But the poem of Parnell's best known, and on to England, and are sensible how much that Docwhich his best reputation is grounded, is the Her- tor is cursed and hated, who introduced their spemit. Pope, speaking of this in those manuscript cies into your nation; therefore, as you dread the anecdotes already quoted, says "That the poem is wrath of St. Patrick, send them hither, and rid the very good. The story," continues he, “was writ- kingdom of those pernicious and loquacious animals. ten originally in Spanish, whence probably Howel "I have at length received your poem out of Mr. had translated it into prose, and inserted it in one Addison's hands, which shall be sent as soon as of his letters. Addison liked the scheme, and was you order it, and in what manner you shall appoint. not disinclined to come into it." However this I shall in the mean time give Mr. Tooke a packet may be, Dr. Henry Moore, in his dialogues, has for you, consisting of divers merry pieces. Mr. the very same story; and I have been informed by some, that it is originally of Arabian invention. With respect to the prose works of Parnell, I have mentioned them already; his fame is too well grounded for any defects in them to shake it. 1 will only add, that the Life of Zoilus was written at the request of his friends, and designed as a satire upon Dennis and Theobald, with whom his club had long been at variance. I shall end this account with a letter to him from Pope and Gay, in which they endeavour to hasten him to finish that production. "DEAR SIR, "London, March 18. Gay's new farce, Mr. Burnet's letter to Mr. Pope, Mr. Pope's Temple of Fame, Mr. Thomas Burnet's Grumbler on Mr. Gay, and the Bishop of Ailsbury's Elegy, written either by Mr. Cary or some other hand. "Mr. Pope is reading a letter; and in the mean time, I make use of the pen to testify my uneasiness in not hearing from you. I find success, even in the most trivial things, raises the indignation of Scribblers: for I, for my What-d'ye-call-it, could neither escape the fury of Mr. Burnet, or the German doctor; then where will rage end, when Homer is to be translated? Let Zoilus hasten to your friend's assistance, and envious criticism shall be no more. I am in hopes that we may order our affairs so as to meet this summer at the Bath; for Mr. Pope and myself have thoughts of taking a trip thither. You shall preach, and we will write lampoons; for it is esteemed as great an honour to leave the Bath for fear of a broken head, as for a Terræ Filius of Oxford to be expelled. I have no place at court; therefore, that I may not entirely be without one every where, show that I have a place in your remembrance. "Your most affectionate, "I must own I have long owed you a letter, but you must own, you have owed me one a good deal longer. Besides, I have but two people in the whole kingdom of Ireland to take care of; the Dean and you but you have several who complain of your neglect in England. Mr. Gay complains, Mr. Harcourt complains, Mr. Jervas complains, Dr. Arbuthnot complains, my Lord complains; I complain. (Take notice of this figure of iteration, when you make your next sermon.) Some say you are in deep discontent at the new turn of affairs; others, that you are so much in the archbishop's good graces, that you will not correspond with any that have seen the last ministry. Some affirm you have quarrelled with Pope (whose friends they observe daily fall from him on account of his satirical I can not finish this trifle without returning, my and comical disposition;) others that you are in- sincerest acknowledgments to Sir John Parnell, sinuating yourself into the opinion of the inge- for the generous assistance he was pleased to give nious Mr. What-do-ye-call-him. Some think you me, in furnishing me with many materials, when are preparing your sermons for the press; and he heard I was about writing the life of his uncle, others, that you will transform them into essays and as also to Mr. and Mrs. Hayes, relations of our moral discourses. But the only excuse that I will poet; and to my very good friend Mr. Stevens, allow, is your attention to the Life of Zoilus. The who, being an ornament to letters himself, is very frogs already seem to croak for their transportation | ready to assist all the attempts of others. "Homer will be published in three weeks." THE LIFE OF Henry, Lord Viscount Bolingbroke. [FIRST PRINTED IN 1771.] THERE are some characters that seem formed | know, was strongly attached to the republican by nature to take delight in struggling with oppo-party, Henry, the subject of the present memoir, sition, and whose most agreeable hours are passed was brought up in his family, and consequently in storms of their own creating. The subject of imbibed the first principles of his education amongst the present sketch was, perhaps, of all others, the the dissenters. At that time, Daniel Burgess, a most indefatigable in raising himself enemies, to fanatic of a very peculiar kind, being at once posshow his power in subduing them; and was not sessed of zeal and humour, and as well known for less employed in improving his superior talents the archness of his conceits as the furious obstinathan in finding objects on which to exercise their cy of his principles, was confessor in the presbyactivity. His life was spent in a continual con- terian way to his grandmother, and was appointed flict of politics; and, as if that was too short for the to direct our author's first studies. Nothing is so combat, he has left his memory as a subject of last-apt to disgust a feeling mind as mistaken zeal; and, ing contention. perhaps, the absurdity of the first lectures he reIt is, indeed, no easy matter to preserve an ac- ceived might have given him that contempt for all knowledged impartiality in talking of a man so religions which he might have justly conceived differently regarded on account of his political, as against one. Indeed no task can be more mortiwell as his religious principles. Those whom his fying than what he was condemned to undergo: politics may please will be sure to condemn him "I was obliged," says he, in one place, "while yet for his religion; and, on the contrary, those most a boy, to read over the commentaries of Dr. Manstrongly attached to his theological opinions are ton, whose pride it was to have made a hundred the most likely to decry his politics. On whatever and nineteen sermons on the hundred and nineside he is regarded, he is sure to have opposers; [teenth psalm." Dr. Manton and his sermons were and this was perhaps what he most desired, having, from nature, a mind better pleased with the struggle than the victory. not likely to prevail much on one who was, perhaps, the most sharp-sighted in the world at discovering the absurdities of others, however he might have been guilty of establishing many of his own. Henry St. John, Lord Viscount Bolingbroke, was born in the year 1672, at Battersea, in Surrey, at a seat that had been in the possession of his an- But these dreary institutions were of no very cestors for ages before. His family was of the first long continuance; as soon as it was fit to take him rank, equally conspicuous for its antiquity, dignity, out of the hands of the women, he was sent to and large possessions. It is found to trace its origin Eton school, and removed thence to Christ-church as high as Adam de Port, Baron of Basing, in college in Oxford. His genius and understanding Hampshire, before the Conquest; and in a suc- were seen and admired in both these seminaries, cession of ages, to have produced warriors, patriots, but his love of pleasure had so much the ascenden and statesmen, some of whom were conspicuous cy, that he seemed contented rather with the con for their loyalty, and others for their defending the sciousness of his own great powers than their ex rights of the people. His grandfather, Sir Walter ertion. However, his friends, and those who knew St. John, of Battersea, marrying one of the daugh-him most intimately, were thoroughly sensible of ters of Lord Chief Justice St. John, who, as all the extent of his mind; and when he left the university, he was considered as one who had the|ing the poet, and praising his translation. Wo fairest opportunity of making a shining figure in have another, not so well known, prefixed to a active life. French work, published in Holland by the CheNature seemed not less kind to him in her ex-valier de St. Hyacinth, entitled, Le Chef-d'-EŒuvre ternal embellishments than in adorning his mind. d'un Inconnu. This performance is a humorous With the graces of a handsome person, and a face piece of criticism upon a miserable old ballad; and in which dignity was happily blended with sweet- Bolingbroke's compliment, though written in Engness, he had a manner of address that was very lish, is printed in Greek characters, so that at the engaging. His vivacity was always awake, his first glance it may deceive the eye, and be mistaken apprehension was quick, his wit refined, and his for real Greek. There are two or three things memory amazing: his sublety in thinking and more of his composition, which have appeared since reasoning was profound; and all these talents his death, but which do honour neither to his parts were adorned with an elocution that was irre- nor memory. sistible. In this mad career of pleasure he continued for To the assemblage of so many gifts from na- some time; but at length, in 1700, when he ar ture, it was expected that art would soon give her rived at the twenty-eighth year of his age, he be finishing hand; and that a youth, begun in excel- gan to dislike his method of living, and to find that lence, would soon arrive at perfection: but such is sensual pleasure alone was not sufficient to make the perverseness of human nature, that an age the happiness of a reasonable creature. He therewhich should have been employed in the acquisi-fore made his first effort to break from his state of tion of knowledge, was dissipated in pleasure; and infatuation, by marrying the daughter and coheir instead of aiming to excel in praiseworthy pur- ess of Sir Henry Winchescomb, a descendant from suits, Bolingbroke seemed more ambitious of being the famous Jack of Newbury, who, though but a thought the greatest rake about town. This period clothier in the reign of Henry VIII., was able to might have been compared to that of fermentation entertain the king and all his retinue in the most in liquors, which grow muddy before they bright- splendid manner. This lady was possessed of a but it must also be confessed, that those liquors fortune exceeding forty thousand pounds, and was which never ferment are seldom clear. In this not deficient in mental accomplishments; but state of disorder, he was not without his lucid in- whether he was not yet fully satiated with his tervals; and even while he was noted for keeping former pleasures, or whether her temper was not Miss Gumley, the most expensive prostitute in the conformable to his own, it is certain they were far kingdom, and bearing the greatest quantity of wine from living happily together. After cohabiting for without intoxication, he even then despised his some time together, they parted by mutual consent, paltry ambition. "The love of study," says he, both equally displeased; he complaining of the ob "and desire of knowledge, were what I felt all my stinacy of her temper, she of the shamelessness of life; and though my genius, unlike the demon of his infidelity. A great part of her fortune, some Socrates, whispered so softly, that very often I time after, upon his attainder, was given her back; heard him not in the hurry of these passions with but, as her family estates were settled upon him, which I was transported, yet some calmer hours he enjoyed them after her death, upon the reversal there were, and in them I hearkened to him." of his attainder. en; These sacred admonitions were indeed very few, Having taken a resolution to quit the alluresince his excesses are remembered to this very day. ments of pleasure for the stronger attractions of I have spoken to an old man, who assured me, that ambition, soon after his marriage he procured a he saw him and one of his companions run naked seat in the House of Commons, being elected for through the Park in a fit of intoxication; but then the borough of Wotton-Basset, in Wiltshire, his it was a time when public decency might be trans- father having served several times for the same gressed with less danger than at present. place. Besides his natural endowments and his During this period, as all his attachments were large fortune, he had other very considerable adto pleasure, so his studies only seemed to lean that vantages that gave him weight in the senate, and way. His first attempts were in poetry, in which seconded his views of preferment. His grandhe discovers more wit than taste, more labour than father, Sir Walter St. John, was still alive; and harmony in his versification. We have a copy of that gentleman's interest was so great in his own his verses prefixed to Dryden's Virgil, compliment- county of Wilts, that he represented it in two Par • Our author appears fond of this figure, for we find it introduced into his Essay on Polite Literature. The propriety, however, both of the simile, and of the position it endeavours liaments in a former reign. His father also was then the representative for the same; and the interest of his wife's family in the House was very extensive. Thus Bolingbroke took his seat with. to illustrate, is ably examinal in a periodical work, entitled many accidental helps, but his chief and great re the Philanthrope, published in London in the year 1797. I source lay in his own extensive abilities. At that time the whig and the tory parties were | been sincere and disinterested; for the latter chose strongly opposed in the House, and pretty nearly to follow his fortune, and the next day resigned his balanced. In the latter years of King William, the employments in the administration, following his tories, who from every motive were opposed to the friend's example, and setting an example at once of court, had been gaining popularity, and now began integrity and moderation. As an instance of this, to make a public stand against their competitors. when his coadjutors, the tories, were for carrying Robert Harley, afterwards Earl of Oxford, a a violent measure in the House of Commons, in staunch and confirmed tory, was in the year 1700 order to bring the Princess Sophia into England, chosen Speaker of the House of Commons, and Bolingbroke so artfully opposed it, that it dropped was continued in the same upon the accession of without a debate. For this his moderation was Queen Anne, the year ensuing. Bolingbroke had praised, but perhaps at the expense of his sagacity. all along been bred up, as was before observed, For some time the whigs seemed to have gained among the dissenters, his friends leaned to that a complete triumph, and upon the election of a new persuasion, and all his connexions were in the Parliament, in the year 1708, Bolingbroke was not whig interest. However, either from principle, or returned. The interval which followed, of above from perceiving the tory party to be then gaining two years, he employed in the severest study, and ground, while the whigs were declining, he soon this recluse period he ever after used to consider as changed his connexions, and joined himself to Har- the most active and serviceable of his whole life. ley, for whom then he had the greatest esteem; nor But his retirement was soon interrupted by the did he bring him his vote alone, but his opinion, prevailing of his party once more; for the Whig which, even before the end of his first session, he Parliament being dissolved in the year 1710, he rendered very considerable, the House perceiving was again chosen, and Harley being made Chaneven in so young a speaker the greatest eloquence, cellor, and Under-treasurer of the Exchequer, the united with the profoundest discernment. The important post of Secretary of State was given to year following he was again chosen anew for the our author, in which he discovered a degree of same borough, and persevered in his former at- genius and assiduity that perhaps have never been tachments, by which he gained such an authority known to be united in one person to the same and influence in the House, that it was thought degree. proper to reward his merit; and, on the 10th of April, 1704, he was appointed Secretary at War and of the Marine, his friend Harley having a little before been made Secretary of State. The English annals scarcely produce a more trying juncture, or that required such various abilities to regulate. He was then placed in a sphere where he was obliged to conduct the machine of The tory party being thus established in power, state, struggling with a thousand various calamift may easily be supposed that every method would ties; a desperate enraged party, whose characterbe used to depress the whig interest, and to prevent |istic it has ever been to bear none in power but it from rising; yet so much justice was done even themselves; a war conducted by an able general, to merit in an enemy, that the Duke of Marlbo- his professed opponent, and whose victories only rough, who might be considered as at the head of tended to render him every day more formidable; the opposite party, was supplied with all the ne-a foreign enemy, possessed of endless resources, cessaries for carrying on the war in Flanders with and seeming to gather strength from every defeat; vigour; and it is remarkable, that the greatest an insidious alliance, that wanted only to gain the events of his campaigns, such as the battles of Blenheim and Ramilies, and several glorious attempts made by the duke to shorten the war by some decisive action, fell out while Bolingbroke was Secretary at War. In fact he was a sincere admirer of that great general, and avowed it upon all occasions to the last moment of his life; he knew his faults, he admired his virtues, and had the boast of being instrumental in giving lustre to those triumphs by which his own power was in a manner overthrown. advantage of victory, without contributing to the expenses of the combat ; a weak declining mistress, that was led by every report, and seemed ready to listen to whatever was said against him; still more, a gloomy, indolent, and suspicious colleague, that envied his power, and hated him for his abilities: these were a part of the difficulties that Bolingbroke had to struggle with in office, and under which he was to conduct the treaty of peace of Utrecht, which was considered as one of the most complicated negociations that history can afford. But nothing As the affairs of the nation were then in as seemned too great for his abilities and industry; he fluctuating a state as at present, Harley, after set himself to the undertaking with spirit; he be maintaining the lead for above three years, was in gan to pave the way to the intended treaty, py his turn obliged to submit to the whigs, who once making the people discontented at the continuance more became the prevailing party, and he was com- of the war; for this purpose he employed himself pelled to resign the seals. The friendship between in drawing up accurate computations of the numhim and Bolingbroke seemed at this time to havebers of our own men, and that of foreigners, em ployed in its destructive progress. He even wrote cestors had been distinguished, having kept the in the Examiner, and other periodical papers of spirit of the one, and acknowledged the subordinathe times, showing how much of the burden rested tion that distinguished the other. upon England, and how little was sustained by Bolingbroke, being thus raised very near the those who falsely boasted their alliance. By these summit of power, began to perceive more clearly means, and after much debate in the House of the defects of him who was placed there. He now Commons, the Queen received a petition from Par-began to find, that Lord Oxford, whose party he liament, showing the hardships the allies had put had followed, and whose person he had esteemed, upon England in carrying on this war, and conse-was by no means so able or so industrious as he quently how necessary it was to apply relief to so supposed him to be. He now began from his heart ill-judged a connexion. It may be easily supposed to renounce the friendship which he once had for that the Dutch, against whom this petition was his coadjutor; he began to imagine him treachechiefly levelled, did all that was in their power to rous, mean, indolent, and invidious; he even beoppose it: many of the foreign courts also, with gan to ascribe his own promotion to Oxford's hawhom he had any transactions, were continually tred, and to suppose that he was sent up to the at work to defeat the minister's intentions. Me- House of Lords only to render him contemptible. morial was delivered after memorial; the people of These suspicions were partly true, and partly sugEngland, the Parliament, and all Europe, were gested by Bolingbroke's own ambition: being senmade acquainted with the injustice and the dan- sible of his own superior importance and capacity, gers of such a proceeding; however, Bolingbroke he could not bear to see another take the lead in went on with steadiness and resolution, and al- public affairs, when he knew they owed their chief though the attacks of his enemies at home might success to his own management. Whatever might have been deemed sufficient to employ his atten- have been his motives, whether of contempt, hation, yet he was obliged, at the same time that he tred, or ambition, it is certain an irreconcileable furnished materials to the press in London, to fur- breach began between these two leaders of their nish instructions to all our ministers and ambassa- party; their mutual hatred was so great, that even dors abroad, who would do nothing but in pursu- their own common interest, the vigour of their neance of his directions. As an orator in the senate, gociations, and the safety of their friends, were enhe exerted all his eloquence, he stated all the great tirely sacrificed to it. It was in vain that Swift, points that were brought before the House, he an- who was admitted into their counsels, urged the swered the objections that were made by the lead-unreasonable impropriety of their disputes; that, ers of the opposition; and all this with such suc- while they were thus at variance within the walls, cess, that even his enemies, while they opposed the enemy were making irreparable breaches withhis power, acknowledged his abilities. Indeed, out. Bolingbroke's antipathy was so great, that such were the difficulties he had to encounter, that even success would have been hateful to him if we find him acknowledging himself some years Lord Oxford were to be a partner. He abhorred after, that he never looked back on this great event, him to that degree, that he could not bear to be passed as it was, without a secret emotion of mind, joined with him in any case; and even some time when he compared the vastness of the undertaking, after, when the lives of both were aimed at, he and the importance of the success, with the means could not think of concerting measures with him employed to bring it about, and with those which for their mutual safety, preferring even death itself were employed to frustrate his intentions. to the appearance of a temporary friendship. While he was thus industriously employed, he Nothing could have been more weak and injudiwas not without the rewards that deserved to fol- cious than their mutual animosities at this junclow such abilities, joined to so much assiduity. In ture; and it may be asserted with truth, that men July, 1712, he was created Baron St. John of who were unable to suppress or conceal their reLidyard Tregoze, in Wiltshire, and Viscount Bo- sentments upon such a trying occasion, were unfit lingbroke; by the last of which titles he is now to take the lead in any measures, be their industry generally known, and is likely to be talked of by or their abilities ever so great. In fact, their disposterity; he was also the same year appointed sensions were soon found to involve not only them, Lord Lieutenant of the county of Essex. By the but their party in utter ruin; their hopes had for titles of Tregoze and Bolingbroke, he united the some time been declining, the whigs were daily honours of elder and younger branches of his fami- gaining ground, and the queen's death soon after ly; and thus transmitted into one channel the op- totally destroyed all their schemes with their posing interest of two races, that had been distin- power. guished, one for their loyalty to King Charles I. Upon the accession of George I. to the throne, the other for their attachment to the Parliament danger began to threaten the late ministry on every that opposed him. It was always his boast, that side: whether they had really intentions of bringne steered clear of the extremes for which his an-ling in the Pretender, or whether the whigs made |