Having an active and inquisitive mind he never, except in his 9 paroxysms of intemperance, was wholly negligent of study; he read what is considered as polite learning so much that he is mentioned by Wood as the greatest scholar of all the nobility'. Sometimes he retired into the country and amused himself with writing libels, in which he did not pretend to confine himself to truth 2. His favourite author in French was Boileau, and in English 10 Cowley 3. Thus in a course of drunken gaiety and gross sensuality, with 11 intervals of study perhaps yet more criminal, with an avowed contempt of all decency and order, a total disregard to every moral, and a resolute denial of every religious obligation, he lived worthless and useless, and blazed out his youth and his health in lavish voluptuousness, till, at the age of one and thirty, he had exhausted the fund of life, and reduced himself to a state of weakness and decay. At this time he was led to an acquaintance with Dr. Burnet, to 12 whom he laid open with great freedom the tenour of his opinions and the course of his life, and from whom he received such con the west end, a very delightfull place, and noble prospects westwards. Here his lordship had severall lascivious pictures drawen.' AUBREY, Brief Lives, ii. 304. 'He was a person of most rare parts, and his natural talent was ex. cellent, much improved by learning and industry, being thoroughly acquainted with the classic authors, both Greek and Latin; a thing very rare (if not peculiar to him) among those of his quality.' Ath. Oxon. iii. 1229. "He had made himself master of the ancient and modern wit, and of the modern French and Italian, as well as the English.' Life, p. 7. His tutor told Hearne that 'he understood very little or no Greek, and that he had but little Latin.' Hearne's Coll. iii. 263. The standard of learning among the nobility was not high: Evelyn wrote of the Earl of Essex in 1680:'He is a sober, wise, judicious, and pondering person, not illiterate beyond the rate of most noblemen in this age.' Diary, ii. 149. 2 'He said the lies in these libels came often in as ornaments, that could not be spared without spoiling the beauty of the poem.' Life, p. 26. 'He found out a footman that knew all the Court, and he furnished him with a red coat and a musket as a sentinel, and kept him all the winter long every night at the doors of such ladies as he believed might be in intrigues.... ...When he was furnished with materials he used to retire into the country for a month or two, to write libels.' BURNET, Hist. of my own Time, i. 295. 3 Life, p. 8. Lord Rochester said [of Cowley], though somewhat profanely:-"Not being of God, he could not stand." DRYDEN, Works, xi. 224. 4 Johnson held them as perhaps more criminal, as he directed his studies to fortify his mind by dispossessing it all he could of the belief and apprehensions of religion,' and also to strengthen these ill principles in others.' Life, pp. 15, 16. viction of the reasonableness of moral duty and the truth of Christianity as produced a total change both of his manners and opinions. The account of those salutary conferences is given by Burnet, in a book intituled Some Passages of the Life and Death of John Earl of Rochester, which the critick ought to read for its elegance, the philosopher for its arguments, and the saint for its piety. It were an injury to the reader to offer him an abridgement 2. 13 He died July 26, 1680, before he had completed his thirtyfourth year; and was so worn away by a long illness that life went out without a struggle 3. 14 15 Lord Rochester was eminent for the vigour of his colloquial wit*, and remarkable for many wild pranks and sallies of extravagance. The glare of his general character diffused itself upon his writings; the compositions of a man whose name was heard so often were certain of attention, and from many readers certain of applause 5. This blaze of reputation is not yet quite extinguished; and his poetry still retains some splendour beyond that which genius has bestowed 6. Wood and Burnet give us reason to believe that much was imputed Life, p. 30. He wrote to Burnet shortly before his death:-'If God be yet pleased to spare me longer in this world I hope in your conversation to be exalted to that degree of piety, that the world may see how much I abhor what I so long loved, and how much I glory in repentance in God's service.' Hist. of my own Time, Preface, p. 17. 'Nor was the King pleased with my being sent for by the Earl when he died; he fancied that he had told me many things of which I might make an ill use; yet he had read the book that I writ concerning him and spoke well of it.' Ib. ii. 122. 'I asked if Burnet had not given a good Life of Rochester. JOHNSON. We have a good Death; there is not much Life.' Boswell's Johnson, iii. 191. 3 He lay much silent; once they heard him praying very devoutly. And on Monday, about two of the clock in the morning, he died without any convulsion, or so much as a groan.' Life, p. 157. 'At length, after a short but pleasant life, this noble and beautiful count paid his last debt to nature.' Ath. Oxon. iii. 1232. The writings of this noble and beautiful count, as Anthony Wood calls him (for his Lordship's vices were among the fruits of the Restoration, and consequently not unlovely in that biographer's eyes),' &c. HORACE WALPOLE, Works, i. 399. The dissolute Earl of Sandwich (the fourth earl) was Rochester's grandson. Post, SHEFFIELD, 3n. 4 His wit had in it a peculiar brightness, to which none could ever arrive.' BURNET, History, i. 294. 5 Mr. Andrew Marvell, who was a good judge of witt, was wont to say that he was the best English satyrist, and had the right veine.' AUBREY, Brief Lives, ii. 304. 'Lord Rochester's poems have much more obscenity than wit, more wit than poetry, more poetry than politeness.' WALPOLE, Works, i. 399. to him which he did not write. I know not by whom the original collection was made or by what authority its genuineness was ascertained. The first edition was published in the year of his death, with an air of concealment, professing in the title page to be printed at Antwerp2. Of some of the pieces, however, there is no doubt. The 16 Imitation of Horace's Satire 3, the Verses to Lord Mulgrave1, the Satire against Man, the Verses upon Nothing, and perhaps some others, are, I believe, genuine, and perhaps most of those which the late collection exhibits 7. As he cannot be supposed to have found leisure for any course 17 of continued study, his pieces are commonly short, such as one fit of resolution would produce. Ath. Oxon. iii. 1230. 'When anything extraordinary that way [libels and satires] came out, as a child is fathered sometimes by its resemblance, so was it laid at his door as its parent and author.' BURNET, Life, p. 14. The three most eminent wits of that time, on whom all the lively libels were fastened, were the Earls of Dorset and Rochester, and Sir Charles Sedley.' History, i. 294. 26 BURNET, 2' Poems on Several Occasions, Antwerp [London] 1680, octavo.' Walpole's Works, i. 400. This edition is not in the British Museum. In the Advertisement' of his Funeral Sermon by Robert Parsons it is stated that all the lewd and profane poems and libels of the late Lord Rochester have been (contrary to his dying request) published to the world.' N.&Q.6 S. v. 424. For a reward offered in the London Gazette, No. 1567, Nov. 22-25, 1680, for the discovery of the printer of this 'Libel of lewd scandalous Poems' see Cunningham's Lives of the Poets, i. 192. For Curll's impudence about an edition of his poems see Pope's Works (Elwin and Courthope), vi. 421 n., and for Stevens's 'castration' of them for the English Poets, at Johnson's request, see Boswell's Johnson, iii. 191. 3 Eng. Poets, xv. 63. Ib. p. 38. For Lord Mulgrave (Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham) see ante, ROCHESTER, 3; post, SHEF 18 19 20 21 His songs have no particular character: they tell, like other. songs, in smooth and easy language of scorn and kindness, dismission and desertion, absence and inconstancy, with the common places of artificial courtship. They are commonly smooth and easy; but have little nature, and little sentiment. His imitation of Horace on Lucilius is not inelegant or unhappy. In the reign of Charles the Second began that adaptation, which has since been very frequent, of ancient poetry to present times'; and perhaps few will be found where the parallelism is better preserved than in this. The versification is indeed sometimes careless, but it is sometimes vigorous and weighty 2. The strongest effort of his Muse is his poem upon Nothing3. He is not the first who has chosen this barren topick for the boast of his fertility. There is a poem called Nihil in Latin by Passerat, a poet and critick of the sixteenth century in France; who, in his own epitaph, expresses his zeal for good poetry thus: 'Molliter ossa quiescent Sint modo carminibus non onerata malis 5' His works are not common, and therefore I shall subjoin his verses. * Ante, COWLEY, 125. Sprat, speaking of Cowley's adaptations, says: This way of leaving verbal translations, and chiefly regarding the sense and genius of the author, was scarce heard of in England before this present age. I will not presume to say that Mr. Cowley was the absolute inventor of it. Nay, I know that others had the good luck to recommend it first in print. Yet I appeal to you, Sir [Mr. Clifford], whether he did not conceive it, and discourse of it, and practise it as soon as any man.' Hurd's Cowley, i. 28. In the first years of the reign of Charles II Boileau was bringing out his adaptations. He was the model to Pope and Johnson. 2 Lord Dorset and Lord Rochester should be considered as holidaywriters; as gentlemen that diverted themselves now and then with poetry rather than as poets.' POPE, Spence's Anec. p. 281. 3 It was 'printed on one side of a sheet of paper in two columns.' WALPOLE, Works, i. 399. 'French truth and British policy make a conspicuous figure in nothing, as the Earl of Rochester has very well observed in his admirable poem upon that barren subject.' ADDISON, The Spectator, No. 305. 'French truth, Dutch prowess, British policy, Hibernian learning, Scotch civility, Spaniards' dispatch, Danes' wit, are mainly seen in thee.' Eng. Poets, xv. 57. • In a note on Voltaire's 'Observations' on the French translation of Tristram Shandy, where he speaks of ' la satire Ménippée,' it is said that Passerat was one 'des sept joyeux auteurs de ce malin chef-d'œuvre de plaisanterie.' Euvres de Voltaire, xlii. 432. 5 'Je dis comme Passerat :"Mea molliter ossa quiescent,"' &c. Ménagiana, vi. 255. In a note it is added:- Ce sont les deux derniers vers des six que fit Passerat pour son épitaphe, qu'on peut voir dans l'église des Jacobins de la rue S.-Jacques.' In examining this performance Nothing must be considered as 22 having not only a negative but a kind of positive signification; as I need not fear thieves, I have nothing; and nothing is a very powerful protector. In the first part of the sentence it is taken negatively; in the second it is taken positively, as an agent. In one of Boileau's lines it was a question, whether he should use à rien faire or à ne rien faire; and the first was preferred, because it gave rien a sense in some sort positive. Nothing can be a subject only in its positive sense, and such a sense is given it in the first line: 'Nothing, thou elder brother ev'n to shade.' In this line I know not whether he does not allude to a curious book De Umbra, by Wowerus, which, having told the qualities of Shade, concludes with a poem in which are these lines: 'Jam primum terram validis circumspice claustris Terrasque tractusque maris, camposque liquentes The positive sense is generally preserved with great skill 23 through the whole poem, though sometimes in a subordinate sense the negative nothing is injudiciously mingled *. confounds the two senses. Another of his most vigorous ''Felix cui nihil est (fuerant haec vota Tibullo); 2 Non timet insidias: fures, incendia temnit. Sollicitas sequitur nullo sub iudice lites.' Post, ROCHESTER, 28. Sans ce métier, fatal au repos de ma vie, Mes jours pleins de loisir couleraient sans envie, Je n'aurais qu'à chanter, rire, Et comme un gras chanoine, à La nuit à bien dormir, et le jour 'Quant à son tems, bien le sçût dis Passerat pieces is his Lampoon on Sir 24 Deux parts en fit, dont il soûloit passer L'une à dormir, et l'autre à ne rien faire.' He adds: 'M. Despréaux [Boileau] demanda à l'Académie, laquelle de ces deux manières, la sienne, ou celle de La Fontaine, valoit mieux. Il passa tout d'une voix, que la sienne étoit la meilleure, parce qu'en ôtant la négative, Rien faire devenoit une espèce d'occupation.' Euvres de Boileau, i. 46. See also ib. v. 188. 3 Joan. Wouweri, Dies Aestiva sive De Umbra Paegnion, 1610, p. 130. See post, YALDEN, 17. 4 "Yet this of thee the wise may freely say, Thou from the virtuous nothing |