former, however, has drawn a laboured, but diffuse and feeble character of him in the

Somers very different from what is here given, and from the picture drawn of him in the dedication to the Tale of a Tub. Yet, distorted as the features are in this new history, it is a pleasure to find that party-malice attempted to discolour rather than to alter them. How lovely does a character burst forth, when the greatest objections to it are, that it was steady to its principles, of universal civility, conscious of an humble birth, of no avarice, of satisfied ambition, that the person so accused did violence to himself to govern his passions, and (one can scarce repeat seriously such a charge!) preferred reading and thinking to the pleasures of conversation. How black a statesman not to be fickle! How poor a philosopher to master his passions when he could not eradicate them! How bad a man, to endeavour to improve his mind and understanding !— Can one wonder that lord Bolingbroke and Pope always tried to prevent Swift* from exposing himself by publishing this wretched and ignorant libel! and could it avoid falling, as it has, into immediate contempt and oblivion?-However, as the greatest characters cannot be clear of all alloy, Swift might have known that lord Somers was not entirely justifiable in obtaining some grants of crown lands, which, though in no proportion to other gains in that reign, it would have become him to resist, not to countenance by his example. [N. B. "One might as well," observes lord Hardwicke, «lay a heavy charge on his father's (sir Robert Walpole) memory for the grants of lucrative offices obtained for his family, and taking a pension when he resigned. Lord Somers raised no

[It has been remarked however that Swift yielded to their advice: so that the piece, being posthumous, must be read with that consi. deration in the author's favour. See Biog. Brit. vol. v. p. 3755, note 62.]

Freeholder, neither worthy of the author nor his subject. It is known that my lord Somers survived the powers of his understanding. Mr. Addison says, "His life indeed seems to have been prolonged beyond its natural term under those indispositions which hung upon the latter part of it, that he might have the satisfaction. of seeing the happy settlement take place which he had proposed to himself as the principal end of all his public labours."-A very wise way indeed of interpreting the will of Providence! As if a man was preserved by Heaven in a state of dotage, till an event should arrive which would make him happy if he retained his senses! Equally injudicious is another passage, intended for encomium, where we are told, "that he gained great esteem with queen Anne, who had conceived many unreasonable prejudices against him!" Mr. Addison might as well have said, that the queen had at first disbelieved, and was afterwards converted to sir Isaac Newton's system of comets. Her majesty was full as good a judge of astronomy as of lord Somers's merits. In truth, Mr. Addison was sometimes as weak

more from his offices and grants than a fortune which enabled him to live with decency and elegance." MS. note in Mr. Gough's copy.]

Of May 14, 1716.

a writer, when he wrote seriously 5, as he was admirable in touching the delicacies of natural humour. He says, that my lord Somers was often compared with sir Francis Bacon, and gives the preference to the former," because he, all integrity, did not behave as meanly, when prosecuted by the house of commons, as the other under conviction of guilt." This argument is as poor as the panegyric. To argue from their behaviour, they should have been in similar circumstances. If they are to be compared, the superior penetration of genius cannot be denied to Bacon; the virtue will all be Somers's. If he must be compared with another chancellor, it must not be with Clarendon, who was more morose and severe, had less capacity, and a thousand more prejudices. The great chancellor de l'Hospital seems to resemble Somers most in the dignity of his soul and the elegance of his understanding.

3 [In reference to this flippant censure of lord Orford, Dr. Kippis has remarked that " a few passages which may be thought exceptionable can by no means justify so severe a charge. Mr. Addison's serious writings will, by competent judges, be pronounced to have great beauty and merit; and notwithstanding the occasional strictures which have been advanced in order to lessen him in the public opinion, he will always be held in the highest estimation as one of the brightest ornaments of, perhaps, the finest age of English literature.” Biog. Brit. art. Addison.]