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High dames of honor once, that garnish'd
The drawing room of fierce queen Mary.

The Peeress comes. The audience stare
And off their hats with due submission;
She curt'sies, as she takes her chair,
To all the people of condition.

The bard with many an artful fib,
Had in imagination fenc'd him,
Disprov'd the arguments or Squib,
And all that groom could urge against him.

But soon his rhetoric forsook him,
When he the solemn hall had seen;
A sudden fit of ague shook him;
He stood as mute as poor Macleane.

Yet something he was heard to mutter,
"How in the park beneath an old tree,

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(Without design to hurt the butter, "Or any malice to the poultry),

"He once or twice had penn'd a sonnet,
"Yet hoped, that he might save his bacon,
"Numbers would give their oaths upon it,'
"He ne'er was for a conj'rer taken."

The ghostly prudes with hagged face
Already had condemn'd the sinner,
My lady rose and with a grace-
She smil'd, and bid him come to dinner.
"Jesu-Maria! Madam Bridget,

"Why, what can the viscountess mean?"
(Cried the square-hoods in woeful fidget)
"The times are alter'd quite and clean!
"Decorum 's turn'd' to mere civility,
"Her air and all her manners shew it,
Commend me to her affability;
Speak to a commoner and poet!"

[Here 500 Stanzas are lost.]

In 1753, several of his poems were splendidly published, with designs by Mr. Bently; and this year he lost his mother. In 1756, some young men of the college, whose chambers were near his, diverted themselves with disturbing him by frequent and troublesome noises. This insolence, having endured it awhile, he

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represented to the governors of the college; but finding his com plaint little regarded, he removed to Pembroke-hall. In 1757, he published "The Progress of Poetry," and "The Bard-" This year he had the offer of being appointed poet-laureat; but he declined the office.

Two years after, he quitted Cambridge for some time, and took an apartment near the British Museum; where he resided near three years, reading and transcribing. In 1765, he undertook a journey into Scotland. In 1768, without his own solicitation, or that of his friends, he was appointed regius professor of modern history in the university of Cambridge. He lived there three years after this promotion; and died on the 31st of July,

1772.

The poems of Gray are few in number, but they possess a very high degree of merit. A complete edition of them, with me. moirs of his life, including many of his letters, was published by his ingenious friend Mr. W. Mason, in four volumes, 8vo. in 1778.

The following character of Gray, was published soon after his death:

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Perhaps he was the most learned man in Europe. He was equally acquainted with the elegant and profound parts of science, and that not superficially, but thoroughly. He knew every branch of history, both natural and civil; had read all the original historians of England, France, and Italy; and was a great antiquarian. Criticism, metaphysics, morals, politics, made a principal part of his study; voyages and travels of all sorts were his favorite amusements; and he had a fine taste in painting, prints, architecture, and gardening. With such a fund of knowledge, his conversation must have been equally instructing and entertaining; but he was also a good man, a man of virtue and humanity. There is no character without some speck, some imperfection; and I think the greatest defect in his, was an affectation in delicacy, or rather effeminancy, and a visible fastidiousness, or contempt and disdain of his inferiors in science. He also had in some degree, that weakness which disgusted Voltaire so much with Mr. Congreve ; though he seemed to value others chiefly according to the progress they had made in knowledge, yet he could not bear to be consider

ed himself merely as a man of letters; and though without birth or fortune, or station, his desire was to be looked upon as a private, independant gentleman, who read for his amusement. Perhaps it may be said, what signifies so much knowledge, when it prodcues so little? Is it worth taking so much pains to leave no memorial but a few poems? But let it be considered, that Mr. Gray was, to others, at least innocently employed; to himself, certainly beneficially. His time passed agreeably; he was every day making some new acquisition in science; his mind was enlarged, his heart softened, his virtue strengthened; the world and mankind were shewn to him without a mask; and he was taught to consider every thing as trifling, and unworthy of the attention of a wise man, except the pursuit of knowledge, and practice of virtue, in that state wherein God hath placed us."

Some of the poems of Gray, have been treated with great critical arrogance and injustice by Dr. Johnson; but they have been ably defended by several ingenious writers; and Dr. Warton has remarked, that Pope himself has produced nothing equal to the bard of Gray. Perhaps one reason that induced Johnson to attack Gray's poems with so much severity was, that he had obtained great reputation, though he was a Cambridge man; for such prejudices, however absurd, are known to have operated on the mind of Johnson.

Before we conclude, we shall here insert our author's Adversity."

"Daughter of Jove, relentless pow'r,

Thou tamer of the human breast,

Whose iron scourge and tort'ring hour,

The bad affright, afflict the best!

Bound in thy adamantine chain

The Proud are taught to taste of pain,

And purple tyrants vainly groan

With pangs unfelt before, unpitied and alone.

"When first thy sire to send on earth

Virtue, his darling child, design'd,
To thee he gave the heav'nly birth,
And bad to form her infant mind.

Ode to

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What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know,

And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe.

"Scar'd at the frown terrific, fly

Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood,

While laughter, Noise, and thoughtless joy,

And leave us leisure to be good.

Light they disperse, and with them go

The summer friend, the flatt'ring foe;

By vain prosperity received,

To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd
Wisdom in sable garb array'd,

Immers'd in rap'rous thought profound,

And melancholy, silent maid,

With leaden eye, that loves the ground,

Still on thy solemn steps attend:
Warm charity, the general friend,

With justice to herself severe,

And pity, dropping soft the sadly pleasing tear.
“Oh, gently on thy suppliant's head,

Dread goddess, lay thy chast'ning hand!'
Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad,

Nor circled with the vengeful band

(As by the impious thou art seen)

With thund'ring voice, and threat'ning mien.
With screaming horror's funeral cry,

Despair, and fell disease, and ghastly poverty.

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Thy form benign, oh goddess, wear,

Thy milder influence impart,

Thy philosophic train be there

To soften, not to wound my heart.
The generons spark extinct revive,
Teach me to love and to forgive,

Exact my own defects to scan,

What others are to feel, and know myself a man.”

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Authorities, Mason's Memoirs of the life and writings of

Mr. Gray. Johnson's Lives of the poets,

89

THE LIFE OF

DAVID HUME.

[A. D. 1711, to 1776.]

DAVID HUME was born at Edinburgh on the 26th of April, 1711. He was descended from a good family, both on the father and mother's side. His father's family was a branch of the earl of Home's, or Hume's, and his ancestors had been proprietors of the estate, which his brother possessed, for several generations. His mother was daughter of sir David Falconer, president of the college of justice. His family however, was not rich; and as he was a younger brother, his patrimony was very slender. His father, who was considered as a man of parts, died when he was an infant, leaving him, with an elder brother and sister, under the care of his mother, a woman of great merit, who though young and handsome, devoted herself entirely to the rearing and educating of her children. He early discovered a strong passion for literature, and prosecuted his studies very successfully. He says himself, "My studious disposition, my sobriety, and my industry, gave my family a notion, that the law was a proper profession for me; but I found an unsurmountable aversion to every thing, but the pursuits of philosophy and general learning; and while they fancied I was poring upon Voet and Vinnius, Cicero and Virgil were the authors which I was secretly devouring.

"My very slender fortune, however, being unsuitable to this plan of life, and my health being a little broken by my ardent application, I was tempted, or rather forced, to make a very feeble trial for entering into a more active scene of life. In 1734, I went to Bristol, with some recommendations to eminent merchants, but in a few months found that scene totally unsuitable

to me."

He passed through his academical courses at the University of Edinburgh, and afterwards went over into France, with a view of prosecuting his studies in a country retirement, and he says, "During my retreat in France, first at Rheims, but chiefly at La Fleche, in Anjou, I composed my "Treatise " of Human Nature." After passing three years very agreeably in that country, I came over

VOL. IV.

M

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