Prospect of Peace." Though it has not much merit as a poem, it presents some noble thoughts on the general subject of peace, and the duty of nations to cultivate it among each other, that, if practised, would make the world much better and happier. In 1717, when Addison was made secretary of state, he advanced his friend Tickell to the post of under secretary, a situation which he filled with equal advantage to himself and his patron. The decease of Addison, 1719, was severely felt and most sincerely lamented by Tickell. To the collected works of his great patron, who had on his death-bed left him the charge of publishing them, he prefixed an Elegy" in memory of their author, "to whose beauty and pathos," says Dr. Drake, "no language can do justice." It is this, indeed, on which his fame as a writer chiefly rests; though his verses on the "Cato" of Addison, and his ballad of "Colin and Lucy" have much merit. His promotion and prosperity ceased not with the death of Addison. In 1725 he was created secretary to the lords justices of Ireland, a situation of dignity and profit, which he held till his death, which took place on the 23d of April, 1740. ON THE DEATH OF ADDISON.1 If, dumb too long, the drooping Muse hath stay'd, Blame not her silence, Warwick, but bemoan, By midnight lamps, the mansions of the dead, Through breathing statues, then unheeded things, Through rows of warriors, and through walks of kings! The pealing organ, and the pausing choir; This was addressed to the Earl of Warwick, Addison's step-son. Of thee forgetful if I form a song, My lyre be broken, and untun'd my tongue, Oft let me range the gloomy aisles alone, In what new region, to the just assign'd, What new employments please th' unbody'd mind; Of heaven's decrees, where wondering angels gaze? In nightly visions seldom fails to rise, Or, rous'd by fancy, meets my waking eyes. If business calls, or crowded courts invite, Th' unblemish'd statesman seems to strike my sight; If in the stage I seek to soothe my care, I meet his soul which breathes in Cato' there; If pensive to the rural shades I rove, His shape o'ertakes me in the lonely grove; 'Twas there of just and good he reason'd strong, Clear'd some great truth, or rais'd some serious song: 'Addison's tragedy of "Cato." There patient show'd us the wise course to steer, RICHARD BENTLEY, 1662-1742. RICHARD BENTLEY, one of the most learned men, and perhaps the greatest classical scholar England has produced, was the son of a farmer near Wakefield, in Yorkshire, and was born in 1662. He was educated at Cambridge, and became chaplain to Stillingfleet, Bishop of Worcester. In 1692 he was appointed to the lectureship instituted by Boyle, for the defence of the Christian religion, and he delivered a series of very able discourses against atheism, which were highly popular. His next public appearance was in the famous controversy with the Hon. Charles Boyle, Earl of Orrery, relative to the genuineness of the Greek Epistles of Phalaris. Most of the wits and scholars of that period joined with Boyle against Bentley; but he triumphantly established the position that the epistles are spurious. Though professedly a controversial work, it embodies a mass of accurate information relative to historical facts, antiquities, chronology, and philology, such as, we may safely say, has rarely, if ever, been collected in the same space, and shows how thoroughly digested and familiar was the vast stock of reading which Bentley possessed. At the end of the "Dissertation on Phalaris," Bentley denies the genuineness of the "Fables" which bear Æsop's name. It would be impossible, in this mere sketch of his life,2 to enumerate all his subsequent works. They were mostly of a classical character, and from the great learning and research which they displayed, established his reputation not in England only, but on the continent, as the first scholar of his age. In one labor, however, he signally failed: it was in his edition of the "Paradise Lost." Assuming that, from the blindness of Milton, and consequently from the necessity of his dictating his thoughts to others, many verbal errors must have been made in transcribing, he undertook to make “emendations' without number, in that immortal work. It proved a most signal failure, and showed that, however learned he was in classic lore, he was destitute of true poetic taste and feeling, and could not enter into the lofty conceptions and sublime flights of the great English bard. One of his " emendations" will suffice here. The sublime line, Bentley renders, "No light, but rather darkness visible," "No light, but rather a transpicuous gloom;" 1 See this controversy spoken of on page 298. Read, Dr. Monk's Life of Bentley, a most interesting as well as learned piece of biography. thus verifying his favorite maxim, that no man was ever written out of his reputation except by himself. After a life of great literary labor, and enjoying some of the highest honors in the church, this distinguished scholar died on the 14th of July, 1742. AUTHORITY OF REASON IN RELIGION. We profess ourselves as much concerned, and as truly as [the deists] themselves are, for the use and authority of reason in controversies of faith. We look upon right reason as the native lamp of the soul, placed and kindled there by our Creator, to conduct us in the whole course of our judgments and actions. True reason, like its divine Author, never is itself deceived, nor ever deceives any man. Even revelation itself is not shy nor unwilling to ascribe its own first credit and fundamental authority to the test and testimony of reason. Sound reason is the touchstone to distinguish that pure and genuine gold from baser metals; revelation truly divine, from imposture and enthusiasm: so that the Christian religion is so far from declining or fearing the strictest trials of reason, that it everywhere appeals to it; is defended and supported by it; and, indeed, cannot continue, in the apostle's description, "pure and undefiled" without it. It is the benefit of reason alone, under the Providence and Spirit of God, that we ourselves are at this day a reformed orthodox church: that we departed from the errors of popery, and that we knew, too, where to stop; neither running into the extravagances of fanaticism, nor sliding into the indifferency of libertinism. Whatsoever, therefore, is inconsistent with natural reason, can never be justly imposed as an article of faith. That the same body is in many places at once; that plain bread is not bread; such things, though they be said with never so much pomp and claim to infallibility, we have still greater authority to reject them, as being contrary to common sense and our natural faculties; as subverting the foundations of all faith, even the grounds of their own credit, and all the principles of civil life. So far are we from contending with our adversaries about the dignity and authority of reason; but then we differ with them about the exercise of it, and the extent of its province. For the deists there stop, and set bounds to their faith, where reason, their only guide, does not lead the way further, and walk along before them. We, on the contrary, as Moses was shown by divine power a true sight of the promised land, though himself could not pass over to it, so we think reason may receive from revelation some further discoveries and new prospects of things, and be fully convinced of the reality of them; though itself cannot pass on, nor travel those regions; cannot penetrate the fund of those truths, nor advance to the utmost bounds of them. For there is certainly a wide difference between what is contrary to reason, and what is superior to it, and out of its reach. WILLIAM SOMERVILLE, 1692-1742. THIS ardent lover and eulogist of field-sports, was born in 1692, and was educated at Oxford. After leaving the University, he settled upon his patrimonial estate in Warwickshire, and occupied his time partly with the duties of a justice of the peace, partly with the active pleasures of the sportsman, and partly with the cultivation of his poetical talents. Hospitable, convivial, and careless of economy, he became involved in debt, and in the latter part of his life, according to the account of his friend Shenstone, the poet, "drank himself into pains of the body, in order to get rid of the pains of the mind." Thus, most lamentably, was his misery completed, and his end accelerated; and he died in 1742, in the fiftieth year of his age. Somerville is best known by his poem, entitled the "Chase," which still has considerable popularity. It is written in blank verse, tolerably harmonious, and his descriptions, always accurate from his own practical knowledge of his subject, are frequently vivid and beautiful. He has also written another rural poem, called "Field-Sports," which describes the amusement of hawking; "Hobbinol, or Rural Games," a mock heroic; and many pieces of a miscellaneous character. Of the latter, the lines to Addison show much good feeling, and just appreciation of the character of that great and good man. BEGINNING OF A FOX HUNT. Ere yet the morning peep, Or stars retire from the first blush of day, And rouse thy bold compeers. Then to the copse, With silence lead thy many-color'd hounds, In all their beauty's pride. See! how they range More nobly full, and swell'd with every mouth. |