"A pig of lead to him who dives the best; "A peck of coals a-piece * fhall glad the reft." In naked majefty Oldmixon ftands †, And Milo-like furveys his arms and hands; 285 G g He nal, British Journal, Daily Journal, etc. the concealed writers of which for fome time were Oldmixon, Roome, Arnall, Concanen, and others; perfons never seen by our author. Our indulgent Poet, whenever he has spoken of any dirty or low work, conftantly puts us in mind of the poverty of the offenders, as the only extenuation of fuch practices. Let any one but remark, when a Thief, a Pickpocket, an Highwayman, or a Knight of the poft are spoken of, how much our hate to those characters is leffened, if they add a needy Thief, a poor Pick-pocket, an hungry Highwaymar, a starving Knight of the poft, etc. † Mr. JOHN OLD MIXON, next to Mr. Dennis, the moft antient Critic of our nation; an unjust cenfurer of Mr. Addifon in his profe Efflay on Criticifin, whom also in his imitation of Bouhours (called the Arts of Logic and, Rhetoric) he misrepresents in plain matter of fact; for in p. 45, he cites the Spectator as abufing Dr. Swift by name, where there is not the least hint of i; and in p. 304, is fo injurious as to fuggeft that Mr. Addifon himself writ that Tatkr, No. 43, which fays of his own Simile, that 'Tis as great as ever entered into the mind of man." "In Poctry he was not so happy as laborious, and therefore characterized by the Tatler, No. 62, by the 61 name of Omicron the unborn Poet." Curl, Key, p. 13, "He writ dramatic "works, and a volume of poetry confifting of heroic Epiftles, etc. fome "whereof are very well done," faid that great Judge Mr. Jacob, in his Lives of Poets, vol. ii. p. 303. In his Effay on Criticifm, and the Arts of Logic and Rhetoric, he frequently reflects on our Author. But the top of his character was a Perverter of Hiftory, in that fcandalous one of the Stuarts in folio, and his Critical Hiftory of England, two volumes, octavo. Being employed by bifhop Kennet, in publishing the hiftorians in his Collection, he falfified Daniel's Chronicle in numberless places. Yet this very man, in the preface to the first of these books, advanced a porticular fact to charge three eminent perfons of falfifying the lord Clarendon's Hiftory; which fact has been difproved by Dr. Atterbury, late bishop of Rochester, then the only furvivor of them; and the particular part he pretended to be falfified, produced fince, after almost He was all s ninety years, in that noble author's original manufcript. life a virulent Party-writer for hire, and received his reward in a small place, which he enjoyed to his death. Very reasonably doth this ancient Critic complain: Without doubt it was a fault in the Conftitution of things. For the World, as a great writer faith, He faid, and climb'd a ftranded lighter's height, Next Smedley div'd; flow circles dimpled o'er 290 Then effay'd-t; fcarce vanish'd out of fight, 295 And mounts far off among the Swans of Thames. A cold, long-winded, native of the deep : 300 If faith, being given to a man for a fubje&t of disputation, he might think himfelf mocked with a penurious gift, were any thing made certain. Hence those fuperior mafters of wifdom, the Sceptics and Academics, reasonably conclude that two and trvo do not make four. SCRIBL. But we need not go fo far, to remark what the Poet principally intended, the abfurdity of complaining of old age, which must neceffarily happen, as long as we are indulged in our desires of adding one year to another. In the furreptitious editions, this whole Episode was applied to an initial letter E -9 by whom if they meant the Laureate, nothing was more abfurd, no part agreeing with his character. The allegory evidently demands a perfon dipp'd in fcandal, and deeply immersed in dirty work : whereas Mr. Eufden's writings rarely offended but by their length and mul titude, and accordingly are taxed of nothing else in book i. ver. 102. But the perfon here mentioned, an Irishman, was author and publisher of many fcurrilous Pieces, a weekly Whitehall Journal, in the year 1722, in the name of Sir James Baker; and particularly whole volumes of Billingsgate against Dr. Swift and Mr. Pope, called Gulliveriana and Alexandriana, printed in octavo, 1728. A gentleman of genins and fp'rit, who was fecretly dipt in fome papers of this kind, on whom our poet beflows a panegyric instead of a fatire, as deferving to be better employed than in party-quarrels, and perfonal invectives. MATTHEW CONCANEN, an Irishman bred to the law. Smedley (one of his brethren in enmity to Swift) in his Metamorphofis of Scriblerus, p. 7, accufes him of "haying boasted of what he had not written, but others had revifed and done for him." He was author of feveral dull and dead feurlities in the British and London Journals, and in a paper called the Spe culatift. If perseverance gain the Diver's prize, 305 No noife, no ftir, no motion can't thou make, G g 2 310 Nor culatist. In a pamphlet, called a Supplement to the Profound, hẹ dealt very unfairly with our Poet, not only frequently imputing to him Mr. Broome's verfes (for which he might indeed feem in fome degree accountable, having corrected what that gentleman did) but thofe of the duke of Buckingham, and others: To this rare piece fomebody humoroufiy caufed him to take for his motto, De profund, clamavi. He was fince a hired Scribler in the Daily Courant, where he poured forth much Billingsgate against the lord Bolingbroke, and others; after which this man was furprisingly promoted to adminifter Juftice and Law in Jamaica. *These were daily papers, a number of which, to lessen the expence, were printed one on the back of another. See the story in Ovid, Met. vii. where the miferable Petrefaction of this old Lady is pathetically described. || A name affumed by the eldest and graveft of these writers, who at last being afhamed of his pupils, gave his paper over, and in his age remained filent. We ought not to fuppofe that a modern Critic here taxeth the Poet with an Anachronism, affirming these Gazetteers not to have lived within the time of his poem, and challenging us to produce any such paper of that date. But we may with equal affurance affert these Gazetteers not to have lived fince, and challenge all the learned world to produce one fuch paper at this day. Surely therefore, where the point is so obscure, our author ought not to be cenfured too rafhly. SCRIBL. Notwithstanding this affected ignorance of the good Scriblerus, the Daily Gazetteer was a title given very properly to certain papers, each of which lafted but a day. Into this, as a common fink, was received all the trash, which |