Possibly we may be allowed to infer from the last couplet, that it was as much to the statesman as the poet, that the homage of Ad dison was in this instance offered. The poem concludes with an expression of the author's intention to quit poetry and prepare to tell of " greater truths." It may be interesting to compare with this poem of Addison's, a passage in Garth's Dispensary, written not many years afterwards, indeed, yet when the catalogue of living English poets had already received some important accessions, including that of Addison himself. It will be seen that Congreve and Montague still retained in the estimation of the best cotemporary judges a reputation which, as poets, they have totally lost with posterity: so capricious is literary taste, so liable to be affected by temporary or personal considerations. "In sense and numbers if you would excel, Pan quits the woods, the list'ning Fauns the plains, And Britain since† Pausanias was writ, When Stepney paints the godlike acts of kings, Or what Apollo dictates Prior sings, The banks of Rhine a pleas'd attention show, 'Tis Montague's rich vein alone must prove, The Dispensary, Cant. iv. 1. 207. *All the early pieces of Addison referred to in this chapter, together with his translation from Virgil, and of the story of Salmacis from Ovid were published in the third and fourth vols. of Miscellany Poems. London, 1693, 1694. See Wood's Athenæ Oxon. by Bliss, vol. iv. col. 603. + By Mr. Norton. CHAPTER III. 1695 to 1700. Poems on public occasions why generally failures. Lines of Addison to the king. To Lord Somers, who becomes his patron. Account of Somers. Latin poem on the peace inscribed to Charles Montague. Account of him. He patronises Addison. Addison reluctant to take orders. Different causes assigned for it. Montague's share in it. He and Somers procure him a pension from the king to travel. Publication of Musa Anglicanæ. Account of his Latin poems. His celebration of Dr. Burnet's theory. Boileau's remarks on his poems. He sets out on his travels. His letters to several friends. Takes up his residence at Blois. His mode of life there. Letters. Friendship and correspondence with Wortley Montague. Letters to Bishop Hough and others. It was another of the unfavorable results of that activity of the spirit of literary patronage which, with its causes, has been already adverted to, that it tempted the poets to an injudicious choice of themes. Extraordinary as it may at first sight appear, facts will bear out the assertion, that public events of the day, whatever their nature or magnitude, however agitating to the passions or important to the destinies of a people, have scarcely ever, in a single instance, served for the foundation of an excellent poem. Even the laureate strains of Dryden, though abounding in those flashes of brightness which his genius could not help emitting, form no just exception to the rule. Victories and peace-makings, royal accessions and births and marriages, so long as they continue topics for the gazette, have always about them too much of vulgar notoriety, too much of the everyday notions and phrases of every man, not to be the scorn and disgust of the Muses. Their sacred flame, we might say, is never kindled at the parish bonfire. Yet these are precisely the topics on which poems are wont to be commanded, or likely to be rewarded, by the rulers of the state. The embarrassments attending a scanty allowance, and the necessity of seeking patronage betimes, as the only passport to the emoluments and dignities of the profession which he purposed to embrace, strongly persuaded Addison to this employment of his talents; and on the return of his majesty from the continent, after the campaign of 1695, the young Oxonian offered him the homage of what was then styled, "a paper of verses." The great event of the year, the capture of Namur in sight of the whole French army under Villeroi, who feared to risk a battle for its relief, supplies, as might be supposed, the prominent theme of eulogy; and in fact it was an action which greatly advanced the military reputation of William. The poet, however, has taken occasion to cast a backward glance upon his former exploits, not omitting the battle of the Boyne; and to celebrate the race of Nassau, as "By heav'n design'd To curb the proud oppressors of mankind; while of the immediate hero of his verse he says, not unhappily, "His toils for no ignoble ends design'd, Promote the common welfare of mankind; This address, therefore, is to be regarded less in the light of a mere laureate effusion of court compliment, than a deliberate assertion of Whig principles, in which, through whatever means he caine by them, born of such a father and educated at Oxford, the life-long perseverance of Addison through all changes of fortune is a sufficient pledge of his sincerity. He prefaced his poem likewise, with what Dr. Johnson scornfully designates, "a kind of rhyming introduction to Lord Somers." Fortunately for their author, his unpretending, and certainly elegant lines, experienced a more generous reception from the illustrious statesman to whom they were inscribed,-himself an ardent cultivator of literature, and justly commended, in this very piece, as, " above degrading envy." The "present of a muse unknown," was accepted with characteristic urbanity, and rewarded by a request to see the author. From this first introduction, Somers, attracted doubtless by a classic elegance of mind, clothed, like his own, in all the graces of native modesty, adopted the patronage of Addison with the zeal of real friendship; such favor, and from such a personage, could not fail of exerting a decided influence, both on the feelings and judgments of its object. In his political capacity, Addison would assuredly have made no difficulty in avowing himself the disciple of Somers; and a slight sketch of the character and career of this memorable statesman will thus cast a reflected light on his own. Somers was born at Worcester in 1651, and received the rudiments of education at the collegiate school of that city. His enemies have reproached him with a low extraction; it is evident, however, that his father, who practised as an attorney, could have been destitute neither of fortune nor liberality, since it was as a gentleman-commoner that he entered his son of Trinity College, Oxford. Swift, writing to Lord Bolingbroke, then in exile, and consoling his lordship's disappointed ambition, and his own, by bitterly remarking on the good success of "men of a lower degree of discretion and regularity," both in rising to high offices, and in filling them, and the contrary results attending on men of genius in the administration of public affairs, adds, "I know but one exception, and that was Lord Somers, whose timorous nature, joined with the trade of a common lawyer, and the consciousness of a mean extraction, had taught him the regularity of an alderman or a gentleman usher." From this casual remark of a bitter enemy, and one who was beyond the reach of scruples in vilifying those whom he hated, we may learn, that while no one dared to refuse to Somers the character of a man of genius, he possessed likewise the qualities of a punctual and methodical man of business, invaluable in the high public offices to which his merit raised him. The reproach of timorousness is sufficiently refuted by the whole tenor of his political conduct. It appears that he was early admitted on the terms of a familiar companion at the country seat of the young earl, afterwards duke, of Shrewsbury, in the convivialities of which, enlivened as they were, with the sallies of wit and the play of fancy, he is said to have partaken, like the duke himself, too freely for his constitution. Being destined by his father to pursue the law in earnest and as a profession, Somers quitted the university without taking a degree, but not without having imbibed a strong passion for literature, of which he still found leisure to afford some proof by contributions to the miscellaneous translations, both of Plutarch's lives and Ovid's epistles. But politics were his true element, and, moved with patriotic indignation against the measures of the court towards the latter end of the reign of Charles II., he commenced his inestimable services to the cause of English liberty by a succession of tracts on all the important questions of that alarming period, as they arose. He ably supported the Exclusion Bill by his pen; and having established his reputation at the bar by his defence, in 1683, of the sheriffs of London and others accused of a riot, he afterwards augmented it to the highest pitch by his appearance as counsel for the seven bishops under James II. In common with his early friend, the Earl of Shrewsbury, Somers was deep in the counsels for bringing over the Prince of Orange; and in the Convention-parliament, where he represented his native city, he managed with great dexterity the conference with the lords concerning the critical word abdicate. For these services he was rewarded by King William in 1689 with the office of solicitor-general; three years afterwards he became attorney-general, then keeper of the seals, and still rising in esteem with the public through his ability and integrity as a magistrate, and the meekness with which his faculties were borne, and with his royal master as a minister on whom, in the midst of almost universal perfidy, he could place firm reliance, he was elevated in 1695 to the dignity of lord chancellor and the peerage. On this occasion his good taste prompted him to employ the pen of Addison in the honorary office of drawing up the preamble to his patent. Lord Somers was soon after solicited to add to his political and professional honors the literary one of the presidency of the Royal Society, then rising into reputation and importance. Of this institution, John Evelyn, that model of a meritorious English gentleman, was one of the original founders and most active managers; and partly from the opportunities of personal acquaintance thus afforded him, he was enabled to draw for posterity the following sketch of its President. "It is certain that this chancellor was a most excellent lawyer, very learned in all polite literature, a superior pen, master of a handsome style, and of easy conversation; but he is said to make too much haste to be rich, as his predecessor and most in place in this age did, to a more prodigious excess than was ever known."* With regard to the serious charge which here counterbalances so much commendation, and from a person of adverse politics, it may be freely admitted, that the general charge brought against the public men of these times, of unexampled rapacity, is perfectly well-founded. It originated probably in the universal both profusion and corruption of the government of Charles II., and especially in the extraordinarily brief and precarious tenure by which all offices were held under the profligate rulers of that unworthy sovereign. It was natural for those to catch with a greedy grasp at present profit, who could place so little dependence on the future; and the same excuse, whatever be its force, must in fairness be extended to the official persons of several * Evelyn's Memoirs, iii. 382. |