after having paffed through the ufual prepa ratory ftudies, as may be reafonably fuppofed with great celerity and fuccefs, his father thought it proper to affign him a profeffion, by which fomething might be gotten; and about the time of the Revolution fent him, at the age of fixteen, to ftudy law in the Middle Temple, where he lived for several years, but with very little attention to Statutes or Reports.

His difpofition to become an author appeared very early, as he very early felt that force of imagination, and poffeffed that copiousness of sentiment, by which intellectual pleasure can be given. His first performance was a novel, called Incognita, or Love and Duty reconciled: It is praised by the biogra phers, who quote fome part of the preface, that is indeed, for fuch a time of life, uncommonly, judicious. I would rather praise it than read it.

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His firft dramatick labour was the Old Batchelor; of which he says, in his defence againft Collier, "that comedy was written, “ as feveral know, fome years before it

was acted. When I wrote it, I had little thoughts of the stage; but did it, to amuse

myself, in a flow recovery from a fit of "fickness. Afterwards through my indif"cretion it was feen, and in fome little time

more it was acted; and I, through the re"mainder of my indifcretion, fuffered myself

to be drawn in, to the profecution of a "difficult and thankless study, and to be in"volved in a perpetual war with knaves and "fools."

There feems to be a ftrange affectation in authors of appearing to have done every thing by chance. The Old Batchelor was written for amufement, in the languor of convalefcence. Yet it is apparently compofed with great elaborateness of dialogue, and inceffant ambition of wit. The age of the writer confidered, it is indeed a a very wonderful performance; for, whenever written, it was acted (1693) when he was not more than twenty-one years old; and was then recommended by Mr. Dryden, Mr. Southern, and Mr. Maynwaring. Dryden faid that he never had feen fuch a firft play; but they found it deficient in fome things requifite to

the

the fuccefs of its exhibition, and by their greater experience fitted it for the stage. Southern used to relate of one comedy, probably of this, that when Congreve read it to the players, he pronounced it fo wretchedly that they had almoft rejected it; but they were afterwards fo well perfuaded of its excellence, that, for half a year before it was acted, the manager allowed its author the privilege of the house.

Few plays have ever been fo beneficial to the writer; for it procured him the patronage of Halifax, who immediately made him one of the commiffioners for licensing coaches, and foon after gave him a place in the pipeoffice, and another in the customs of fix hundred pounds a year. Congreve's converfation must surely have been at least equally pleafing with his writings.

Such a comedy, written at fuch an age, requires fome confideration. As the lighter fpecies of dramatick poetry profeffes the imitation of common life, of real manners, and daily incidents, it apparently prefuppofes a familiar knowledge of many characters, and VOL. III.

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exact

exact observation of the paffing world; the difficulty therefore is, to conceive how this knowledge can be obtained by a boy.

But if the Old Batchelor be more nearly examined, it will be found to be one of thofe comedies which may be made by a mind vigorous and acute, and furiiifhed with comick characters by the perufal of other poets, without much actual commerce with mankind. The dialogue is one conftant reciprocation of conceits, or clafh of wit, in which nothing flows neceffarily from the occafion, or is dictated by nature. The characters both of men and women are either fictitious and artificial, as thofe of Heartwell and the Ladies; or eafy and common, as Wittol a tame idiot, Bluff a fwaggering coward, and Fondle wife a jealous puritan; and the catastrophe arifes from a mistake not very probably produced, by marrying a woman in a mask.

Yet this gay comedy, when all these deductions are made, will still remain the work of a very powerful and fertile mind: the dialogue is quick and sparkling, the incidents

fuch

fuch as feize the attention, and the wit fo exuberant that it o'er-informs its tenement.

Next year he gave another fpecimen of his abilities in The Double Dealer, which was not received with equal kindness. He writes to his patron the lord Halifax a dedication, in which he endeavours to reconcile the reader to that which found few friends among the audience. These apologies are always uselefs; de guftibus non eft difputandum;

men

may be convinced, but they cannot be pleased, against their will. But though taste is obstinate, it is very variable, and time often prevails when arguments have failed.

Queen Mary conferred upon both those plays the honour of her prefence; and when The died, foon after, Congreve testified his gratitude by a defpicable effufion of elegiac paftoral; a compofition in which all is unnatural, and yet nothing is new.

In another year (1695) his prolific pen produced Love for Love; a comedy of nearer alliance to life, and exhibiting more real manners, than either of the former. The character

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