enriched with much that is precious in wisdom, impressive in eloquence, and striking in truth. Many of the topics upon which he employed his pen, are of vital importance to the interests of the community, extending even to the foundations of government, and the principles that regulate the intercourse of society. If their purpose was temporary, their utility is far from having ceased with the occasion: for without insisting, that it is never unseasonable to recal the attention of mankind to such subjects, it may be observed, that no man who sits down to study the history of his country with minute exactness, can hope for satisfaction upon a variety of points, without a previous acquaintance with the writings of De Foe. OF DANIEL DE FOE DANIEL DE FOE, or FoE, as the name was originally spelt, was born in London, in the parish of St Giles, Cripplegate, in the year 1661.† The name is obviously a corruption of foi, and of French origin. For centuries there was a family so called seated in Warwickshire, as we are informed by De Foe himself in his Tour through Great Britain.' Whether, however, the author of Robinson Crusoe' was or was not entitled to claim affinity with Norman blood, is as uncertain as it is immaterial. What he may have wanted in titles of honour, and the gifts of fortune, was amply compensated for in the possession of many other excellences of a far more valuable nature. The grandfather of De Foe, the first person among his ancestors of whom anything is positively known, was a substantial yeoman who farmed his own estate at Elton, in Northamptonshire. The old gentleman kept a pack of hounds, which indicated both his wealth and his principles as a Royalist, for the Puritans did not allow of the sports of the field, though his grandson (contra bonos mores) sometimes indulged in them. In alluding to this circumstance, our author in one of the Reviews, in reference to the practice, common in his time, of bestowing names that were the result of party animosity upon the brute creation, says,-" I remember my grandfather had a huntsman, that used the same familiarity with his dogs, and he had his Roundhead and his Cavalier, Upon what occasion it was that De Foe made the alteration in his name, by connecting with it the foreign prefix, nowhere appears. His enemies said he adopted it because he would not be thought an Englishman; but this is a mere absurdity. Oldmixon intimates, that it was not until after he had stood in the pillory that he changed his name; and Dr Browne tells us, that he did it at the suggestion of Harley— "Have I not chang'd by your advice my name?" But no reliance is to be placed upon the testimony of either of these writers when speaking of De Foe. His motive was, probably, a dislike to his original name, either for its import, or its harshness; or he might have been desirous of restoring it to its Norman origin. A correspondent having bantered the Review,' upon its import, he replies, "If the gentleman has a favourable opinion of the Review,' we fancy he will not dislike it upon the account of the author's name, as like a thing which he himself is not; being a foe in name only, not in nature to anybody." · Until of late years, it was doubtful in what town or county he was born, and even whether he was an Englishman or a foreigner. A Tory writer, who published a lampoon upon him in the reign of Queen Anne, under the title of The True-born Hugonot; or Daniel De Foe, a Satyr,' supposes him to have been of French extraction, and to have come into England with the persecuted Protestants, or, as this author would term them, the rebellious subjects of Louis XIV. He speaks thus: "Out of this rebel herd our rebel sprung, a his Goring, and his Waller, and all the generals of both armies were hounds in his pack; till the times turning, the old gentleman was fain to scatter the pack, and make them up of more dog-like surnames." It was probably from this relative that De Foe inherited a freehold estate, of which he was not a little vain, and which seems to have influenced his opinions in his theory of the right of popular election, and of the British Constitution. He refers to it in one of the Reviews in the following terms :-" I have both a native and an acquired right of election, in more than one place in Britain, and as such am a part of the body that honourable house represents; and from hence, I believe, may claim a right, in due manner, to represent, complain, address, or petition them." Our author's father, James Foe, a younger son of the Elton squire, was a person of a very different cast,-a rigid dissenter, and from him his son appears to have imbibed the grounds of his opinions and practice. He was apprenticed to John Levit, a butcher in London, and afterwards followed this trade upon his own account, in the parish of St Giles, Cripplegate, retiring from business upon a respectable competency, some years before his death, which took place in or about the year 1707. The following curious memorandum, signed by him in 1705, throws some light on his character, as well as on that of the times :-" Sarah Pierce lived with us, about fifteen or sixteen years since, about two years; and behaved herself so well that we recommended her to Mr Cave, that godly minister, which we should not have done, had not her conversation been becoming the gospel. From my lodgings, at the Bell, in Broad street, having left my house in Throgmorton street, October 10, 1705. Witness my hand, JAMES FOE." This is all that is known of our author's immediate ancestors. He had some collateral relations, to whom he alludes occasionally in his writings, but with too much brevity to ascertain the degree of kindred. In his Tour through Great Britain,' he mentions a relative who followed the employment of a schoolmaster at Martock, in Somersetshire, and with whom he maintained a friendly intercourse. In one of his works, he alludes to "a near relation" at Sherborne, in Dorsetshire; and, in another, he draws the character of a cousin, who seems to have resided in London, and was a man of abilities, but in other respects far from estimable. The mother as well as the father of De Foe being a strict nonconformist, under their guidance, and the ministrations of the Rev. Dr Annesley, an esteemed presbyterian minister, who had been ejected from the living of Cripplegate, he was early initiated in those moral and religious principles which give such a lustre to his subsequent life and writings. While yet a boy, he manifested a cheerfulness, vivacity, and buoyancy of spirits, with a remarkable courage, as was soon displayed in that spirit of independence and unconquerable love of liberty, which he maintained throughout his long and singularly chequered life. In one of his Reviews he remarks, of himself, "From a boxing English boy, I learnt this early piece of generosity, not to strike my enemy when he is down," a disposition he cherished in his literary contests. An anecdote referring to his boyish days, and preserved by himself, may be recorded here as an honourable testimony to the principles and conduct of his pious and plainhearted parents :-During that part of the reign of King Charles II, when the nation was under strong apprehensions of a Popish government, and religious persons were the victims of Protestant persecution, it being expected that printed Bibles would become rare, or locked up in an unknown tongue, many honest people, struck with the alarm, employed themselves in copying the Bible into short-hand, that they might not be destitute of its consolations in the hour of calamity. To this task young De Foe also applied himself, and he tells us "That he worked like a horse, till he had written out the whole Pentateuch, when he grew so tired that he was willing to risk the rest." At the age of fourteen, our author, being intended for the clerical profession, was placed in an academy at Newington green, under the direction of that “polite and profound scholar," the Rev. Charles Morton, whom De Foe delights to praise as a master who taught nothing, either in politics or science, which was dangerous to monarchical government, or which was improper for a diligent scholar to know." 66 De Foe's attainments at the academy appear to have been considerable. He tells us, in one of his 'Reviews,' that he had been master of five languages, and that he had studied the mathematics, natural philosophy, logic, geography, and history. With the theory and practice of our constitution he was also well acquainted, and he studied politics as a science. Under the direction of his tutor, he went through a complete course of theology, in which he acquired a proficiency that enabled him to cope with the most acute writers of that disputatious age. His knowledge of ecclesiastical history was also considerable; and possessing an acuteness of intellect thus united with various reading, few persons could be found who were fitter advocates for the cause he espoused. Yet his enemies in after life attacked him as an illiterate person, without education.”—“The enemies of peace," says he, "are not a few; and he that preaches a doctrine men care not to follow, when they cannot object against the subject, they will against the man. He is no scholar, says one; that's true: he was an apprentice to a hosier, says another; that's false; and adds to the number of the intolerable liberties Dr Browne and Mr Observator give themselves, he having never been a hosier, nor an apprentice; but he has been a trader; that's true; and therefore must know no Latin. Excellent logic this! Those gentlemen who reproach my learning to applaud their own, shall have it proved that I have more learning than either of them--because I have more manners. I have no concern to tell Dr Browne I can read English; nor to tell Mr Tutchin I understand Latin: Non ita Latinus sum ut Latine loqui. I easily acknowledge myself blockhead enough to have lost the fluency of expression in the Latin, and so far trade has been a prejudice to me; and yet I think I owe this justice to my ancient father, still living, and in whose behalf I freely testify, that if I am a blockhead, it was nobody's fault but my own, he having spared nothing in my education that might qualify me to match the accurate Dr Browne, or the learned Observator. "As to my little learning and his (Mr Tutchin's) great capacity, I fairly challenge him to translate with me any Latin, French, and Italian author, and after that to re-translate them cross-ways, for twenty pounds each book; and by this he shall have an opportunity to show the world how much De Foe the hosier is inferior in learning to Mr Tutchin the gentleman." The writers of those days observed but little decorum in their language. One of his opponents, De Foe says, "makes himself merry with me, that I stand in need of a logician to mend my arguments, and a grammarian to mend my Latin. I wish this mirth may calm his temper, and I will not make myself amends upon him by telling him that he can mend neither for me that I am master of as many languages as himself, and may have forgot as much Latin as some may have learnt; because I have no mind to quarrel, or put any man into a ferment."-" When they that dispute," observes he, assume to themselves all the learning and all the sense, I think they ought to have some regard to truth and justice: but it is impossible for some people to keep their temper when they are pinched in argument; which want of temper in them shall be far from moving me to the same error." The causes that led to the diversion of our author's talents from his original destination as a Dissenting minister into another channel, are now unknown: it is certain that the times were very unfavourable to the exercise of such a function, and occasioned numbers to abandon their pulpits, or withdraw from their native country. A competent witness observes, that "For some time before a Popish prince ascended the throne, Popish his Goring, and his Waller, and all the generals of both armies were hounds in his pack; till the times turning, the old gentleman was fain to scatter the pack, and make them up of more dog-like surnames." It was probably from this relative that De Foe inherited a freehold estate, of which he was not a little vain, and which seems to have influenced his opinions in his theory of the right of popular election, and of the British Constitution. He refers to it in one of the Reviews in the following terms :"I have both a native and an acquired right of election, in more than one place in Britain, and as such am a part of the body that honourable house represents; and from hence, I believe, may claim a right, in due manner, to represent, complain, address, or petition them." Our author's father, James Foe, a younger son of the Elton squire, was a person of a very different cast,-a rigid dissenter, and from him his son appears to have imbibed the grounds of his opinions and practice. He was apprenticed to John Levit, a butcher in London, and afterwards followed this trade upon his own account, in the parish of St Giles, Cripplegate, retiring from business upon a respectable competency, some years before his death, which took place in or about the year 1707. The following curious memorandum, signed by him in 1705, throws some light on his character, as well as on that of the times :-" Sarah Pierce lived with us, about fifteen or sixteen years since, about two years; and behaved herself so well that we recommended her to Mr Cave, that godly minister, which we should not have done, had not her conversation been becoming the gospel. From my lodgings, at the Bell, in Broad street, having left my house in Throgmorton street, October 10, 1705. Witness my hand, JAMES FOE." This is all that is known of our author's immediate ancestors. He had some collateral relations, to whom he alludes occasionally in his writings, but with too much brevity to ascertain the degree of kindred. In his Tour through Great Britain,' he mentions a relative who followed the employment of a schoolmaster at Martock, in Somersetshire, and with whom he maintained a friendly intercourse. In one of his works, he alludes to a near relation" at Sherborne, in Dorsetshire; and, in another, he draws the character of a cousin, who seems to have resided in London, and was a man of abilities, but in other respects far from estimable. The mother as well as the father of De Foe being a strict nonconformist, under their guidance, and the ministrations of the Rev. Dr Annesley, an esteemed presbyterian minister, who had been ejected from the living of Cripplegate, he was early initiated in those moral and religious principles which give such a lustre to his subsequent life and writings. While yet a boy, he manifested a cheerfulness, vivacity, and buoyancy of spirits, with a remarkable courage, as was soon displayed in that spirit of independence and unconquerable love of liberty, which he maintained throughout his long and singularly chequered life. In one of his Reviews he remarks, of himself, "From a boxing English boy, I learnt this early piece of generosity, not to strike my enemy when he is down," a disposition he cherished in his literary contests. An anecdote referring to his boyish days, and preserved by himself, may be recorded here as an honourable testimony to the principles and conduct of his pious and plainhearted parents :-During that part of the reign of King Charles II, when the nation was under strong apprehensions of a Popish government, and religious persons were the victims of Protestant persecution, it being expected that printed Bibles would become rare, or locked up in an unknown tongue, many honest people, struck with the alarm, employed themselves in copying the Bible into short-hand, that they might not be destitute of its consolations in the hour of calamity. To this task young De Foe also applied himself, and he tells us "That he worked like a horse, till he had written out the whole Pentateuch, when he grew so tired that he was willing to risk the rest.” |