therefore captivated by the respectful filence of a fteady liftener, and told the fame tales too often.

He did not, however, claim the right of talking alone; for it was his rule, when he had spoken a minute, to give room by a paufe for any other fpeaker. Of time, on all occafions, he was an exact computer, and knew the minutes required to every common operation.

It may be justly fuppofed that there was in his conversation, what appears fo frequently in his Letters, an affectation of familiarity with the Great, an ambition of momentary equality fought and enjoyed by the neglect of those ceremonies which custom has eftablished as the barriers between one order of society and another. This tranfgreffion of regularity was by himself and his admirers termed greatnefs of foul. But a great mind disdains to hold any thing by courtesy, and therefore never ufurps what a lawful claimant may take away. He that encroaches on another's dignity, puts himself in his power; he is either repelled with helpless indignity, or endured by clemency and condefcenfion.

Of Swift's general habits of thinking, if his Letters can be fuppofed to afford any evidence, he was not a man to be either loved or envied. He feems to have wafted life in difcontent, by the rage of neglected pride, and the languifhment of unfatisfied defire. He is querulous and faftidious, arrogant and malignant; he fcarcely fpeaks of himself but with indignant lamentations, or of others but with infolent fuperiority when he is gay, and with angry contempt when he is gloomy. From the Letters that pafs between him and Pope it might be inferred that they,

with Arbuthnot and Gay, had engroffed all the understanding and virtue of mankind; that their merits filled the world; or that there was no hope of more. They fhew the age involved in darkness, and shade the picture with fullen emulation.

When the Queen's death drove him into Ireland, he might be allowed to regret for a time the interception of his views, the extinction of his hopes, and his ejection from gay fcenes, important employment, and fplendid friendships; but when time had enabled reason to prevail over vexation, the complaints, which at first were natural, became ridiculous because they were useless. But queruloufnefs was now grown habitual, and he cried out when he probably had ceased to feel. His reiterated wailings perfuaded Bolingbroke that he was really willing to quit his deanery for an English parish; and Boling. broke procured an exchange, which was rejected; and Swift ftill retained the pleasure of complaining.

The greatest difficulty that occurs, in analyfing his character, is to discover by what depravity of intellect he took delight in revolving ideas, from which almost every other mind fhrinks with difguft. The ideas of pleasure, even when criminal, may folicit the imagination; but what has difeafe, deformity, and filth, upon which the thoughts can be allured to dwell? Delany is willing to think that Swift's mind was not much tainted with this grofs corruption before his long vifit to Pope. He does not confider how he degrades his hero, by making him at fiftynine the pupil of turpitude, and liable to the malig

nant influence of an afcendant mind. But the truth, is, that Gulliver had defcribed his Yahoos before, the vifit; and he that had formed thofe images had. nothing filthy to learn.

I have here given the character of Swift as he exhibits himself to my perception; but now let another be heard who knew him better. Dr. Delany,. after long acquaintance, describes him to Lord Or-, rery in these terms:

"My Lord, when you confider Swift's fingular, peculiar, and most variegated vein of wit, always rightly intended (although not always fo rightly. "directed), delightful in many instances, and salu

tary even where it is moft offenfive; when you "confider his ftrict truth, his fortitude in refifting. "oppreffion and arbitrary power; his fidelity in "friendship, his fincere love and zeal for religion, "his uprightness in making right resolutions, and "his steadiness in adhering to them; his care of his “church, its choir, its economy, and its income; "his attention to all thofe that preached in his ca"thedral, in order to their amendment in pronuncia, ❝tion and style; as alfo his remarkable attention to "the intereft of his fucceffors, preferably to his "own prefent emoluments; his invincible patriotism, ❝even to a country which he did not love; his very "various, well-devised, well-judged, and extenfive "charities, throughout his life, and his whole for, "tune (to fay nothing of his wife's) conveyed to "the fame Chriftian purposes at his death, charities, "from which he could enjoy no honour, advantage, "or fatisfaction of any kind in this world; when "you confider his ironical and humorous, as well

"as his ferious fchemes, for the promotion of true 66 religion and virtue, his fuccefs in foliciting for the "First Fruits and Twentieths, to the unfpeakable "benefit of the Established Church of Ireland; and "his felicity (to rate it no higher) in giving occa"fion to the building of fifty new churches in "London:

"All this confidered, the character of his life "will appear like that of his writings; they will "both bear to be re-confidered and re-examined with "the utmost attention, and always discover new "beauties and excellencies upon every examination.

66

They will bear to be confidered as the fun, in "which the brightness will hide the blemishes; and "whenever petulant ignorance, pride, malignity, "or envy, interpofes to cloud or fully his fame, I "will take upon me to pronounce, that the eclipse "will not last long.

"To conclude-No man ever deferved better of "his country, than Swift did of his; a fteady, "perfevering, inflexible friend; a wife, a watchful, "and a faithful counfellor, under many fevere trials "and bitter perfecutions, to the manifeft hazard "both of his liberty and fortune.

"He lived a bleffing, he died a benefactor, and "his name will ever live an honour to Ireland."

IN the poetical works of Dr. Swift there is not much upon which the critick can exercise his powers. They are often humorous, almoft always light, and have the qualities which recommend fuch compofitions, eafinefs and gaiety. They are, for the most part, what their author intended. The diction is correct, the numbers are fmooth, and the rhymes exact. There seldom occurs a hard-laboured expreffion, or a redundant epithet; all his verfes exemplify his own definition of a good style, they confift of " proper words in proper places."

To divide this collection into claffes, and fhew how fome pieces are grofs, and fome are trifling, would be to tell the reader what he knows already, and to find faults of which the author could not be ignorant, who certainly wrote not often to his judgement, but his humour.

It was faid, in a Preface to one of the Irifh editions, that Swift had never been known to take a fingle thought from any writer, ancient or modern. This is not literally true; but perhaps no writer can cafily be found that has borrowed fo little, or that in all his excellencies and all his defects has fo well maintained his claim to be confidered as original.

BROOM E.