Where ever since the seasons wheel, " 'Tis well," said Jove, and for consent Then look'd so wise, before he knew But ere he gave the mighty nod, Her honors made, “Great Jove," she cried, “Nay, rather ask," the monarch said, " Halves, more than halves !''cried honest Care, “ Your pleas would make your titles fair. You claim the body, you the soul, But I, who join'd them, claim the whole.". Thus with the gods debate began, As thus they wrangled, Time came by ; Known by the gods, as near he draws, “Since body from the parent Earth, THE BOOK.WORM. Come hither, boy, we'll hunt to-day, The book-worm, ravening beast of prey, Produc'd by parent Earth, at odds, As Fame reports it, with the gods. Him frantic hunger wildly drives Against a thousand authors' lives : Through all the fields of wit he flies; Dreadful his head with clustering eyes, With horns without, and tusks within, And scales to serve him for a skin. Observe him nearly, lest he climb To wound the bards of ancient time, Or down the vale of fancy go To tear some modern wretch below. On every corner fix thine eye, Or ten to one he slips thee by. See where his teeth a passage eat : We'll rouse him from the deep retreat.But who the shelter's forc'd to give ? 'Tis sacred Virgil, as I live! From leaf to leaf, from song to song, He draws the tad pole form along, He mounts the gilded edge before, He's up, he scuds the cover o'er, He turns, he doubles, there he past, And here we have him, caught at last. Insatiate brute, whose teeth abuse The sweetest servants of the Muse(Nay never offer to deny, I took thee in the fact to fly). His roses nipt in every page, My poor Anacreon mourns thy rage ; By thee my Ovid wounded lies ; By thee my Lesbia's sparrow dies ; Thy rabid teeth have half destroy'd The work of love in Biddy Floyd, They rent Belinda's locks away, And spoil'd the Blouzelind of Gay. For all, for every single deed, Relentless Justice bids thee bleed. Then fall a victim to the Nine, Myself the priest, my desk the shrine. Bring Homer, Virgil, Tasso near, To pile a sacred altar here; Hold, boy, thy hand outruns thy wit, You reach'd the plays that Dennis writ You reach'd me Philips' rustic strain Pray take your mortal bards again. NICHOLAS ROWE. Nicholas Rowe, descended from an ancient derived his principal claims upon posterity, are family in Devonshire, was the son of John Rowe, chiefly founded on the model of French tragedy ; Esquire, a barrister of reputation and extensive and in his diction, which is poetical without being practice. He was born in 1673, at the house of his bombastic or affected ; in his versification, which is maternal grandfather, at Little Berkford, in Bed- singularly sweet; and in tirades of sentiment, given fordshire. Being placed at Westminster-school, with force and elegance, he has few com ors. under Dr. Busby, he pursued the classical studies As a miscellaneous poet, Rowe occupies but an of that place with credit. At the age of sixteen he inconsiderable place among his countrymen; but it was removed from school, and entered a student of has been thought proper to give some of his songs the Middle Temple, it being his father's intention or ballads in the pastoral strain; which have a touchto bring him up to his own profession; but the ing simplicity, scarcely excelled by any pieces or death of this parent, when Nicholas was only nine- the kind. His principal efforts, however, were in teen, freed him from what he probably thought a poetical translation; and his version of Lucan's pursuit foreign to his disposition; and he turned Pharsalia has been placed by Dr. Johnson among his chief studies to poetry and polite literature. the greatest productions of English poetry. At the age of twenty-five he produced his first tra. In politics, Rowe joined the party of the Whigs, gedy, “ The Ambitious Stepmother;" which was under whose influence he had some gainful posts, afterwards succeeded by “ Tamerlane;" “ The Fair without reckoning that of poet-laureate, on the acPenitent;" " · Ulysses;" “The Royal Convert;" cession of George I. He was twice married to “ Jane Shore ;” and “Lady Jane Grey." of women of good connexions, by the first of whom these, though all have their merits, the third and he had a son, and by the second, a daughter. He the two last alone keep possession of the stage ; but died in December, 1718, in the 45th year of his Jane Shore in particular never fails to be viewed age, and was interred among the poets in Westwith deep interest. His plays, from which are minster Abbey. “How foolish was I to believe She could dote on so lowly a clown, To forsake the fine folk of the town? So kind and so constant would prove ; Or live in a cottage on love ? DESPAIRING beside a clear stream, A shepherd forsaken was laid ; A willow supported his head. To his sighs with a sigh did reply; And the brook, in return to his pain, Ran mournfully murmuring by. “ Alas, silly swain that I was!" Thus sadly complaining, he cried, “ When first I beheld that fair face, "Twere better by far I had died. She talk'd, and I bless'd the dear tongue; When she smil'd, 'twas a pleasure too great. I listen'd, and cried, when she sung, Was nightingale ever so sweet? “What though I have skill to complain, Though the Muses my ples have crown'd; The virgins sit weeping around. Thy pipe and thy laurel resign; Whose music is sweeter than thine. “And you, my companions so dear, Who sorrow to see me betray'd, Forbear to accuse the false maid. Then run, gentle brook; and to lose thyself, haste ; Ah willow, willow. Fade thou too, my willow, this verse is my last; Ah willow, willow; ah willow, willow. * Afterwards his wife. JOSEPH ADDISON. JOSEPH Addison, a person in the foremost ranks superior efforts, has deserved that degree of praise, of wit and elegant literature, was the son of the which, in general estimation, has been allotied to Reverend Lancelot Addison, at whose parsonage at him. It cannot be doubled that playful and huMilston, near Ambrosbury, Wiltshire, he was born morous wit was the quality in which he obtained in May, 1672. At the age of fifteen he was entered almost unrivalled pre-eminence; but the reader of of Queen's College, Oxford, where he distinguished his poem to Sir Godfrey Kneller will discover, in bimself by his proficiency in classical literature, the comparison of the painter to Phidias, a very especially in Latin poetry. He was afterwards happy and elegant resemblance pointed out in his elected a demy of Magdalen College, where he took | verse. His celebrated tragedy of “Cato,” equally the degrees of bachelor and master of arts. In his remarkable for a correctness of plan, and a sustained twenty-second year he became an author in his own elevation of style, then unusual on the English language, publishing a short copy of verses addressed stage, was further distinguished by the glow of its to the veteran poet, Dryden. Other pieces in verse sentiments in favor of political liberty, and was and prose succeeded; and in 1695 he opened the equally applauded by both parties. career of his fortune as a literary man, by a com- A very short account will suffice for the remainplimentary poem on one of the campaigns of King der of his works. His connexion with Steele enWilliam, addressed to the Lord-keeper Somers. A gaged him in occasionally writing in the Tatler, the pension of 300l. from the crown, which his patron Spectator, and the Guardian, in which his producobtained for him, enabled him to indulge his incli- tions, serious and humorous, conferred upon him nation for travel; and an epistolary poem to Lord immortal honor, and placed him deservedly at the Halifax in 1701, with a prose relation of his travels, head of his class. Some other periodical papers, published on his return, are distinguished by the decidedly political, were traced to Addison, of which spirit of liberty which they breathe, and which, dur- The Freeholder was one of the most conspicuous. ing life, was his ruling passion. The most famous of In 1716 he married the Countess-Dowager of War. his political poems, “ The Campaign," appeared in wick, a connexion which is said not to have been 1704. It was a task kindly imposed by Lord Hali- remarkably happy. In the following year he was fax, who intimated to him that the writer should raised to the office of one of the principal secretanot lose his labor. It was accordingly rewarded ries of state ; but finding himself ill suited to the by an immediate appointment to the post of com- post, and in a declining state of health, he resigned missioner of appeals. it to Mr. Craggs. In reality, his constitution was This will be the proper place for considering the suffering from an habitual excess in wine; and it is merits of Addison in his character of a writer in a lamentable circumstance that a person so generally verse. Though Dryden and Pope had already se- free from moral defects, should have given way to cured the first places on the British Parnassus, and a fondness for the pleasures of a tavern life. Addiother rivals for fame were springing to view, it will son died in June, 1719, leaving an only daughter scarcely be denied that Addison, by a decent medi- by the Countess of Warwick. ocrity of poetic language, rising occasionally to Me into foreign realms my fate conveys Through nations fruitful of immortal lays, Where the soft season and inviting clime Conspire to trouble your repose with rhyme. For wheresoe'er I turn my ravish'd eyes, Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise, Salve magna parens frugum Saturnia tellus, Poetic fields encompass me around, Magna virúm! tibi res antiquæ laudis et artis And still I seem to tread on classic ground ; Aggredior, sanctos a usus recludere fontes. For here the Muse so oft her harp has strung, Virg. Georg. ii. That not a mountain rears its head unsung, While you, my lord, the rural shades admire, Renown'd in verse each shady thicket grows, And from Britannia's public posts retire, And every stream in heavenly numbers Aows. Nor longer, her ungrateful sons to please, How am I pleas’d to search the hills and woods For their advantage sacrifice your ease ; For rising springs and celebrated floods ! |
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