It happened, however, that Pope preferred in-door to out-door nature; but did this require inferior skill or less of the creative faculty than Mr Bowles's nature? In Pope's artificial life we discover a great deal of nature; and in Mr Bowles's nature, or poetry, we find much that is artificial. On this absurd principle of definition and criterion, Mr Wordsworth, who is often by genius so true a poet, is by his theory so mistaken a one. Darwin too ascertained that the invariable principle of poetry,' or, in his own words, the essence of poetry, was picture.' This was a convenient principle for one whose solitary talent lay in the minute pencillings of his descriptions; and the idea was instantly adopted as being so consonant to nature, and to Alderman Boydell, that our author-painters now asserted that if the excellence of a poem consisted in forming a picture, the more perfect poetry would be painting itself: -in consequence of this invariable principle of poetry,' Mr Shee, in his brilliant Rhymes on Art,' declared that the narrative of an action is not comparable to the action itself before the eyes,' and Barry ardently exclaimed, that 'painting is poetry realized !' To detract from what itself is excellent, by parallels with another species of excellence, or by trying it by some arbitrary criterion, will ever terminate, as here, in false criticism and absurd depreciation."

Jonathan Swift.

BORN A. D. 1667.-died A. D. 1745.

JONATHAN SWIFT, poet, politician, divine, and wit, one of the most accomplished and remarkable men in an age which has been characterized as the Augustine era of English literature, was the son of an Irish gentleman of good family but very straitened circumstances. His mother was an English lady, a native of Leicestershire, whose ancient genealogy was also her principal inheritance. The father died in 1667, leaving an infant-daughter, and his pregnant widow, to the care of a brother, in whose house, in Hoey's-court, Dublin, Jonathan Swift was born, on the 30th of November, 1667.

His

At the age of six the orphan was sent to school at Kilkenny. mother had returned to her native country within two years after her husband's death, but her boy remained in charge of a faithful nurse under his uncle's roof. In 1682 young Swift was received as a pensioner into Trinity college, Dublin; a cousin of his, who afterwards became rector of Puttenham in Surrey, and who advanced claims to a share in the authorship of The Tale of a Tub,' to which he was by no means entitled, accompanied Swift to college. At the university, he seems to have pursued his studies in a very fitful and desultory manner, besides being guilty of many irregularities and violent breaches of academical decorum. When he took his bachelor's degree it bore to have been granted speciali gratiâd, or of the unearned favour of the senate; and at last he, and five of his associates, received a public admonition for notorious neglect of duties. The reproof, however merited, failed to work the reformation of one of the culprits at least, for we soon afterwards find Swift convicted of insolent conduct towards Dean Lloyd, and suspended from his academical degree in consequence. In

this fact we have, probably, the secret of that keen dislike to his Alma Mater, and to Dr Lloyd, which appears in his writings.

In 1688 Swift left college, and joined his mother in Leicestershire. Mrs Swift was related to the lady of Sir William Temple, and that accomplished statesman and scholar took young Swift into his house as an amanuensis. King William occasionally visited Temple, and Swift was so far honoured with the confidence of both as to be permitted to be present at their confidential interviews. Swift's conversational powers amused his majesty, while his quick and keen penetration was probably of use to Sir William in these interviews. The king offered him a troop of horse, which he respectfully declined, but his hopes of church preferment were now justly excited.

In 1692 Swift was admitted of Hart's hall, Oxford, and in the same year took his master's degree at that university. He appears to have been very graciously received at Oxford. About this time he produced his Pindaric Odes,' "the only kind of writing which he seriously attempted without attaining excellence," says one of his biographers, whose opinion must be deferred to on such a point. "But," Sir Walter Scott adds, "after all the vituperation which has been heaped upon these odes, they are not, generally speaking, worse than the pindaries of Donne and Cowley, which, in the earlier part of the century, gained these authors unbounded applause." The bard is said to have consulted Dryden as to the merit of these poetical prolusions, and to have received the staggering reply, which he never forgot, "Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet."

In 1694 Swift went to Ireland, and took orders. His first preferment was the prebend of Kilroot, in the diocese of Connor, with about £100 a-year. He resided a short time on his living, but threw it up the following year, and returned to his old patron Sir William Temple, with whom he continued to reside till his death in 1699. We have elsewhere noticed the foolish controversy betwixt Temple and Wotton concerning the superiority of ancient or modern learning, and in which Bentley and Boyle also took part: Swift aided his patron on this occasion, and drew up a satirical piece, entitled 'The Battle of the Books,' in which he assailed the Bentleians and Wottonians with those weapons which he knew so well how to use. His Tale of a Tub' appears to have been completed about this time also. But neither of these pieces were given to the public till 1704.

After the death of Sir William Temple, Swift accepted an invitation to attend the earl of Berkeley, one of the lords-justices of Ireland, to that country, as chaplain and private secretary. A Mr Buske, however, contrived to interfere in the matter of this appointment so effectually that Swift left his lordship's house in disgust, and gave vent to his irritated feelings in one or two bitter satires. To pacify him, Lord Berkeley presented him with the rectory of Agher, and the vicarages of Laracor and Rathbeggan, to which the prebend of Dunlavin was afterwards added, making altogether an income of betwixt £350 and £400.

In 1701, when Lords Somers, Oxford, Halifax, and Portland, were impeached, Swift published a discourse on the contentions between the

aristocracy and democracy of the ancient states, which excited much attention, and procured for him the patronage and friendship of the whig leaders, besides introducing him to the fellowship of Addison, Arbuthnot, and the group of wits who used to assemble at Button's coffeehouse. His rising reputation was confirmed by the publication of 'The Tale of a Tub.' "This celebrated production," says Scott, "is founded upon a simple and obvious allegory, conducted with all the humour of Rabelais, and without his extravagance. The main purpose is to trace the gradual corruptions of the church of Rome, and to exalt the English reformed church at the expense both of the Roman Catholic and Presbyterian establishments." It is an elaborate, but tedious whimsical, and inconsiderate production. The graver clergy felt scandalized by it; while Voltaire, and others of his school, hailed its appearance as well-calculated to lower the claims of religion, by associating them with vulgar and ridiculous ideas. The vicar of Laracor was now a man of note and estimation, and received many flattering attentions from the leading whigs, who justly regarded a writer of his popular and ready talents, and formidable powers of satire and invective, as an important ally in the then state of public affairs. While, however, Swift was the strenuous advocate of Revolution principles and whig pretensions in civil politics, he differed widely from the party in his notions of ecclesiastical polity. No high-churchman was a more zealous stickler for the rights and prerogatives of the church than he. His 'Letter upon the Sacramental Test,' published in 1708-9, contained such an unequivocal exposition of high-church sentiments that the whigs began to look upon their partisan with jealousy and mistrust; but no open rupture took place till 1710, when the tories came into power, and Swift with the most shameless profligacy and effrontery went over to the prevailing party.

Sir Walter Scott, with the amiable partiality of genius for genius, has laboured hard to apologize for, if not to vindicate, Swift's conduct in this matter; but the attempt, as might be expected, is much more well-meant than successful. Sir Walter's defence amounts to this, that Swift had at first resolved to stand neutral in the approaching struggle of parties, feeling himself to have been unjustly neglected by his former friends, but at the same time not yet willing to sink political principle in personal resentment; that his scruples were at last overcome by Harley and St John's professions of liberal or at least moderate principles of state-policy, and by his anxiety for the triumph of the establishment, joined to a consciousness of some power on his own part to mould and moderate the tone of public feeling so as to soften the rancour of parties, and enable the new ministry to devote themselves to the real interest of the country. The reader will, we imagine, smile at the idea of such a man as Swift acting the part of moderator in any contest whatever; moderation had never formed any part of his character or principles. His early works contain innumerable proofs that he started not only a whig, but a very zealous and ultra one. He designates himself "a whig, and one who wears a gown," meaning, we suppose, by the expression, to place his political principles in decided contrast with those avowed by most of his clerical brethren; assailing Tisdal, a tory opponent, he says, "to cool your insolence a little, know that the queen, and court, and house of lords, and half the commons

almost are whigs, and the number daily increases."

And in his verses

on Whitehall he boldly speaks out his high approbation of the execution of Charles, when he says

"That theatre produced an action truly great,

On which eternal acclamations wait."

The fact is, the only pretence which even Swift himself offers for this sudden dereliction of the principles which he had maintained for nearly forty years, is the plea of neglect and bad usage from the party with whom he had held them. He does not attempt to gloss over the matter in any other way, but fairly speaks out his motives as if unconscious of the existence of moral distinctions, and utterly inaccessible to feelings of remorse or shame.

His first exhibition in the character of a 'moderator' was every way worthy of the man; "he took up the cudgels with the ferocity of a hireling, and the rancour of a renegade." The tories handed over to him the management of a political periodical called 'The Examiner,' which St John, Dr Freind, King, and others, had already commenced as the organ of the new ministry. This publication was conducted by Swift from the 13th to the 46th number, and with a personality and malignancy of abuse which left the first projectors of The Examiner' far behind in the contention. Sunderland, Godolphin, Cowper, Walpole, Somers, Steele, and many others with whom he had been but lately on terms of warmest intimacy, were successively assailed by him with the most keen and scurrilous invective. In short, to use his own phrase, he "libelled them all round." Of course he was proportionally zealous in his expressions of attachment and fidelity to his new friends; "a thorough partisan is a thorough despiser of sincerity, and no man seems to have got over that weakness more completely than the reverend person before us."3 We cannot allow Swift credit for sincerity even in his high-churchism. That too was but a part of his cool, selfish, unprincipled, calculating system. He wished to raise the influence of the order to which he happened to belong; and, by soothing the highchurch party, he calculated on being better able to force his way to a mitre, notwithstanding his avowed connection with the opposite party in the church on other points.

Swift's generous biographer represents him as pursuing the new political career on which he had entered with "freedom and independence," spurning the proposals of pecuniary remuneration which his grateful friends in the ministry made him, rejecting a chaplaincy, and maintaining "the right of an independent friend, to take umbrage at the slightest shadow of caprice in those to whom he was so ardently attached!" This is really too much. One might almost suspect the biographer of a design to employ Swift's favourite instruments of satire and ridicule against him. The independent minded patriot, who is first represented to us as taking affront at the offer of recompense for his services, refusing preferments, hating caprice, and ardently loving his new friends, is at the very moment writing to his confidant Stella, that he hopes his new profession (of toryism) "will turn to some account;" that his new friends are very kind, and make him promises enough;

that he hopes not to return without some mark of distinction; and that he would likewise gladly be somewhat richer than he is. Soon after, this despiser of preferment seems to have asked for the see of Hereford, and when refused, fairly strikes work, and refuses to return to his hireling employments for any less consideration than a deanery, which last he succeeds in wringing from the hands of a reluctant minister, and, after all, accepts only with much grumbling and discontent. Nay, this is not all, the spurner at pecuniary recompense discovers that he has got into debt, and thinks that the queen, or the ministry, should help him to clear it off. He estimates his past services at £1000, and declares that the lord-treasurer uses him most barbarously in laughing when he mentions a £1000--though £1000 is a very serious thing. His noble independence of mind and hatred of caprice are features equally well-supported. He dances attendance on the queen's favourite, Mrs Masham; writes bulletins of the progress of her pregnancy, and prays for the preservation of a life of so much importance to the nation. His detestation of caprice is manifested in his publicly sending the prime minister into the house of commons to call out the first secretary of state, only to let him know, that Mr Swift would not dine with him if he dined late; and in his insisting that a duke should make him the first visit, merely because he was a duke. Few, we think, acquainted with Swift's habits, will doubt the justness and accuracy of the critic's remark, that Swift exhibited, during this period of favour, "as much of the ridiculous airs of a parvenu,—of a low underling brought suddenly into contact with wealth and splendour, as any of the base understrappers that ever made party disgusting." His apologist further informs us, that he used every effort, consistent with the line of political conduct which he had adopted, to propitiate his friends of the whig party. We are not disposed to question the truth of the statement; but we see in this fact only another evidence of the detestable meanness and selfishness of the man's spirit. It was his object to curry favour with all parties, so as to place his chances of preferment on the broadest possible foundation. This was the whole secret of his unwillingness to pursue the rupture with his old associates to the widest possible extent. He was too keen-sighted a politician not to foresee the probability of the whig party again coming into office; and he wished to stand as well with them as was consistent with his worship of the present dispensers of good things in church and state. His patronage of such men as Congreve, Parnell, Prior, King, and other literary characters, was probably the result of sheer vanity."

Edinburgh Review, vol. xxvii. p. 17.

The opinion pretty generally entertained in Dublin of the new dean, was wittily expressed in a copy of verses, which are said to have been affixed to the door of St Patrick's cathedral on the day of his instalment. The following stanzas may serve as a specimen of this jeu-d'esprit :

"When Wharton reign'd, a whig he was;

When Pembroke, that's dispute, Sir;
In Oxford's time, what Oxford pleased,-
Non-con., or Jack, or Neuter.

This place he got by wit and rhyme,

And many ways most odd;

And might a bishop be in time,
Did he believe in God.