Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

As Mr. Nash's thoughts were entirely the morning lighted it himself, and sat employed in the affairs of his government, down to read some of his few but wellhe was seldom at home but at the time chosen books. After reading some time, of eating or of rest. His table was well he usually went to the pump-room and served, but his entertainment consisted drank the waters; then took a walk on principally of plain dishes. Boiled chicken the parade, and went to the coffee-house and roast mutton were his favourite meats, to breakfast; after which, till two o'clock and he was so fond of the small sort of (his usual time of dinner) his hours were potatoes, that he called them English spent in arbitrating differences amongst pine-apples, and generally ate them as his neighbours, or the company resorting others do fruit, after dinner. In drink- to the wells; in directing the diversions ing he was altogether as regular and of the day, visiting the new comers, or abstemious. Both in this and in eating, receiving friends at his own house; of he seemed to consult Nature, and obey which there was a great concourse till only her dictates. Good small beer, within six or eight years before his death. with or without a glass of wine in it, and sometimes wine and water, was his drink at meals, and after dinner he generally drank one glass of wine. He seemed fond of hot suppers, usually supped about nine or ten o'clock, upon roast breast of mutton and his potatoes, and soon after supper went to bed; which induced Dr. Cheyne to tell him jestingly, that he behaved like other brutes, and lay down as soon as he had filled his belly. Very true," replied Nash, "and this prescription I had from my neighbour's cow, who is a better physician than you, and a superior judge of plants, notwithstanding you have written so learnedly on the vegetable diet."

66

Nash generally arose early in the morning, being seldom in bed after five; and to avoid disturbing the family and depriving his servants of their rest, he had the fire laid after he was in bed, and in

His generosity and charity in private life, though not so conspicuous, was as great as that in public, and indeed far more considerable than his little income would admit of. He could not stifle the natural impulse which he had to do good, but frequently borrowed money to relieve the distressed; and when he knew not conveniently where to borrow, he has been often observed to shed tears, as he passed through the wretched supplicants who attended his gate.

This sensibility, this power of feeling the misfortunes of the miserable, and his address and earnestness in relieving their wants, exalts the character of Mr. Nash, and draws an impenetrable veil over his foibles. His singularities are forgotten when we behold his virtucs, and he who laughed at the whimsical character and behaviour of this Monarch of Bath, now laments that he is no more.

END OF THE LIFE OF RICHARD NASH.

POEMS.

THE TRAVELLER;

OR, A PROSPECT OF SOCIETY.

(1764.)

To the REV. HENRY GOLDSMITH.

DEAR SIR,—I am sensible that the friendship between us can acquire no new force from the ceremonies of a Dedication; and perhaps it demands an excuse thus to prefix your name to my attempts, which you decline giving with your own. But as a

part of this Poem was formerly written to you from Switzerland, the whole can now, with propriety, be only inscribed to you. It will also throw a light upon many parts of it when the reader understands that it is addressed to a man who, despising fame and fortune, has retired early to happiness and obscurity, with an income of forty pounds a year.

I now perceive, my dear brother, the wisdom of your humble choice. You have entered upon a sacred office, where the harvest is great and the labourers are but few; while you have left the field of ambition, where the labourers are many, and the harvest not worth carrying away. But of all kinds of ambition, what from the refinement of the times, from different systems of criticism, and from the divisions of party, that which pursues poetical fame is the wildest.

Poetry makes a principal amusement among unpolished nations; but in a country verging to the extremes of refinement Painting and Music come in for a share. As these offer the feeble mind a less laborious entertainment, they at first rival Poetry, and at length supplant her; they engross all that favour once shown to her, and though but younger sisters, seize upon the elder's birthright.

Yet, however this art may be neglected by the powerful, it is still in great danger from the mistaken efforts of the learned to improve it. What criticisms have we not heard of late in favour of blank verse and Pindaric odes, chorusses, anapests, and iambics, alliterative care and happy negligence! Every absurdity has now a champion to defend it: and as he is generally much in the wrong, so he has always much to say; for error is ever talkative.

But there is an enemy to this art still more dangerous,-I mean party. Party entirely distorts the judgment, and destroys the taste. When the mind is once infected with this disease, it can only find pleasure in what contributes to increase the distemper. Like the tiger, that seldom desists from pursuing man after having once preyed upon human flesh, the reader who has once gratified his appetite with calumny, makes ever after the most agreeable feast upon murdered reputation. Such readers generally admire some half-witted thing, who wants to be thought a bold man, having lost the character of a wise one. Him they dignify with the name of poet: his tawdry lampoons are called satires; his turbulence is said to be force, and his phrenzy fire.

« VorigeDoorgaan »