the common level, or virtue refined from paffion, or proof against corruption, could not eafily find an abler judge, or a warmer advocate.

What was the refult of Mr. Savage's enquiry, though he was not much accustomed to conceal his difcoveries, it may not be entirely fafe to relate, because the persons whose characters he criticised are powerful; and power and refentment are feldom ftrangers; nor would it perhaps be wholly just, because what he afferted in converfation might, though true in general, be heightened by fome momentary ardour of imagination, and, as it can be delivered only from memory, may be imperfectly reprefented; fo that the picture at first aggravated, and then unskilfully copied, may be justly suspected to retain no great refemblance of the original.

It may however be observed, that he did not appear to have formed very elevated ideas of those to whom the adminiftration of affairs, or the conduct of parties, has been intrufted; who have been confidered as the advocates of the crown, or the guardians of

the

the people; and who have obtained the most implicit confidence, and the loudeft applaufes. Of one particular perfon, who has been at one time fo popular as to be generally ef teemed, and at another fo formidable as to be univerfally detefted, he observed, that his acquifitions had been fmall, or that his ca pacity was narrow, and that the whole range of his mind was from obfcenity to politics, and from politics to obfcenity.

But the opportunity of indulging his fpeculations on great characters was now at an end. He was banished from the table of Lord Tyrconnel, and turned again adrift upon the world, without prospect of finding quickly any other harbour. As prudence was not one of the virtues by which he was distinguished, he had made no provision against a misfortune like this. And though it is not to be imagined but that the feparation muft for fome time have been preceded by coldnefs, peevishness, or neglect, though it was undoubtedly the confequence of accumulated provocations on both fides; yet every one that knew Savage will readily believe, that to him it was fudden as a ftroke of thunder; VOL. III. T that,

that, though he might have transiently fufpected it, he had never fuffered any thought fo unpleafing to fink into his mind, but that he had driven it away by amufements, or dreams of future felicity and affluence, and had never taken any measures by which he might prevent a precipitation from plenty to indigence.

This quarrel and feparation, and the diffi culties to which Mr. Savage was expofed by them, were foon known both to his friends and enemies; nor was it long before he perceived, from the behaviour of both, how much is added to the luftre of genius by the ornaments of wealth.

His condition did not appear to excite much compaffion; for he had not always been careful to use the advantages he enjoyed with that moderation which ought to have been with more than ufual caution preferved by him, who knew, if he had reflected, that he was only a dependant on the bounty of another, whom he could expect to support him no longer than he endeavoured to preserve his favour by complying with his inclinations,

inclinations, and whom he nevertheless fet at defiance, and was continually irritating by negligence or encroachments.

any

Examples need not be fought at any great distance to prove, that fuperiority of fortune has a natural tendency to kindle pride, and that pride seldom fails to exert itself in contempt and infult; and if this is often the effect of hereditary wealth, and of honours enjoyed only by the merit of others, it is fome extenuation of indecent triumphs to which this unhappy man may have been betrayed, that his profperity was heightened by the force of novelty, and made more intoxicating by a sense of the mifery in which he had fo long languished, and perhaps of the infults which he had formerly borne, and which he might now think himself entitled to revenge. It is too common for those who have unjustly fuffered pain, to inflict it likewife in their turn with the fame injustice, and to imagine that they have a right to treat others as they have themselves been treated.

That Mr. Savage was too much elevated by any good fortune, is generally known; and T 2

fome

fome paffages of his Introduction to The Au thor to be let fufficiently fhew, that he did not wholly refrain from fuch fatire as he afterwards thought very unjuft, when he was exposed to it himself; for when he was afterwards ridiculed in the character of a diftreffed poet, he very easily discovered, that distress was not a proper fubject for merriment, or topic of invective. He was then able to difcern, that, if mifery be the effect of virtue, it ought to be reverenced; if of ill-fortune, to be pitied; and if of vice, not to be infulted, because it is perhaps itself a punishment adequate to the crime by which it was produced. And the humanity of that man can deserve no panegyric, who is capa ble of reproaching a criminal in the hands of the executioner.

But these reflections, though they readily occurred to him in the firft and laft parts of his life, were, I am afraid, for a long time forgotten; at least they were, like many other maxims, treafured up in his mind, rather for fhew than ufe, and operated very little upon his conduct, however elegantly, he might fometimes explain, or however forcibly he might inculcate, them.