YOUNG.

Tex forving ife was written, at my request, by a bem vis had better information than I could easily b rocamed, and the publick will, perhaps, wish that I iz subred and obtained more such favours from him.

- DEAR SIR.-In consequence of our different conv satires about authentick materials for the life of Your send you the following detail.

• Of great men, something must always be said gratify curiosity. Of the illustrious author of the N Thoaris much has been told of which there never co have been proofs; and little care appears to have be taken to tell that, of which proofs, with little trouble, m have been procured."

Edward Young was born at Upham, near Wincheste in June, 1681. He was the son of Edward Young, that time fellow of Winchester college, and rector Upham; who was the son of Jo. Young, of Woodba in Berkshire, styled by Wood, gentleman. In Septembe 1682, the poet's father was collated to the prebend of G lingham Minor, in the church of Sarum, by bishop Ward. When Ward's faculties were impaired through age, duties were necessarily performed by others. We lear from Wood, that at a visitation of Sprat's, July the 12th, 1686, the prebendary preached a Latin sermon, terwards published, with which the bishop was so pleased, that he told the chapter he was concerned to find the preacher had one of the worst prebends in their church. Some time after this, in consequence of his merit and re

See Gent. Mag. vol. lxx. p. 225. N.

cation, or of the interest of lord Bradford, to whom, in )2, he dedicated two volumes of sermons, he was apnted chaplain to king William and queen Mary, and eferred to the deanery of Sarum. Jacob, who wrote in 20, says, "he was chaplain and clerk of the closet to e late queen, who honoured him by standing godmother the poet." His fellowship of Winchester he resigned favour of a gentleman of the name of Harris, who mared his only daughter. The dean died at Sarum, after a ort illness, in 1705, in the sixty-third year of his age. n the Sunday after his decease, bishop Burnet preached t the cathedral, and began his sermon with saying, Death has been of late walking round us, and making reach upon breach upon us, and has now carried away he head of this body with a stroke; so that he, whom you aw a week ago distributing the holy mysteries, is now aid in the dust. But he still lives in the many excellent lirections he has left us, both how to live and how to die."

The dean placed his son upon the foundation at Winchester college, where he had himself been educated. At this school Edward Young remained till the election after his eighteenth birthday, the period at which those upon the foundation are superannuated. Whether he did not betray his abilities early in life, or his masters had not skill enough to discover in their pupil any marks of genius for which he merited reward, or no vacancy at Oxford afforded them an opportunity to bestow upon him the reward provided for merit by William of Wykeham; certain it is, that to an Oxford fellowship our poet did not succeed. By chance, or by choice, New college cannot claim the honour of numbering among its fellows him who wrote the Night Thoughts.

On the 13th of October, 1703, he was entered an independent member of New college, that he might live at little expense in the warden's lodgings, who was a particular friend of his father, till he should be qualified to stand for a fellowship at All Souls. In a few months the warden of New college died. He then removed to

VOL. VIII.

Ee

beng dedicated in Enrisa. + the inches of the ÛN rungan famir.” It test indres be SETS

Te fur in a single, by being obür write an episte dedicat raid of commonplace. Burb a one as was never pabusted before by any 2013 wever: that this practice absolved them from The gation of reading what was presented to them, and thi the bookseler approved of it, because it would make per pie stare, was absurd enough, and perfectly right.”

Of this oration there is no appearance in his own editi of his works; and prefixed to an edition by Curll and Tor son, 1741, is a letter from Young to Curll, if we may credit Curll, dated December the 9th, 1739, wherein he says that he has not leisure to review what he formerly wrote, "I have not the Epistle to lord Lansdowne. If you will take my advice, I would have you omit that, and

and adds,

⚫oration on Codrington. I think the collection will sell ter without them."

There are who relate, that, when first Young found himf independent, and his own master at All Souls, he was t the ornament to religion and morality which he afterards became.

The authority of his father, indeed, had ceased, some ne before, by his death; and Young was certainly not hamed to be patronised by the infamous Wharton. But Wharton befriended in Young, perhaps, the poet, and parcularly the tragedian. If virtuous authors must be paronised only by virtuous peers, who shall point them out? Yet Pope is said, by Ruffhead, to have told Warburon, that "Young had much of a sublime genius, though without common sense; so that his genius, having no guide, was perpetually liable to degenerate into bombast. This made him pass a foolish youth, the sport of peers and poets: but his having a very good heart enabled him to support the clerical character when he assumed it, first with decency, and afterwards with honour."

They who think ill of Young's morality in the early part of his life may, perhaps, be wrong; but Tindal could not err in his opinion of Young's warmth and ability in the cause of religion. Tindal used to spend much of his time at All Souls. "The other boys," said the atheist, "I can always answer, because I always know whence they have their arguments, which I have read a hundred times; but that fellow Young is continually pestering me with something of his own."

be

After all, Tindal and the censurers of Young may reconcilable. Young might, for two or three years, have tried that kind of life, in which his natural principles would not suffer him to wallow long. If this were so, he has

As my great friend is now become the subject of biography, it should be told, that every time I called upon Johnson during the time I was employed in collecting materials for this life and putting it together, he never suffered me to depart without some such farewell as this: "Don't forget that rascal Tindal, sir. Be sure to hang up the atheist." Alluding to this anecdote, which Johnson had mentioned to me.

unz. Termans, serien te god fortune of Attist heen a 3 Len presented, with a copy ty Prses. a Somers. at wred that he also might soar d vesa na or A The same kind. Hak coetical fit as a rem tine called up to the lonse I arts arts of Northampton m. Ansour indt andet n me tay, ten others to the BarI reactie the people to one.-] v Os & pubisaei, in 1712, an Epis aurice Sere ori Lansdowne. In composition be wet pours out his panegyrick with the extravagance of A THEEZ TOM, Who thinks his present sări of wealth will ever be examsted.

The poem seems intended also to reconcile the public to the late peace. Tus s endeavoured to be done by showing that men are siain in war, and that in peace " birvests wave, and commerce sweds her sail." If this be b manity, for which he meant it; is it politicks? Another purpose of this epistie appears to have been, to prepare the publick for the reception of some tragedy he migh have in hand. His lordship's patronage, he says, will not let him “repent his passion for the stage;" and the par ticular praise bestowed on Othello and Oroonoko looks as if some such character as Zanga was even then in contem plation. The affectionate mention of the death of his friend Harrison, of New college, at the close of this poem, is an instance of Young's art, which displayed it self so wonderfully, some time afterwards, in the Night Thoughts, of making the publick a party in his private

it

Should justice call upon you to censure this poem, anght, at least, to be remembered, that he did not insert it works; and that in the letter to Curll, as we have