No More Learning

She was, I think, the
person meant by Pope in the line,

Each widow asks it for her own good man. M. ]

[Footnote 152: Sewell, who was acquainted with Howe, speaks very highly
of him: "I dare not venture to give you his character, either as a
companion, a friend, or a poet. It may be enough to say, that all good
and learned men loved him; that his conversation either struck out mirth,
or promoted learning or honour whereever he went; that the openness of a
gentleman, the unstudied eloquence of a scholar, and the perfect freedom
of an Englishman, attended him in all his actions. " Life of Rowe prefixed
to his poems. M.

That the author of Jane Shore should have no heart; that Addison should
assert this, whilst he admitted, in the same breath, that Rowe was
grieved at his displeasure; and that Pope should coincide in such an
opinion, and yet should have stated in his epitaph on Rowe,

'That never heart felt passion more sincere,'

are circumstances that cannot be admitted, without sacrificing to the
veracity of an anecdote, the character and consistency of all the persons
introduced. Roscoe's Life of Pope, prefixed to his works, vol. i. p.
250. ]

[Footnote 153: Rowe's Lucan, however, has not escaped without censure.
Bentley has criticised it with great severity in his Philoleutheros
Lipsiensis. J. B.

The life of Rowe is a very remarkable instance of the uncommon strength
of Dr. Johnson's memory. When I received from him the MS. he complacently
observed, "that the criticism was tolerably well done, considering that
he had not read one of Rowe's plays for thirty years! " N. ]




ADDISON

Joseph Addison was born on the 1st of May, 1672, at Milston, of which
his father, Launcelot Addison, was then rector, near Ambrosebury, in
Wiltshire, and appearing weak and unlikely to live, he was christened
the same day[154]. After the usual domestick education, which, from the
character of his father, may be reasonably supposed to have given him
strong impressions of piety, he was committed to the care of Mr. Naish,
at Ambrosebury, and afterwards of Mr. Taylor, at Salisbury.

Not to name the school or the masters of men illustrious for literature,
is a kind of historical fraud, by which honest fame is injuriously
diminished: I would, therefore, trace him through the whole process of
his education. In 1683, in the beginning of his twelfth year, his father,
being made dean of Lichfield, naturally carried his family to his new
residence, and, I believe, placed him, for some time, probably not long,
under Mr. Shaw, then master of the school at Lichfield, father of the
late Dr. Peter Shaw. Of this interval his biographers have given no
account, and I know it only from a story of a barring-out, told me, when
I was a boy, by Andrew Corbet, of Shropshire, who had heard it from Mr.
Pigot his uncle.

The practice of barring-out was a savage license, practised in many
schools to the end of the last century, by which the boys, when the
periodical vacation drew near, growing petulant at the approach of
liberty, some days before the time of regular recess, took possession
of the school, of which they barred the doors, and bade their master
defiance from the windows. It is not easy to suppose that on such
occasions the master would do more than laugh; yet, if tradition may be
credited, he often struggled hard to force or surprise the garrison. The
master, when Pigot was a schoolboy, was barred-out at Lichfield; and the
whole operation, as he said, was planned and conducted by Addison.

To judge better of the probability of this story, I have inquired when he
was sent to the Chartreux; but, as he was not one of those who enjoyed
the founder's benefaction, there is no account preserved of his
admission. At the school of the Chartreux, to which he was removed either
from that of Salisbury or Lichfield, he pursued his juvenile studies
under the care of Dr. Ellis, and contracted that intimacy with
sir Richard Steele, which their joint labours have so effectually
recorded[155].

Of this memorable friendship the greater praise must be given to Steele.
It is not hard to love those from whom nothing can be feared; and Addison
never considered Steele as a rival; but Steele lived, as he confesses,
under an habitual subjection to the predominating genius of Addison, whom
he always mentioned with reverence, and treated with obsequiousness.

Addison[156], who knew his own dignity, could not always forbear to show
it, by playing a little upon his admirer; but he was in no danger of
retort: his jests were endured without resistance or resentment.

But the sneer of jocularity was not the worst. Steele, whose imprudence
of generosity, or vanity of profusion, kept him always incurably
necessitous, upon some pressing exigence, in an evil hour, borrowed a
hundred pounds of his friend, probably without much purpose of repayment;
but Addison, who seems to have had other notions of a hundred pounds,
grew impatient of delay, and reclaimed his loan by an execution. Steele
felt, with great sensibility, the obduracy of his creditor, but with
emotions of sorrow rather than of anger[157].

In 1687 he was entered into Queen's college in Oxford, where, in 1689,
the accidental perusal of some Latin verses gained him the patronage
of Dr. Lancaster, afterwards provost of Queen's college; by whose
recommendation he was elected into Magdalen college as a demy, a term by
which that society denominates those which are elsewhere called scholars;
young men, who partake of the founder's benefaction, and succeed in their
order to vacant fellowships[158]. Here he continued to cultivate poetry
and criticism, and grew first eminent by his Latin compositions, which
are, indeed, entitled to particular praise. He has not confined himself
to the imitation of any ancient author, but has formed his style from
the general language, such as a diligent perusal of the productions of
different ages happened to supply.

His Latin compositions seem to have had much of his fondness, for he
collected a second volume of the Musae Anglicanae, perhaps, for a
convenient receptacle, in which all his Latin pieces are inserted, and
where his poem on the Peace has the first place. He afterwards presented
the collection to Boileau, who, from that time, "conceived," says
Tickell, "an opinion of the English genius for poetry. " Nothing is better
known of Boileau, than that he had an injudicious and peevish contempt of
modern Latin, and, therefore, his profession of regard was, probably, the
effect of his civility rather than approbation.

Three of his Latin poems are upon subjects on which, perhaps, he would
not have ventured to have written in his own language. The Battle of the
Pygmies and Cranes; the Barometer; and a Bowling-green. When the matter
is low or scanty, a dead language, in which nothing is mean because
nothing is familiar, affords great conveniencies; and, by the sonorous
magnificence of Roman syllables, the writer conceals penury of thought
and want of novelty, often from the reader, and often from himself.

In his twenty-second year he first showed his power of English poetry
by some verses addressed to Dryden; and soon afterwards published a
translation of the greater part of the fourth Georgick upon bees; after
which, says Dryden, "my latter swarm is hardly worth the hiving. "

About the same time he composed the arguments prefixed to the several
books of Dryden's Virgil; and produced an Essay on the Georgicks,
juvenile, superficial, and uninstructive, without much either of the
scholar's learning or the critick's penetration.

His next paper of verses contained a character of the principal English
poets, inscribed to Henry Sacheverell, who was then, if not a poet, a
writer of verses[159]; as is shown by his version of a small part of
Virgil's Georgicks, published in the Miscellanies; and a Latin Encomium
on queen Mary, in the Musae Anglicanae. These verses exhibit all the
fondness of friendship; but, on one side or the other, friendship was
afterwards too weak for the malignity of faction.

In this poem is a very confident and discriminative character of Spenser,
whose work he had then never read[160]. So little, sometimes, is
criticism the effect of judgment. It is necessary to inform the reader,
that about this time he was introduced by Congreve to Montague, then
chancellor of the exchequer[161]: Addison was then learning the trade of
a courtier, and subjoined Montague, as a poetical name to those of Cowley
and Dryden.

By the influence of Mr. Montague, concurring, according to Tickell, with
his natural modesty, he was diverted from his original design of entering
into holy orders. Montague alleged the corruption of men who engaged in
civil employments without liberal education; and declared, that, though
he was represented as an enemy to the church, he would never do it any
injury but by withholding Addison from it.

Soon after, in 1695, he wrote a poem to king William, with a rhyming
introduction, addressed to lord Somers[162]. King William had no regard
to elegance or literature; his study was only war; yet by a choice
of ministers, whose disposition was very different from his own, he
procured, without intention, a very liberal patronage to poetry. Addison
was caressed both by Somers and Montague.

In 1697 appeared his Latin verses on the Peace of Ryswick, which he
dedicated to Montague, and which was afterwards called, by Smith, "the
best Latin poem since the Aeneid. " Praise must not be too rigorously
examined; but the performance cannot be denied to be vigorous and
elegant.

Having yet no publick employment, he obtained, in 1699, a pension of
three hundred pounds a year, that he might be enabled to travel. He staid
a year at Blois[163], probably to learn the French language; and then
proceeded in his journey to Italy, which he surveyed with the eyes of a
poet.

While he was travelling at leisure, he was far from being idle; for he
not only collected his observations on the country, but found time to
write his Dialogues on Medals, and four acts of Cato. Such, at least, is
the relation of Tickell. Perhaps he only collected his materials, and
formed his plan.

Whatever were his other employments in Italy, he there wrote the letter
to lord Halifax, which is justly considered as the most elegant, if not
the most sublime, of his poetical productions[164]. But in about two
years he found it necessary to hasten home; being, as Swift informs
us, distressed by indigence, and compelled to become the tutor of a
travelling squire, because his pension was not remitted[165].

At his return he published his travels, with a dedication to lord Somers.
As his stay in foreign countries was short[166], his observations are
such as might be supplied by a hasty view, and consist chiefly in
comparisons of the present face of the country with the descriptions left
us by the Roman poets, from whom he made preparatory collections, though
he might have spared the trouble, had he known that such collections had
been made twice before by Italian authors.

The most amusing passage of his book is his account of the minute
republick of San Marino: of many parts it is not a very severe censure to
say, that they might have been written at home. His elegance of language,
and variegation of prose and verse, however, gains upon the reader; and
the book, though awhile neglected, became, in time, so much the favourite
of the publick, that before it was reprinted it rose to five times its
price.

When he returned to England, in 1702, with a meanness of appearance which
gave testimony of the difficulties to which he had been reduced, he found
his old patrons out of power, and was, therefore, for a time, at full
leisure for the cultivation of his mind; and a mind so cultivated gives
reason to believe that little time was lost[167].

But he remained not long neglected or useless. The victory at Blenheim,
1704, spread triumph and confidence over the nation; and lord Godolphin,
lamenting to lord Halifax, that it had not been celebrated in a manner
equal to the subject, desired him to propose it to some better poet.
Halifax told him, that there was no encouragement for genius; that
worthless men were unprofitably enriched with publick money, without any
care to find or employ those whose appearance might do honour to their
country. To this Godolphin replied, that such abuses should, in time, be
rectified; and that, if a man could be found capable of the task then
proposed, he should not want an ample recompense. Halifax then named
Addison; but required that the treasurer should apply to him in his
own person. Godolphin sent the message by Mr. Boyle, afterwards lord
Carleton; and Addison, having undertaken the work, communicated it to the
treasurer, while it was yet advanced no farther than the simile of the
angel, and was immediately rewarded by succeeding Mr. Locke in the place
of commissioner of appeals.

In the following year he was at Hanover with lord Halifax: and the year
after was made under-secretary of state, first to sir Charles Hedges, and
in a few months more to the earl of Sunderland.

About this time the prevalent taste for Italian operas inclined him to
try what would be the effect of a musical drama in our own language. He,
therefore, wrote the opera of Rosamond, which, when exhibited on the
stage, was either hissed or neglected[168]; but, trusting that the
readers would do him more justice, he published it, with an inscription
to the dutchess of Marlborough; a woman without skill, or pretensions
to skill, in poetry or literature. His dedication was, therefore, an
instance of servile absurdity, to be exceeded only by Joshua Barnes's
dedication of a Greek Anacreon to the duke.

His reputation had been somewhat advanced by the Tender Husband, a comedy
which Steele dedicated to him, with a confession, that he owed to him
several of the most successful scenes. To this play Addison supplied a
prologue.

When the marquis of Wharton was appointed lord lieutenant of
Ireland[169], Addison attended him as his secretary; and was made keeper
of the records in Birmingham's tower, with a salary of three hundred
pounds a year. The office was little more than nominal, and the salary
was augmented for his accommodation.

Interest and faction allow little to the operation of particular
dispositions, or private opinions. Two men of personal characters more
opposite than those of Wharton and Addison could not easily be brought
together. Wharton was impious, profligate, and shameless, without regard,
or appearance of regard, to right and wrong: whatever is contrary to this
may be said of Addison; but, as agents of a party, they were connected,
and how they adjusted their other sentiments we cannot know.

Addison, must, however, not be too hastily condemned. It is not necessary
to refuse benefits from a bad man, when the acceptance implies no
approbation of his crimes; nor has the subordinate officer any obligation
to examine the opinions or conduct of those under whom he acts, except
that he may not be made the instrument of wickedness. It is reasonable to
suppose, that Addison counteracted, as far as he was able, the malignant
and blasting influence of the lieutenant; and that, at least, by his
intervention some good was done, and some mischief prevented.

When he was in office, he made a law to himself, as Swift has recorded,
never to remit his regular fees in civility to his friends: "for," said
he, "I may have a hundred friends; and, if my fee be two guineas, I
shall, by relinquishing my right, lose two hundred guineas, and no friend
gain more than two; there is, therefore, no proportion between the good
imparted and the evil suffered. " He was in Ireland when Steele, without
any communication of his design, began the publication of the Tatler; but
he was not long concealed: by inserting a remark on Virgil, which Addison
had given him, he discovered himself. It is, indeed, not easy for any man
to write upon literature, or common life, so as not to make himself known
to those with whom he familiarly converses, and who are acquainted with
his track of study, his favourite topicks, his peculiar notions, and his
habitual phrases.

If Steele desired to write in secret, he was not lucky; a single month
detected him. His first Tatler was published April 12, 1709; and
Addison's contribution appeared May 26. Tickell observes, that the Tatler
began, and was concluded without his concurrence. This is, doubtless,
literally true; but the work did not suffer much by his unconsciousness
of its commencement, or his absence at its cessation; for he continued
his assistance to December 23, and the paper stopped on January 2,
1710-11. He did not distinguish his pieces by any signature; and I know
not whether his name was not kept secret till the papers were collected
into volumes.

To the Tatler, in about two months, succeeded the Spectator[170]; a
series of essays of the same kind, but written with less levity, upon a
more regular plan, and published daily. Such an undertaking showed the
writers not to distrust their own copiousness of materials or facility
of composition, and their performance justified their confidence. They
found, however, in their progress, many auxiliaries. To attempt a single
paper was no terrifying labour; many pieces were offered, and many were
received.

Addison had enough of the zeal of party; but Steele had, at that time,
almost nothing else. The Spectator, in one of the first papers, showed
the political tenets of its authors; but a resolution was soon taken, of
courting general approbation by general topicks, and subjects on which
faction had produced no diversity of sentiments; such as literature,
morality, and familiar life. To this practice they adhered with few
deviations. The ardour of Steele once broke out in praise of Marlborough;
and when Dr. Fleetwood prefixed to some sermons a preface, overflowing
with whiggish opinions, that it might be read by the queen[171], it was
reprinted in the Spectator.

To teach the minuter decencies and inferiour duties, to regulate the
practice of daily conversation, to correct those depravities which are
rather ridiculous than criminal, and remove those grievances which, if
they produce no lasting calamities, impress hourly vexation, was first
attempted by Casa in his book of Manners, and Castiglione in his
Courtier; two books yet celebrated in Italy for purity and elegance, and
which, if they are now less read, are neglected only because they have
effected that reformation which their authors intended, and their
precepts now are no longer wanted. Their usefulness to the age in which
they were written is sufficiently attested by the translations which
almost all the nations of Europe were in haste to obtain.

This species of instruction was continued, and perhaps advanced, by the
French; among whom la Bruyere's Manners of the Age, though, as Boileau
remarked, it is written without connexion, certainly deserves great
praise, for liveliness of description, and justness of observation.

Before the Tatler and Spectator, if the writers for the theatre are
excepted, England had no masters of common life. No writers had
yet undertaken to reform either the savageness of neglect, or the
impertinence of civility; to show when to speak, or to be silent; how
to refuse, or how to comply. We had many books to teach us our more
important duties, and to settle opinions in philosophy or politicks;
but an Arbiter Elegantiarum, a judge of propriety, was yet wanting, who
should survey the track of daily conversation, and free it from thorns
and prickles, which tease the passer, though they do not wound him.

For this purpose nothing is so proper as the frequent publication of
short papers, which we read not as study but amusement. If the subject be
slight, the treatise, likewise, is short. The busy may find time, and the
idle may find patience.

This mode of conveying cheap and easy knowledge began among us in the
civil war[172], when it was much the interest of either party to raise
and fix the prejudices of the people. At that time appeared Mercurius
Aulicus, Mercurius Rusticus, and Mercurius Civicus. It is said, that when
any title grew popular, it was stolen by the antagonist, who, by this
stratagem, conveyed his notions to those who would not have received him,
had he not worn the appearance of a friend. The tumult of those
unhappy days left scarcely any man leisure to treasure up occasional
compositions; and so much were they neglected, that a complete collection
is nowhere to be found.

These Mercuries were succeeded by l'Estrange's Observator; and that by
Lesley's Rehearsal, and, perhaps, by others; but hitherto nothing had
been conveyed to the people, in this commodious manner, but controversy
relating to the church or state; of which they taught many to talk, whom
they could not teach to judge.

It has been suggested that the Royal Society was instituted soon after
the restoration, to divert the attention of the people from publick
discontent. The Tatler and Spectator had the same tendency; they were
published at a time when two parties, loud, restless, and violent, each
with plausible declarations, and each, perhaps, without any distinct
termination of its views, were agitating the nation; to minds heated with
political contest they supplied cooler and more inoffensive reflections;
and it is said by Addison, in a subsequent work, that they had a
perceptible influence upon the conversation of that time, and taught the
frolick and the gay to unite merriment with decency; an effect which they
can never wholly lose, while they continue to be among the first books by
which both sexes are initiated in the elegancies of knowledge.

The Tatler and Spectator adjusted, like Casa, the unsettled practice of
daily intercourse by propriety and politeness; and, like la Bruyere,
exhibited the characters and manners of the age. The personages
introduced in these papers were not merely ideal; they were then known
and conspicuous in various stations. Of the Tatler this is told by Steele
in his last paper; and of the Spectator by Budgel, in the preface to
Theophrastus, a book which Addison has recommended, and which he was
suspected to have revised, if he did not write it. Of those portraits,
which may be supposed to be sometimes embellished, and sometimes
aggravated, the originals are now partly known and partly forgotten.

But to say that they united the plans of two or three eminent writers,
is to give them but a small part of their due praise; they superadded
literature and criticism, and sometimes towered far above their
predecessors; and taught, with great justness of argument and dignity of
language, the most important duties and sublime truths.

All these topicks were happily varied with elegant fictions and refined
allegories, and illuminated with different changes of style and
felicities of invention.

It is recorded by Budgel, that, of the characters feigned or exhibited
in the Spectator, the favourite of Addison was sir Roger de Coverley, of
whom he had formed a very delicate and discriminated idea[173], which he
would not suffer to be violated; and, therefore, when Steele had shown
him innocently picking up a girl in the temple, and taking her to a
tavern, he drew upon himself so much of his friend's indignation, that he
was forced to appease him by a promise of forbearing sir Roger for the
time to come.

The reason which induced Cervantes to bring his hero to the grave, "para
mi solo nacio don Quixote, y yo para el," made Addison declare, with an
undue vehemence of expression, that he would kill sir Roger; being of
opinion that they were born for one another, and that any other hand
would do him wrong.

It may be doubted whether Addison ever filled up his original
delineation. He describes his knight as having his imagination somewhat
warped; but of this perversion he has made very little use. The
irregularities in sir Roger's conduct seem not so much the effects of a
mind deviating from the beaten track of life, by the perpetual pressure
of some overwhelming idea, as of habitual rusticity, and that negligence
which solitary grandeur naturally generates.

The variable weather of the mind, the flying vapours of incipient
madness, which, from time to time, cloud reason, without eclipsing it,
it requires so much nicety to exhibit, that Addison seems to have been
deterred from prosecuting his own design.

To sir Roger, who, as a country gentleman, appears to be a tory, or, as
it is gently expressed, an adherent to the landed interest, is opposed
sir Andrew Freeport, a new man, a wealthy merchant, zealous for the
moneyed interest, and a whig. Of this contrariety of opinions, it is
probable more consequences were at first intended, than could be produced
when the resolution was taken to exclude party from the paper. Sir Andrew
does but little, and that little seems not to have pleased Addison, who,
when he dismissed him from the club, changed his opinions. Steele had
made him, in the true spirit of unfeeling commerce, declare that he
"would not build an hospital for idle people;" but at last he buys land,
settles in the country, and builds not a manufactory, but an hospital
for twelve old husbandmen, for men with whom a merchant has little
acquaintance, and whom he commonly considers with little kindness.

Of essays thus elegant, thus instructive, and thus commodiously
distributed, it is natural to suppose the approbation general, and the
sale numerous. I once heard it observed, that the sale may be calculated
by the product of the tax, related in the last number to produce more
than twenty pounds a week, and, therefore, stated at one-and-twenty
pounds, or three pounds ten shillings a day: this, at a half-penny a
paper, will give sixteen hundred and eighty[174] for the daily number.

This sale is not great; yet this, if Swift be credited, was likely to
grow less; for he declares that the Spectator, whom he ridicules for his
endless mention of the _fair sex,_ had, before his recess, wearied his
readers. The next year, 1713, in which Cato came upon the stage, was the
grand climacterick of Addison's reputation. Upon the death of Cato, he
had, as is said, planned a tragedy in the time of his travels[175], and
had, for several years, the first four acts finished, which were shown to
such as were likely to spread their admiration. They were seen by Pope,
and by Cibber, who relates that Steele, when he took back the copy, told
him, in the despicable cant of literary modesty, that, whatever spirit
his friend had shown in the composition, he doubted whether he would have
courage sufficient to expose it to the censure of a British audience.

The time, however, was now come, when those, who affected to think
liberty in danger, affected, likewise, to think that a stage-play might
preserve it; and Addison was importuned, in the name of the tutelary
deities of Britain, to show his courage and his zeal by finishing his
design.

To resume his work he seemed perversely and unaccountably unwilling; and
by a request, which, perhaps, he wished to be denied, desired Mr. Hughes
to add a fifth act[176]. Hughes supposed him serious; and, undertaking
the supplement, brought, in a few days, some scenes for his examination;
but he had, in the mean time, gone to work himself, and produced half
an act, which he afterwards completed, but with brevity irregularly
disproportionate to the foregoing parts, like a task performed with
reluctance, and hurried to its conclusion.

It may yet be doubted whether Cato was made publick by any change of the
author's purpose; for Dennis charged him with raising prejudices in
his own favour by false positions of preparatory criticism, and with
"poisoning the town" by contradicting, in the Spectator, the established
rule of poetical justice, because his own hero, with all his virtues, was
to fall before a tyrant. The fact is certain; the motives we must guess.

Addison was, I believe, sufficiently disposed to bar all avenues against
all danger. When Pope brought him the prologue, which is properly
accommodated to the play, there were these words, "Britons, arise, be
worth like this approved;" meaning nothing more than, Britons, erect
and exalt yourselves to the approbation of publick virtue. Addison was
frighted lest he should be thought a promoter of insurrection, and the
line was liquidated to "Britons, attend. "

Now "heavily in clouds came on the day, the great, the important day,"
when Addison was to stand the hazard of the theatre. That there might,
however, be left as little hazard as was possible, on the first night
Steele, as himself relates, undertook to pack an audience. This, says
Pope[177], had been tried, for the first time, in favour of the Distrest
Mother; and was now, with more efficacy, practised for Cato.

The danger was soon over. The whole nation was, at that time, on fire
with faction. The whigs applauded every line in which liberty was
mentioned, as a satire on the tories; and the tories echoed every clap,
to show that the satire was unfelt. The story of Bolingbroke is well
known. He called Booth to his box, and gave him fifty guineas for
defending the cause of liberty so well against a perpetual dictator[178].
The whigs, says Pope, design a second present, when they can accompany it
with as good a sentence.

The play, supported thus by the emulation of factious praise, was acted,
night after night for a longer time than, I believe, the publick had
allowed to any drama before; and the author, as Mrs. Porter long
afterwards related, wandered through the whole exhibition behind the
scenes with restless and unappeasable solicitude.

When it was printed, notice was given that the queen would be pleased
if it was dedicated to her; "but, as he had designed that compliment
elsewhere, he found himself obliged," says Tickell, "by his duty on the
one hand, and his honour on the other, to send it into the world without
any dedication. "

Human happiness has always its abatements; the brightest sunshine of
success is not without a cloud. No sooner was Cato offered to the reader,
than it was attacked by the acute malignity of Dennis, with all the
violence of angry criticism. Dennis, though equally zealous, and probably
by his temper more furious, than Addison, for what they called liberty,
and though a flatterer of the whig ministry, could not sit quiet at a
successful play; but was eager to tell friends and enemies, that they had
misplaced their admirations. The world was too stubborn for instruction;
with the fate of the censurer of Corneille's Cid, his animadversions
showed his anger without effect, and Cato continued to be praised.

Pope had now an opportunity of courting the friendship of Addison, by
vilifying his old enemy, and could give resentment its full play, without
appearing to revenge himself. He, therefore, published a Narrative of the
Madness of John Dennis; a performance which left the objections to the
play in their full force, and, therefore, discovered more desire of
vexing the critick than of defending the poet.

Addison, who was no stranger to the world, probably saw the selfishness
of Pope's friendship; and, resolving that he should have the consequences
of his officiousness to himself, informed Dennis, by Steele, that he was
sorry for the insult; and that, whenever he should think fit to answer
his remarks, he would do it in a manner to which nothing could be
objected.

The greatest weakness of the play is in the scenes of love, which are
said, by Pope[179], to have been added to the original plan upon a
subsequent review, in compliance with the popular practice of the stage.
Such an authority it is hard to reject; yet the love is so intimately
mingled with the whole action, that it cannot easily be thought
extrinsick and adventitious; for, if it were taken away, what would be
left? or how were the four acts filled in the first draught?

At the publication the wits seemed proud to pay their attendance with
encomiastick verses. The best are from an unknown hand, which will,
perhaps, lose somewhat of their praise when the author is known to be
Jeffreys.

Cato had yet other honours. It was censured as a party-play by a scholar
of Oxford; and defended in a favourable examination by Dr. Sewel. It was
translated by Salvini into Italian, and acted at Florence; and by the
Jesuits of St. Omer's into Latin, and played by their pupils. Of this
version a copy was sent to Mr. Addison: it is to be wished that it could
be found, for the sake of comparing their version of the soliloquy with
that of Bland.

A tragedy was written on the same subject by Deschamps, a French poet,
which was translated with a criticism on the English play. But the
translator and the critick are now forgotten.

Dennis lived on unanswered, and, therefore, little read. Addison knew the
policy of literature too well to make his enemy important by drawing
the attention of the publick upon a criticism, which, though sometimes
intemperate, was often irrefragable.
While Cato was upon the stage, another daily paper, called the Guardian,
was published by Steele[180]. To this Addison gave great assistance,
whether occasionally, or by previous engagement, is not known.

The character of guardian was too narrow and too serious: it might
properly enough admit both the duties and the decencies of life, but
seemed not to include literary speculations, and was, in some degree,
violated by merriment and burlesque. What had the guardian of the Lizards
to do with clubs of tall or of little men, with nests of ants, or with
Strada's prolusions?

Of this paper nothing is necessary to be said, but that it found many
contributors, and that it was a continuation of the Spectator, with the
same elegance, and the same variety, till some unlucky sparkle, from a
tory paper, set Steele's politicks on fire, and wit at once blazed
into faction. He was soon too hot for neutral topicks, and quitted the
Guardian to write the Englishman.

The papers of Addison are marked in the Spectator by one of the letters
in the name of Clio, and in the Guardian by a hand; whether it was, as
Tickell pretends to think, that he was unwilling to usurp the praise of
others, or, as Steele, with far greater likelihood, insinuates, that he
could not, without discontent, impart to others any of his own. I have
heard that his avidity did not satisfy itself with the air of renown, but
that with great eagerness he laid hold on his proportion of the profits.

Many of these papers were written with powers truly comick, with nice
discrimination of characters, and accurate observation of natural or
accidental deviations from propriety; but it was not supposed that he had
tried a comedy on the stage, till Steele, after his death, declared him
the author of the Drummer. This, however, Steele did not know to be true
by any direct testimony; for, when Addison put the play into his hands,
he only told him, it was the work of a "gentleman in the company;" and
when it was received, as is confessed, with cold disapprobation, he was
probably less willing to claim it. Tickell omitted it in his collection;
but the testimony of Steele, and the total silence of any other claimant,
has determined the publick to assign it to Addison, and it is now printed
with his other poetry. Steele carried the Drummer to the playhouse, and
afterwards to the press, and sold the copy for fifty guineas.

To the opinion of Steele may be added the proof supplied by the
play itself, of which the characters are such as Addison would have
delineated, and the tendency such as Addison would have promoted. That it
should have been ill received would raise wonder, did we not daily see
the capricious distribution of theatrical praise.

He was not all this time an indifferent spectator of publick affairs. He
wrote, as different exigencies required, in 1707, the present State of
the War, and the Necessity of an Augmentation; which, however judicious,
being written on temporary topicks, and exhibiting no peculiar powers,
laid hold on no attention, and has naturally sunk by its own weight
into neglect. This cannot be said of the few papers entitled the Whig
Examiner, in which is employed all the force of gay malevolence and
humorous satire. Of this paper, which just appeared and expired, Swift
remarks, with exultation, that "it is now down among the dead men[181]. "
He might well rejoice at the death of that which he could not have
killed. Every reader of every party, since personal malice is past, and
the papers which once inflamed the nation are read only as effusions of
wit, must wish for more of the Whig Examiners; for on no occasion was
the genius of Addison more vigorously exerted, and on none did the
superiority of his powers more evidently appear. His Trial of Count
Tariff, written to expose the treaty of commerce with France, lived no
longer than the question that produced it.

Not long afterwards, an attempt was made to revive the Spectator, at a
time, indeed, by no means favourable to literature, when the succession
of a new family to the throne filled the nation with anxiety, discord,
and confusion; and either the turbulence of the times, or the satiety of
the readers, put a stop to the publication, after an experiment of eighty
numbers, which were afterwards collected into an eighth volume, perhaps
more valuable than any of those that went before it. Addison produced
more than a fourth part[182]; and the other contributors are, by no
means, unworthy of appearing as his associates. The time that had passed
during the suspension of the Spectator, though it had not lessened his
power of humour, seems to have increased his disposition to seriousness:
the proportion of his religious, to his comick papers, is greater than in
the former series.

The Spectator, from its recommencement, was published only three times a
week; and no discriminative marks were added to the papers. To Addison
Tickell has ascribed twenty-three.

The Spectator had many contributors; and Steele, whose negligence kept
him always in a hurry, when it was his turn to furnish a paper, called
loudly for the letters, of which Addison, whose materials were more, made
little use; having recourse to sketches and hints, the product of his
former studies, which he now reviewed and completed: among these are
named by Tickell, the essays on Wit, those on the Pleasures of the
Imagination, and the Criticism on Milton.

When the house of Hanover took possession of the throne, it was
reasonable to expect that the zeal of Addison would be suitably rewarded.
Before the arrival of king George, he was made secretary to the regency,
and was required, by his office, to send notice to Hanover that the queen
was dead, and that the throne was vacant. To do this would not have
been difficult to any man but Addison, who was so overwhelmed with the
greatness of the event, and so distracted by choice of expression, that
the lords, who could not wait for the niceties of criticism, called Mr.
Southwell, a clerk in the house, and ordered him to despatch the message.
Southwell readily told what was necessary in the common style of
business, and valued himself upon having done what was too hard for
Addison[183].

He was better qualified for the Freeholder, a paper which he published
twice a week, from Dec. 23, 1715, to the middle of the next year. This
was undertaken in defence of the established government, sometimes with
argument, and sometimes with mirth. In argument he had many equals; but
his humour was singular and matchless. Bigotry itself must be delighted
with the Tory Fox-hunter.

There are, however, some strokes less elegant, and less decent; such as
the Pretender's Journal, in which one topick of ridicule is his poverty.
This mode of abuse had been employed by Milton against king Charles the
second.

_Jacobaei_
Centum, exulantis viscera marsupii regis.

And Oldmixon delights to tell of some alderman of London, that he had
more money than the exiled princes; but that which might be expected from
Milton's savageness, or Oldmixon's meanness, was not suitable to the
delicacy of Addison.

Steele thought the humour of the Freeholder too nice and gentle for such
noisy times; and is reported to have said, that the ministry made use of
a lute, when they should have called for a trumpet.

This year, 1716[184], he married the countess dowager of Warwick, whom
he had solicited by a very long and anxious courtship, perhaps with
behaviour not very unlike that of sir Roger to his disdainful widow; and
who, I am afraid, diverted herself often by playing with his passion. He
is said to have first known her by becoming tutor to her son [185]. "He
formed," said Tonson, "the design of getting that lady from the time when
he was first recommended into the family. " In what part of his life he
obtained the recommendation, or how long and in what manner he lived
in the family, I know not. His advances, at first, were certainly
timorous[186], but grew bolder as his reputation and influence increased;
till, at last, the lady was persuaded to marry him, on terms much like
those on which a Turkish princess is espoused, to whom the sultan is
reported to pronounce, "Daughter, I give thee this man for thy slave. "
The marriage, if uncontradicted report can be credited, made no addition
to his happiness; it neither found them nor made them equal. She always
remembered her own rank, and thought herself entitled to treat with very
little ceremony the tutor of her son. Howe's ballad of the Despairing
Shepherd, is said to have been written, either before or after marriage,
upon this memorable pair; and it is certain that Addison has left behind
him no encouragement for ambitious love.

The year after, 1717, he rose to his highest elevation, being made
secretary of state. For this employment he might justly be supposed
qualified by long practice of business, and by his regular ascent through
other offices; but expectation is often disappointed; it is universally
confessed that he was unequal to the duties of his place. In the house of
commons he could not speak, and, therefore, was useless to the defence
of the government. In the office, says Pope,[187] he could not issue
an order without losing his time in quest of fine expressions. What he
gained in rank he lost in credit; and, finding by experience his own
inability, was forced to solicit his dismission, with a pension of
fifteen hundred pounds a year. His friends palliated this relinquishment,
of which both friends and enemies knew the true reason, with an account
of declining health, and the necessity of recess and quiet.

He now returned to his vocation, and began to plan literary occupations
for his future life. He purposed a tragedy on the death of Socrates; a
story of which, as Tickell remarks, the basis is narrow, and to which I
know not how love could have been appended. There would, however, have
been no want either of virtue in the sentiments, or elegance in the
language.

He engaged in a nobler work, a defence of the Christian religion, of
which part was published after his death; and he designed to have made a
new poetical version of the psalms.

These pious compositions Pope imputed[188] to a selfish motive, upon the
credit, as he owns, of Tonson[189], who, having quarrelled with Addison,
and not loving him, said, that when he laid down the secretary's office,
he intended to take orders, and obtain a bishoprick; "For," said he, "I
always thought him a priest in his heart. "

That Pope should have thought this conjecture of Tonson worth
remembrance, is a proof, but, indeed, so far as I have found, the only
proof, that he retained some malignity from their ancient rivalry. Tonson
pretended but to guess it; no other mortal ever suspected it; and Pope
might have reflected, that a man, who had been secretary of state in
the ministry of Sunderland, knew a nearer way to a bishoprick than by
defending religion, or translating the psalms.

It is related, that he had once a design to make an English dictionary,
and that he considered Dr. Tillotson as the writer of highest authority.
There was formerly sent to me by Mr. Locker, clerk of the leathersellers'
company, who, was eminent for curiosity and literature, a collection of
examples selected from Tillotson's works, as Locker said, by Addison. It
came too late to be of use, so I inspected it but slightly, and remember
it indistinctly. I thought the passages too short.

Addison, however, did not conclude his life in peaceful studies; but
relapsed, when he was near his end, to a political dispute.

It so happened that, 1718-19, a controversy was agitated, with great
vehemence, between those friends of long continuance, Addison and Steele.
It may be asked, in the language of Homer, what power or what cause
could set them at variance. The subject of their dispute was of great
importance. The earl of Sunderland proposed an act, called the Peerage
Bill; by which the number of peers should be fixed, and the king
restrained from any new creation of nobility, unless when an old family
should be extinct. To this the lords would naturally agree; and the king,
who was yet little acquainted with his own prerogative, and, as is now
well known, almost indifferent to the possessions of the crown, had been
persuaded to consent. The only difficulty was found among the commons,
who were not likely to approve the perpetual exclusion of themselves and
their posterity. The bill, therefore, was eagerly opposed, and, among
others, by sir Robert Walpole, whose speech was published.

The lords might think their dignity diminished by improper advancements,
and particularly by the introduction of twelve new peers at once, to
produce a majority of tories in the last reign; an act of authority
violent enough, yet certainly legal, and by no means to be compared with
that contempt of national right with which, some time afterwards, by the
instigation of whiggism, the commons, chosen by the people for three
years, chose themselves for seven. But, whatever might be the disposition
of the lords, the people had no wish to increase their power. The
tendency of the bill, as Steele observed in a letter to the earl of
Oxford, was to introduce an aristocracy; for a majority in the house of
lords, so limited, would have been despotick and irresistible.

To prevent this subversion of the ancient establishment, Steele, whose
pen readily seconded his political passions, endeavoured to alarm the
nation by a pamphlet called the Plebeian. To this an answer was published
by Addison, under the title of the Old Whig, in which it is not
discovered that Steele was then known to be the advocate for the commons.
Steele replied by a second Plebeian; and, whether by ignorance or by
courtesy, confined himself to his question, without any personal notice
of his opponent.

Nothing, hitherto, was committed against the laws of friendship, or
proprieties of decency; but controvertists cannot long retain their
kindness for each other. The Old Whig answered the Plebeian, and could
not forbear some contempt of "little Dicky, whose trade it was to write
pamphlets. " Dicky, however, did not lose his settled veneration for his
friend; but contented himself with quoting some lines of Cato, which
were at once detection and reproof. The bill was laid aside during that
session; and Addison died before the next, in which its commitment was
rejected by two hundred and sixty-five to one hundred and seventy-seven.

Every reader surely must regret that these two illustrious friends, after
so many years passed in confidence and endearment, in unity of interest,
conformity of opinion, and fellowship of study, should finally part
in acrimonious opposition. Such a controversy was "Bellum plusquam
_civile_," as Lucan expresses it. Why could not faction find other
advocates? But, among the uncertainties of the human state, we are doomed
to number the instability of friendship.

Of this dispute I have little knowledge but from the Biographica
Britannica. The Old Whig is not inserted in Addison's works; nor is it
mentioned by Tickell in his life; why it was omitted, the biographers,
doubtless, give the true reason; the fact was too recent, and those who
had been heated in the contention were not yet cool.

The necessity of complying with times, and of sparing persons, is the
great impediment of biography. History may be formed from permanent
monuments and records; but lives can only be written from personal
knowledge, which is growing every day less, and in a short time is lost
for ever. What is known can seldom be immediately told; and when it might
be told, it is no longer known. The delicate features of the mind, the
nice discriminations of character, and the minute peculiarities of
conduct, are soon obliterated; and it is surely better that caprice,
obstinacy, frolick, and folly, however they might delight in the
description, should be silently forgotten, than that, by wanton merriment
and unseasonable detection, a pang should be given to a widow, a
daughter, a brother, or a friend. As the process of these narratives is
now bringing me among my contemporaries, I begin to feel myself "walking
upon ashes under which the fire is not extinguished," and coming to the
time of which it will be proper rather to say "nothing that is false,
than all that is true. "

The end of this useful life was now approaching. Addison had, for some
time, been oppressed by shortness of breath, which was now aggravated
by a dropsy; and, finding his danger pressing, he prepared to die
conformably to his own precepts and professions.

During this lingering decay, he sent, as Pope relates[190], a message by
the earl of Warwick to Mr. Gay, desiring to see him. Gay, who had not
visited him for some time before, obeyed the summons, and found himself
received with great kindness. The purpose for which the interview had
been solicited was then discovered. Addison told him, that he had injured
him; but that, if he recovered, he would recompense him. What the injury
was, he did not explain, nor did Gay ever know, but supposed that
some preferment designed for him had, by Addison's intervention, been
withheld.

Lord Warwick was a young man of very irregular life, and, perhaps, of
loose opinions[191]. Addison, for whom he did not want respect, had
very diligently endeavoured to reclaim him; but his arguments and
expostulations had no effect. One experiment, however, remained to be
tried: when he found his life near its end, he directed the young lord to
be called; and when he desired, with great tenderness, to hear his last
injunctions, told him: "I have sent for you, that you may see how a
Christian can die. " What effect this awful scene had on the earl, I know
not: he, likewise, died himself in a short time, In Tickell's excellent
elegy on his friend are these lines:

He taught us how to live; and, oh! too high
The price of knowledge, taught us how to die.

In which he alludes, as he told Dr. Young, to this moving interview.

Having given directions to Mr. Tickell for the publication of his works,
and dedicated them on his deathbed to his friend Mr. Craggs, he died June
17, 1719, at Holland-house, leaving no child but a daughter[192].

Of his virtue it is a sufficient testimony, that the resentment of party
has transmitted no charge of any crime. He was not one of those who are
praised only after death; for his merit was so generally acknowledged,
that Swift, having observed that his election passed without a contest,
adds, that, if he had proposed himself for king, he would hardly have
been refused.

His zeal for his party did not extinguish his kindness for the merit of
his opponents: when he was secretary in Ireland, he refused to intermit
his acquaintance with Swift.

Of his habits, or external manners, nothing is so often mentioned as that
timorous or sullen taciturnity, which his friends called modesty, by too
mild a name. Steele mentions, with great tenderness, "that remarkable
bashfulness, which is a cloak that hides and muffles merit;" and tells
us, "that his abilities were covered only by modesty, which doubles the
beauties which are seen, and gives credit and esteem to all that are
concealed. " Chesterfield affirms, that "Addison was the most timorous
and awkward man that he ever saw. " And Addison, speaking of his own
deficiency in conversation, used to say of himself, that, with respect to
intellectual wealth, "he could draw bills for a thousand pounds, though
he had not a guinea in his pocket. "

That he wanted current coin for ready payment, and, by that want, was
often obstructed and distressed; that he was oppressed by an improper and
ungraceful timidity; every testimony concurs to prove; but Chesterfield's
representation is, doubtless, hyperbolical. That man cannot be supposed
very unexpert in the arts of conversation and practice of life, who,
without fortune or alliance, by his usefulness and dexterity, became
secretary of state; and who died at forty-seven, after having not only
stood long in the highest rank of wit and literature, but filled one of
the most important offices of state.

The time in which he lived had reason to lament his obstinacy of silence;
"or he was," says Steele, "above all men in that talent called humour,
and enjoyed it in such perfection, that I have often reflected, after
a night spent with him apart from all the world, that I had had the
pleasure of conversing with an intimate acquaintance of Terence and
Catullus, who had all their wit and nature, heightened with humour more
exquisite and delightful than any other man ever possessed. " This is the
fondness of a friend; let us hear what is told us by a rival: "Addison's
conversation[193]," says Pope, "had something in it more charming than
I have found in any other man. But this was only when familiar; before
strangers, or, perhaps, a single stranger, he preserved his dignity by a
stiff silence. "

This modesty was by no means inconsistent with a very high opinion of
his own merit. He demanded to be the first name in modern wit; and, with
Steele to echo him, used to depreciate Dryden, whom Pope and Congreve
defended against them[194]. There is no reason to doubt, that he suffered
too much pain from the prevalence of Pope's poetical reputation; nor is
it without strong reason suspected, that by some disingenuous acts he
endeavoured to obstruct it; Pope was not the only man whom he insidiously
injured, though the only man of whom he could be afraid.

His own powers were such as might have satisfied him with conscious
excellence. Of very extensive learning he has, indeed, given no proofs.
He seems to have had small acquaintance with the sciences, and to have
read little except Latin and French; but, of the Latin poets, his
Dialogues on Medals show that, he had perused the works with great
diligence and skill. The abundance of his own mind left him little
need of adventitious sentiments; his wit always could suggest what the
occasion demanded. He had read, with critical eyes, the important volume
of human life, and knew the heart of man from the depths of stratagem to
the surface of affectation.

What he knew he could easily communicate. "This," says Steele, "was
particular in this writer, that, when he had taken his resolution, or
made his plan for what he designed to write, he would walk about a room,
and dictate it into language, with as much freedom and ease as any one
could write it down, and attend to the coherence and grammar of what he
dictated. "

Pope[195], who can be less suspected of favouring his memory, declares
that he wrote very fluently, but was slow and scrupulous in correcting;
that many of his Spectators were written very fast, and sent immediately
to the press; and that it seemed to be for his advantage not to have time
for much revisal.

"He would alter," says Pope, "any thing to please his friends, before
publication; but would not retouch his pieces afterwards: and, I believe,
not one word in Cato, to which I made an objection, was suffered to
stand. "

The last line of Cato is Pope's, having been originally written,

And, oh! 'twas this that ended Cato's life.

Pope might have made more objections to the six concluding lines. In the
first couplet the words, "from hence," are improper; and the second line
is taken from Dryden's Virgil. Of the next couplet, the first verse being
included in the second, is, therefore, useless; and in the third, discord
is made to produce strife.

Of the course of Addison's familiar day[196], before his marriage, Pope
has given a detail. He had in the house with him Budgell, and, perhaps,
Philips. His chief companions were Steele, Budgell, Philips, Carey,
Davenant, and colonel Brett. With one or other of these he always
breakfasted. He studied all morning; then dined at a tavern; and went
afterwards to Button's.

Button had been a servant in the countess of Warwick's family; who, under
the patronage of Addison, kept a coffee-house on the south side of Russel
street, about two doors from Covent garden. Here it was that the wits of
that time used to assemble. It is said, that when Addison had suffered
any vexation from the countess, he withdrew the company from Button's
house.

From the coffee-house he went again to a tavern, where he often sat late,
and drank too much wine. In the bottle, discontent seeks for comfort,
cowardice for courage, and bashfulness tot confidence. It is not unlikely
that Addison was first seduced to excess by the manumission which he
obtained from the servile timidity of his sober hours. He that feels
oppression from the presence of those to whom he knows himself superiour,
will desire to set loose his powers of conversation; and who, that ever
asked succours from Bacchus, was able to preserve himself from being
enslaved by his auxiliary?

Among those friends it was that Addison displayed the elegance of his
colloquial accomplishments, which may easily be supposed such as Pope
represents them. The remark of Mandeville, who, when he had passed an
evening in his company, declared that he was a parson in a tie-wig, can
detract little from his character; he was always reserved to strangers,
and was not incited to uncommon freedom by a character like that of
Mandeville.

From any minute knowledge of his familiar manners, the intervention of
sixty years has now debarred us. Steele once promised Congreve and the
publick a complete description of his character; but the promises of
authors are like the vows of lovers. Steele thought no more on his
design, or thought on it with anxiety that at last disgusted him, and
left his friend in the hands of Tickell.

One slight lineament of his character Swift has preserved. It was his
practice, when he found any man invincibly wrong, to flatter his opinions
by acquiescence, and sink him yet deeper in absurdity. This artifice
of mischief was admired by Stella; and Swift seems to approve her
admiration.

His works will supply some information. It appears, from his various
pictures of the world, that, with all his bashfulness, he had conversed
with many distinct classes of men, had surveyed their ways with very
diligent observation, and marked, with great acuteness, the effects
of different modes of life. He was a man in whose presence nothing
reprehensible was out of danger; quick in discerning whatever was wrong
or ridiculous, and not unwilling to expose it. "There are," says Steele,
"in his writings many oblique strokes upon some of the wittiest paen of
the age. " His delight was more to excite merriment than detestation; and
he detects follies rather than crimes.

If any judgment be made, from his books, of his moral character, nothing
will be found but purity and excellence. Knowledge of mankind, indeed,
less extensive than that of Addison, will show, that to write, and to
live, are very different. Many who praise virtue, do no more than praise
it. Yet it is reasonable to believe that Addison's professions and
practice were at no great variance, since, amidst that storm of faction
in which most of his life was passed, though his station made him
conspicuous, and his activity made him formidable, the character given
him by his friends was never contradicted by his enemies: of those, with
whom interest or opinion united him, he had not only the esteem, but the
kindness; and of others, whom the violence of opposition drove against
him, though he might lose the love, he retained the reverence.

It is justly observed by Tickell, that he employed wit on the side of
virtue and religion. He not only made the proper use of wit himself, but
taught it to others; and from his time it has been generally subservient
to the cause of reason and of truth. He has dissipated the prejudice that
had long connected gaiety with vice, and easiness of manners with
laxity of principles. He has restored virtue to its dignity, and taught
innocence not to be ashamed. This is an elevation of literary character,
"above all Greek, above all Roman fame. " No greater felicity can genius
attain, than that of having purified intellectual pleasure, separated
mirth from indecency, and wit from licentiousness; of having taught
a succession of writers to bring elegance and gaiety to the aid of
goodness; and, if I may use expressions yet more awful, of having "turned
many to righteousness. "

Addison, in his life, and for some time afterwards, was considered, by
the greater part of readers, as supremely excelling both in poetry
and criticism. Part of his reputation may be probably ascribed to
the advancement of his fortune: when, as Swift observes, he became a
statesman, and saw poets waiting at his levee, it is no wonder that
praise was accumulated upon him. Much, likewise, may be more honourably
ascribed to his personal character: he who, if he had claimed it, might
have obtained the diadem, was not likely to be denied the laurel.

But time quickly puts an end to artificial and accidental fame; and
Addison is to pass through futurity protected only by his genius. Every
name, which kindness or interest once raised too high, is in danger, lest
the next age should, by the vengeance of criticism, sink it in the same
proportion. A great writer has lately styled him "an indifferent poet,
and a worse critick. "

His poetry is first to be considered; of which it must be confessed,
that it has not often those felicities of diction which give lustre to
sentiments, or that vigour of sentiment that animates diction; there
is little of ardour, vehemence, or transport; there is very rarely the
awfulness of grandeur, and not very often the splendour of elegance. He
thinks justly; but he thinks faintly. This is his general character; to
which, doubtless, many single passages will furnish exceptions.

Yet, if he seldom reaches supreme excellence, he rarely sinks into
dulness, and is still more rarely entangled in absurdity. He did not
trust his powers enough to be negligent. There is, in most of his
compositions, a calmness and equability, deliberate and cautious,
sometimes with little that delights, but seldom with any thing that
offends.

Of this kind seem to be his poems to Dryden, to Somers, and to the king.
His ode on St. Cecilia has been imitated by Pope, and has something in it
of Dryden's vigour. Of his account of the English poets, he used to speak
as a "poor thing[197];" but it is not worse than his usual strain. He has
said, not very judiciously, in his character of Waller,

Thy verse could show ev'n Cromwell's innocence,
And compliment the storms that bore him hence.
O! had thy muse not come an age too soon,
But seen great Nassau on the British throne,
How had his triumph glitter'd in thy page!

What is this but to say, that he who could compliment Cromwell had been
the proper poet for king William; Addison, however, never printed the
piece.

The letter from Italy has been always praised, but has never been praised
beyond its merit.