Our Will* shall be wild fowl, of excellent flavor; And Dickt with his pepper shall heighten the sa vor: Still aiming at honor, yet fearing to roam, Our Cumberland's sweet-bread its place shall What was good was spontaneous, his faults were his Here lies honest Richard, whose fate I must Alas! that such frolic should now be so quiet: And Douglas is pudding, substantial and plain: If he had any faults, he has left us in doubt, We scarcely can praise it, or blame it too much; To persuade Tommy Townshend‡‡ to lend him a Here Cumberland lies, having acted his parts, The Terence of England, the mender of hearts; A flattering painter, who made it his care To draw men as they ought to be, not as they are. His gallants are all faultless, his women divine, And Comedy wonders at being so fine: Like a tragedy queen he has dizen'd her out, Or rather like Tragedy giving a rout. His fools have their follies so lost in a crowd Of virtues and feelings, that folly grows proud; And coxcombs, alike in their failings, alone, Adopting his portraits, are pleas'd with their own Say, where has our poet this malady caught? Or wherefore his characters thus without fault? Say, was it that vainly directing his view To find out men's virtues, and finding them few, Quite sick of pursuing each troublesome elf, He grew lazy at last, and drew from himself? Here Douglas retires from his toils to relax, When satire and censure encircled his throne; Macpherson write bombast, and call it a style; No countryman living their tricks to discover; Here lies David Garrick, describe him who can, * Mr. William Burke, Secretary to General Conway, An abridgment of all that was pleasant in man: and Member for Bedwin. † Mr. Richard Burke, Collector of Grenada. ↑ Mr. Richard Cumberland, author of the West-Indian, Fashionable Lover, The Brothers, and other dramatic pieces. § Dr. Douglas, Bishop of Salisbury, who no less distinguished himself as a citizen of the world, than a sound critic, in detecting several literary mistakes (or rather forgeries) of his countrymen; particularly Lauder on Milton, and Bower's History of the Popes. | David Garrick, Esq. ¶ Counsellor John Ridge, a gentleman belonging to the Irish bar. ** Sir Joshua Reynolds. tt An eminent attorney. 1f Mr. T. Townshend, Member for Whitchurch. As an actor, confest without rival to shine; * Mr. Richard Burke. This gentleman having slightly fractured one of his arms and legs, at different times, the Doctor has rallied him on those accidents, as a kind of retributive justice for breaking his jests upon other people. †The Rev. Dr. Dodd. Dr. Kenrick, who read lectures at the Devil Tavern, under the title of The School of Shakspeare. § James Macpherson, Esq. who, from the mere force of his style, wrote down the first poet of all antiquity. SAMUEL JOHNSON. SAMUEL JOHNSON, a writer of great eminence, thirteen nights, but has never since appeared on was born in 1709 at Litchfield, in which city his the theatre: Johnson, in fact, found that he was not father was a petty bookseller. After a desultory formed to excel on the stage, and made no further course of school-education, it was proposed to him, trials. by Mr. Corbet, a neighboring gentleman, that he His periodical paper, entitled "The Rambler," should accompany his own son to Oxford as his appeared in March 1750, and was continued till companion; accordingly, in his nineteenth year, he March 1752. The solemnity of this paper prewas elected a commoner of Pembroke College. vented it at first from attaining an extensive cirFrom young Corbet's departure, he was left to culation; but after it was collected into volumes, it struggle with penury till he had completed a resi- continually rose in the public esteem, and the author dence of three years, when he quitted Oxford had the satisfaction of seeing a tenth edition. The without taking a degree. His father died, in very" Adventurer," conducted by Dr. Hawkesworth, narrow circumstances, soon after his return from the succeeded the Rambler, and Johnson contributed university; and for some time he attempted to gain several papers of his own writing. In 1755, the a maintenance by some literary projects. At length, first edition of his "Dictionary" made its appearin 1735, he thought proper to marry a widow twice ance. It was received by the public with general his own age, and far from attractive, either in her applause, and its author was ranked among the person or manners. By the aid of her fortune he greatest benefactors of his native tongue. Modern was enabled to set up a school for instruction in Latin accuracy, however, has given an insight into its and Greek, but the plan did not succeed; and after defects; and though it still stands as the capital a year's experiment, he resolved to try his fortune work of the kind in the language, its authority as a in the great metropolis. Garrick, afterwards the standard is somewhat depreciated. Upon the last celebrated actor, had been one of his pupils, accom- illness of his aged mother, in 1759, for the purpose panied by whom he arrived in London; Johnson of paying her a visit, and defraying the expense of having in his pocket his unfinished tragedy of Irene. her funeral, he wrote his romance of " Rasselas, The first notice which he drew from the judges Prince of Abyssinia," one of his most splendid perof literary merit, was by the publication of " London, formances, elegant in language, rich in imagery, a Poem," in imitation of Juvenal's third satire. and weighty in sentiment. Its views of human life The manly vigor, and strong painting, of this per-are, indeed, deeply tinged with the gloom that overformance, placed it high among works of its kind, shadowed the author's mind; nor can it be praised though it must be allowed, that its censure is coarse for moral effect. and exaggerated, and that it ranks rather as a party, Soon after the accession of George III., a than as a moral poem. It was published in 1738. grant of a pension of 300l. per annum was made For some years Johnson is chiefly to be traced in him by His Majesty during the ministry of Lord the pages of the Gentleman's Magazine, then con- Bute. A short struggle of repugnance to accept a ducted by Cave; and it was for this work that he favor from the House of Hanover was overcome gratified the public with some extraordinary pieces of eloquence which he composed under the disguise of debates in the senate of Liliput, meaning the British parliament. He likewise wrote various biographical articles for the same miscellany, of which the principal and most admired was "The Life of Savage." by a sense of the honor and substantial benefit conferred by it, and he became that character, a pensioner, on which he had bestowed a sarcastic definition in his Dictionary. Much obloquy attended this circumstance of his life, which was enhanced when he published, in several of his productions, arguments which seemed directly to oppose the rising spirit of liberty. The plan of his English Dictionary was laid before the public in a letter addressed to Lord Ches- A long-promised edition of Shakspeare appeared terfield in 1747. In the same year he furnished in 1765; but though ushered in by a preface writ Garrick with a prologue on the opening of Drury-ten with all the powers of his masterly peu, the lane theatre, which in sense and poetry has not a edition itself disappointed those who expected much competitor among compositions of this class, except from his ability to elucidate the obscurities of the ing Pope's prologue to Cato. Another imitation great dramatist. A tour to the Western Islands of of Juvenal, entitled "The Vanity of Human Scotland in 1773, in which he was attended by his Wishes," was printed in 1749, and may be said to enthusiastic admirer and obsequious friend, James reach the sublime of ethical poetry, and to stand at Boswell, Esq. was a remarkable incident of his life. the head of classical imitations. The same year. considering that a strong antipathy to the natives of under the auspices of Garrick, brought on the stage that country had long been conspicuous in his conof Drury-lane his tragedy of "Irene." It ran versation. But when, two years afterwards, he LONDON: Behold her the Tumphant in the tam. The part of commerce, and he iron of Sen. NIMITATION OF THE THIRD SATIRE JE JUVENAL And for a moment nil he sense if we Tum patiens irbis, 'am ferrens it 'enent e "—Jua Taaran ref and findness in my breast whel. When njurt Thaies bits the own threweil. Yet till my mumer thoughts us thoice nmmend. I raise the hernit, ut regret the end, Resiv i at Length from mee and Landon far To breathe n istant ields a rer ur And, ix't on Cambra's solitary shore. Give 4. Damit me re Briton more For who would Leara, inor) i. Hiberia's and. Or change the melts of Sentiand for the Strand “ There none are swept by sudden te rv1. But ail, whom hunger spares, with age decay: Here malice, mine, emident, conspire. And now a monie rages, aw 1 fre: Their ambush her relentless ruffians lay. And here the fei. inorney prow's for prev; Here failing houses thunder in your head. And here a female atheist niks on fead. Wule Thales wus the wherry that contains Of dissipated wealth the mail remains, On Thames's banks, in silent thought, we stood Where Greenwich miles apon the siver food ; Stick with the seat that gave Eliza* birth. We kneel, and is the consecrated earth : in plesang dreams the bitssful age renew, And call Bettannia's glories back a view: • Queen Elizaneta, born at Greenwich. 4: ength waking with contenɔtɔus iWIL. Indignant Thaies as he reign ang pwL Since worth, te mes nese tenerte tave Wints even the hean wart of my TUSP In these mrsi wails, ievotees und gu Since inrewardesi se:enes vile in run Since hope it soothes o iourie my fistress, And every moment leaves ny ittle ess Wie get my steady sters no staff sustains. And he stul vg mus reis n ny vars Grant me kind Heaven, o in me harmer ace Where onesty id sense tre 10 fsgare, Some leasing ank where remiant mers nav. Sime penertiu vaie with Nature's pannes LI": Where ince the harass i Beton Sound repase, And safe in poverty tetiei us Des Some secret reil, ve now is, minigent gire To vote a parrot ines, a curter wine: To such, the plunder of a land is giv'n, Well may they rise, while I, whose rustic tongue For what but social guilt the friend endears? The cheated nation's happy fav'rites, see! Illustrious Edward! from the realms of day, On Britain's fond credulity they prey. No gainful trade their industry can 'scape, Well may they venture on the mimic's art, Who play from morn to night a borrow'd part; Practis'd their master's notions to embrace, Repeat his maxims, and reflect his face; With ev'ry wild absurdity comply, And view each object with another's eye; To shake with laughter ere the jest they hear, To pour at will the counterfeited tear; And, as their patron hints the cold or heat, To shake in dog-days, in December sweat. How, when competitors like these contend, gropes his breeches with a monarch's air. By numbers here from shame or censure free, But here more slow, where all are slaves to gold, But hark! th' affrighted crowd's tumultuous cries They sing, they dance, clean shoes, or cure a Roll through the streets, and thunder to the skies: clap: All sciences a fasting Monsieur knows, Ah! what avails it, that, from slav'ry far, Besides, with justice, this discerning age Admires their wondrous talents for the stage: |