phyfics a new and useful turn. I know, fays he, in one of these, how little regard you pay to writings of this kind; but Imagine, that if you can like any, it must be those that strip metaphyfics of all their bombaft, keep within the fight of every well conftituted eye, and never bewilder themselves, whilft they pretend to guide the reafon of others. Having now arrived at the fixtieth year of his age, and being bleffed with a very competent fhare of fortune, he returned into France, far from the noise and hurry of party; for his feat at Dawley was too near to devote the reft of his life to retirement and ftudy. Upon his going to that country, as it was generally known that difdain, vexation, and difappointment had driven him there, many of his friends as well as his enemies fuppofed, that he was once again gone over to the Pretender. Among the number who entertained this fufpicion was Swift, whom Pope in one of his letters very roundly chides for harbouring fuch an unjust opinion. "You fhould "be cautious," fays he," of cenfuring any motion "or action of Lord Bolingbroke, because you hear it only from a fhallow, envious, and malicious re66 porter. What you writ to me about him, I find, "to my great scandal, repeated in one of yours to "another. Whatever you might hint to me, was "this for the profane? The thing, if true, fhould "be concealed; but it is, I affure you, abfolutely "untrue in every circumftance. He has fixed in a very agreeable retirement, near Fontainbleau, " and makes it his whole business vacare litteris." .. 66 This reproof from Pope was not more friendly than it was true; Lord Bolingbroke was too well acquainted with the forlorn ftate of that party, and the folly of its conductors, once more to embark in their defperate concerns. He now faw that he had gone as far towards reinftating himself in the full poffeffion of his former honours, as the mere dint of parts and application could go, and was at length experimentally convinced, that the decree was abfolutely irreverfible, and the door of the House of Lords finally fhut against him. He therefore at Pope's fuggeftion retired merely to be at leifure from the broils of oppofition, for the calmer pleasures of philofophy. Thus the decline of his life, though lefs brilliant, became more amiable, and even his happiness was improved by age, which had rendered his paffions more moderate, and his wishes more attainable. But he was far from fuffering even in folitude his hours to glide away in torpid inactivity. That active reftlefs difpofition ftill continued to actuate his pursuits; and having loft the season for gaining power over his contemporaries, he was now refolved upon acquiring fame from pofterity. He had not been long in his retreat near Fontainbleau, when he began a course of letters on the ftudy and use of hisftory, for the ufe of a young nobleman. In thefe he does not follow the methods of St. Real and others who have treated on this fubject, who make hiftory the great fountain of all knowledge; he very wifely confines its benefits, and fuppofes them rather to confift in deducing general maxims from particular facts, than in illuftrating maxims by the application of hiftorical paffages. In mentioning ecclefiaftical hiftory he gives his opinion very freely upon the fubject of the divine original of the facred books, which he fuppofes to have no fuch foundation. This new fyftem of thinking, which he had always propagated in converfation, and which he now began to adopt in his more laboured compofitions, feemed no way supported either by his acutenefs or his learning. He began to reflect seriously on thefe fubjects too late in life, and to fuppofe thofe objections very new and unanswerable, which had been already confuted by thousands. "Lord Bolingbroke," fays Pope, in one of his letters, "is above trifling; when he "writes of any thing in this world, he is more than "mortal. If ever he trifles, it must be when he "turns divine." In the mean time, as it was evident that a man of his active ambition, in chufing retirement when no longer able to lead in public, muft be liable to ridicule in refuming a refigned philofophical air : in order to obviate the cenfure, he addreffed a letter to Lord Bathurst, upon the true ufe of retirement and ftudy; in which he fhows himself still able and willing to undertake the cause of his country, whenever its diftreffes fhould require his exertion. I have, fays he, renounced neither my country nor my friends; and by friends I mean all those, and those alone, who are fuch to their country. In their profperity they fhall never hear of me; in their dif trefs always. In that retreat, wherein the remainder of my days fhall be spent, I may be of fome use to them, fince even thence I may advise, exhort, and warn them. Bent upon this purfuit only, and having now exchanged the gay ftatefman for the grave philofopher, he thone forth with diftinguished luftre. His converfation took a different turn from what had been usual with him; and as we are affured by Lord Orrery, who knew him, it united the wisdom of Socrates, the dignity and ease of Pliny, and the wit of Horace. Yet ftill amid his refolutions to turn himself from politics, and to give himself up entirely to the calls of philofophy, he could not refift embarking once more in the debates of his country; and coming back from France, fettled at Batterfea, an old feat which was his father's, and had been long in the poffeffion of the family. He fuppofed he faw an impending calamity, and though it was not in his power to remove, he thought it his duty to retard its fall. To redeem or fave the nation from perdition, he thought thought impoffible, fince national corruptions were to be purged by national calamities; but he was refolved to lend his feeble affiftance, to ftem the torrent that was pouring in. With this fpirit he wrote that excellent piece, which is intituled, "The Idea of a Patriot King;" in which he defcribes a monarch uninfluenced by party, leaning to the fuggeftions neither of whigs nor tories, but equally the friend and the father of all. Some time after, in the year 1749, after the conclufion of the peace two years before, the measures taken by the adminiftration feemed not to have been repugnant to his notions of political prudence for that juncture; in that year he wrote his laft production, containing reflections on the then state of the nation, principally with regard to her taxes and debts, and on the causes and confequences of them. This undertaking was left unfinished, for death snatched the pen from the hand of the writer. Having paffed the latter part of his life in dignity and fplendour, his rational faculties improved by reflection, and his ambition kept under by difappointment, his whole aim feemed to have been to leave the stage of life, on which he had acted fuch various parts, with applaufe. He had long wifhed to fetch his last breath at Batterfea, the place where he was born; and fortune, that had through life feemed to traverse all his aims, at laft indulged him in this. He had long been troubled with a cancer in his cheek, by which excruciating disease he died on the verge of fourfcore years of age. He was confonant with himself to the last, and those principles which he had all along avowed, he confirmed with his dying breath, having given orders that none of the clergy should be permitted to trouble him in his latest moments. His body was interred in Batterfea church with thofe of his ancestors; and a marble monument erected erected to his memory, with the following excellent infcription. Here lies HENRY ST. JOHN, In the Reign of Queen Anne In the Days of King George I. and King Something more and better. His Attachment to Queen Anne Expofed him to a long and fevere Perfecution; He died the 12th of December, 1751, In this manner lived and died Lord Bolingbroke; ever active, never depreffed, ever pursuing fortune, and as conftantly difappointed by her. In whatever light we view his character, we fhall find him an object rather properer for our wonder, than our imitation, more to be feared than esteemed, and gaining our admiration without our love. His ambition ever aimed at the fummit of power, and nothing feemed capable of fatisfying his immoderate defires, but the liberty of governing all things without a rival. With as much ambition, as great abilities, and more acquired knowledge than Cæfar, he wanted only his courage to be as fuccefsful; but the fchemes his head dictated his heart often refused to execute; and he |