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cidental influence or tranfient perfuafion, must perish with their parents.

• Much therefore of that humour which tranfported the last century with merriment is loft to us, who do not know the four folemnity, the fullen fuperftition, the gloomy morofeness, and the ftubborn fcruples of the ancient Puritans; or, if we knew them, derive our information only from books, or from tradition, have never had them before our eyes, and cannot but by recollection and study understand the lines in which they are fatirifed. Our grandfathers knew the picture from the life; we judge of the life by contemplating the picture.'

In the Life of Cowley there is rather too much quotation from parts of his works that are not the most entertaining. The Life of Waller is excellent throughout, and of all we have yet read the most amufing. Dr. Johnson, in fpeaking of Waller's facred poems, towards the end of it has accounted in a most ingenious manner for the effect which that species of writing always has upon the reader; the disgust or ennui which it perpetually excites, has often, we believe, been felt, but never fo well and properly accounted for as in the following obfervations.

It has been, fays this excellent critic, the frequent lamentation of good men, that verfe has been too little applied to the purposes of worship, and many attempts have been made to animate devotion by pious poetry; that they have very seldom attained their end is fufficiently known, and it may not be improper to enquire why they have mifcarried.

Let no pious ear be offended if I advance, in oppofition to many authorities, that poetical devotion cannot often pleafe. The doctrines of religion may indeed be defended in a didactick poem; and he who has the happy power of arguing in verse, will not lofe it because his fubject is facred. A poet - may defcribe the beauty and the grandeur of nature, the flowers of the fpring, and the harvests of autumn, the viciffitudes of the tide, and the revolutions of the fky, and praise the Maker for his works in lines which no reader fhall lay afide. The subject of the difputation is not piety, but the motives to piety; that of the defcription is not God, but the works of God.

Contemplative piety, or the intercourfe between God and the human foul, cannot be poetical. Man admitted to implore the mercy of his Creator, and plead the merits of his Redeemer, is already in a higher state than poetry can confer.

The effence of poetry is invention; fuch invention as, by producing fomething unexpected, furprises and delights. The topicks of devotion are few, and being few are univerfally known; but few as they are, they can be made no more: they can receive no grace from novelty of fentiment, and very little from novelty of expreflion.

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Poetry pleases by exhibiting an idea more grateful to the mind than things themselves afford. This effect proceeds from the difplay of thofe parts of nature which attract, and the concealment of those which repel the imagination: but religion must be fhewn as it is; fuppreffion and addition equally corrupt it; and fuch as it is, it is known already.

From poetry the reader justly expects, and from good poetry always obtains, the enlargement of his comprehenfion and elevation of his fancy; but this is rarely to be hoped by Chriftians from metrical devotion. Whatever is great, defireable, or tre mendous, is comprised in the name of the Supreme Being. Omnipotence cannot be exalted; Infinity cannot be amplified; Perfection cannot be improved.

The employments of pious meditation are faith, thanksgiv ing, repentance, and fupplication. Faith, invariably uniform, cannot be invested by fancy with decorations. Thanksgiving, the most joyful of all holy effufions, yet addreffed to a Being without paffions, is confined to a few modes, and is to be felt rather than expreffed. Repentance, trembling in the presence of the Judge, is not at leifure for cadences and epithets. Supplication of man to man may diffuse itself through many topicks of perfuafion; but fupplication to God can only cry for

mercy.

Of fentiments purely religious, it will be found that the moft. fimple expreffion is the moft fublime. Poetry lofes its luftre and its power, because it is applied to the decoration of fomething more excellent than itself. All that verfe can do is to help the memory, and delight the ear, and for these purposes it may be very ufeful; but it fupplies nothing to the mind. The ideas of Chriftian theology are too fimple for eloquence, too facred for fiction, and too majestick for ornament; to recommend them by tropes and figures, is to magnify by a concave mirror the fidereal hemisphere.'

[To be continued. ]

A Supplement to Dr. Swift's Works: being a Collection of Mifcellanies in Profe and Verje, by the Dean; Dr. Delany, Dr. Sheridan, Mrs. Johnton, and Others, his intimate Friends.

Second.

beards.

With Notes, and an Index, by the Editor.
Conant.

Volume the

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ΤΗ HIS volume of Supplement begins with an article, entitled, The present state of Wit.' It is written in a letter, dated May 3, 1711, and fubfcribed J. G. fuppofed, with great reason, to be the production of Mr. Gay. It contains an account of the feveral periodical publications of that time; among which we meet with the following character of the Tailer.

• At

At the beginning of the winter, to the infinite furprize of all men, Mr. Steele flung up his Tatler; and, inftead of Ifaac Bickerstaff, efq. fubfcribed himfelf Richard Steele to the last of thofe papers, after an handfome compliment to the town, for their kind acceptance of his endeavours to divert them. The chief reafon he thought fit to give, for his leaving-off writing, was, that, having been fo long looked on in all public places and companies as the author of thofe papers, he found that his most intimate friends and acquaintance were in pain to act or speak before him. The town was very far from being fatisfied with this reafon; and most people judged the true caufe to be, either that he was quite fpent, and wanted matter to continue his undertaking any longer, or that he laid it down as a fort of fubmiffion to, or compofition with, the government, for fome paft offences; or, laftly, that he had a mind to vary his shape, and appear again in fome new light.

However that were, his difappearing feemed to be bewailed as fome general calamity: every one wanted fo agreeable an amusement: and the coffee-houfes began to be fenfible, that the efquire's lucubrations alone had brought them more customers than all their other news-papers put together.

• It must indeed be confeffed, that never man threw-up his pen under ftronger temptations to have employed it longer; his reputation was at a greater height than, I believe, ever any living author's was before him. It is reasonable to fuppofe that his gains were proportionably confiderable; every one read him with pleasure and good-will; and the Tories, in respect to his other good qualities, had almoft forgiven his unaccountable imprudence in declaring against them. Laftly, it was highly improbable, if he threw off a character the ideas of which were fo ftrongly impreffed in every one's mind, however finely he might 'write in any new form, that he fhould meet with the fame reception,

To give you my own thoughts of this gentleman's writings, I fhall in the first place obferve, that there is this noble difference between him and all the reft of our polite and gallant authors: the latter have endeavoured to pleafe the age by falling in with them, and encouraging them in their fashionable vices, and falfe notions of things. It would have been a jeft fome time fince, for a man to have afferted that any thing witty could be faid in praise of a married ftate; or that devotion and virtue were any way neceffary to the character of a fine gentleman. Bickerstaff ventured to tell the town, that they were a parcel of fops, fools, and vain coquettes; but in fuch a manner, as even pleafed them, and made them more than half-inclined to believe that he spoke truth.

Inftead of complying with the falfe fentiments or vicious taftes of the age, either in morality, criticifm, or good-breeding; he boldly affured them, that they were altogether in the wrong, and commanded them, with an authority which per

fectly

fectly well became him, to furrender themselves to his arguments for virtue and good-fenfe.

It is incredible to conceive the effect his writings have had on the town; how many thoufand follies they have either quite banished, or given a very great check to; how much countenance they have added to virtue and religion; how many peo ple they have rendered happy, by fhewing them it was their own fault if they were not fo; and, laftly, how intirely they have convinced our fops and young fellows of the value and advantages of learning.

He has indeed rescued it out of the hands of pedants and fools, and discovered the true method of making it amiable and lovely to all mankind. In the drefs he gives it, it is a moft welcome guest at tea-tables and affemblies, and is relished and carefied by the merchants on the Change; accordingly, there is not a lady at court, nor a banker in Lombard-ftreet, who is not verily perfuaded, that captain Steele is the greatest scholar and beft cafuift of any man in England.

• Laftly, his writings have fet all our wits and men of letters upon a new way of thinking, of which they had little or no notion before; and though we cannot yet fay that any of them have come up to the beauties of the original, I think we may venture to affirm, that every one of them writes and thinks much more justly than they did fome time fince.'

Next follows, A Modeft Enquiry into the Reasons of the Joy expreffed by a certain Set of People upon the spreading of a Report of her Majesty's (Queen Anne's) death. This tract was written by Mrs. Manley, with the affiftance of Dr. Swift, and contains many just remarks on the political fentiments discovered at that time.

6

Subfequent is an analytical table of the Tale of the Tub;' after which is, The Right of Precedence between Phyficians and Civilians enquired into.' Whether this little tract be the genuine production of the dean, the editor does not determine. There is no authority for calling it his, except its having been ascribed to him at the time of its first publication. The ftrain, however, in which it is written, seems strongly to confirm fuch an opinion.

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We next meet with a Defence of English Commodities.' This jeu d'efprit is an answer to the Proposal for the Univerfal Ufe of Irish Manufactures.' How far the dean was concerned in the compofition is not certain, but he, doubless, had some fhare in the publication.

The fucceeding article is, A modeft Defence of the Lady's Dreffing-Room.' This piece bears fuch intrinfic proof of the dean's compofition, that no doubt can be entertained refpecting the author.

The

The next is, The Drapier's Letter to the Good People of Ireland, 1745. This letter was not written by Dr. Swift, who, at the time of its publication, was reduced to a state of almoft total infenfibility; but as it was written with the view of being confidered as his, and on that fuppofition had actually a good effect, it has been inferted in the prefent volume. There is reason for thinking that lord Chesterfield had a share in the compofition of this paper.

To the former fucceeds Epiftolary Correfpondence, confifting of Nine Letters; which are followed with omiffions and principal corrections in vol. xviii, xix. xx.

The production immediately following is, A Narrative of the feveral Attempts, which the Diffenters of Ireland have made, for a Repeal of the Sacramental Teft.' This is fucceeded by a Collection of Poems, to which are fubjoined, Swift's Remarks on Dr. Gibb's Pfalms; faithfully copied from the original found in the dean's library. Thefe Remarks, under the appearance of bagatelles, may juftly be confidered as a valuable specimen of Dr. Swift's excellent tafte, and critical accuracy in compofition; on which account, and for the entertainment it affords, we fhould have gladly inferted them, but for want of room, muft refer the reader to the work before us. We afterwards meet with biographical anecdotes of dean Swift, in addition to the Life by Dr, Hawkefworth. The editor acquaints us, that the papers, whence most of them are extracted, were put into his hands by a friend, who had accidentally met with them, without knowing by whom they were written; but they are, doublefs, the productions of a perfon well-informed, and probably, an intimate of the dean's. They confift of an interleaved copy of Dr. Hawkefworth's Life of Swift,' with numerous corrections and additions in almost every page, and appear to have been written about July 1765. The following is the addition to a paffage in p. 16.

While he had good health, he read prayers to his family; and when his deafnefs increased, his friends retired about ten o'clock; after which he spent fome time in his private devotions, and made ufe of the Liturgy of the church as his pattern for prayer, turning fuch parts thereof to his own private occafions as he thought proper. His prayer-book (which a friend of his ftill has), being fouled with the fnuff from his fingers, fhews the parts of it which he most approved. The following is the form which he used in the pulpit, before his fermon; as copied from his own hand : " Almighty and most merciful God forgive us all our fins. Give us grace heartily to repent them, and to lead new lives. Graft in our hearts a true love and veneration for thy holy name and word. Make thy paftors burning and fhining lights, able to convince gain

fayers,

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