"Amelia" in 1751. Smollett's novels appeared between the years 1748 and 1771. All of these works had extraordinary popularity; but with the exception of Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield," no novel of a high order of excellence followed them until the time of Sir Walter Scott.

A little later than this remarkable group of novelists there appeared another trio equally remarkable, but in a different department of literature, that of history, in the persons of Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon. Hume was an essayist and a philosopher

as well as an historian. Gibbon is admitted to have produced the greatest historical work of his century. Robertson, though the possessor of an excellent style, is now but little read. The influence of these historians, especially that of Gibbon, upon English style was profound.

There was in this period no school of dramatic literature, and only a few plays appeared that are of notable merit. Addison's

Tray

Cato" is never acted, and seldom read.

Goldsmith's

"She Stoops to Conquer," and Sheridan's "Rivals" and "School for Scandal" are almost the only plays of the century that stand out above the general level of mediocrity.

Verse was abundant, poetry rare. The spirit of the age was unromantic, and whatever is merely practical takes on the prose form. The first poet of the century was Pope, the last was Burns. Between them were Cowper and Grav,

both of them meditative, and out of harmony with the time. "It is more difficult," says Palgrave, "to characterize the English poetry of the eighteenth century than that of any other. For it was not only an age of spontaneous transition, but it included such vast contemporaneous differences as lie between Pope and Collins, Burns and Cowper. Yet we may clearly trace three leading moods or tendencies, the aspects of courtly or educated life, represented by Pope and carried to exhaustion by his followers; the poetry of nature and of man, viewed through a cultivated, and at the same time an impassioned frame of mind, by Collins and Gray; lastly, the study of vivid and simple narrative, including natural description, begun by Gay and Thomson, pursued by Burns and others in the north, and established in England by Goldsmith, Percy, Crabbe, and Cowper. Great varieties in style accompanied these diversities in aim. Poets could not always distinguish the manner suitable for subjects so far apart; and the union of the language of courtly and of common life, exhibited most conspicuously by Burns, has given a tone to the poetry of that century which is best explained by reference to its historical origin."

Speaking generally of the literature of this age, we may say that, while it fell short of the highest intellectual beauty, it yet had great vitality and success, and that it was of cultivated form and remarkable fullness and variety.

SWIFT

1667-1745

JONATHAN SWIFT was born in Dublin, in November, 1667, and died in October, 1745. At Dublin University, where he was matriculated, Swift distinguished himself by his contempt for college laws and neglect of his studies; and only by special grace did he receive his degree of B. A., in 1685. He entered the family of Sir William Temple in the capacity of secretary.

the same household "Stella," immortalized in Swift's writings, was a dependant. "Stella" was a Miss Hester Johnson, whose tutor Swift afterwards became, and to whom, many years later, he was privately married. In 1694 Swift was admitted to deacon's orders, and a few years later went to Ireland as chaplain to Lord Berkeley. Here he occupied various ecclesiastical offices, and in 1713 was made Dean of St. Patrick's. He began his career in literature as a writer of political tracts, and was secretly employed by the government to write in its behalf. In 1704 he published "The Tal

of a Tub." From that time till 1725 he lived in England, and was mainly engaged in political controversy. In 1726 appeared “Gulliver's Travels,” and at frequent intervals thereafter his other writings, prose and poetry.

In 1740 he evinced the first symptoms of the madness which clouded his closing years. From early manhood Swift was subject to fits of vertigo accompanied by deafness, and it was his daily custom to take prolonged walks in the hope of warding off these attacks. It is charitable to suppose that his extraordinary arrogance, his morbid vanity, and his overbearing and passionate disposition were to some extent attributable to bodily afflictions. Swift's character was compounded of contradictory traits. What was needful economy in his youth approached to avarice in his age; yet he was habitually an alms-giver, and devised extensive charitable projects: he was so negligent of study at Dublin that his degree was grudgingly yielded to him; yet so intense in later application and so finished in attainment that Oxford was glad to confer upon him a higher distinction. By nature indolent, he was scrupulous in his attention to the details of duty, however irksome; though constitutionally a satirist and scoffer, there can be no question that he was sincerely devout; and while affecting a dislike of Ireland and the Irish, he said truly of himself, as Dr. Johnson writes, that "Ireland was his debtor. Nor can the Irish be charged with ingratitude to their benefactor; for they reverenced him as a guardian, and obeyed him as a dictator."

As to Swift's rank as a writer, it is not easy to define it; but of his extraordinary abilities there is no room for doubt. He was, perhaps, the greatest master of satire that has ever written in English. His originality is remarkable, — probably no writer of his time borrowed so little from his predecessors, and his versatility for he succeeded in every department of literature that he attempted — is not less wonderful. All things considered, his "Gulliver's Travels " must be regarded as his greatest work, though several eminent critics, including Hallam, have found it inferior to "The Tale of a Tub." Perhaps these words of Lord Jeffrey best embody the general estimate of Dean Swift as a literary man: "In humor and in irony, and in the talent of debasing and defiling what he hated, we join with the world in thinking the Dean of St. Patrick's without a rival." We give an extract from "Gulliver's Travels " which illustrates his best manner as a satirist.

PHILOSOPHERS AND PROJECTORS

I was received very kindly by the warden, and went for many days to the academy. Every room hath in it one or more projectors, and I believe I could not be in fewer than five hundred rooms.

The first man I saw was of a meager aspect, with sooty hands and face, his hair and beard long, ragged, and singed in several places. His clothes, shirt, and skin were all of the same color. He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers, which were to be put into vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw, inclement summers. He told me he did not doubt in eight years more that he should be able to supply the governor's gardens with sunshine at a reasonable rate; but he complained that the stock was low, and entreated me to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers. I made him a small present, for my lord had furnished me with money, on purpose, because he knew their practice of begging from all who go to see them.

I saw another at work to calcine1 ice into gunpowder, who likewise showed me a treatise he had written concerning the malleability of fire, which he intended to publish.

There was a most ingenious architect, who had contrived a new method for building houses, by beginning at the roof and working downwards to the foundation; which he justified to me by the like practice of those two prudent insects, the bee and the spider.

In another apartment I was highly pleased with a projector who had found a device of ploughing the ground with hogs, to save the charges of ploughs, cattle, and labor. The method is this in an acre of ground, you bury, at six inches distance, and eight deep, a quantity of acorns, dates, chestnuts, and other masts 2 or vegetables, whereof these animals are fondest; then you drive six hundred or more of them into the field, where in a few days they will root up the whole ground in search of their food, and make it fit for sowing. It is true, upon experiment they found the charge and trouble very great, and they had little or no crop. However, it is not doubted that this invention may be capable of great improvement.

1 to pulverize by means of heat

2 mast consists of beechnuts and acorns; this word has no plural