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Montague, afterwards Earl of Halifax, and, in conjunction with him, wrote, in 1688, his celebrated poem, "The Country and City Mouse," a satirical parody on Dryden's polemical "Hind and Panther," which has attained to far more general and lasting popularity than its prototype. Under favour of his early patron, Prior was introduced at court, and obtained from William III. the important post of secretary to the English plenipotentiaries to the Hague. He subsequently filled various offices of trust, and at length was sent as ambassador to the court of France. In 1701, he was elected a member of the House of Commons, and was made under-secretary of state. Under Queen Anne, he was again sent as ambassador to France, and remained there till 1713. On his return, a change of parties involved him in difficulties, and he remained for two years in custody, on a charge of high treason, apparently without any just grounds, as he was liberated at last without a trial. During this tedious confinement, he wrote his poem of " Alma,” and published by subscription his collected poems. The profits amounted to four thousand guineas, and the Earl of Oxford liberally presented the poet with double the amount. This sum relieved Prior from all pecuniary difficulties consequent on his exclusion from court favour and patronage; and on his death, in 1721, he bequeathed a sum of five hundred pounds, which was expended, in accordance with his will, in erecting a monument over his remains in Westminster Abbey.

Prior, though by no means invariably strictly delicate, is pure, compared with the writers of the same school, of equal merit in other respects. His poems are characterized by correctness, humour, and vivacity; but while they are free from the grosser faults of many contemporary

writings, they are nearly as deficient as any of them in earnest or lofty purpose; nor are they without the traces of labour which detract from the value of so much of the polished wit of his age. Still, he exhibits, with peculiar vigour, the powers of graceful and fluent versification; and, as a satirist, he is witty and pungent, without betraying personal bitterness or rancour. One of his critics has happily summed up the character of his writings, by pronouncing him "the most natural of artificial poets."

JONATHAN SWIFT.

BORN, 1667; DIED, 1745.

SWIFT, the witty Dean of St. Patrick's, was born on the 30th of November 1667, at Dublin, where his mother had removed to the house of Godwin Swift, her brother-inlaw, on her husband's death. After passing his early childhood in England, young Swift was placed at a school in Kilkenny, from whence he proceeded, at the age of fifteen, to Trinity College, Dublin. Like many other men of genius, Swift appears to have rebelled against the formal routine of scholastic education; and, having neglected logic and mathematics for his favourite studies of history and poetry, he was refused his degree of Bachelor of Arts at the end of the usual term of study, fully as much, probably, on account of his frequent irregularities and notorious violations of college discipline, as for his deficiencies in the requisite amount of knowledge.

In 1688, Swift found himself once more cast on the world, in consequence of the death of his uncle, Godwin, in embarrassed circumstances. By his mother's advice, he

paid a visit to Sir William Temple, with whom she was distantly connected by marriage, and received from him a very kind reception. He resided for upwards of two years at Moor Park, Surrey, in the house of his patron, and, while there, had various opportunities of meeting with King William III., who, on one occasion, offered him a captaincy of horse. This, however, he declined, having resolved to enter the church; and, with this object in view, he entered Oxford University, and received his degree of Master of Arts there in 1692. Having taken orders in the church, he received, through the recommendation of Sir William Temple to Lord Capel, the prebendary of Kilroot, in the diocese of Connor; but as its emoluments did not exceed one hundred pounds a year, he accepted the invitation of Sir William Temple to return to Moor Park, and lived with him there till his death in 1699, when he obtained, by his patron's will, a legacy of one hundred pounds, along with all his valuable manuscripts.

Swift obtained various preferments, and at length procured, through his political friends, in 1713, the Irish deanery of St. Patrick's. His secret ambition, however, was an English bishopric, but this he was precluded from by the character of his writings, which, however witty, are equally loose in sentiment, and coarse in language. In 1704 he published the "Tale of a Tub," to which was appended his "Battle of the Books," both of them, like too many of his singularly able writings, more creditable to his reputation for wit and irony than to his position as a divine; and the same must be said of his famous "Gulliver's Travels," which appeared in 1726. In the interval between these publications, his "Bickerstaff" and "Drapier Letters," as well as many political writings,

appeared, some of which secured for him a popularity in Ireland which continued to be cherished, with all the native ardour, long after his death. His life presents many strange anomalies to a biographer, not the least singular of which are his friendships with the different ladies celebrated by him under the fanciful names of Stella, Varina, and Vanessa. It is deeply to be regretted that Swift did not avail himself of the interest of his early patron, to secure him a position more suited to his singularly powerful but erratic genius, than the church, which forced him into a situation for the duties of which he was unfitted, and which neither his life nor writings were calculated to adorn. The faculties of his mind decayed in his latter years, and the fate which he had long dreaded at length overtook him, His reason almost totally gave way early in 1742; and he died in this condition in 1745, at the advanced age of seventy-eight; having, with a singular anticipation of his own fate, bequeathed the bulk of his fortune, amounting to about twelve thousand pounds, to an hospital for lunatics.

JOSEPH ADDISON.

BORN, 1672; DIED, 1719.

ADDISON Contrasts in every respect with the subject of the previous biography; his fame rests no less on the moral purity, than on the grace, elegance, and wit of his writings. His poetry, however, is for the most part cold, polished, and artificial; and his permanent reputation now depends chiefly on his prose contributions to the periodical literature of his day. He was the son of the Rev. Launcelot

Addison, dean of Litchfield, and made the acquaintance of Sir Richard Steele, with whom he was afterwards associated in the "Tatler" and "Spectator," when they were both pupils at the Charter House, London. From that school he proceeded, at the age of fifteen, to Queen's College, Oxford. Two years afterwards, he removed to Magdalene College, where he resided for ten years, and acquired great distinction as a scholar. Under the patronage of Lord Halifax, he succeeded to various offices of considerable emolument, and after entering Parliament in 1708, he successfully filled the offices of Under-Secretary of State, Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Secretary of State. In 1713, his celebrated tragedy of "Cato" was brought out, and met with a triumphant reception. It had been projected in early life, and bears abundant traces of the fastidious care with which it was elaborated. On this dramatic work Addison's fame as a poet chiefly rests, and some of its best passages, such as that on the immortality of the soul, still retain their place in many popular collections. In 1716, he married the Countess of Warwick, by whom he had one daughter, who died unmarried. His death took place at Holland House, on the 17th June 1719, in the forty-ninth year of his age.

ISAAC WATTS.

BORN, 1674; DIED, 1748.

AMONG the contributors to English sacred poetry, none have commanded a wider popularity than Isaac Watts. He was a pious and learned dissenting minister, the son of a schoolmaster at Southampton, where he was born, the

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