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excluded from any collection printed under. his infpection and with his confent, particularly The Life and Character of Dr. Swift, on a maxim of Rochefocault, of which he says, in a letter to Mr. Pope, dated May 1, 1733, it is an imposture, mean and trivial, and full of the cant that I moft defpife. It appears also by a letter of Mr. Pope, dated 15 Sept. 1734, that the Dean had strongly disavowed this piece, not to him only, but to Lord Carteret, and others, and that there was reafon to believe it the performance of a perfon who offered a piece in profe to a bookfeller as the Dean's, which he afterwards confelfed to be bis own. In the Irish copy of the verfes on his death many passages are to be found which Mr. Pope rejected, for when he added these verses to the mifcellany in 1742, he took nothing from the Irish copy which he had then feen, and upon his cuthority the Irish variations are rejected in this edition.

But there is evidence of another kind to prove that the Dean never revifed any edition of his works for Falkener to print,

and

and that on the contrary he was unwilling that Falkener fhould print them at all. Falkener, in an advertisement published Oct. 15, 1754, calls himself the editor as well as publisher of the Dublin edition, and the Dean bas often renounced the undertaking in express terms. In his letter to Mr. Pope dated May 1, 1733, he fays, that when the printer applied to him for leave to print his works in Ireland, be told him he would give no leave; and when he printed them without, he declared it was much to his discontent; the fame fentiment is alfo more frongly expressed in the following extract from a letter now in the hands of the publisher, which was written by the Dean to the late Mr. Benjamin Motte his bookfeller in London.

"Mr. Falkener in printing thofe volumes did what I much difliked, and yet what was not in my power to hinder; and all my friends preffed him to print them, and gave him what manufcript copies they had occafionally gotten from me; my defire was that thofe works fhould have been

VOL. I.

B

printed

printed in London, by an agreement be→ tween those who had a right to them.

I am Sir with great truth

Nov. 1.

1735.

your moft humble and
affectionate fervant,

J. Swift.

N. B. In the references that will be found in the margin of the Life D. S. ftands for Deane Swift's Effay on the Life, Writings and Character of Doctor Jonathan Swift. O. for Orrery's Remarks on the Life and Writings of Doctor Jonathan Swift, the 5th edition 12mo, printed for Millar in 1752. 7. R. for 7. R's Obfervations on Lord Orrery's Remarks, generally fuppofed to have been written by Doctor Delany. Sketch for a Fragment intitled, The Family of Swift, written by the Dean himself, annexed to Mr. Swift's Effay, and Letter to S. Letters from the Dean to Stella, mentioned by Mr. Swift, but not published.

ACCOUNT

OF THE

LIFE

OF THE

Reverend Jonathan Swift, D. D. Dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin.

то

O gratify that curiofity which great eminence always excites, many accounts have been published of the life of Dr. Jonathan Swift. These have mutually reflected light upon each other, afcertained controverted facts, and rectified mistakes, which, if they had still been traditional and oral, would ftill have been believed. Several little incidents, which fhewed the peculiarities of his converfation and domestic life, were related by Mrs. Pilkington in her memoirs; though these could be believed only in proportion as they verified themselves. Lord Orrery's Letters contained many of the principal events, intermingled with many characteristic incidents fupported in general upon better authority; but fometimes founded upon falfe information. Some of these miftakes were detected by a Volume of Letters figned 7. R. in which were also fome new materials; and the account fince published by Mr. Swift, with an imperfect fketch by the Dean himself, has furnished yet more. From a comparison of all thefe with each other this account is compiled. It is not thought neceffary to relate every trifling particular that has been recorded, but only to felect fuch as will fufficiently diftinguish the peculiarities of his character and manners, and

B 2

transmit

tranfmit a knowledge of him to pofterity of the fame kind, if not in the fame degree, as was obtained by those among his contemporaries, who were admitted to his converfation and friendship.

For the hiftory of his works the reader is referred to them, and to the notes and remarks that are now added.

Doctor Jonathan Swift was defcended from a younger branch of an ancient family of that name in YorkJhire. Bernam Swift, efq; who in the reign of king James the First, poffeffed the paternal eftate, was, on the 20th of March, 1627, by king Charles the First, created a peer of Ireland, with the title of viscount Carlingford, though it is faid he never went into that kingdom. He died without male iffue, and the family inheritance defcended to his daughters, one of whom married Robert Fielding, efq; commonly called handfome Fielding, and the other the earl of Eglington. Fielding foon diffipated his wife's patrimony; and that of her fifter being transferred to the family of lord Eglington, the principal estate of the Swifts was divided from the name for ever. One of the younger branches from the fame ftem, was fir Edward Swift, who diftinguifhed himself by his attachment to the royal cause in the great rebellion of 1641, from whom there is no defcendant of the name.

Another of the younger branches was the reverend Thomas Swift, vicar of Goodrich, in Herefordshire, with which he alfo held another ecclefiaftical living.

His father William Swift, rector of St. Andrews in Centerbury, married the heiress of Phi pot, who contrived to keep her eftate which was very confiderable in her own hands; fhe is faid to have been extremely capricious and ill-natured, and to have difinherited her fon Thomas, an only child, merely for robbing an o:chard when he was a boy; but however this be, it is certain, that except a church or chapter leafe y hich was not renewed, Thomas never poffeffed more

*than

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