though frequently sluggish and encumbered. Of his style, the general fault is harshness, and its general excellence is dignity of his sentiments, the prevailing beauty is simplicity, and uniformity the prevailing defect.

For his life, or for his writings, none, who candidly consider his fortune, will think an apology either necessary or difficult. If he was not always sufficiently instructed in his subject, his knowledge was, at least, greater than could have been attained by others in the same state. If his works were sometimes unfinished, accuracy cannot reasonably be expected from a man oppressed with want, which he has no hope of relieving but by a speedy publication, The insolence and resentment of which he is accused were not easily to be avoided by a great mind, irritated by perpetual hardships, and constrained hourly to return the spurns of contempt, and repress the insolence of prosperity; and vanity may surely be readily pardoned in him, to whom life afforded no other comforts than barren praises, and the consciousness of deserving them.

Those are no proper judges of his conduct, who have slumbered away their time on the down of plenty; nor will any wise man presume to say, "Had I been in Savage's condition, I should have lived or written better than Savage."

This relation will not be wholly without its use, if those, who languish under any part of his sufferings, shall be enabled to fortify their patience, by reflecting that they feel only those afflictions from which the abilities of Savage did not exempt him; or if those, who, in confidence of superiour capacities or attainments, disregard the common maxims of life, shall be reminded, that nothing will supply the want of prudence, and that negligence and irregularity, long continued, will make knowledge useless, wit ridiculous, and genius contemptible.

SWIFT.

AN account of Dr. Swift has been already collected, with great diligence and acuteness, by Dr. Hawkesworth, according to a scheme which I laid before him in the intimacy of our friendship. I cannot, therefore, be expected to say much of a life, concerning which I had long since communicated my thoughts to a man capable of dignifying his narrations with so much elegance of language and force of sentiment.

Jonathan Swift was, according to an account said to be written by himself, the son of Jonathan Swift, an attorney, and was born at Dublin, on St. Andrew's day, 1667: according to his own report, as delivered by Pope to Spence, he was born at Leicester, the son of a clergyman, who was minister of a parish in Herefordshire. During his life the place of his birth was undetermined. He was contented to be called an Irishman by the Irish; but would occasionally call himself an Englishman. The question may, without much regret, be left in the obscurity in which he delighted to involve it.

Whatever was his birth, his education was Irish. He was sent, at the age of six, to the school at Kilkenny, and in his fifteenth year, 1682, was admitted into the university of Dublin.

In his academical studies he was either not diligent or not happy. It must disappoint every reader's expectation, that, when at the usual time he claimed the bachelorship of arts, he was found by the examiners too conspicuously deficient for regular admission, and obtained his degree, at last, by special favour; a term used in that university to denote want of merit.

a Mr. Sheridan, in his Life of Swift, observes, that this account was really written by the dean, and now exists in his own handwriting in the library of Dublin college. R.

b Spence's Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 273.

Of this disgrace it may easily be supposed that he was much ashamed, and shame had its proper effect in producing reformation. He resolved, from that time, to study eight hours a day, and continued his industry for seven years, with what improvement is sufficiently known. This part of his story well deserves to be remembered; it may afford useful admonition and powerful encouragement to men whose abilities have been made for a time useless by their passions or pleasures, and who, having lost one part of life in idleness, are tempted to throw away the remainder in despair.

In this course of daily application he continued three years longer at Dublin; and in this time, if the observation and memory of an old companion may be trusted, he drew the first sketch of his Tale of a Tub.

When he was about one-and-twenty, 1688, being, by the death of Godwin Swift, his uncle, who had supported him, left without subsistence, he went to cousult his mother, who then lived at Leicester, about the future course of his life; and by her direction solicited the advice and patronage of sir William Temple, who had married one of Mrs. Swift's relations, and whose father, sir John Temple, master of the Rolls in Ireland, had lived in great familiarity of friendship with Godwin Swift, by whom Jonathan had been to that time maintained.

Temple received with sufficient kindness the nephew of his father's friend, with whom he was, when they conversed together, so much pleased, that he detained him two years in his house. Here he became known to king William, who sometimes visited Temple when he was disabled by the gout, and, being attended by Swift in the garden, showed him how to cut asparagus in the Dutch way.

King William's notions were all military; and he expressed his kindness to Swift by offering to make him a captain of horse.

When Temple removed to Moor-park, he took Swift with him; and when he was consulted by the earl of Port

VOL. VIII.

land about the expedience of complying with a bill then depending for making parliaments triennial, against which king William was strongly prejudiced, after having in vain tried to show the earl that the proposal involved nothing dangerous to royal power, he sent Swift for the same purpose to the king. Swift, who probably was proud of his employment, and went with all the confidence of a young man, found his arguments, and his art of displaying them, made totally ineffectual by the predetermination of the king; and used to mention this disappointment as his first antidote against vanity.

Before he left Ireland he contracted a disorder, as he thought, by eating too much fruit. The original of diseases is commonly obscure. Almost every boy eats as much fruit as he can get, without any great inconvenience. The disease of Swift was giddiness with deafness, which attacked him from time to time, began very early, pursued him through life, and, at last, sent him to the grave, deprived of reason.

Being much oppressed at Moor-park by this grievous malady, he was advised to try his native air, and went to Ireland; but, finding no benefit, returned to sir William, at whose house he continued his studies, and is known to have read, among other books, Cyprian and Irenæus. He thought exercise of great necessity, and used to run half a mile up and down a hill every two hours.

It is easy to imagine that the mode in which his first degree was conferred, left him no great fondness for the university of Dublin, and, therefore, he resolved to become a master of arts at Oxford. In the testimonial which he produced, the words of disgrace were omitted; and he took his master's degree July 5, 1692, with such reception and regard as fully contented him.

While he lived with Temple, he used to pay his mother,

The words speciali gratia, or per specialem gratiam, were used in the record of his degree in the college of Dublin; but were never entered in any testimonium, which merely states the fact of a degree having been taken, and, therefore, the account that they were omitted as a favour to Swift is incorrect.

at Leicester, a yearly visit. He travelled on foot, unless some violence of weather drove him into a wagon; and at night he would go to a penny lodging, where he purchased clean sheets for sixpence. This practice lord Orrery imputes to his innate love of grossness and vulgarity: some may ascribe it to his desire of surveying human life through all its varieties; and others, perhaps, with equal probability, to a passion which seems to have been deeply fixed in his heart, the love of a shilling.

In time he began to think that his attendance at Moorpark deserved some other recompense than the pleasure, however mingled with improvement, of Temple's conversation; and grew so impatient, that, 1694, he went away in discontent.

Temple, conscious of having given reason for complaint, is said to have made him deputy-master of the rolls, in Ireland; which, according to his kinsman's account, was an office which he knew him not able to discharge. Swift, therefore, resolved to enter into the church, in which he had at first no higher hopes than of the chaplainship to the factory, at Lisbon; but being recommended to lord Capel, he obtained the prebend of Kilroot, in Connor, of about a hundred pounds a year.

But the infirmities of Temple made a companion like Swift so necessary, that he invited him back, with a promise to procure him English preferment in exchange for the prebend, which he desired him to resign. With this request Swift complied, having, perhaps, equally repented their separation, and they lived on together with mutual satisfaction; and, in the four years that passed between his return and Temple's death, it is probable that he wrote the Tale of a Tub, and the Battle of the Books.

Swift began early to think, or to hope, that he was a poet, and wrote Pindarick odes to Temple, to the king, and to the Athenian society, a knot of obscure men, who

The affecting and amiable circumstances attending this resignation are not mentioned by Johnson, but may be seen in Sheridan's Life of Swift, p. 21, 22. e The publisher of this collection was John Dunton. R.