strength, was not discouraged by this treatment; especially as he had some friends on whose judgment he could better rely, and who thought very differently of his performances. Only, from that time, he began to turn his views towards London; where works of genius may always expect a candid reception and due encouragement; and an accident soon after entirely determined him to try his fortune there.

The divinity chair at Edinburgh was then filled by the Rev. and learned Mr. Hamilton; a gentleman universally respected and beloved; and who had particularly endeared himself to the young divines under his care, by his kind offices, his candour and affability. Our author had attended his lectures for about a year, when there was prescribed to him for the subject of an exercise, a psalm, in which the power and majesty of God are celebrated. Of this psalm he gave a paraphrase and illustration, as the nature of the exercise required; but in a style so highly poetical as surprised the whole audience. Mr. Hamilton, as his custom was, complimented the orator upon his performance, and pointed out to the students the most masterly, striking parts of it; but at last, turning to Mr. Thomson, he told him, smiling, that if he thought of being useful in the ministry, he must keep a stricter rein upon his imagination, and express himself in language more intelligible to an ordinary congregation.

This gave Mr. Thomson to understand, that his expectations from the study of theology might be very precarious; even though the church had been more his free choice than probably it was.* So that having, soon after, received some encouragement from a lady of quality, a friend of his mother's, then in London, he quickly prepared himself for Baillies,] to which he was introduced by the kindred of his mother, he received the earliest attentions; and some verses of his, addressed to one of that family for the use of some books, are, I believe, still preserved as a specimen of his infantine genius."-EDIT.

* See note D, p. xli.

his journey. And although this encouragement ended in nothing beneficial, it served for the present as a good pretext, to cover the imprudence of committing himself to the wide world, unfriended and unpatronized, and with the slender stock of money he was then possessed of.

But his merit did not long lie concealed. Mr. Forbes, afterwards lord president of the session, then attending the service of Parliament, having seen a specimen of Mr. Thomson's poetry in Scotland, received him very kindly, and recommended him to some of his friends: particularly to Mr. Aikman, who lived in great intimacy with many persons of distinguished rank and worth. This gentleman, from a connoisseur in painting, was become a professed painter; and his taste being no less just and delicate in the kindred art of descriptive poetry, than in his own, no wonder that he soon conceived a friendship for our author. What a warm return he met with, and how Mr. Thomson was affected by his friend's premature death, appears in the copy of verses which he wrote on that occasion.+

In the mean time, our author's reception, wherever he was introduced, emboldened him to risk the publication of his "Winter;"‡ in which, as himself was a mere novice in * See note E, p. xliv.

Mr. Aikman was the son of William Aikman, of Cuirny, Esq., (Sheriff-depute of Forfarshire, a lawyer of eminence, and in nomination for a Judge's gown at the time of his death,) by Margaret, sister of Sir John Clerk, of Pennycuik, Baronet. He was born on the 24th of October, 1682, and destined for the profession of the law. Nature thought fit to destine him for another, more elegant, not less liberal, and certainly much more delightful. He went to Italy in the year 1705; and returned to Britain in 1710, not only a good painter, but an accomplished and agreeable man. In the Gothic reigns of George I. and II. he could look for money but for starch heads and periwigs; and starch heads and periwigs was he forced to delineate and paint till his dying day. O che sciagura! Mr. Aikman died at London, on the 7th of June, old style, 1731; whence his remains were sent to Scotland, and interred in the Grey-Friars church-yard, close by those of his only son, who had been buried only a few months before."-THE EARL OF BUCHAN.

See note F, p. xlviii.

acquainted with Dr. Rundle, afterwards Lord Bishop of Derry who, upon conversing with Mr. Thomson, and finding in him qualities greater still, and of more value, than those of a poet, received him into his intimate confidence and friendship; promoted his character every where; introduced him to his great friend the Lord Chancellor Talbot; and, some years after, when the eldest son of that nobleman was to make his tour of travelling, recommended Mr. Thomson as a proper companion for him. His affection and gratitude to Dr. Rundle, and his indignation at the treatment that worthy prelate had met with, are finely expressed in his poem to the memory of Lord Talbot. The true cause of that undeserved treatment has been secreted from the public, as well as the dark manoeuvres that were employed but Mr. Thomson, who had access to the best information, places it to the account of

slanderous zeal, and politics infirm,

Jealous of worth.

Meanwhile, our poct's chief care had been, in return for the public favour, to finish the plan which their wishes laid out for him; and the expectations which his "Winter" had raised, were fully satisfied by the successive publication of the other Seasons: of "Summer," in the year 1727; of "Spring," in the beginning of the following year; and of "Autumn," in a quarto edition of his works, printed in 1730.*

In that edition, the Seasons are placed in their natural order; and crowned with that inimitable Hymn, in which we view them in their beautiful succession, as one whole, the immediate effect of infinite power and goodness. In imitation of the Hebrew bard, all nature is called forth to do homage to the Creator, and the reader is left enraptured in silent adoration and praise.

Besides these, and his tragedy of "Sophonisba," + written

*See note K, p. lix.

+Slight accidents will operate upon the taste of pleasure. There is a feeble line in the play: O Sophonisba! Sophonisba O! This gave occasion to a waggish parody: O Jemmy Thomson! Jemmy Thomson

and acted with applause, in the year 1729, Mr. Thomson had, in 1727, published his "Poem to the Memory of Sir Isaac Newton," then lately deceased; containing a deserved encomium of that incomparable man, with an account of his chief discoveries; sublimely poetical; and yet so just, that an ingenious foreigner, the count Algarotti, takes a line of it for the text of his philosophical dialogues, Il Neutonianismo per le Dame: this was in part owing to the assistance he had of his friend Mr. Gray, now (1768) of the Marischal College, Aberdeen, a gentleman well versed in the Newtonian philosophy, who, on that occasion, gave him a very exact, though general, abstract of its principles.*

That same year, the resentment of our merchants, for the interruption of their trade by the Spaniards in America, running very high, Mr. Thomson zealously took part in it; and wrote his poem "Britannia," to rouse the nation to revenge. And although this piece is the less read that its subject was but accidental and temporary, the spirited generous sentiments that enrich it can never be out of season they will at least remain a monument of that love of his country, that devotion to the public, which he is ever inculcating as the perfection of virtue, and which none ever felt more pure, or more intense, than himself.

Our author's poetical studies were now to be interrupted, or rather improved, by his attendance on the Honourable Mr. Charles Talbot in his travels. A delightful task in deed! endowed as that young nobleman was by nature, and accomplished by the care and example of the best of fathers, in whatever could adorn humanity: graceful of O!' which for a while was echoed through the town."-JOHNSON'S **Lives of the Poets."

* John Gray, Esq., was in 1765 chosen rector of Marischal College, Aberdeen; and died at London in 1769. From Robertson's conversation with Thomas Park, Esq., it would appear, that this gentleman had held some lucrative situation under government, either in the Victualling Office or the Commissariat Department. In Thomson's last letter to Paterson in 1748, Gray is represented as at that time "working hard at passing his accounts."-EDIT.