When he had finished his business, he returned | fervent devotion, two lines of his own version of to London was made master of the horse to "Dies Iræ:"the Dutchess of York; and married the Lady Frances, daughter to the Earl of Burlington, and widow of Colonel Courteney.* He now busied his mind with literary projects, and formed the plan for a society for refining our language and fixing its standard; "in imitation," says Fenton, "of those learned and polite societies with which he had been acquainted abroad." In this design his friend Dryden is said to have assisted him. The same design, it is well known, was revived by Dr. Swift in the ministry of Oxford; but it has never since been publicly mentioned, though at that time great expectations were formed, by some, of its establishment and its effects. Such a society might, perhaps, without much difficulty, be collected; but that it would produce what is expected from it may be doubted. The Italian academy seems to have obtained its end. The language was refined, and so fixed that it has changed but little. The French academy thought that they refined their language, and doubtless thought rightly; but the event has not shown that they fixed it; for the French of the present time is very different from that of the last century. My God, my Father, and my Friend, He died in 1684, and was buried with great pomp in Westminster Abbey. His poetical character is given by Mr. Fen ton: the image of a mind which was naturally seri"In his writings," says Fenton, "we view ous and solid; richly furnished and adorned with all the ornaments of learning, unaffectedly disposed in the most regular and elegant order. fruitful and sprightly, if his judgment had been His imagination might have probably been more less severe. But that severity (delivered in a masculine, clear, succinct style) contributed to make him so eminent in the didactical manner, that no man, with justice, can affirm he was ever equalled by any of our nation, without confessing at the same time that he is inferior to none. In some other kinds of writing, his genius seems to have wanted fire to attain the point of perfection; but who can attain it?" who would not imagine that they had been disFrom this account of the riches of his mind, played in large volumes and numerous perform this character, be surprised to find that all the ances? Who would not, after the perusal of In this country an academy could be expected to do but little. If an academician's place were profitable, it would be given by interest; if attend-proofs of this genius, and knowledge, and judg ance were gratuitous, it would be rarely paid, and no man would endure the least disgust. Unanimity is impossible, and debate would separate the assembly. ment, are not sufficient to form a single book, the works of some other writer of the same or to appear otherwise than in conjunction with petty size ?* But thus it is that characters are may written we know somewhat, and we imagine But suppose the philological decree made and the rest. The observation, that his imagination promulgated, what would be its authority? In would probably have been more fruitful and absolute governments, there is sometimes a general reverence paid to all that has the sanction sprightly, if his judgment had been less severe, of power, and the countenance of greatness.clined to cavil, by a contrary supposition, that be answered by a remarker somewhat inFlow little this is the state of our country needs his judgment would probably have been less se not be told. We live in an age in which it is a kind of public sport to refuse all respect that It is ridiculous to oppose judgment to imagina. vere, if his imagination had been more fruitful. cannot be enforced. The edicts of an English tion; for it does not appear that men have academy would probably be read by many, only necessarily less of one as they have more of the that they might be sure to disobey them. other. That our language is in perpetual danger of We must allow of Roscommon, what Fenton corruption cannot be denied; but what preven-has not mentioned so distinctly as he ought, and tion can be found? The present manners of the what is yet very much to his honour, that he is, nation would deride authority; and therefore perhaps, the only correct writer in verse before nothing is left but that every writer should criti- Addison: and that, if there are not so many or cise himself. of some contemporaries, there are at least fewer so great beauties in his compositions as in those faults. Nor is this his highest praise; for Mr. Pope has celebrated him as the only moral writer of King Charles' reign : All hopes of new literary institutions were quickly suppressed by the contentious turbulence of King James's reign; and Roscommon, foreseeing that some violent concussion of the state was at hand, purposed to retire to Rome, alleging, that "it was best to sit near the chimney when the chamber smoked;" a sentence, of which the application seems not very clear. His departure was delayed by the gout; and he was so impatient, either of hinderance or of pain, that he submitted himself to a French empiric, who is said to have repelled the disease! into his bowels. At the moment which he expired, he uttered with an energy of voice that expressed the most He was married to Lady Frances Boyle, in April, 1662. By this lady he had no issue. He married secon-lly, 10th Nov. 1674, Isabella, daughter of Matthew Boynton, of Barmston, in Yorkshire. Malone. Unhappy Dryden! in all Charles' days, "It was my Lord Roscommon's 'Essay on They were published, together with those of Duke, in an octavo volume, in 1717. The editor, whoever he was, professes to have taken great care to procure and insert of all his Lordship's poems that are truly genuine. The truth of this assertion is flatly denied by the author of an account of Mr. John Pomfret, prefixed to his remains; who asserts, that the Prospect of Death was writ ten by that person many years after Lord Roscommon's decease; as, also, that the paraphrase of the Prayer of Jeremy was written by a gentleman of the name of Southcourt, living in the year 1724.-H. Translated Verse,'" says Dryden, "which made Having disentangled himself from the diffime uneasy, till I tried whether or no I was ca-culties of rhyme, he may justly be expected to pable of following his rules, and of reducing the give the sense of Horace with great exactness, speculation into practice. For many a far: pre-and to suppress no subtlety of sentiment for the cept in poetry is like a seeming demonstration difficulty of expressing it. This demand, howin mathematics, very specious in the diagram, ever, his translation will not satisfy; what he but failing in the mechanic operation. I think found obscure, I do not know that he has ever I have generally observed his instructions: I am cleared. sure my reason is sufficiently convinced, both of their truth and usefulness; which, in other words, is to confess no less a vanity than to pretend that I have, at least in some places, made examples to his rules." This declaration of Dryden will, I am afraid, be found little more than one of those cursory civilities which one author pays to another; for when the sum of Lord Roscommon's precepts is collected, it will not be easy to discover how they can qualify their reader for a better performance of translation than might have been attained by his own reflections. He that can abstract his mind from the elegance of the poetry, and confine it to the sense of the precepts, will find no other direction than Among his smaller works the "Eclogue of Virgil" and the " Dies Ira" are well translated; though the best line in the "Dies Iræ" is borrowed from Dryden. In return, succeeding poets have borrowed from Roscommon. In the verses on the Lap-dog, the pronouns thou and you are offensively confounded; and the turn at the end is from Waller. His versions of the two odes of Horace are made with great liberty, which is not recompensed by much elegance or vigour. His political verses are sprightly, and when they were written must have been very popular. Of the scene of "Guarini" and the prologue of "Pompey," Mrs. Philips, in her letters to Sir Charles Cotterel, has given the history. that the author should be suitable to the trans- "Lord Roscommon," says she, " is certainly lator's genius; that he should be such as may one of the most promising young noblemen in deserve a translation; that he who intends to Ireland. He has paraphrased a psalm admiratranslate him should endeavour to understand bly; and a scene of "Pastor Fido" very finely, him; that perspicuity should be studied, and in some places much better than Sir Richard unusual and uncouth names sparingly inserted; Fanshaw. This was undertaken merely in comand that the style of the original should be co-pliment to me, who happened to say that it was pied in its elevation and depression. These are the best scene in Italian, and the worst in Engthe rules that are celebrated as so definite and lish. He was only two hours about it. It beimportant; and for the delivery of which to gins thus:mankind so much honour has been paid. Roscommon has indeed deserved his praises, had they been given with discernment, and bestowed not on the rules themselves, but the art with which they are introduced, and the decorations with which they are adorned. The "Essay," though generally excellent, is not without its faults. The story of the Quack, borrowed from Boileau, was not worth the importation; he has confounded the British, and Saxon mythology: I grant that from some mossy idol oak, In double rhymes, our Thor and Woden spoke. The oak, as I think Gildon has observed, belonged to the British druids, and Thor and Woden were Saxon deities. Of the double rhymes, which he so liberally supposes, he certainly had no knowledge. His interposition of a long paragraph of blank verses is unwarrantably licentious. Latin poets might as well have introduced a series of iambics among their heroics. His next work is the translation of the "Art of Poetry;" which has received, in my opinion, not less praise than it deserves. Blank verse, left merely to its numbers, has little operation either on the ear or mind: it can hardly support itself without bold figures and striking images. A poem frigidly didactic, without rhyme, is so near to prose, that the reader only scorns it for pretending to be verse. "Dear happy groves, and you the dark retreat Of silent horror, Rest's eternal seat." mended, it appears that he did not think a work From these lines, which are since somewhat of two hours fit to endure the eye of criticism without revisal. dies that had seen her translation of "Pompey," When Mrs. Philips was in Ireland, some laresolved to bring it on the stage at Dublin; and, to promote their design, Lord Roscommon gave them a prologue, and Sir Edward Dering an epilogue; "which," says she, "are the best is not criticism, it is at least gratitude. The performances of those kinds I ever saw." If this thought of bringing Cæsar and Pompey into Ireland, the only country over which Cæsar any power, is lucky. never had public seems to be right. He is elegant, but not Of Roscommon's works the judgment of the great; he never labours after exquisite beauties, and he seldom falls into gross faults. His versirhymes are remarkably exact. He improved fication is smooth, but rarely vigorous; and his taste, if he did not enlarge knowledge, and may be numbered among the benefactors to English literature.* This Life was originally written by Dr. Johnson in the "Gentleman's Magazine" for May, 1748. It then had notes, which are now incorporated with the text.-C OTWAY. Of THOMAS OTWAY, one of the first names in the English drama, little is known; nor is there any part of that little which his biographer can take pleasure in relating. He was born at Trottin, in Sussex, March 3, 1651, the son of Mr. Humphry Otway, rector of Woolbeding. From Winchester-school, where he was educated, he was entered, in 1669, a commoner of Christ-church; but left the university without a degree, whether for want of money, or from impatience of academical restraint, or mere eagerness to mingle with the world, is not known. in himself, those whom Otway frequented had but London in extreme indigence; which Rochester Tom Otway came next, Tom Shadwell's dear zany, Some exception, however, must be made. The Earl of Plymouth, one of King Charles' It seems likely that he was in hope of being natural sons, procured for him a cornet's combusy and conspicuous; for he went to London, mission in some troops then sent into Flanders. and commenced player; but found himself un- But Otway did not prosper in his military character: for he soon left his commission behind able to gain any reputation on the stage.* This kind of inability be shared with Shak-him, whatever was the reason, and came back to speare and Jonson, as he shared likewise some of their excellencies. It seems reasonable to expect that a great dramatic poet should without difficulty become a great actor; that he who can feel, could express; that he who can excite passion, should exhibit with great readiness its external modes: but since experience has fully proved, that of these powers, whatever be their affinity, one may be possessed in a great degree by him who has very little of the other; it must be allowed that they depend upon different faculties, or on different use of the same faculty; that the actor must have a pliancy of mien, a flexibility of countenance, and a variety of tones, which the poet may be easily supposed to want; or that the attention of the poet and the player has have been differently employed: the one been considering thought, and the other action; one has watched the heart, and the other contemplated the face. Though he could not gain much notice as a player, he felt in himself such powers as might qualify for a dramatic author; and in 1675, his "Alcibiades," a tratwenty-fifth year, produced gedy; whether from the Alcibiade of Palaprat, have not means to inquire. Langbaine, the great detector of plagiarism, is silent. In 1677, he published "Titus and Berenice," translated from Rapin, with the "Cheats of Scapin," from Moliere; and in 1678, "Friendship in Fashion," a comedy, which, whatever might be its first reception, was, upon its revival at Drury-lane, in 1749, hissed off the stage for immorality and obscenity. Want of morals, or of decency, did not in company those days exclude any man from the of the wealthy and the gay, if he brought with him any powers of entertainment; and Otway is said to have been at this time a favourite companion of the dissolute wits. desires no virtue in his companion has no virtue But as he who *In "Roscius Anglicanus," by Downes the prompter. p. 34, we learn that it was the character of the King, in Mrs. Behn's "Forced Marriage, or the Jealous Bridegroom," which Mr. Otway attempted to perform, and failed in. This event appears to have happened in the year 1672.-R. kill'd. But Apollo had seen his face on the stage, } "Don Carlos," from which he is represented as having received so much benefit, was played in 1675. It appears, by the lampoon, to have had great success, and is said to have been played thirty nights together. This, however, it is reasonable to doubt ; as so long a continuance of one play upon the stage is a very wide deviation from the practice of that time; the ardour for theatrical entertainments was not yet diffused through the whole people, and the audience, consisting nearly of the same persons, could be drawn together only by variety. when The "Orphan" was exhibited in 1680. This is one of the few plays that keep possession of the stage, and has pleased for almost a century, through all the vicissitudes of dramatic fashion. Of this play nothing new can easily be said. It is a domestic tragedy drawn from middle life. Its whole power is upon the affections; for it is not written with much comprehension of thought, or elegance of expression. But if the heart is interested, many other beauties may be wanting, yet not be missed. The same year produced "The History and Fall of Caius Marius ;" much of which is borrowed from the "Romeo and Juliet" of Shakspeare. In 1683 was published the first, and next year the second, parts of "The Soldier's For tune," two comedies now forgotten; and in 1685§ his last and greatest dramatic work, This doubt is indeed very reasonable. I know not Wherever it is said, it is untrue. where it is said that "Don Carlos" was acted thirty nights together. Downes, who is perfectly good authority on this point, informs us that it was performed ten days successive1684. § 1682 ly. Malone. 1681. "Venice Preserved," a tragedy which still continues to be one of the favourites of the public, notwithstanding the want of morality in the original design, and the despicable scenes of vile comedy with which he has diversified his tragic action. By comparing this with his "Orphan," it will appear that his images were by time become stronger, and his language more energetic. The striking passages are in every mouth; and the public seems to judge rightly of the faults and excellencies of this play, that it is the work of a man not attentive to decency, nor zealous for virtue; but of one who conceived forcibly, and drew originally, by consulting nature in his own breast. Together with those plays he wrote the poems which are in the present collection, and translated from the French the "History of the Triumvirate." All this was performed before he was thirtyfour years old; for he died April 14, 1685, in a manner which I am unwilling to mention. Hai ving been compelled by his necessities to contract debts, and hunted, as is supposed, by the terriers of the law, he retired to a public-house on Tower-hill, where he is said to have died of want; or, as it is related by one of his biographers, by swallowing, after a long fast, a piece The "despicable scenes of vile comedy" can be no bar to its being a favourite of the public, as they are always omiued in the representation.-J. B. of bread which charity had supplied. He went out, as is reported, almost naked, in the rage of hunger, and, finding a gentleman in a neighbouring coffee-house, asked him for a shilling. The gentleman gave him a guinea; and Otway going away bought a roll, and was choked with the first mouthful. All this, I hope, is not true; and there is this ground of better hope, that Pope, who lived near enough to be well informed, relates in Spence's "Memorials," that he died of a fever caught by violent pursuit of a thief that had robbed one of his friends. But that indigence, and its concomitants, sorrow and despondency, pressed hard upon him, has never been denied, whatever immediate cause might bring him to the grave. Of the poems which the present collection admits, the longest is the " Poet's Complaint of his Muse," part of which I do not understand; and in that which is less obscure, I find little to commend. The language is often gross, and the numbers are harsh. Otway had not much cultivated versification, nor much replenished his mind with general knowledge. His principal power was in moving the passions, to which Drydent in his latter years left an illustrious testimony. He appears by some of his verses to have been a zealous loyalist, and had what was in those times the common reward of loyalty; he lived and died neglected. In his preface to Fresnoy's "Art of Painting.”—Dr. J WALLER. EDMUND WALLER was born on the third of March, 1605, at Colshill, in Hertfordshire. His father was Robert Waller, Esq. of Agmondesham, in Buckinghamshire, whose family was originally a branch of the Kentish Wallers; and his mother was the daughter of John Hampden, of Hampden in the same county, and sister to Hampden, the zealot of rebellion. His father died while he was yet an infant, but left him a yearly income of three thousand five hundred pounds; which, rating together the value of money and the customs of life, we may reckon more than equivalent to ten thousand at the present time. He was educated by the care of his mother, at Eton; and removed afterwards to King's College, in Cambridge. He was sent to parliament in his eighteenth, if not in his sixteenth, year, and frequented the court of James the First, where he heard a very remarkable conversation, which the writer of the Life prefixed to his Works, who seems to have been well informed of facts, though he may sometimes err in chronology, has delivered as indubitably certain:- "He found Dr. Andrews, bishop of Winchester, and Dr. Neale, bishop of Durham, standing behind his majesty's chair; and there happened something extraordinary," continues this writer, "in the conversation those prelates had with the King, on which Mr. Waller did often reflect. His majesty asked the bishops, 'My Lords, cannot I take my subjects' money when I want it, without all this formality of parliament ? The Bishop of Durham readily answered, 'God forbid, Sir, but you should: you are the breath of our nostrils.' Whereupon the King turned, and said to the Bishop of Winchester, Well, my Lord, what say you?' 'Sir,' replied the Bishop, 'I have no skill to judge of parliamentary cases.' The King answered, 'No put-offs, my Lord; answer me presently.' Then, Sir,' said he, I think it is lawful for you to take my brother Neale's money; for he offers it.' Mr. Waller said, the company was pleased with this answer, and the wit of it seemed to affect the King; for, a certain lord coming in soon after, his Majesty cried out. 'Oh, my Lord, they say you lig with my lady.' No, Sir,' says his Lordship in confusion; but I like her company, because she has so much wit.' 'Why then,' says the King, 'do you not lig with my Lord of Winchester there?"" Waller's political and poetical life began nearly together. In his eighteenth year he wrote the poem that appears first in his works, on the "Prince's Escape at St. Andero :" a piece which justifies the observation made by one of his editors, that he attained, by a felicity like in wishes, though in vain, to break, and whose presence is wine that inflames to madness. stinct, a style which, perhaps, will never be obsolete: and that, were we to judge only by the wording, we could not know what was wrote His acquaintance with this high-born dame at twenty, and what at four-score." His versi- gave wit no opportunity of boasting its influfication was, in his first essay, such as it appears ence; she was not to be subdued by the powers in his last performance. By the perusal of Fair- of verse, but rejected his addresses, it is said, fax's translation of "Tasso," to which, as Dry-with disdain, and drove him away to solace his den* relates, he confessed himself indebted for disappointment with Amoret or Phillis. She the smoothness of his numbers, and by his own married, in 1639, the Earl of Sunderland, who nicety of observation, he had already formed died at Newberry in the King's cause; and, in such a system of metrical harmony as he never her old age, meeting somewhere with Waller, afterwards much needed, or much endeavoured asked him when he would again write such to improve. Denham corrected his numbers by verses upon her: "When you are as young, experience, and gained ground gradually upon Madam," said he, "and as handsome as you the ruggedness of his age; but what was acquired by Denham was inherited by Waller. The next poem, of which the subject seems to fix the time, is supposed by Mr. Fenton to be the Address to the Queen, which he considers as congratulating her arrival, in Waller's twentieth year. He is apparently mistaken; for the mention of the nation's obligations to her frequent pregnancy, proves that it was written when she had brought many children. We have therefore no date of any other poetical production before that which the murder of the Duke of Buckingham occasioned: the steadiness with which the King received the news in the chapel deserved indeed to be rescued from oblivion. were then." In this part of his life it was that he was known to Clarendon, among the rest of the men who were eminent in that age for genius and literature; but known so little to his advantage that they who read his character will not much condemn Sacharissa, that she did not descend from her rank to his embraces, nor think every excellence comprised in wit. The lady was, indeed, inexorable; but his uncommon qualifications, though they had no power upon her, recommended him to the scholars and statesmen; and undoubtedly many beauties of that time, however they might receive his love, were proud of his praises. Who they were whom he dignifies with poetical names, cannot now be known. Amoret, according to Mr. Fenton, was the Lady Sophia Murray. Perhaps by traditions preserved in families more may be discovered. Neither of these pieces that seem to carry their own dates could have been the sudden effusion of fancy. In the verses on the Prince's escape, the prediction of his marriage with the Princess of France must have been written after the event; in the other, the promises of the From the verses written at Penshurst, it has King's kindness to the descendants of Bucking- been collected that he diverted his disappointham, which could not be properly praised till it ment by a voyage; and his biographers, from had appeared by its effects, show that time was his poem on the Whales, think it not improbable taken for revision and improvement. It is not that he visited the Bermudas; but it seems known that they were published till they ap-much more likely that he should amuse himself peared long afterwards with other poems. Waller was not one of those idolaters of praise who cultivate their minds at the expense of their fortunes. Rich as he was by inheritance, he took care early to grow richer, by marrying Mrs. Banks, a great heiress in the city, whom the interest of the court was employed to obtain for Mr. Croft. Having brought him a son, who died young, and a daughter, who was afterwards married to Mr. Dormer, of Oxfordshire, she died in childbed, and left him a widower of about fiveand-twenty, gay and wealthy, to please himself with another marriage. Being too young to resist beauty, and probably too vain to think himself resistible, he fixed his heart, perhaps half fondly and half ambitiously, upon the Lady Dorothea Sidney, eldest daughter of the Earl of Leicester, whom he courted by all the poetry in which Sacharissa is celebrated; the name is derived from the Latin appellation of sugar, and implies, if it means any thing, a spiritless mildness, and dull good-nature, such as excites rather tenderness than esteem, and such as, though always treated with kindness, is never honoured or admired. Yet he describes Sacharissa as a sublime predominating beauty, of lofty charms, and imperious influence, on whom he looks with amaze. ment rather than fondness, whose chains he Preface to his "Fables."-Dr. J. with forming an imaginary scene, than that so important an incident as a visit to America, should have been left floating in conjectural probability. From his twenty-eighth to his thirty-fifth year, he wrote his pieces on the reduction of Sallee; on the reparation of St. Paul's; to the King on his Navy; the panegyric on the Queen-mother; the two poems to the Earl of Northumberland; and perhaps others, of which the time cannot be discovered. When he had lost all hopes of Sacharissa, he looked round him for an easier conquest, and gained a lady of the family of Bresse, or Breaux. The time of his marriage is not exactly known. It has not beeu discovered that this wife was won by his poetry; nor is any thing told of her, but that she brought him many children. He doubtless praised some whom he would have been afraid to marry, and perhaps married one whom he would have been ashamed to praise. Many qualities contribute to domestic happiness, upon which poetry has no colours to bestow; and many airs and sallies may delight imagination, which he who flatters them never can approve. There are charms made only for distant admiration. No spectacle is nobler than a blaze. Of this wife, his biographers have recorded that she gave him five sons and eight daughters. During the long interval of parliament, he is represented as living among those with whom it was most honourable to converse, and enjoying |