16 0, turn to me thy face at length, And me have mercy on; Unto thy servant give thy strength, And save thy handmaid's son. 17 Some sign of good to me afford, And let my foes then see, And be asham'd: because thou, Lord, Dost help and comfort me. PSALM LXXXVII. 1 AMONG the holy mountains high 2 Sion's fair gates the Lord loves more Than all the dwellings fair Of Jacob's land, though there be store, And all within his care. 3 City of God, most glorious things Of thee abroad are spoke; 4 I mention Egypt, where proud kings Did our forefathers yoke: I mention Babel to my friends And Tyre with Ethiops' utmost ends, 5 But twice that praise shall in our ear This and this man was born in her; 6 The Lord shall write it in a scroll That this man there was born. 7 Both they who sing, and they who dance, With sacred songs are there; In thee fresh brooks, and soft streams glance, And all my fountains clear. PSALM LXXXVIII. 1 LORD God! that dost me save and keep, All day to thee I cry; And all night long before thee weep, 2 Into thy presence let my prayer With sighs devout ascend; 3 For, cloy'd with woes and trouble sore, Surcharg'd my soul doth lie; 4 Reckon'd I am with them that pass Down to the dismal pit; I am a man, but weak, alas! 5 From life discharg'd and parted quite Whom thou rememberest no more, Them, from thy hand deliver'd o'er, 6 Thou in the lowest pit profound Where thickest darkness hovers round, 7 Thy wrath, from which no shelter saves 8 Thou dost my friends from me estrange, And mak'st me odious, Me to them odious, for they change, 9 Through sorrow and affliction great, 10 Wilt thou do wonders on the dead? And praise thee from their loathsome bed 11 Shall they thy loving kindness tell, 12 In darkness can thy mighty hand 13 But I to thee, O Lord! do cry, 14 Why wilt thou, Lord, my soul forsake, 15 That am already bruis'd, and shake With terror sent from thee? Bruis'd and afflicted, and so low 16 Thy fierce wrath over me doth flow; Thy threatenings cut me through: 17 All day they round about me go, Like waves they me pursue. 18 Lover and friend thou hast remov❜d, And sever'd from me far: They fly me now whom I have lov'd, A PARAPHRASE ON PSALM CXIV. This and the following Psalm were done by the WHEN the bless'd seed of Terah's faithful son, PSALM CXXXVI. LET us, with a gladsome mind, Praise the Lord, for he is kind; For his mercies aye enduro, Ever faithful, ever sure. Let us blaze his name abroad, For of gods he is the God. For his, &c. O, let us his praises tell, Who doth the wrathful tyrants quell, For his, &c. Who with his miracles, doth make Who, by his wisdom, did create Who did the solid earth ordain For his, &c. The Life of Dr. Edward Young. DR. YOUNG's father, whose name was also Edward, was Fellow of Winchester College, Rector of Upham in Hampshire, and in the latter part of his life, Dean of Sarum; chaplain to William and Mary, and afterwards to queen Ann. Jacob tells us that the latter, when Princess Royal, did him the honour to stand godmother to our poet; and that, upon her ascending the throne, he was appointed Clerk of the Closet to her Majesty. the witty and profligate Duke of Wharton,* and his gay companions, by whom his finances might be improved, but not his morals. This is the period at which Pope is said to have told Warburton, our young author had "much genius without common sense:" and it should seem likewise that he possessed a zeal for religion with little of its practical influence; for, with all his gaiety and ambition, he was an advocate for Revelation and Chris It does not appear that this gentleman distin- tianity. Thus when Tindel, the atheistical philoguished himself in the Republic of Letters, other-sopher, used to spend much of his time at All wise than by a Latin Visitation Sermon, preached Souls, he complained: "The other boys I can alin 1686, and by two volumes of Sermons, printed ways answer, because I know whence they have in 1702, and which he dedicated to Lord Bradford, through whose interest he probably received some of his promotions. The Dean died at Sarum in 1705, aged 63; after a very short illness, as appears by the exordium of Bishop Burnet's sermon at the Cathedral on the following Sunday. "Death (said he) has been of late walking round us, and making breach upon us, and has now carried away the head of this body with a stroke; so that he, whom you saw a week ago distributing the holy mysteries, is now laid in the dust. But he still lives in the many excellent directions he has left us, both how to live and how to die." their arguments, which I have read an hundred times; but that fellow Young is continually pestering me with something of his own." This apparent inconsistency is rendered the more striking from the different kinds of composi tion in which, at this period, he was engaged: viz. a political panegyric on the new Lord Lansdowne, and a sacred Poem on the Last Day, which was written in 1710, but not published till 1713. It was dedicated to the Queen, and acknowledges an obligation, which has been differently understood, either as referring to her having been his godmother, or his patron; for it is inferred from a couplet of Swift's, that Young was a pensioned advocate of government: "Whence Gay was banished in disgrace, Our author, who was an only son, was born at cis father's rectory, in 1681, and received the first part of his education (as his father had formerly done) at Winchester College; from whence, in his nineteenth year, he was placed on the foundation of New College, Oxford; whence again, on the death of the Warden in the same year, he was removed to Corpus Christi. In 1708, Archbishop This, however, might be mere report, at this peTennison nominated him to a law fellowship at riod, since Swift was not over-nice in his authoriAll Souls, where, in 1744, he took the degree of ties, and nothing is more common than to suppose Bachelor of Civil Law, and five years afterward the advocate, and the flatterer of the great, an hirethat of Doctor. ling. Flattery seems indeed to have been our poBetween the acquisition of these academic hon-et's besetting sin through life; but if interest was ours, Young was appointed to speak the Latin his object, he must have been frequently disappointOration on the foundation of the Codrington Li-ed; and to those disappointments we probably owe brary; which he afterwards printed, with a dedi- some of his best reflections on human life. cation to the ladies of that family, in English. In this part of his life, our author is said not ance) Dr. Johnson observes, that it "has an equahave been that ornament to virtue and religion bility and propriety which he afterwards either which he afterwards became. This is easy to be accounted for. He had been released from parental authority by his father's death; and his genius and conversation had introduced him to the notice of S Of his Last Day, (his first considerable perform At the instigation of this peer he was once candidate for a seat in Parliament, but without success, and the expences were paid by Wharton. |