now first performed; for it is to our author's credit, that many of his works were laid by him a considerable time before they were offered to the public. Our great dramatic critic pronounces this piece "too far removed from known life" to affect the passions. His next performance was The Revenge, the dramatic character of which is sufficiently ascertained by its still keeping possession of the stage. The hint of this is supposed to have been taken from Othello; but the reflections, the incidents, and the diction, are original."-The success of this induced him to attempt another tragedy, which was written in 1721, but not brought upon the stage for thirty years afterwards; and then without success, as we shall have farther occasion to observe. It has been remarked, that all his plays conclude with suicide,* and I much fear the frequent introduction of this unnatural crime upon the stage, has contributed greatly to its commission, We have passed over our author's Paraphrase on part of the Book of Job, in order to bring his dramatic performances together. The Paraphrase has been well received, and has often been printed with his Night Thoughts. This would be admired, perhaps, as much as any of his works, could we forget the original but there is such a dignified simplicity even in our prose translation of the poetic parts of scripture, that we can seldom bear to see them reduced to rhyme, or modern measures. 66 His next, and one of his best performances, is entitled, The Love of Fame the Universal Passion, in Seven characteristic Satires, originally published separately, between the years 1725, and 1728. This, according to Dr. Johnson, is a very great performance. It is said to be a series of epigrams, and if it be, it is what the author intended: His endeavor was at the production of striking distichs, and pointed sentences; and his distichs have the weight of solid sentiment, and his points the sharpness of resistless *Our author seems early to have been enamoured with the Tragic Muse, and with the charms of melancholy. Dr. Ridley relates, that when at Oxford, he would sometimes shut up his room, and study by a lamp, at mid-day. truth. His characters are often selected with discern ment, and drawn with nicety; his illustrations are often happy, and his reflections often just. His spe cies of satire is between those of Horace and Juvenal: he has the gaiety of Horace without his laxity of num bers; and the morality of Juvenal, with greater variety of images."Swift indeed has pronounced of these Satires, that they should have been either "more merry, or more severe :" in that case, they might probably have caught the popular taste more; but this does not prove that they would have been better. The opinion of the Duke of Grafton, however, was of more worth than all the opinions of the wits, if it be true as related by Mr. Spence, that his grace presented the author with two thousand pounds. "Two thousand pounds for a poem !" said one of the Duke's friends to whom his grace replied, that he had made an excellent bargain, for he thought it worth four. On the accession of George I. Young flattered him with an Ode, called Ocean, to which was prefixed an introductory Ode to the King, and an Essay on Lyric Poetry of these the most observable thing is, that the poet and the critic could not agree: for the Rules of the Essay condemned the Poetry, and the Poetry set at defiance the maxims of the Essay. The biographer of British poets has truly said, " he had least success in his lyric attempts, in which he seems to have been under some malignant influence: he is always laboring to be great, and at last is only turgid." We now leave awhile the works of our author, to contemplate the conduct of the man. About this time his studies took a more serious turn; and, for saking the law, which he had never practised, when he was almost fifty he entered into orders, and was in 1728, appointed Chaplain to the King. One of Pope's biographers relates, that, on this occasion Young applied to his brother poet for direction in his studies, who jocosely recommended Thomas Aquinas, which the former taking seriously, he retired to the suburbs with the angelical doctor, till his friend discovered him, and brought him back. His Vindication of Providence, and Estimate of Human Life, were published in this year; they have gone through several editions, and are generally regarded as the best of his prose compositions: But the plan of the latter never was completed. The following year he printed a very loyal sermon on King Charles' Martyrdom, intitled, Án Apology for Princes. In 1730, he was presented by his college to the rectory of Welwyn in Hertfordshire, worth about 3001. à year, beside the lordship of the manor annexed to it, This year he relapsed again to poetry, and published a loyal Naval Ode, and Two Epistles to Pope, of which nothing particular need be said. He was married, in 1731, to Lady Elizabeth Lee, widow of Colonel Lee, and daughter to the Earl of Litchfield and it was not long before she brought him a son and heir. Sometime before his marriage, the Doctor walking in his garden at Welwyn, with this lady and another, a servant came to tell him a gentleman wished to speak to him. "Tell him," says the Doctor, "I am too happily engaged to change my situation." The ladies insisted that he should go, as his visitor was a man of rank, his patron, and his friend; and as persuasion had no effect on him, they took him, one by the right hand, and the other by the left, and led him to the garden-gate. He then laid his hand upon his heart, and in that expressive manner for which he was so remarkable, uttered the following lines: "Thus Adam look'd when from the garden driven, "Like him I go, for angels drove us both. "Hard was his fate, but mine still more unkind; Another striking instance of his wit is related in reference to Voltaire: who, while in England, (probably at Mr. Doddington's seat in Dorsetshire) ridiculed, with some severity, Milton's allegorical personages, Sin and Death; on which Young, who was one of the company, immediately addressed him in the following extemporaneous distich: "Thou art so witty, profligate, and thin, "Thou seem'st a Milion, with his Death and Sin." Soon after his marriage, our author again indulged his poetic vein in two odes, called the Sea Piece, with a Poetical Dedication to Voltaire, in which the above incident seems alluded to in these lines, "On Dorset downs, when Milton's page "With Sin and Death provok'd thy rage." In 1734 he printed an Argument for Peace, which afterward, with several of his smaller pieces, and most of his Dedications, was consigned by his own hand to merited oblivion: in which circumstance he deserves both the thanks and imitation of posterity. About the year 1741 he had the unhappiness to lose his wife; her daughter by Colonel Lee, and this daughter's husband, Mr. Temple. What affliction he felt for their loss, may be seen in his Night Thoughts, written on this occasion. They are addressed to Lorenzo, a man of pleasure, and of the world; and who, it is generally supposed, was his own son, then laboring under his father's displeasure. His son-in-law is said to be characterized by Philander, and his Lady's daughter was certainly the person he speaks of under the appellation of Narcissa. (See Night III. line 62.) In her last illness, which was a consumption, he accompanied her to Montpellier; or, as Mr. Croft says, to Lyons, in the South of France, at which place she died soon after her arrival. Being regarded as a heretic, she was denied christian burial, and her afflicted father was obliged to steal a grave, and inter her privately with his own hands.* I take the liberty of inserting here a passage from a letter written by Mr. W. Taylor, from Montpellier, to his sister, Mrs. Mouncher, in the preceding year 1789, which may be considered as curious, and will be interesting and affecting to the admirers of Dr. Young and his Narcissa: Mrs. H I know you, as well as myself, are not a little partial to Dr. Young. Had you been with me in a solitary walk the other day, you would have. shed a tear over the remains of his dear Narcissa. I was walking in a place called the King's Garden; and there I saw the spot where she was interred. Mr. J and myself, had some conversation with the gardener respecting it; who fold us, that about 45 years ago, Dr. Young was here with his daughter for her health; and that he used constantly to be walking backward and forward in this gar den (no doubt, as he saw her gradually declining, to find the most solitary spot where he might shew his last token of affection, by leaving her remains as secure as possible from those savages, who would have denied her a christian burial: for at that time, an Englishman in this country was (See Night III. line 162, &c.) In this celebrated poem he thus addresses Death : "Insatiate archer! could not one suffice? "Thy shaft flew thrice, and thrice my peace was slain; These lines have been universally understood of the above deaths but this supposition can no way be reconciled with Mr. Croft's dates, who says, Mrs. Temple died in 1736, Mr. Temple in 1740, and Lady Young in 1741. Which quite inverts the order of the poet, who makes Narcissa's death follow Philander's: "Narcissa follows e'er his tomb is clos'd." Night III. line 62. There is no possible way to reconcile these contradictions: either we must reject Mr. Craft's dates, for which he gives us no authority, or we must suppose the characters and incidents, if not entirely fictitious, as the author assures us that they are not, were accommodated by poetic licence to his purpose. As to the character of Lorenzo, whether taken from real life, or moulded purely in the author's imagination, Mr. Croft has sufficiently proved that it could not intend his son, who was but eight years old when the greater part of the Night Thoughts was written; for Night the Seventh is dated, in the original edition, July 1744. looked upon as an heretic, infidel, and devil. They begin now to verge from their bigotry, and allow them at least to be men, though not christians, I believe ;) and that he bribed the under gardener, belonging to his father, to let him bury his daughter, which he did; pointed out the most solitary place, and dug the grave. The man, through a private door, admitted the Doctor at midnight, bringing his beloved daughter, wrap ped up in a sheet, upon his shoulder: he laid her in the hole, sat down, and (as the man expressed it) 'rained tears! With pious sacrilege a grave I stole. The man who was thus bribed is dead, but the master is still living. Before the man died, they were one day going to dig, and set some flowers, &c. in this spot where she was buried. The man said to his master,Don't dig there; for, so many years ago, 1 buried an English lady there.' The master was much surprised; and as Doctor Young's book had made much noise in France, it led him to enquire into the matter; and only two years ago it was known for a certainty that that was the place, and in this way: There was an English nobleman bere, who was acquainted with the governor of this place; and wishing to ascertain the fact, he obtained permission to dig up the ground, whefe he found some bones, which were examined by a surgeon, and pronounced to be the remains of a human body: this therefore puts the authenticity of it beyond a doubt,"See Evan. Mag. for 1797, p. 444, |