User: Can you write me a poem about samuel garth and isaac watts?
Assistant: Sure, here's a poem about samuel garth and isaac watts:
  William Somervil[l]e.
edition of Johnson's Lives of the Poets, from which a few only of
The eldest of the Poets here discussed were Samuel Garth, Charles
Philips and Rowe were born in 1671 and 1673, and Isaac Watts in
wrote "Rule Britannia"--was of Thomson's age.
The other writers of whose lives Johnson here gives his note were
little patrimony, was born in 1714; Thomas Gray, in 1716; William
consideration as a young man's first venture for fame.  He spent
much of the rest of his life in overloading it with valueless
From Westminster School, where he was a scholar on the foundation
thousand odd hundred books and manuscripts.  The books were
In 1688, the same year in which he was made Master of Arts, he
published a confutation of Varillas's account of Wickliffe; and,
subordination and government is endangered.
Though he was a regular advocate in the courts of civil and canon
business which interrupted his voluptuary dreams or forced him to
The expense of his pleasures, and neglect of business, had now
But it is vain to put wealth within the reach of him who will not
purity of sentiment; and in 1709 imitated Horace in an "Art of
Cookery," which he published with some letters to Dr. Lister.
In 1710 he appeared as a lover of the Church, on the side of
Sacheverell; and was supposed to have concurred at least in the
projection of the Examiner.  His eyes were open to all the
operations of Whiggism; and he bestowed some strictures upon Dr.
produced without the powers of King.  The same year he published
adherents.
In 1711, competence, if not plenty, was again put into his power.
In the autumn of 1712 his health declined; he grew weaker by
degrees, and died on Christmas Day.  Though his life had not been
After this relation it will be naturally supposed that his poems
necessary to think well of his opinions.
expedients, and combating opposition, and exposed to the
Charles Montague was born April 16, 1661, at Horton, in
Cambridge, without waiting for the advantages of another year.
It seemed indeed time to wish for a removal, for he was already a
which continued through his life, and was at last attested by a
legacy.
In 1685 his verses on the death of King Charles made such an
impression on the Earl of Dorset that he was invited to town, and
purchased for 1,500 pounds the place of one of the clerks of the
After he had written his epistle on the victory of the Boyne, his
high treason; and in the midst of his speech falling into some
confusion, was for a while silent; but, recovering himself,
Council.  In 1694 he became Chancellor of the Exchequer; and the
At the accession of Queen Anne he was dismissed from the Council;
conformity.  He headed the inquiry into the danger of the Church.
with slight censure, and Pope, in the character of Bufo, with
acrimonious contempt.
He was, as Pope says, "fed with dedications;" for Tickell affirms
discover great ignorance of human nature and human life.  In
determinations depending not on rules, but on experience and
patronage may be in time so increased that modest praise will no
longer please.
esteemed no honour, by a contributor to the monthly bundles of
verses, to be told that, in strains either familiar or solemn, he
The life of Dr. Parnell is a task which I should very willingly
decline, since it has been lately written by Goldsmith, a man of
such variety of powers, and such felicity of performance, that he
confusion; whose language was copious without exuberance, exact
without constraint, and easy without weakness.
descended to the poet, who was born at Dublin in 1679; and, after
About three years afterwards he was made a priest and in 1705 Dr.
amiable lady, by whom he had two sons, who died young, and a
daughter, who long survived him.
At the ejection of the Whigs, in the end of Queen Anne's reign,
inquire for him, and to bid him welcome; and, as may be inferred
fortune, which, however, was in no great need of improvement.
preferment.  As he thought himself qualified to become a popular
preacher, he displayed his elocution with great success in the
pulpits of London; but the Queen's death putting an end to his
expectations, abated his diligence; and Pope represents him as
falling from that time into intemperance of wine.  That in his
latter life he was too much a lover of the bottle, is not denied;
But his prosperity did not last long.  His end, whatever was its
He seems to have been one of those poets who take delight in
writing.  He contributed to the papers of that time, and probably
opinion, and his criticism it is seldom safe to contradict.  He
happiest of Parnell's performances.  The hint of "The Hymn to
Contentment" I suspect to have been borrowed from Cleveland.
The general character of Parnell is not great extent of
comprehension or fertility of mind.  Of the little that appears,
still less is his own.  His praise must be derived from the easy
sweetness of his diction:  in his verses there is more happiness
than pains; he is sprightly without effort, and always delights,
they are going.  They stand upon the faith of the compilers.
where he resided till he became Doctor of Physic on July the 7th,
obtain very extensive practice; and, if a pamphlet of those times
Radcliffe had of the other.  He is always mentioned as a man of
benevolence; and it is just to suppose that his desire of helping
Whether what Temple says be true, that physicians have had more
dignity of sentiment, very prompt effusion of beneficence, and
willingness to exert a lucrative art where there is no hope of
Candidates, and Licentiates to give gratuitous advice to the
neighbouring poor.  This edict was sent to the Court of Aldermen;
should be extended, the College answered that it should be
After a year's experience the physicians found their charity
Mayor and Aldermen, who appointed a committee to treat with the
College and settle the mode of administering the charity.
It was desired by the aldermen that the testimonials of
considered as POOR.  This likewise was granted by the College.
apothecaries to undertake the dispensation, and offered that the
warden and company of the apothecaries should adjust the price.
This offer was rejected; and the apothecaries who had engaged to
assist the charity were considered as traitors to the company,
ventured upon public opposition, and presented a kind of
The physicians still persisted; and in 1696 a subscription was
raised by themselves according to an agreement prefixed to "The
Dispensary."  The poor were, for a time, supplied with medicines;
away.
About the time of the subscription begins the action of "The
speaking of the mischiefs done by quacks, has these expressions:
"Non tamen telis vulnerat ista agyrtarum colluvies, sed theriaca
defended or excused by Mr. Addison that, for the sake of the
vindication, it ought to be preserved.
Marlborough; and was made Physician-in-Ordinary to the King, and
Physician-General to the army.  He then undertook an edition of
Ovid's "Metamorphoses," translated by several hands; which he
recommended by a preface, written with more ostentation than
ability; his notions are half-formed, and his materials
His personal character seems to have been social and liberal.  He
Pope afterwards declared himself convinced that Garth died in the
perpetual doubt, willingly seeks repose in the bosom of an
infallible Church.
proportion to the subject; the means and end have no necessary
connection.  Resnel, in his preface to Pope's Essay, remarks that
The general design is, perhaps, open to criticism; but the
composition can seldom be charged with inaccuracy or negligence.
The author never slumbers in self-indulgence; his full vigour is
improvement.  It appears, however, to want something of poetical
popularity, it has been scarcely able to support itself.
house, at Lambertoun in Devonshire.  The ancestor from whom he
descended in a direct line received the arms borne by his
Dallison's Reports in the reign of James the Second, when, in
several languages are said to have been written with uncommon
learning sufficient to qualify him for the study of law, and was
precepts, but as a system of rational government and impartial
been arbitrarily assigned him by his poet, for I know not that
withheld from him, that it might not be thrown away was bestowed
The Fair Penitent, his next production (1703), is one of the most
delightful by the language.  The story is domestic, and therefore
occasion requires.
spectator's kindness.  It was in the power of Richardson alone to
correspond with the behaviour of Calista, who at last shows no
evident signs of repentance, but may be reasonably suspected of
feeling pain from detection rather than from guilt, and expresses
His next (1706) was Ulysses; which, with the common fate of
adventures, is to offend by violating received notions.
"The Royal Convert" (1708) seems to have a better claim to
objects are imperfectly seen, they easily take forms from
personage truly tragical, of high spirit, and violent passions,
great with tempestuous dignity, and wicked with a soul that would
Rowe does not always remember what his characters require.  In
anticipated blessings of union are not very naturally introduced,
great vehemence, whenever he had, in his own opinion, produced a
conceive.  The numbers, the diction, the sentiments, and the
conduct, everything in which imitation can consist, are remote in
Being by a competent fortune exempted from any necessity of
under-secretary for three years when the Duke of Queensberry was
contained the following character:--
fluently, and the other two tolerably well.  He had likewise read
expressed on all occasions his full persuasion of the truth of
revealed religion; and, being a sincere member of the Established
tincture of affectation or pedantry; and his inimitable manner of
provocations he met with at any time, he passed them over without
"The love of learning and poetry made him not the less fit for
immediately before his last agony, with the same tranquillity of
daughter of Mr. Parsons, one of the auditors of the revenue; and
afterwards to a daughter of Mr. Devenish, of a good family in
Dorsetshire.  By the first he had a son; and by the second a
daughter, married afterwards to Mr. Fane.  He died 6th December,
Pope has left behind him another mention of his companion less
advantageous, which is thus reported by Dr. Warburton:--
felt very severely.  Mr. Pope, their common friend, knowing this,
heard I was going to be hanged.'  Mr. Pope said he could not deny
This censure time has not left us the power of confirming or
Rowe is chiefly to be considered as a tragic writer and a
translator.  In his attempt at comedy he failed so ignominiously
that his Biter is not inserted in his works:  and his occasional
poems and short compositions are rarely worthy either praise or
done by Rowe, in the middle of an act, is to add more acts to the
without interruption.  Rowe, by this licence, easily extricates
himself from difficulties; as in Jane Grey, when we have been
terrified with all the dreadful pomp of public execution; and are
stage.
Shore, who is always seen and heard with pity.  Alicia is a
without any attempt at innovation or improvement, seldom wants
either melody or force.  His author's sense is sometimes a little
John Gay, descended from an old family that had been long in
possession of the manor of Goldworthy, in Devonshire, was born in
poetry.  Being born without prospect of hereditary riches, he was
mercer.  How long he continued behind the counter, or with what
degree of softness and dexterity he received and accommodated the
servility of his occupation, and easily persuaded his master to
discharge him.
attractions in his manners and conversation that he seems to have
respect.
poets, nor knowledge of the critical dispute.
mortification to see it again rejected.
dedicated his "Shepherd's Week" to Bolingbroke, which Swift
Of this performance the value certainly is but little; but it was
Marriage, a comedy written, as there is sufficient reason for
believing, by the joint assistance of Pope and Arbuthnot.  One
purpose of it was to bring into contempt Dr. Woodward, the
directly and apparently ridiculed, by the introduction of a mummy
driven off the stage with general condemnation.
Gay is represented as a man easily incited to hope, and deeply
depressed when his hopes were disappointed.  This is not the
character of a hero, but it may naturally imply something more
generally welcome, a soft and civil companion.  Whoever is apt to
fortune of its author, and, finding nothing done, sunk into
dejection.  His friends endeavoured to divert him.  The Earl of
Burlington sent him (1716) into Devonshire, the year after Mr.
Pulteney took him to Aix, and in the following year Lord Harcourt
Being now generally known, he published (1720) his poems by
subscription, with such success that he raised a thousand pounds,
particular tenderness, his health was restored; and, returning to
screen.  The Princess started, the ladies screamed, and poor Gay,
unexampled success of the Beggar's Opera.  This play, written in
"Dr. Swift had been observing once to Mr. Gay what an odd pretty
stronger every act, and ended in a clamour of applause."
Its reception is thus recorded in the notes to the "Dunciad":--
thirtieth and fortieth time; at Bath and Bristol fifty, etc.  It
made its progress into Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, where it was
furnished with it in screens.  The fame of it was not confined to
became all at once the favourite of the town; her pictures were
engraved and sold in great numbers; her life written, books of
Of this performance, when it was printed, the reception was
different, according to the different opinions of its readers.
Swift commended it for the excellence of its morality, as a piece
light;" but others, and among them Dr. Herring, afterwards
evidently multiplied.
Both these decisions are surely exaggerated.  The play, like many
purpose, and is therefore not likely to do good; nor can it be
impressed with the preconception of some misfortune.
After his death was published a second volume of "Fables," more
As a poet he cannot be rated very high.  He was, I once heard a
must be allowed to the author of a new species of composition,
though it be not of the highest kind.  We owe to Gay the ballad
audience that it is likely to keep long possession of the stage.
His first performance, the Rural Sports, is such as was easily
delivers ready to the hand, but which, like other things that lie
naturally retires from a new tale of Venus, Diana, and Minerva.
His "Fables" seem to have been a favourite work; for, having
Apologue, such as is now under consideration, seems to be, in its
abstracted allegory; and from some, by whatever name they may be
To "Trivia" may be allowed all that it claims; it is sprightly,
superfluous; a shoe-boy could have been produced by the casual
cohabitation of mere mortals.  Horace's rule is broken in both
"Dione" is a counterpart to "Amynta" and "Pastor Fido" and other
trifles of the same kind, easily imitated, and unworthy of
learned.
Thomas Tickell, the son of the Rev. Richard Tickell, was born in
comply with the statutes by taking orders, he obtained a
regard, for they contain some of the most elegant encomiastic
"Let joy salute fair Rosamonda's shade,
And wreaths of myrtle crown the lovely maid.
While now perhaps with Dido's ghost she roves,
And hears and tells the story of their loves,
Alike they mourn, alike they bless their fate,
Since Love, which made them wretched, made them great.
Nor longer that relentless doom bemoan,
Which gained a Virgil and an Addison."--TICKELL.
"Then future ages with delight shall see
How Plato's, Bacon's, Newton's, looks agree;
Or in fair series laurelled bards be shown,
A Virgil there, and here an Addison."--POPE.
He produced another piece of the same kind at the appearance of
Cato, with equal skill, but not equal happiness.
When the Ministers of Queen Anne were negotiating with France,
Tickell published "The Prospect of Peace," a poem of which the
party, I know not; this poem certainly did not flatter the
practices, or promote the opinions, of the men by whom he was
afterwards befriended.
Mr. Addison, however he hated the men then in power, suffered his
Spectator such praises of Tickell's poem that when, after having
long wished to peruse it, I laid hold of it at last, I thought it
himself, an apparent opposition to Pope's "Homer," of which the
first part made its entrance into the world at the same time.
Addison declared that the rival versions were both good, but that
wits, his adherents and followers, were certain to concur.  Pope
Pope did not long think Addison an impartial judge, for he
(Budgell and Philips).  He went accordingly, and after dinner Mr.
communicate to the other whatever verses they wrote, even to the
surprise of Dr. Young, together with what Steele has said against
there was some underhand dealing in that business; and indeed
Tickell himself, who is a very fair worthy man, has since, in a
manner, as good as owned it to me.  When it was introduced into a
Upon these suspicions, with which Dr. Warburton hints that other
To compare the two translations would be tedious; the palm is now
When the Hanover succession was disputed, Tickell gave what
assistance his pen would supply.  His "Letter to Avignon" stands
high among party poems; it expresses contempt without coarseness,
deserved, being five times printed.
friendship seems to have continued without abatement; for, when
beauties to the assistance which might be suspected to have
afterwards (about 1725) made secretary to the Lords Justices of
character, he is said to have been a man of gay conversation, at
least a temperate lover of wine and company, and in his domestic
relations without censure.
Of Mr. Somervile's life I am not able to say anything that can
satisfy curiosity.  He was a gentleman whose estate lay in
Warwickshire; his house, where he was born in 1693, is called
country, where he was distinguished as a poet, a gentleman, and a
quaerimus.  I can now excuse all his foibles; impute them to age,
sense; to be forced to drink himself into pains of the body, in
order to get rid of the pains of the mind is a misery."--He died
July 19, 1742, and was buried at Wotton, near Henley on Arden.
His distresses need not be much pitied:  his estate is said to be
commonly be said at least, that "he writes very well for a
gentleman."  His serious pieces are sometimes elevated; and his
trifles are sometimes elegant.  In his verses to Addison, the
couplet which mentions Clio is written with the most exquisite
lines; but in the second Ode he shows that he knew little of his
hero, when he talks of his private virtues.  His subjects are
commonly such as require no great depth of thought or energy of
sufficient rapidity of narration.  His great work is his Chase,
lines give a bad specimen.  To this poem praise cannot be totally
transition and variety could easily effect; and has with great
propriety enlarged his plan by the modes of hunting used in other
crippled prose; and familiar images in laboured language have
nothing to recommend them but absurd novelty, which, wanting the
attractions of nature, cannot please long.  One excellence of the
Roxburgh, of which his father was pastor.  His mother, whose name
friends with poetical compositions; with which, however, he so
little pleased himself that on every New Year's Day he threw into
From the school he was removed to Edinburgh, where he had not
money a mortgage could afford; and, removing with her family to
Edinburgh, lived to see her son rising into eminence.
The design of Thomson's friends was to breed him a minister.  He
explaining a psalm.  His diction was so poetically splendid, that
reported to have repressed his thoughts of an ecclesiastical
character, and he probably cultivated with new diligence his
credentials was stolen from him.
His first want was a pair of shoes.  For the supply of all his
"Winter" was dedicated to Sir Spencer Compton, but attracted no
regard from him to the author; till Aaron Hill awakened his
Thomson's credit was now high, and every day brought him new
friends; among others Dr. Rundle, a man afterwards unfortunately
well known.  Why the dedications are, to "Winter" and the other
philosopher by the instruction of Mr. Gray; and of "Britannia," a
Opposition, and had therefore no favour to expect from the Court.
Thomson, having been some time entertained in the family of Lord
"Autumn," the season to which the "Spring" and "Summer" are
preparatory, still remained unsung, and was delayed till he
published (1730) his works collected.
He produced in 1727 the tragedy of Sophonisba, which raised such
expectation that every rehearsal was dignified with a splendid
This gave occasion to a waggish parody--
which for a while was echoed through the town.
Thomson was not long afterwards, by the influence of Dr. Rundle,
sent to travel with Mr. Charles Talbot, the eldest son of the
establishment.
resolved to write a very long poem, in five parts, upon Liberty.
quickly grow disgusting.
The poem of "Liberty" does not now appear in its original state;
but, when the author's works were collected after his death, was
exhibited as its author left it.
though the Lord Hardwicke delayed for some time to give it away,
Thomson's bashfulness or pride, or some other motive perhaps not
struggling for popularity, and by the influence of Mr. Lyttelton
Being now obliged to write, he produced (1738) the tragedy of
till a friendly hint frighted him to silence.  Pope countenanced
About this time (1737) the Act was passed for licensing plays, of
Alfred, which was acted before the Prince at Cliefden House.
His next work (1745) was, Tancred and Sigismunda, the most
successful of all his tragedies, for it still keeps its turn upon
The last piece that he lived to publish was the "Castle of
Indolence," which was many years under his hand, but was at last
inscription; but a monument has been erected to his memory in
Thomson was of stature above the middle size, and "more fat than
bard beseems," of a dull countenance and a gross, unanimated,
raised, of which part discharged his debts, and the rest was
Boswell, from whom I received it:--
"Hagley in Worcestershire, October the 4th, 1747.
"My Dear Sister,--I thought you had known me better than to
ever prove an unkind friend and brother.  I must do myself the
charitable and forgiving.
"I esteem you for your sensible and disinterested advice to Mr.
delicacy of difficult old bachelors.  I am, however, not a little
infectious subject.  Pray let me hear from you now and then; and
"Your most affectionate Brother,
offices of intervention or solicitation he could not conquer his
sluggishness sufficiently to perform.  The affairs of others,
however, were not more neglected than his own.  He had often felt
peculiarities was a very unskilful and inarticulate manner of
Yet Savage always spoke with the most eager praise of his social
numbers, his pauses, his diction, are of his own growth, without
transcription, without imitation.  He thinks in a peculiar train,
impresses.  His is one of the works in which blank verse seems
appearances subsisting all at once, no rule can be given why one
mind.
applied to wines in its primitive sense, means the flavour of the
"Liberty," when it first appeared, I tried to read, and soon
"No line which, dying, he could wish to blot."
Isaac Watts was born July 17, 1674, at Southampton, where his
father, of the same name, kept a boarding-school for young
Isaac, the eldest of nine children, was given to books from his
infancy, and began, we are told, to learn Latin when he was four
years old--I suppose, at home.  He was afterwards taught Latin,
taught by Mr. Rowe, where he had for his companions and fellow
exercises at this academy, show a degree of knowledge, both
philosophical and theological, such as very few attain by a much
neglect of all metrical rules as is without example among the
another.
devotion at the house of his father, who treated him with great
tenderness, and had the happiness, indulged to few parents, of
living to see his son eminent for literature and venerable for
himself to the study of the Holy Scriptures; and, being chosen
which it brought upon him he never perfectly recovered.  This
years with all the kindness that friendship could prompt, and all
eight years afterwards, but he continued with the lady and her
benefits, deserves a particular memorial; and I will not withhold
what is known likewise to multitudes besides:--
"Our next observation shall be made upon that remarkably kind
without any care of his own, he had everything which could
contribute to the enjoyment of life, and favour the unwearied
excellent sermons and works which he drew up and published during
that of her daughter, the present Mrs. Elizabeth Abney, who in a
If this quotation has appeared long, let it be considered that it
From the time of his reception into this family his life was no
sermons, but, having adjusted the heads and sketched out some
weighty sentences he gave time, by a short pause, for the proper
impression.
To stated and public instruction he added familiar visits and
humility can teach.
only in his book, but in his mind, that orthodoxy was united with
In his metaphysical disquisitions it was observed by the late
Few books have been perused by me with greater pleasure than his
care of instructing others may be charged with deficiency in his
duty if this book is not recommended.
I have mentioned his treatises of theology as distinct from his
other productions; but the truth is that whatever he took in hand
wishing, to be better.  The attention is caught by indirect
instruction; and he that sat down only to reason is on a sudden
diploma, by which he became a Doctor of Divinity.  Academical
honours would have more value if they were always bestowed with
increased, and at last confined him to his chamber and his bed,
where he was worn gradually away without pain, till he expired
November 25th 1748, in the seventy-fifth year of his age.
As a poet, had he been only a poet, he would probably have stood
high among the authors with whom he is now associated.  For his
other subjects seldom rise higher than might be expected from the
that, to so much piety and innocence, does not wish for a greater
prose, to imitate him in all but his non-conformity, to copy his
benevolence to man, and his
reverence to God.
notice of the world by some English verses, in the collection
Philips was a zealous Whig, and therefore easily found access to
Addison and Steele; but his ardour seems not to have procured him
The book is divided into many sections, for each of which, if he
received half-a-crown, his reward, as writers then were paid, was
In 1712 he brought upon the stage The Distressed Mother, almost a
uncommon powers, but the friends of Philips exerted every art to
promote his interest. Before the appearance of the play a whole
recited twice, and not only continued to be demanded through the
run, as it is termed, of the play, but whenever it is recalled to
undoubtedly admitted for the sake of the answer, which soon
attention.  It may be discovered in the defence that Prior's
Budgell, whom Addison used to denominate "the man who calls me
Philips was now high in the ranks of literature.  His play was
applauded; his translations from Sappho had been published in the
that he should be sure of its continuance.  The work which had
procured him the first notice from the public was his "Six
At the revival of learning in Italy it was soon discovered that a
adopted by subsequent writers, and among others by our Spenser.
comment, and, as Scaliger complained, received into schools, and
taught as classical; his complaint was vain, and the practice,
however injudicious, spread far and continued long.  Mantuan was
carried their disquisitions beyond the country to censure the
corruptions of the Church, and from him Spenser learned to employ
Philips thinks it "somewhat strange to conceive how, in an age so
Not long afterwards Pope made the first display of his powers in
advantage, he gives the preference to Philips.  The design of
either praise or satire, there was no proportion between the
money; he only delayed, and with sufficient meanness, the
gratification of him by whose prosperity he was pained.
Men sometimes suffer by injudicious kindness; Philips became
lottery (1717), and, what did not much elevate his character, a
justice of the peace.
already acquired, till after nine years he produced (1722) The
Briton, a tragedy which, whatever was its reception, is now
neglected; though one of the scenes, between Vanoc the British
His happiest undertaking was (1711) of a paper called The
Freethinker, in conjunction with associates, of whom one was Dr.
friendship.  When he was advanced to the height of ecclesiastical
After the death of his patron he continued some years in Ireland,
returned (1748) to London, having doubtless survived most of his
Of his personal character all that I have heard is, that he was
Of The Distressed Mother not much is pretended to be his own, and
please best are those which, from Pope and Pope's adherents,
valued but when they are done by those who can do greater.
sublimity; he will be allowed, if he has less fire, to have more
smoke.  He has added nothing to English poetry, yet at least half
West; perhaps him who published "Pindar" at Oxford about the
beginning of this century.  His mother was sister to Sir Richard
Temple, afterwards Lord Cobham.  His father, purposing to educate
Oxford; but he was seduced to a more airy mode of life, by a
commission in a troop of horse, procured him by his uncle.  He
himself more inclined to civil employment, he laid down his
His adherence to Lord Townshend ended in nothing but a nomination
Paul."  These two illustrious friends had for a while listened to
Mr. West's income was not large; and his friends endeavoured, but
required a more extensive power of superintendence than it was
thought proper to allow him.  In time, however, his revenue was
improved; he lived to have one of the lucrative clerkships of the
rich; but wealth came too late to be long enjoyed; nor could it
elegance and its exactness.  He does not confine himself to his
author's train of stanzas; for he saw that the difference of
languages required a different mode of versification.  The first
strophe is eminently happy; in the second he has a little strayed
"Hiero's royal brows, whose care
Tends the courser's noble breed,
Pleased to nurse the pregnant mare,
Pleased to train the youthful steed."
"Near the billow-beaten side
Of the foam-besilvered main,
Darkling, and alone, he stood:"
which, however, is less exuberant than the former passage.
A work of this kind must, in a minute examination, discover many
His "Institution of the Garter" (1742) is written with sufficient
process of events, neither knowledge nor elegance preserves the
reader from weariness.
His "Imitations of Spenser" are very successfully performed, both
artifice of the copy, the mind has two amusements together.  But
such compositions are not to be reckoned among the great
achievements of intellect, because their effect is local and
There is in the Adventurer a paper of verses given to one of the
thought it, as he told me, and as he tells the public.
Winchester College, where he was educated by Dr. Burton.  His
maintenance; but was, in about half a year, elected a Demy of
know not that he told.
designed many works; but his great fault was irresolution; or the
meditation or remote inquiries.  He published proposals for a
"History of the Revival of Learning;" and I have heard him speak
with great kindness of Leo X., and with keen resentment of his
tasteless successor.  But probably not a page of his history was
ever written.  He planned several tragedies, but he only planned
them.  He wrote now and then odes and other poems, and did
cheerful.  By degrees I gained his confidence; and one day was
booksellers, who, on the credit of a translation of Aristotle's
"Poetics," which he engaged to write with a large commentary,
advanced as much money as enabled him to escape into the country.
"Mr. Collins was a man of extensive literature, and of vigorous
waterfalls of Elysian gardens.  This was, however, the character
efforts sometimes caused harshness and obscurity, they likewise
produced in happier moments sublimity and splendour.  This idea
which enchains the faculties without destroying them, and leaves
reason the knowledge of right without the power of pursuing it.
These clouds which he perceived gathering on his intellect he
retired to the care of his sister in Chichester, where death, in
discernible in his mind by any but himself; but he had withdrawn
from study, and travelled with no other book than an English
Testament, such as children carry to the school.  When his friend
that is the best.'"
Such was the fate of Collins, with whom I once delighted to
converse, and whom I yet remember with tenderness.
He was visited at Chichester, in his last illness, by his learned
disapprobation of his "Oriental Eclogues," as not sufficiently
selected.  He affected the obsolete when it was not worthy of
sometimes extort praise when it gives little pleasure.
Mr. Collins's first production is added here from the Poetical
"Cease, fair Aurelia, cease to mourn;
Lament not Hannah's happy state;
You may be happy in your turn,
And seize the treasure you regret.
With Love united Hymen stands,
And softly whispers to your charms,
'Meet but your lover in my bands,
You'll find your sister in his arms.'"
John Dyer, of whom I have no other account to give than his own
probably, unsatisfied with his own proficiency, he, like other
married about the same time a lady of the name of Ensor; "whose
Leicestershire, of eighty pounds a year, on which he lived ten
years, and then exchanged it for Belchford, in Lincolnshire, of
seventy-five.  His condition now began to mend.  In 1751 Sir John
year; and in 1755 the Chancellor added Kirkby, of one hundred and
Dyer is not a poet of bulk or dignity sufficient to require an
elaborate criticism.  "Grongar Hill" is the happiest of his
productions:  it is not indeed very accurately written; but the
scenes which it displays are so pleasing, the images which they
neighbourhood of dilapidating edifices, he says,
At dead of night, 'mid his orison hears
Aghast the voice of Time, disparting tow'rs
Tumbling all precipitate down dashed,
Rattling around, loud thund'ring to the Moon."
SERPENT WITH THE FOWL.  When Dyer, whose mind was not unpoetical,
commodity by interspersing rural imagery, and incidental
Let me, however, honestly report whatever may counterbalance this
poetical question, has a right to be heard, said, "That he would
regulate his opinion of the reigning taste by the fate of Dyer's
received such delight from books, that he was always calling for
When he was young (June, 1724) he was deprived of his father, and
brother, who died afterwards unmarried, left to the care of his
grandmother, who managed the estate.
From school he was sent in 1732 to Pembroke College in Oxford, a
diversify his surface, to entangle his walks, and to wind his
skilful; a place to be visited by travellers and copied by
designers.  Whether to plant a walk in undulating curves, and to
place a bench at every turn where there is an object to catch the
perhaps a sullen and surly spectator may think such performances
innocent amusement, and some praise must be allowed, by the most
acquaintance of the little fellow that was trying to make himself
The pleasure of Shenstone was all in his eye; he valued what he
valued merely for its looks.  Nothing raised his indignation more
reparation.  In time his expenses brought clamours about him that
He was never married, though he might have obtained the lady,
"I have read, too, an octavo volume of Shenstone's Letters.  Poor
variety.  The peace of solitude, the innocence of inactivity, and
pages.  That of which the essence is uniformity will be soon
described.  His elegies have, therefore, too much resemblance of
philosophical argument and poetical spirit.  Of the rest I cannot
however, more of the epigram than of the ode.
But the four parts of his "Pastoral Ballad" demand particular
notice.  I cannot but regret that it is pastoral:  an intelligent
imitation of Rowe's "Despairing Shepherd."  In the first are two
passages, to which if any mind denies its sympathy, it has no
acquaintance with love or nature:--
"I prized every hour that went by,
Beyond all that had pleased me before:
But now they are past, and I sigh,
And I grieve that I prized them no more.
When forced the fair nymph to forego,
What anguish I felt in my heart!
Yet I thought (but it might not be so)
'Twas with pain that she saw me depart.
She gazed, as I slowly withdrew,
My path I could hardly discern;
So sweetly she bade me adieu,
I thought that she bade me return."
In the second this passage has its prettiness; though it be not
equal to the former:--
"I have found out a gift for my fair:
I have found where the wood pigeons breed:
But let me that plunder forbear,
She will say 'twas a barbarous deed:
For he ne'er could be true, she averred,
Who could rob a poor bird of its young;
And I loved her the more when I heard
Such tenderness fall from her tongue."
In the third he mentions the common-places of amorous poetry with
"'Tis his with mock passion to glow!
'Tis his in smooth tales to unfold,
How her face is as bright as the snow,
And her bosom, be sure, is as cold:
How the nightingales labour the strain,
With the notes of this charmer to vie:
How they vary their accents in vain,
Repine at her triumphs, and die."
In the fourth I find nothing better than this natural strain of
"Alas! from the day that we met,
What hope of an end to my woes,
When I cannot endure to forget
The glance that undid my repose?
Yet Time may diminish the pain:
The flower, and the shrub, and the tree,
Which I reared for her pleasure in vain,
In time may have comfort for me."
His "Levities" are by their title exempted from the severities of
Of the Moral Poems, the first is the "Choice of Hercules," from
Xenophon.  The numbers are smooth, the diction elegant, and the
find to be like the blank verses of his neighbours.  "Love and
Honour" is derived from the old ballad, "Did you not hear of a
Spanish Lady?"--I wish it well enough to wish it were in rhyme.
short compositions, contributes much to the increase of pleasure:
sentiments, of the original author in the style, and between them
"Dear Sir,--In consequence of our different conversations about
Woodhay, in Berkshire, styled by Wood, GENTLEMAN.  In September,
faculties were impaired through age, his duties were necessarily
performed by others.  We learn from Wood that, at a visitation of
distributing the holy mysteries, is now laid in the dust.  But he
which he merited reward, or no vacancy at Oxford offered them an
opportunity to bestow upon him the reward provided for merit by
should be qualified to stand for a fellowship at All Souls.  In a
father, reflects credit on the conduct of the son.  The manner in
On the 23rd of April, 1714, Young took his degree of bachelor of
better without them."
There are who relate that, when first Young found himself
independent, and his own master at All Souls, he was not the
afterwards with honour."
atheist, "I can always answer, because I always know whence they
have their arguments, which I have read a hundred times; but that
After all, Tindal and the censurers of Young may be reconcilable.
favour of virtue, but the potent testimony of experience against
vice.  We shall soon see that one of his earliest productions was
panegyric with the extravagance of a young man, who thinks his
present stock of wealth will never be exhausted.  The poem seems
intended also to reconcile the public to the late peace.  This is
that in peace "harvests wave, and commerce swells her sail."  If
this be humanity, for which he meant it, is it politics?  Another
When Addison published "Cato" in 1713, Young had the honour of
On the appearance of his poem on the "Last Day," Addison did not
time on the composition of it.  While other bards "with Britain's
"Whence Gay was banished in disgrace,
Where Pope will never show his face,
Where Y---- must torture his invention
To flatter knaves, or lose his pension."
And tune your harps and strew your bays;
Your panegyrics here provide;
You cannot err on flattery's side."
been regularly called Hirelings, and on the other Patriots?
passing the first and second heavens, and leaving the fixed stars
The queen was soon called away from this lower world, to a place
Before the queen's death, "The Force of Religion, or Vanquished
Love," was sent into the world.  This poem is founded on the
wrought into a tragedy by Rowe.  The dedication of it to the
person ONLY virtuous, stirs in us a prudent regret; to behold a
person ONLY amiable to the sight, warms us with a religious
poem on the queen's death, and his Majesty's accession to the
throne.  It is inscribed to Addison, then secretary to the Lords
Justices.  Whatever were the obligations which he had formerly
more than praise.  Neither was this deemed one of his excusable
pieces.  We do not find it in his works.
To the Dean of Sarum's visitation sermon, already mentioned, were
Ireland:  where, says the Biographia, "on the score of his
extraordinary qualities, he had the honour done him of being
others were taking with him an evening walk, about a mile out of
Dublin, he stopped short; we passed on; but perceiving he did not
earnestly gazing upward at a noble elm, which in its uppermost
undeserved and uncommon favour, in an affair of some consequence,
quarters at Lerida, in Spain, was some scenes of a tragedy on the
poetry, but as the promoter of his fortune.  Young concludes his
partiality to one who bears him so sincere a duty and respect, I
happen to receive the benefit of it."  That he ever had such a
should have remembered that he at the same time concealed his
obligation to Wharton for THE MOST BEAUTIFUL INCIDENT in what is
"Be this thy partial smile from censure free!
'Twas meant for merit, though it fell on me."
While Young, who, in his "Love of Fame," complains grievously how
however, was certainly indebted to it for something material; and
guides as the oaths of the persons whom they record.  Chancellor
Hardwicke was to determine whether two annuities, granted by the
Duke of Wharton to Young, were for legal considerations.  One was
Of his adventures in the Exeter family I am unable to give any
account.  The attempt to get into Parliament was at Cirencester,
following lines, if they contain any, it is now vain to seek:
"IN JOY ONCE JOINED, in sorrow, now, for years--
Partner in grief, and brother of my tears,
Tickell, accept this verse, thy mournful due."
From your account of Tickell it appears that he and Young used to
retirement, seems to make an unusual struggle to escape from
chancellor, of whom he clearly appears to have had no kind of
knowledge.
Of his Satires it would not have been possible to fix the dates
written.  For these internal notes of time we should not have
"Is thy ambition sweating for a rhyme,
Thou unambitious fool, at this late time?
A fool at FORTY is a fool indeed."
strain of compliment as poetry too often seeks to pay to royalty.
"'Midst empire's charms, how Carolina's heart
Glowed with the love of virtue and of art."
Since the grateful poet tells us, in the next couplet,
"Her favour is diffused to that degree,
Excess of goodness! it has dawned on me."
To these poems, when, in 1728, he gathered them into one
publication, he prefixed a Preface, in which he observes that "no
Is it not somewhat singular that Young preserved, without any
little subject to blindness, which makes her mistake her way to
sister Prose, to utter?  She was always, indeed, taught by him to
though nearly related to Poetry, had no connection with her whom
behind him.  By "The Universal Passion" he acquired no vulgar
fortune--more than three thousand pounds.  A considerable sum had
After inscribing his Satires, not perhaps without the hopes of
preferments and honours, to such names as the Duke of Dorset, Mr.
explains the intention.  If Young must be acknowledged a ready
"Oh! how I long, enkindled by the theme,
In deep eternity to launch thy name!"
The bounty of the former reign seems to have been continued,
"My breast, O Walpole, glows with grateful fire.
The streams of royal bounty, turned by thee,
Refresh the dry remains of poesy."
Concluding with a Wish."  This wish consists of thirteen stanzas.
"O may I STEAL
Along the VALE
Of humble life, secure from foes!
My friend sincere,
My judgment clear,
And gentle business my repose!"
"Prophetic schemes,
And golden dreams,
May I, unsanguine, cast away!
Have what I HAVE,
And live, not LEAVE,
Enamoured of the present day!
"My hours my own!
My faults unknown!
My chief revenue in content!
Then leave one BEAM
Of honest FAME!
And scorn the laboured monument!
Till that great TURN
When mighty Nature's self shall die,
Time cease to glide,
With human pride,
Sunk in the ocean of eternity!"
following stanza of what every reader will discover in it
"involuntary burlesque:--
"The northern blast,
The shattered mast,
The syrt, the whirlpool, and the rock,
The breaking spout,
The boiling strait, the monster's shock."
We shall soon come to a work, before which we find indeed no
Soon after the appearance of "Ocean," when he was almost fifty,
Young entered into orders.  In April, 1728, not long after he had
The tragedy of The Brothers, which was already in rehearsal, he
Of Young's taking orders something is told by the biographer of
Pope, which places the easiness and simplicity of the poet in a
instructions in theology, but to Pope, who, in a youthful frolic,
sought after him, and found him just in time to prevent what
Ruffhead calls "an irretrievable derangement."
Estimate of Human Life," dedicated, notwithstanding the Latin
quotations with which it abounds, to the Queen; and a sermon
"Estimate," without which it cannot be called "A True Estimate,"
though in 1728 it was announced as "soon to be published," never
poetry, and that the Pindaric is the most spirited kind of Ode.
"This I speak," he adds, "with sufficient candour at my own very
great peril.  But truth has an eternal title to our confession,
occasion seems to have been an apprehension lest, from the
liveliness of his satires, he should not be deemed sufficiently
serious for promotion in the Church.
In July, 1730, he was presented by his College to the Rectory of
connection, and to the expectations of that preferment which he
The next production of his muse was "The Sea-piece," in two odes.
"You are so witty, profligate and thin,
At once we think thee Milton, Death, and Sin."
"No stranger, sir, though born in foreign climes.
On DORSET Downs, when Milton's page,
With Sin and Death provoked thy rage,
Thy rage provoked who soothed with GENTLE rhymes?"
"While with your Dodington retired you sit,
Charmed with his flowing Burgundy and wit," etc.
"Where, in the secret bower and winding walk,
For virtuous Young and thee they twine the bay."
"Who nobly durst, in rhyme-unfettered verse,
With British freedom sing the British song,"
formal farewell to Ode, which few of Young's readers will regret:
"My shell, which Clio gave, which KINGS APPLAUD,
Which Europe's bleeding genius called abroad,
circumstances, it is probable that the poet had both him and Mrs.
"Insatiate archer! could not one suffice?
Thy shaft flew thrice, and thrice my peace was slain;
And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had filled her horn."
been pitied for having to pour the "Midnight Sorrows" of his
Temple, in 1741.  How could the insatiate archer thrice slay his
reflections on the thought of the writer."  It is probable,
therefore, that in these three contradictory lines the poet
generally supposed, whatever heightening a poet's sorrow may have
same pious poet, but we hear less of Philander and Narcissa, and
less of the mourner whom he loved to pity.
accompanied her to the Continent:
"I flew, I snatched her from the rigid North,
And bore her nearer to the sun."
only for this reason.  He who runs and reads may remember that in
That domestic grief is, in the first instance, to be thanked for
happened.  "Night Thoughts" were not uncommon to her, even when
first she visited the poet, and at a time when he himself was
"whom dismal scenes delight,
Frequent at tombs and in the realms of Night."
"Oh! permit the gloom of solemn night
To sacred thought may forcibly invite.
Oh! how divine to tread the milky way,
To the bright palace of Eternal Day!"
Whether you think with me, I know not; but the famous "De mortuis
weakness than of manly reason.  He that has too much feeling to
living.  Yet censure is not heard beneath the tomb, any more than
world, little satisfied with inventing perhaps a melancholy
Young's own son.  "The Biographia," and every account of Young,
pretty roundly assert this to be the fact; of the absolute
impossibility of which, the "Biographia" itself, in particular
From the first line to the last of the "Night Thoughts" no one
former companions; one of the Duke of Wharton's set.  The poet
styles him "gay friend;" an appellation not very natural from a
portrait, from the sight of some of whose features the artist
address to the poet's supposed son is:--
"Lorenzo, Fortune makes her court to thee."
"And burns Lorenzo still for the sublime
Of life? to hang his airy nest on high?"
Is this a picture of the son of the Rector of Welwyn?  "Eighth
"In foreign realms (for thou hast travelled far)"--
which even now does not apply to his son.  In "Night Five:"--
"So wept Lorenzo fair Clarissa's fate,
Who gave that angel-boy on whom he dotes,
And died to give him, orphaned in his birth!"
At the beginning of the "Fifth Night" we find:--
"Lorenzo, to recriminate is just,
I grant the man is vain who writes for praise."
Anti Lucretius, "quo nomine," says Polignac, "quemvis Atheum
characters; but a writer does not feign a name of which he only
gives the initial letter:--
"Tell not Calista.  She will laugh thee dead,
Or send thee to her hermitage with L---."
forbidden his college at Oxford for misbehaviour.  How such
follies who is free?  But, whatever the "Biographia" chooses to
beyond the ken of mortals, and descend not to earth but when
compelled by necessity.  The prose of ordinary occurrences is
Christian may be allowed to observe that Young is one of those
concerning whom, as you remark in your account of Addison, it is
Of the "Night Thoughts," notwithstanding their author's professed
Chancellors of the Exchequer.  In "Night Eight" the politician
plainly betrays himself:--
"Think no post needful that demands a knave:
When late our civil helm was shifting hands,
So P--- thought:  think better if you can."
Yet it must be confessed that at the conclusion of "Night Nine,"
weary perhaps of courting earthly patrons, he tells his soul--
Thy PATRON he, whose diadem has dropped
You gems of Heaven; Eternity thy prize;
And leave the racers of the world their own."
The "Fourth Night" was addressed by "a much-indebted Muse" to the
"Dark, though not blind, like thee, Meonides;
Or, Milton, thee.  Ah! could I reach your strain;
Or his who made Meonides our own!
Man too he sung.  Immortal man I sing.
Oh had he pressed his theme, pursued the track
Which opens out of darkness into day!
Oh, had he mounted on his wing of fire,
Soared, where I sink, and sung immortal man--
How had it blest mankind, and rescued me!"
To the author of these lines was dedicated, in 1756, the first
volume of an "Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope," which
attempted, whether justly or not, to pluck from Pope his "Wing of
whom he invokes as his Muse.
Part of "paper-sparing" Pope's Third Book of the "Odyssey,"
prologue, I am told.
"May the 2nd.
want that instance of your friendship I mentioned in my last; a
friendship I am very sensible I can receive from no one but
yourself.  I should not urge this thing so much but for very
particular reasons; nor can you be at a loss to conceive how a
leisure.
"I am, sir, your most faithful
"and obedient servant,
Nay, even after Pope's death, he says in "Night Seven:"--
"Pope, who could'st make immortals, art thou dead?"
account of Young, two or three short passages, which stand almost
picture, by his own hand, from the study of which my readers may
"Ah me! the dire effect
Of loitering here, of death defrauded long;
Of old so gracious (and let that suffice),
I've been so long remembered I'm forgot.
When in his courtiers' ears I pour my plaint,
They drink it as the Nectar of the Great;
And squeeze my hand, and beg me come to-morrow.
Twice told the period spent on stubborn Troy,
Court favour, yet untaken, I BESIEGE.
If this song lives, Posterity shall know
One, though in Britain born, with courtiers bred,
Who thought, even gold might come a day too late;
Nor on his subtle deathbed planned his scheme
For future vacancies in Church or State."
Deduct from the writer's age "twice told the period spent on
told us--
"A fool at forty is a fool indeed."
after all, he had perhaps no right to suppress.  They all, I
believe, speak, not a little to the credit of his gratitude, of
favours received; and I know not whether the author, who has once
Of the "Epitaph on Lord Aubrey Beauclerk," dated 1740, all I know
seemed to have taken in the "Night Thoughts" of everything which
Kingdom, addressed to the Duke of Newcastle;" indignant, as it
appears, to behold
"---a pope-bred Princeling crawl ashore,
And whistle cut-throats, with those swords that scraped
Their barren rocks for wretched sustenance,
To cut his passage to the British throne."
This political poem might be called a "Night Thought;" indeed, it
In 1753, when The Brothers had lain by him above thirty years, it
The next performance which he printed was a prose publication,
entitled "The Centaur Not Fabulous, in Six Letters to a Friend on
noble, ingenious, accomplished, and most wretched Altamont."  His
extravagance has beggared my boy, my unkindness has murdered my
wife!"  Either Altamont and Lorenzo were the twin production of
Report has been accustomed to call Altamont Lord Euston.
"The Old Man's Relapse," occasioned by an Epistle to Walpole, if
written by Young, which I much doubt, must have been written very
dedicator, and publishing a sermon addressed to the king.
"--ostia septem
Pulverulenta vocant, septem sine flumine valles."
Such leaden labours are like Lycurgus's iron money, which was so
affords us a miraculous delight.  He asks why it should seem
altogether impossible that Heaven's latest editions of the human
The few lines which stand in the last edition, as "sent by Lord
Melcombe to Dr. Young not long before his lordship's death," were
"Love thy country, wish it well,
Not with too intense a care;
'Tis enough, that, when it fell,
Thou its ruin didst not share.
Envy's censure, Flattery's praise,
With unmoved indifference view;
Learn to tread life's dangerous maze,
With unerring Virtue's clue.
Void of strong desire and fear,
Life's void ocean trust no more;
Strive thy little bark to steer
With the tide, but near the shore.
Thus prepared, thy shortened sail
Shall, whene'er the winds increase,
Seizing each propitious gale,
Waft thee to the Port of Peace.
Keep thy conscience from offence,
And tempestuous passions free,
So, when thou art called from hence,
Easy shall thy passage be;
Easy shall thy passage be,
Cheerful thy allotted stay,
Short the account 'twixt God and thee;
Hope shall meet thee on the way:
Truth shall lead thee to the gate,
Mercy's self shall let thee in,
Where its never-changing state,
Full perfection, shall begin."
The poem was accompanied by a letter.
"DEAR SIR,--You seemed to like the ode I sent you for your
"Yours, most cordially,
In 1762, a short time before his death, Young published
"Resignation."  Notwithstanding the manner in which it was really
Montagu in the following lines:--
"Yet write I must.  A lady sues:
How shameful her request!
My brain in labour with dull rhyme,
Hers teeming with the best!"
And again--
"A friend you have, and I the same,
Whose prudent, soft address
Will bring to life those healing thoughts
Which died in your distress.
That friend, the spirit of my theme
Extracting for your ease,
Will leave to me the dreg, in thoughts
Too common; such as these."
By the same lady I was enabled to say, in her own words, that
Young's unbounded genius appeared to greater advantage in the
"--letting down the golden chain from high,
He drew his audience upward to the sky."
Notwithstanding Young had said, in his "Conjectures on Original
Richardson's death he says--
"When heaven would kindly set us free,
And earth's enchantment end;
It takes the most effectual means,
And robs us of a friend."
To "Resignation" was prefixed an apology for its appearance, to
sounding names and titles, to be informed that the author of the
"Night Thoughts" did not blush to leave a legacy to his "friend
upon James Baker, dated 1749; which I am glad to find in the late
Much is told in the "Biographia," which I know not to have been
praise he bestows upon Socrates, in the Preface to "Night Seven,"
"When, after battle, I the field have SEEN
Spread o'er with ghastly shapes which once were men."
probably had an eye when he determined on the Church.  To satisfy
above the need of advancement; and your sentiments, above that
"Your loving Brother, THO. CANT."
gained some friends, he made many enemies.  Again:  Young was a
coxcomb treats his mistress; to be threatened with desertion, in
order to increase fondness.
Young seems to have been taken at his word.  Notwithstanding his
enamoured.  Alexander assigned no palace for the residence of
Thoughts," I hoped to have given you an account from the best
authority; but who shall dare to say, To-morrow I will be wise or
In a letter from Tscharner, a noble foreigner, to Count Haller,
swelled beyond their real bulk, that they will hardly shut.
"What though we wade in wealth, or soar in fame!
Earth's highest station ends in HERE HE LIES!
And DUST TO DUST concludes her noblest song!"
The author of these lines is not without his 'Hic jacet.'  By the
marble can make the bad or the foolish merit; which, without the
Optimi parentis
Hujus Ecclesiae rect. et Elizabethae faem. praenob
Conjugis ejus amantissimae
Pio et gratissimo animo hoc marmor posuit
Filius superstes.
Is it not strange that the author of the "Night Thoughts" has
Such, my good friend, is the account which I have been able to
collect of the great Young.  That it may be long before anything
like what I have just transcribed be necessary for you, is the
sincere wish of,
Dear Sir, your greatly obliged Friend,
experience improves, and who, observing their own faults, become
gradually correct.  His poem on the "Last Day," his first great
performance, has an equability and propriety, which he afterwards
disappointed is that the thought of the LAST DAY makes every man
elegance enough, but Jane is too heroic to be pitied.
author intended; his endeavour was at the production of striking
choosing those parts which most easily admit the ornaments of
English poetry.  He had least success in his lyric attempts, in
which he seems to have been under some malignant influence; he is
In his "Night Thoughts" he has exhibited a very wide display of
original poetry, variegated with deep reflections and striking
regarded; the power is in the whole, and in the whole there is a
magnificence like that ascribed to Chinese plantation, the
magnificence of vast extent and endless diversity.
His last poem was the "Resignation," in which he made, as he was
accustomed, an experiment of a new mode of writing, and succeeded
every stanza, such as he often was in the highest vigour.  His
seemed to have one favourite catastrophe, as his three plays all
concluded with lavish suicide, a method by which, as Dryden
imagination, but the pride of Busiris is such as no other man can
reflections, the incidents, and the diction, are original.  The
"Her merchants princes, and each DECK A THRONE."
Let burlesque try to go beyond him.
He has the trick of joining the turgid and familiar:  to buy the
alliance of Britain, "Climes were paid down."  Antithesis is his
writers; he picks up no hemistichs, he copies no favourite
expressions; he seems to have laid up no stores of thought or
Of David Mallet, having no written memorial, I am able to give no
years ago, under the conduct of Robin Roy, so formidable and so
David Malloch was, by the penury of his parents, compelled to be
disadvantages of his birth and fortune; for, when the Duke of
reputation; and plagiarism has been boldly charged, but never
devoid of poetical spirit.  Many of his images are striking, and
misrepresented; and is little more than an improvement, or rather
versification is tolerable, nor can criticism allow it a higher
praise.
His first tragedy was Eurydice, acted at Drury Lane in 1731; of
which I know not the reception nor the merit, but have heard it
much commended.  Having cleared his tongue from his native
pronunciation so as to be no longer distinguished as a Scot, he
seems inclined to disencumber himself from all adherences of his
secret.
A new edition of the works of Bacon being prepared (1740) for the
undertook the "Life of Marlborough," Warburton remarked that he
might perhaps forget that Marlborough was a general, as he had
forgotten that Bacon was a philosopher.
When the Prince of Wales was driven from the palace, and, setting
endeavoured to increase his popularity by the patronage of
literature, and made Mallet his under-secretary, with a salary of
posthumous renown.  When he died, it was soon determined that his
Steele, who, in some of his exigencies, put them in pawn.  They
Thomson.  For some time afterwards he lay at rest.  After a long
interval his next work was "Amyntor and Theodora" (1747), a long
story in blank verse; in which it cannot be denied that there is
copiousness and elegance of language, vigour of sentiment, and
imagery well adapted to take possession of the fancy.  But it is
blank verse.  This he sold to Vaillant for one hundred and twenty
forgetfulness.
Mallet, by address or accident, perhaps by his dependence on the
Prince, found his way to Bolingbroke, a man whose pride and
petulance made his kindness difficult to gain or keep, and whom
unauthorised pamphlet called the "Patriot King," Bolingbroke in a
beginning of the last war, when the nation was exasperated by ill
children.  One daughter, who married an Italian of rank named
Cilesia, wrote a tragedy called Almida, which was acted at Drury
composition in which he was eminent.  His dramas had their day, a
emerging occasionally from time to time into notice, might keep
alive by his personal influence; but which, conveying little
information, and giving no great pleasure, must soon give way, as
other modes of amusement.
resolved not to be a dissenting minister, he ceased to be a
dissenter, I know not.  He certainly retained an unnecessary and
which it possesses, an envious desire of plundering wealth or
degrading greatness; and of which the immediate tendency is
innovation and anarchy, an impetuous eagerness to subvert and
confound, with very little care what shall be established.
according to the custom of the Dutch Universities, published a
thesis or dissertation.  The subject which he chose was "The
Original and Growth of the Human Foetus;" in which he is said to
have departed, with great judgment, from the opinion then
established, and to have delivered that which has been since
confirmed and received.
pounds a year.  Thus supported, he advanced gradually in medical
reputation, but never attained any great extent of practice or
Akenside appears not to have been wanting to his own success:  he
became physician to St. Thomas's Hospital; he read the Gulstonian
Akenside is to be considered as a didactic and lyric poet.  His
The exemption which blank verse affords from the necessity of
closing the sense with the couplet betrays luxuriant and active
minds into such self-indulgence that they pile image upon image,
ornament upon ornament, and are not easily persuaded to close the
found in description exuberant, in argument loquacious, and in
metre into harsh inversions.  The sense, however, of his words is
seems to have somewhat contracted his diffusion; but I know not
whether he has gained in closeness what he has lost in splendour.
vigour and poignancy his "Epistle to Curio," he transformed it
afterwards into an ode disgraceful only to its author.
further labour may be spared, for to what use can the work be
criticised that will not be read?
transition from the school to the college is, to most young
scholars, the time from which they date their years of manhood,
liberty, and happiness; but Gray seems to have been very little
delighted with academical gratifications; he liked at Cambridge
neither the mode of life nor the fashion of study, and lived
sullenly on to the time when his attendance on lectures was no
look, however, without prejudice on the world, we shall find that
compliances of servility are apt enough in their association with
punctilious jealousy, and in the fervour of independence to exact
poetry; for in this year were produced the "Ode to Spring," his
reasonable to wish that he had prosecuted his design; for though
there is at present some embarrassment in his phrase, and some
retirement he wrote (1747) an ode on the "Death of Mr. Walpole's
magazine, first, I believe, made him known to the public.
impression was soon bought.  This year he lost his mother.  Some
offensive and contemptuous.  This insolence, having endured it
regarded, removed himself to Pembroke Hall.
In 1759 he published "The Progress of Poetry" and "The Bard," two
they could not see.
given to Mr. Brocket, the tutor of Sir James Lowther.  His
curious and elegant; for, as his comprehension was ample, his
contracted a friendship with Dr. Beattie, whom he found a poet, a
offered him a degree of Doctor of Laws, which, having omitted to
journey necessary, and he visited (1769) Westmoreland and
terminated in death.  His character I am willing to adopt, as Mr.
"Perhaps he was the most learned man in Europe.  He was equally
gardening.  With such a fund of knowledge, his conversation must
have been equally instructing and entertaining; but he was also a
without some speck, some imperfection; and I think the greatest
inferiors in science.  He also had, in some degree, that weakness
"You say you cannot conceive how Lord Shaftesbury came to be a
philosopher in vogue; I will tell you:  first, he was a lord;
secondly, he was as vain as any of his readers; thirdly, men are
very prone to believe what they do not understand; fourthly, they
seems always to mean more than he said.  Would you have any more
Mr. Mason has added, from his own knowledge, that though Gray was
fantastic foppery to which my kindness for a man of learning and
virtue wishes him to have been superior.
The poem "On the Cat" was doubtless by its author considered as a
"What female heart can gold despise?
What cat's averse to fish?"
the first relates merely to the nymph, and the second only to the
objections violate the dignity.
common sense at first universally rejected them, many have been
since persuaded to think themselves delighted.  I am one of those
vales, roll down the steep amain," so as that "rocks and nodding
groves rebellow to the roar"?  If this be said of music, it is
spotting."  This stanza, however, has something pleasing.  Of the
The caverns of the North and the plains of Chili are not the
residences of "glory and generous shame."  But that poetry and
virtue go always together is an opinion so pleasing that I can
there is a kind of cumbrous splendour which we wish away.  His
"The Bard" appears, at the first view, to be, as Algarotti and
others have remarked, an imitation of the prophecy of Nereus.
Algarotti thinks it superior to its original; and, if preference
depends only on the imagery and animation of the two poems, his
ballad of "Johnny Armstrong,"
"Is there ever a man in all Scotland--?"
commended, I think, beyond its merit.  The personification is
might have been concluded with an action of better example, but
suicide is always to be had without expense of thought.
These odes are marked by glittering accumulations of ungraceful
poetry deserve praise; the imagery is preserved, perhaps often
improved, but the language is unlike the language of other poets.
models to his schoolfellows.  From Eton he went to Christchurch,
flowers; and the letters have something of that indistinct and
The Prince of Wales, being (1737) driven from St. James's, kept a
died in childbed about five years afterwards, and he solaced his
grief by writing a long poem to her memory.  He did not, however,
engaged in supporting the schemes of the Ministry.
Politics did not, however, so much engage him as to withhold his
thoughts from things of more importance.  He had, in the pride of
chance, and applied himself seriously to the great question.  His
pleasure in a letter which deserves to be inserted:--
"I have read your religious treatise with infinite pleasure and
satisfaction.  The style is fine and clear, the arguments close,
cogent, and irresistible.  May the King of Kings, whose glorious
cause you have so well defended, reward your pious labours, and
grant that I may be found worthy, through the merits of Jesus
talents, and giving me so good a son.
"Your affectionate father,
A few years afterwards (1751), by the death of his father, he
inherited a baronet's title, with a large estate, which, though
perhaps he did not augment, he was careful to adorn by a house of
gradually advancing his claim to profit and preferment; and
qualifications which he soon perceived himself to want.  The year
Archibald Bower, a man of whom he has conceived an opinion more
favourable than he seems to have deserved, and whom, having once
espoused his interest and fame he was never persuaded to disown.
Bower, whatever was his moral character, did not want abilities.
Attacked as he was by a universal outcry, and that outcry, as it
seems, the echo of truth, he kept his ground; at last, when his
About this time Lyttelton published his "Dialogues of the Dead,"
which were very eagerly read, though the production rather, as it
"Critical Reviewers;" and poor Lyttelton, with humble gratitude,
returned, in a note which I have read, acknowledgments which can
When, in the latter part of the last reign, the inauspicious
commencement of the war made the dissolution of the Ministry
unavoidable, Sir George Lyttelton, losing with the rest his
employment, was recompensed with a peerage; and rested from
political turbulence in the House of Lords.
Andrew Reid, a man not without considerable abilities and not
unacquainted with letters or with life, undertook to persuade
Lyttelton, as he had persuaded himself, that he was master of the
"On Sunday evening the symptoms of his lordship's disorder, which
death, very sufficiently.  Though his lordship wished his
without some hopes of his recovery.
difficulties which staggered me, but I kept my mind open to
conviction.  The evidences and doctrines of Christianity, studied
unjust designs upon any person whatsoever.'
"On the evening, when the symptoms of death came on, he said, 'I
shall die; but it will not be your fault.'  When Lord and Lady
Valentia came to see his lordship, he gave them his solemn
around him.  On Monday morning a lucid interval gave some small
hopes, but these vanished in the evening; and he continued dying,
"This unadorned stone was placed here by the particular
desire and express directions of the Right Honourable
Lord Lyttelton's Poems are the works of a man of literature and
judgment, devoting part of his time to versification.  They have
have raised to excellence.