humorous and playful They are concerned only with beauty fashion and love affairs Pope uses the spirits to show the daily affairs of fashionable but foolish women like Belinda Ariel and the Sylphs Ariel is the chief Sylph who guards Belinda He behaves like an epic god He declares A watchful sprite and Ariel is my name But his duty is very trivial He protects Belinda s dress fan hair and smile Ariel warns Belinda in a dream that some dread event will happen But even Ariel does not know what it is This is funny because the dread event turns out to be only the cutting of a lock of Belinda s hair Pope mocks epic seriousness by using a supernatural warning for such a small matter Ariel says the Sylphs must guard Belinda carefully He notes that they must not think a woman s love for fashion dies with her It continues even after death Think not when woman s transient breath is fled That all her vanities at once are dead So the Sylphs must protect Belinda s beauty and fashion Here Pope is using Ariel to laugh gently at women s vanity Protection of Beauty The Sylphs form a protective army around Belinda They guard her eyes hair dress and jewellery This looks like a heroic battle plan but the goal is very silly Pope compares Belinda s beauty to a battlefield Ariel divides duties among the Sylphs just like a general in war Some guard her ear-rings and some her shining hair Pope describes this mock-epic preparation in a heroic tone Swift to the Lock a thousand Sprites repair This line shows how many supernatural beings are busy protecting only one lock of hair The epic seriousness makes the situation funny When the Baron cuts the lock the Sylphs fail Ariel cannot stop it because Belinda secretly enjoys attention from men Umbriel and the Cave of Spleen After the lock is cut Umbriel a gloomy gnome goes to the Cave of Spleen Umbriel goes there to collect bad moods and emotional outbursts for Belinda The Cave of Spleen is dark strange and full of sadness Here live Ill-nature Affectation and spleenful spirits The Queen of Spleen sits lazily surrounded by vapours yawns and dreams Umbriel politely bows and receives A bag of Sighs a Phial filled with Tears He pours them on Belinda This explains why Belinda suddenly becomes very angry and dramatic So Pope uses supernatural action to make the scene very funny and satirical Mock-Epic Purpose In real epics gods decide wars and the fate of nations In The Rape of the Lock supernatural beings fight over a lock of hair This contrast creates humour Pope raises a small social event to an epic level He shows how empty and meaningless high society quarrels are The supernatural elements make the poem lively but also expose the shallow values of the upper class In conclusion Pope s treatment of supernatural elements in The Rape of the Lock is playful satirical and clever He uses Sylphs Ariel and Umbriel not to create fear or mystery but to laugh at society s obsession with beauty pride and fashion Through supernatural machinery Pope successfully turns a small social incident into a grand mock-epic