ther to procure a remission from the King; but | every day in council to preserve the public peace, (mark the friendship of the dissolute!) they begged the fine for themselves, and exacted it to the last groat. In 1665, Lord Buckhurst attended the Duke of York as a volunteer in the Dutch war; and was in the battle of June 3, when eighteen great Dutch ships were taken, fourteen others were destroyed, and Opdam, the admiral, who engaged the Duke, was blown up beside him, with all his crew. On the day before the battle, he is said to have composed the celebrated song, "To all you ladies now at land," with equal tranquillity of mind and promptitude of wit. Seldom any splendid story is wholly true. I have heard, from the late Earl of Orrery, who was likely to have good hereditary intelligence, that Lord Buckhurst had been a week employed upon it, and only retouched or finished it on the memorable evening. But even this, whatever it may subtract from his facility, leaves him his courage. He was soon after made a gentleman of the bed-chamber, and sent on short embassies to France. In 1674, the estate of his uncle James Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, came to him by its owner's death, and the title was conferred on him the year after. In 1677, he became, by the death of his father, Earl of Dorset, and inherited the estate of his family. In 1684, having buried his first wife of the family of Bagot, who left him no child, he married a daughter of the Earl of Northampton, celebrated both for beauty and understanding. He received some favourable notice from King James; but soon found it necessary to oppose the violence of his innovations, and, with some other lords, appeared in Westminster Hall to countenance the bishops at their trial. As enormities grew every day less supportable, he found it necessary to concur in the Revolution. He was one of those lords who sat after the King's departure; and, what is not the most illustrious action of his life, was employed to conduct the Princess Anne to Nottingham with a guard, such as might alarm the populace as they passed, with false apprehensions of her danger. Whatever end may be designed, there is always something despicable in a trick. He became, as may be easily supposed, a favourite of King William, who, the day after his accession, made him lord-chamberlain of the household, and gave him afterwards the garter. He happened to be among those that were tossed with the King in an open boat sixteen hours, in very rough and cold weather, on the coast of Holland. His health afterwards declined; and, on January 19, 1705-6, he died at Bath. He was a man whose elegance and judgment were universally confessed, and whose bounty to the learned and witty was generally known. To the indulgent affection of the public, Lord Rochester bore ample testimony in this remark"I know not how it is, but Lord Buckhurst may do what he will, yet is never in the wrong.' If such a man attempted poetry, we cannot wonder that his works were praised. Dryden, whom, if Prior tells truth, he distinguished by his beneficence, and who lavished his blandishments on those who are not known to have so well deserved them, undertaking to produce authors of our own country superior to those of antiquity, says, "I would instance your Lordship in satire, and Shakspeare in tragedy.” Would it be imagined that, of this rival to antiquity, all the satires were little personal invectives, and that his longest composition was a song of eleven stanzas? The blame, however, of this exaggerated praise falls on the encomiast, not upon the author; whose performances are, what they pretend to be, the effusions of a man of wit; gay, vigorous, and airy. His verses to Howard show great fertility of mind; and his Dorinda has been imitated by Pope. wwwwwwww STEPNEY. www GEORGE STEPNEY, descended from the Stepneys | ceived the first part of his education at Westof Pendigrast, in Pembrokeshire, was born at minster, where he passed six years in the ColWestminster, in 1663. Of his father's condition or fortune I have no account.* Having re * It has been conjectured that our Poet was either son or grandson of Charles, third son of Sir John Stepney, the first baronet of that family. See Granger's History, vol. ii. p. 396, edit. 8vo. 1775. Mr. Cole says, the Poet's father was a grocer. Cole's MSS. in Brit. Mus.-C. lege, he went at nineteen to Cambridge, where he continued a friendship begun at school with Mr. Montague, afterwards Earl of Halifax. They came to London together, and are said to have been invited into public life by the Earl of Dorset. His qualifications recommended him to many foreign employments, so that his time seems to have been spent in negociations. In 1692, he was sent envoy to the Elector of Brandenburgh; in 1693, to the Imperial Court; in 1694, to the Elector of Saxony; in 1696, to the Electors of Mentz and Cologne, and the Congress at Francfort; in 1698, a second time to Brandenburgh; in 1699, to the King of Poland; in 1701, again to the Emperor; and in 1706, to the Statesgeneral. In 1697, he was made one of the commissioners of trade. His life was busy, and not long. He died in 1707; and is buried in Westminster Abbey, with this epitaph, which Jacob transcribed: H. S. E. GEORGIUS STEPNEIUS, Armiger, Ob Ingenii acumen, Morum Suavitatem, Virorum Amplissimorum Consuetudinem, Linguæ, Styli, ac Vitæ Elegantiam, Præclara Officia cum Britanniæ tum Europæ præstita, Suâ ætate multum celebratus, Eâ Fide, Diligentiâ, ac Felicitate, Post longum honorum Curfum Brevi Temporis Spatio confectum, Cum Naturæ parum, Famæ satis vixerat, Animam ad altiora aspirantem placidè efflavit. On the left hand. G. S. Ex Equestri Familia Stepneiorum, Sancti Petri Westmonast. A. 1676. Frequentiâ, huc elatus, 1707. It is reported that the juvenile compositions of Stepney made grey authors blush. I know not whether his poems will appear such wonders to the present age. One cannot always easily find the reason for which the world has sometimes conspired to squander praise. It is not very unlikely that he wrote very early as well as he ever wrote; and the performances of youth have many favourers, because the authors yet lay no claim to public honours, and are therefore not considered as rivals by the distributors of fame. He apparently professed himself a poet, and added his name to those of the other wits in the version of Juvenal; but he is a very licentious translator, and does not recompense his neglect of the author by beauties of his own. In his original poems, now and then, a happy line may perhaps be found, and now and then a short composition may give pleasure. But there is, in the whole, little either of the grace of wit, or the vigour of nature. www J. PHILIPS. JOHN PHILIPS was born on the 30th of Decem- told by Dr. Sewel, his biographer, he was soon ber, 1676, at Bampton, in Oxfordshire; of distinguished by the superiority of his exercises; which place his father, Dr. Stephen Philips, and what is less easily to be credited, so much archdeacon of Salop, was minister. The first part of his education was domestic; after which he was sent to Winchester, where, as we are endeared himself to his schoolfellows, by his civility and good-nature, that they, without murmur or ill-will, saw him indulged by the master with particular immunities. It is related, that when he was at school, he seldom * He was entered of Trinity College, and took his mingled in play with the other boys, but retired master's degree in 1689.-H. to his chamber; where his sovereign pleasure M was to sit hour after hour, while his hair was combed by somebody, whose services he found means to procure.* At school he became acquainted with the poets, ancient and modern, and fixed his attention particularly on Milton. In 1694, he entered himself at Christ-church, a college at that time in the highest reputation, by the transmission of Busby's scholars to the care first of Fell, and afterwards of Aldrich. Here he was distinguished as a genius eminent among the eminent, and for friendship particularly intimate with Mr. Smith, the author of "Phædra and Hippolytus." The profession which he intended to follow was that of physic; and he took much delight in natural history, of which botany was his favourite part. His reputation was confined to his friends and to the University; till about 1703, he extended it to a wider circle by the "Splendid Shilling," which struck the public attention with a mode of writing new and unexpected. This performance raised him so high, that, when Europe resounded with the victory of Blenheim, he was, probably with an occult opposition to Addison, employed to deliver the acclamation of the Tories. It is said that he would willingly have declined the task, but that his friends urged it upon him. It appears that he wrote this poem at the house of Mr. St. John. "Blenheim" was published in 1705. The next year produced his great work, the poem upon "Cider," in two books; which was received with loud praises, and continued long to be read, as an imitation of Virgil's "Georgic," which needed not shun the presence of the original. He then grew probably more confident of his own abilities, and began to meditate a poem on the "Last Day;" a subject on which no mind can hope to equal expectation. This work he did not live to finish; his diseases, a slow consumption and an asthma, Isaac Vossius relates, that he also delighted in having his hair combed when he could have it done by barbers, or other persons skilled in the rules of prosody. Of the passage that contains this ridicu lous fancy, the following is a translation :-" Many people take delight in the rubbing of their limbs, and the combing of their hair; but these exercises would delight much more, if the servants at the baths, and of the barbers, were so skilful in this art, that they could express any measures with their fingers. I remember that more than once I have fallen into the hands of men of this sort, who could imitate any measure of songs in combing the hair, so as sometimes to express very intelligibly iambics, trochees, dactyls, &c. from whence there arose to me no small delight." See his "Treatise de Poematum cantu et Viribus Rythmi." Oxon. 1673. p. 62.-H. put a stop to his studies, and on Feb. 15, 1708, at the beginning of his thirty-third year, put an end to his life. He was buried in the cathedral of Hereford; and Sir Simon Harcourt, afterwards lord-chancellor, gave him a monument in Westminster Abbey. The inscription at Westminster was written, as I have heard, by Dr. Atterbury, though commonly given to Dr. Freind. 1 Herefordiæ conduntur Ossa, Litterarum Amoniorum sitim, Præclaris Æmulorum studiis excitatus, Optimia scribendi Magistris semper intentus, Carmina sermone Patrio composuit A Græcis Latinisque fontibus feliciter deducta, Antiquo illo, libero, multiformi Ad res ipsas apto prorsus, et attemperato, Non numeris in eundem ferè orbem redeuntibus, Non Clausularum similiter cadentium sono Metiri : Uni in hoc laudis genere Miltono secundus, Res seu Tenues, seu Grandes, seu Mediocres Et videt, & assecutus est, Auso licèt à tua Metrorum Lege discedere, Vatum certe Cineres, tuos undique stipantium Quoad viveret Fautor, Post Obitum piè memor, Hoc illi Saxum poni voluit. J. PHILIPS, STEPHANI, S. T. P. Archidiaconi In agro Oxon, Dec. 30, 1676. Philips has been always praised, without contradiction, as a man modest, blameless, and pious; who bore narrowness of fortune without discontent, and tedious and painful maladies without impatience; beloved by those that knew him, but not ambitious to be known. He was probably not formed for a wide circle. His conversation is commended for its innocent gayety, which seems to have flowed only among his intimates; for I have been told, that he was in company silent and barren, and employed only upon the pleasure of his pipe. His addiction to tobacco is mentioned by one of his biographers, who remarks, that in all his writings, except "Blenheim," he has found an opportunity of celebrating the fragrant fume. In common life he was probably one of those who please by not offending, and whose person was loved because his writings were admired. He died honoured and lamented, before any part of his reputation had withered, and before his patron St. John had disgraced him. a college. He seems to have formed his ideas of the field of Blenheim from the battles of the heroic ages, or the tales of chivalry, with very little comprehension of the qualities necessary to the composition of a modern hero, which Addison has displayed with so much propriety. makes Mariborough behold at a distance the slaughter made by Tallard, then haste to encounter and restrain him, and mow his way through ranks made headless by his sword. He He imitates Milton's numbers indeed, but imitates them very injudiciously. Deformity is easily copied; and whatever there is in Milton which the reader wishes away, all that is obsolete, peculiar, or licentious, is accumulated with great care by Philips. Milton's verse was harmonious, in proportion to the general state of our metre in Milton's age; and, if he had written after the improvements made by Dryden, it is reasonable to believe that he would have admitted a more pleasing modulation of numbers into his work; but Philips sits down with a resolution to make no more music than he found; to want all that his master wanted, though he is very far from having what his master bad. Those asperities, therefore, that are venerable in the " Paradise Lost," are contemptible in the "Blenheim." His works are few. The "Splendid Shilling" To the poem on "Cider," written in imitation has the uncommon merit of an original design, of the "Georgics," may be given this peculiar unless it may be thought precluded by the an- praise, that it is grounded in truth; that the cient Centos. To degrade the sounding words precepts which it contains are exact and just; and stately construction of Milton, by an appli- and that it is therefore, at once, a book of entercation to the lowest and most trivial things, gra- Miller, the great gardener and botanist, whose tainment and of science. This I was told by tifies the mind with a momentary triumph over that grandeur which hitherto held its captives expression was, that "there were many books in admiration; the words and things are pre-not contain so much truth as that poem." written on the same subject in prose, which do sented with a new appearance, and novelty is always grateful where it gives no pain. But the merit of such performances begins and ends with the first author. He that should again adapt Milton's phrase to the gross incidents of common life, and even adapt it with more art, which would not be difficult, must yet expect but a small part of the praise which Philips has obtained; he can only hope to be considered as the repeater of a jest. "The parody on Milton," says Gildon, "is the only tolerable production of its Author." This is a censure too dogmatical and violent. The poem of "Blenheim" was never denied to be tolerable, even by those who do not allow it supreme excellence. It is indeed the poem of a scholar," all inexpert of war;" of a man who writes books from books, and studies the world in In the disposition of his matter, so as to intersperse precepts relating to the culture of trees with sentiments more generally alluring, and in * This ode I am willing to mention, because there seems to be an error in all the printed copies, which is, I find, retained in the last. They all read: Quam Gratiarum cura decentium The Author probably wrote, Quam Gratiarum cura decentium Hannes was professor of chemistry at Oxford, and wrote one or two poems in the "Musa Angli canæ."-J. B. easy and graceful transitions from one subject to another, he has very diligently imitated his master; but he unhappily pleased himself with blank verse, and supposed that the numbers of Milton, which impress the mind with veneration, combined as they are with subjects of inconceivable grandeur, could be sustained by images which, at most, can rise only to elegance. Contending angels may shake the regions of heaven in blank verse; but the flow of equal measures, and the embellishment of rhyme, must recommend to our attention the art of engrafting, and decide the merit of the redstreak and pearmain. What study could confer, Philips had obtained: but natural deficience cannot be supplied. He seems not born to greatness and elevation. He is never lofty, nor does he often surprise with unexpected excellence; but, perhaps, to his last poem may be applied what Tully said of the work of Lucretius, that it is written with much art, though with few blazes of genius. The following fragment, written by Edmund Smith, upon the works of Philips, has been transcribed from the Bodleian manuscripts. "A Prefatory Discourse to the poem on Mr. Philips, with a character of his writings. "It is altogether as equitable some account should be given of those who have distinguished themselves by their writings, as of those who are renowned for great actions. It is but reasonable they, who contribute so much to the immortality of others, should have some share in it themselves; and since their genius only is discovered by their works, it is just that their virtues should be recorded by their friends. For no modest men (as the person I write of was in perfection) will write their own panegyrics; and it is very hard that they should go without reputation, only because they the more deserve it. The end of writing lives is for the imitation of the readers. It will be in the power of very few to imitate the Duke of Marlborough; we must be content with admiring his great qualities and actions, without hopes of following them. The private and social virtues are more easily transcribed. The life of Cowley is more instructive, as well as more fine, than any we have in our language. And it is to be wished, since Mr. Philips had so many of the good qualities of that poet, that I had some of the abilities of his historian. in this point; not a learned man nor a poet can die, but all Europe must be acquainted with his accomplishments. They give praise and expect it in their turns; they commend their Patrus and Molieres as well as their Condés and Turennes; their Pellisons and Racines have their eulogies, as well as the Prince whom they celebrate; and their poems, their mercuries, and orations, nay, their very gazettes, are filled with the praises of the learned. "I am satisfied, had they a Philips among them, and known how to value him; had they one of his learning, his temper, but above all of that particular turn of humour, that altogether new genius, he had been an example to their poets, and a subject of their panegyrics, and perhaps set in competition with the ancients, to whom only he ought to submit. "I shall therefore endeavour to do justice to his memory, since nobody else undertakes it. And indeed I can assign no cause why so many of his acquaintance (that are as willing and more able than myself to give an account of him) should forbear to celebrate the memory of one so dear to them, but only that they look upon it as a work entirely belonging to me. "I shall content myself with giving only a character of the person and his writings, without meddling with the transactions of his life, which was altogether private: I shall only make this known observation of his family, that there was scarcely so many extraordinary men in any one. I have been acquainted with five of his brothers (of which three are still living,) all men of fine parts, yet all of a very unlike temper and genius. So that their fruitful mother, like the mother of the gods, seems to have produced a numerous offspring, all of different though uncommon faculties. Of the living, neither their modesty, nor the humour of the present age, permits me to speak of the dead, I may say something. "One of them had made the greatest progress in the study of the law of nature and nations of any one I know. He had perfectly mastered, and even improved, the notions of Grotius, and the more refined ones of Puffendorf. He could refute Hobbes with as much solidity as some of greater name, and expose him with as much wit as Echard. That noble study, which requires the greatest reach of reason and nicety of distinction, was not at all difficult to him. 'Twas a national loss to be deprived of one who understood a science so necessary, and yet so unknown in England. I shall add only, he had the same honesty and sincerity as the person I write of, but more heat: the former was more inclined to argue, the latter to divert: one "The Grecian philosophers have had their lives written, their morals commended, and their sayings recorded. Mr. Philips had all the virtues to which most of them only pretended, and all their integrity without any of their af-employed his reason more; the other his imafectation. "The French are very just to eminent men gination: the former had been well qualified for those posts, which the modesty of the latter |