18.

?

Not those rude garments could obfcure, and hide
The heau'nly beautie of her angels face,
Nor was her princely ofspring damnifide,
Or ought difparag'de, by those labours bace;
Her little flocks to pasture would the guide,
And milke her goates, and in their folds them place,
Both cheese and butter could she make, and frame
Her felfe to please the fhepherd and his dame.

ง

F Mr. JOHN POMFRET nothing is known but from a flight and confufed account prefixed to his poems by a nameless friend; who relates, that he was the fon of the Rev. Mr. Pomfret, rector of Luton in Bedfordshire; that he was bred at Cambridge *; entered into orders, and was rector of Malden in Bedfordshire, and might have rifen in the Church; but that when he applied to Dr. Compton, bishop of London, for institution to a living of confiderable value, to which he had been prefented, he

* He was of Queen's College there, and, by the Univerfity register, appears to have taken his Bachelor's degree in 1684, and his Mafter's in 1698. H.

found

found a troublesome obftruction raised by a malicious interpretation of fome paffage in his Choice; from which it was inferred, that he confidered happinefs as more likely to be found in the company of a mistress than of a wife.

This reproach was eafily obliterated for it had happened to Pomfret as to all other men who plan fchemes of life; he had departed from his purpose, and was then married.

The malice of his enemies had however a very fatal confequence: the delay constrained. his attendance in London, where he caught the small-pox, and died in 1703, in the thirty-fixth year of his age.

He published his poems in 1699; and has been always the favourite of that class of readers, who, without vanity or criticism, feek only their own amusement.

His Choice exhibits a system of life adapted to common notions, and equal to common expectations; fuch a state as affords plenty E e 4

and

and tranquillity, without exclufion of intellectual pleasures. Perhaps no compofition in our language has been oftener perused than Pomfret's Choice.

In his other poems there is an eafy volubility; the pleasure of smooth metre is afforded to the ear, and the mind is not oppreffed with ponderous or entangled with intricate fenti- ment. He pleases many, and he who pleases many must have some species of merit.

OF

dw

F the Earl of Dorfet the character has been drawn fo largely and fo elegantly by Prior, to whom he was familiarly known, that nothing can be added by a cafual hand; and, as its author is fo generally read, it would be useless officioufness to transcribe it.

CHARLES SACKVILLE was born January 24, 1637. Having been educated under a private tutor, he travelled into Italy, and returned a little before the Restoration. He was chofen into the firft parliament that was called, for East Grinstead in Suffex, and foon became a favourite of Charles the Second; but undertook no publick employment, being too eager of the riotous and licentious pleafures which young men of high rank, who afpired