thefe in the contest betwixt Brutus and Caffius in Shakspeare's Julius Cæfar, A&IV. Caff. O Gods! ye Gods! must I endure all this? Brutus. All this! ay more: fret till your proud heart break; * Go fhew your flaves how choleric you are, And make your bondsmen tremble: Must I budge? *The portraits of Butler, particularly that after Soeft prefixed to Dr. Grey's edition of the Hudibras, represent him as a man of a noble afpect, and admit not a doubt that they are genuine; but in an edition thereof in 12mo, 1726, with cuts, defigned and etched by Hogarth, is a head of him, an exact copy of a mezzotinto of Baptist the flower painter, fcraped by Smith or White, but I think the latter, which gives him the countenance of a Saracen. ROCHESTE R. OHN WILMOT, afterwards Earl of Rochester, Jo the fon of Henry Earl of Rochester, better known by the title of Lord Wilmot, fo often mentioned in Clarendon's Hiftory, was born April 10, 1647, at Ditchley in Oxfordshire. After a grammatical education at the school of Burford, he entered a nobleman into Wadham College in 1659, only twelve years old; and in 1661, at fourteen, was, with fome other perfons of high rank, made mafter of arts by Lord Clarendon in perfon. He travelled afterwards into France and Italy; and, at his return, devoted himself to the Court. In 1665 he went to fea with Sandwich, and diftinguifhed himdelf at Bergen by uncommon intrepidity; and the next fummer ferved again on board Sir Edward Spragge, who, in the heat of the engagement, having a meffage of reproof to fend to one of his captains, could find no man ready to carry it but Wilmot, who, in an open boat, went and returned amidst the ftorm of fhot. But But his reputation for bravery was not lafting: he 3 was reproached with flinking away in street quarrels, and leaving his companions to fhift as they could without him; and Sheffield Duke of Buckingham has left a ftory of his refusal to fight him. He had very early an inclination to intemperance, which he totally fubdued in his travels; but, when he became a courtier, he unhappily addicted himself to diffolute and vitious company, by which his principles were corrupted, and his manners depraved. He loft all fenfe of religious reftraint; and, finding it not convenient to admit the authority of laws which he was refolved not to obey, fheltered his wickedness behind infidelity. As he excelled in that noify and licentious merriment which wine incites, his companions eagerly encouraged him in excess, and he willingly indulged it; till, as he confeffed to Dr. Burnet, he was for five years together continually drunk, or fo much inflamed by frequent ebriety, as in no interval to be mafter of himself. In this ftate he played many frolicks, which it is not for his honour that we fhould remember, and which are not now diftinctly known. He often purfued low amours in mean disguises, and always acted with great exactness and dexterity the characters which he affumed. He once erected a stage on Tower-hill, and harangued the populace as a mountebank; and, having made phyfick part of his ftudy, is faid to have practifed it fuccefsfully. He was fo much in favour with King Charles, that he was made one of the gentlemen of the bedchamber, and comptroller of Woodstock Park, Having an active and inquifitive mind, he never, except in his paroxyfms of intemperance, was wholly negligent of study: he read what is confidered as polite learning fo much, that he is mentioned by Wood as the greatest scholar of all the nobility. Sometimes he retired into the country, and amused himself with writing libels, in which he did not pretend to confine himself to truth. His favourite author in French was Boileau, and in English Cowley. Thus in a course of drunken gaiety, and grofs fenfuality, with intervals of study perhaps yet more criminal, with an avowed contempt of all decency and order, a total difregard to every moral, and a refolute denial of every religious obligation, he lived worthless and ufelefs, and blazed out his youth and his health in lavish voluptuoufnefs; till, at the age of one and thirty, he had exhausted the fund of life, and reduced himself to a state of weakness and decay. At this time he was led to an acquaintance with Dr. Burnet, to whom he laid open with great freedom the tenour of his opinions, and the courfe of his life, and from whom he received fuch conviction of the reasonable. nefs of moral duty, and the truth of Chriftianity, as produced a total change both of his manners and opinions, The account of thofe falutary conferences is given by by Burnet, in a book intituled, Some Paffages of the Life and Death of John Earl of Rochefter; which the critick ought to read for its elegance, the philofopher for its arguments, and the faint for its piety. It were an injury to the reader to offer him an abridgement. He died July 26, 1680, before he had completed his thirty-fourth year; and was fo worn away by a long illness, that life went out without a struggle. Lord Lord Rochester was eminent for the vigour of his 4colloquial wit, and remarkable for many wild pranks and fallies of extravagance. The glare of his general character diffused itself upon his writings; the compoditions of a man whofe name was heard fo often were certain of attention, and from many readers certain of applaufe. This blaze of reputation is not yet quite extinguished; and his poetry ftill retains fome fplendour beyond that which genius has bestowed. Wood and Burnet give us reafon to believe, that much was imputed to him which he did not write. I know not by whom the original collection was made, or by what authority its genuineness was afcertained. The first edition was published in the year of his death, with an air of concealment, profeffing in the title to be printed at Antwerp. page Of fome of the pieces, however, there is no doubt. The Imitation of Horace's Satire, the Verfes to Lord Mulgrave, the Satire against Man, the Verfes upon Nothing, and perhaps fome others, are I believe genuine, and perhaps mosft of those which the late collection exhibits. As he cannot be supposed to have found leifure for any course of continued ftudy, his pieces are commonly fhort, fuch as one fit of refolution would produce. His fongs have no particular character: they tell, like other songs, in smooth and easy language, of scorn and kindness, difmiffion and desertion, abfence and inconftancy, with the common places of artificial courtfhip. They are commonly fmooth and eafy; but have little nature, and little fentiment. His imitation of Horace on Lucilius is not inelegant or unhappy. In the reign of Charles the Second be |
