having entertained fome personal malice against Mr. Savage, or fearing, left, by retracting fo confident an affertion, he should impair the credit of his paper, refused to give him that fatisfaction. Mr. Savage therefore thought it neceffary, to his own vindication, to profecute him in the King's Bench; but as he did not find any ill effects from the accufation, having fufficiently cleared his innocence, he thought any farther procedure would have the appearance of revenge, and therefore willingly dropped it. He faw foon afterwards a process commenced in the fame court against himself, on an information in which he was accused of writing and publishing an obscene pamphlet. It was always Mr. Savage's defire to be distinguished; and, when any controversy became popular, he never wanted fome reafon for engaging in it with great ardour, and appearing at the head of the party which he had chofen. As he was never celebrated for his prudence, he had no fooner taken his fide, and informed himself of the chief topicks of the difpute, than he took all opportunities of afferting and propagating his principles, without much regard to his own intereft, or any other vifible defign than that of drawing upon himself the attention. of mankind. The difpute between the Bishop of London and the Chancellor is well known to have been for fome time the chief topic of political converfation; and therefore Mr. Savage, in pursuance of his character, endeavoured to become confpicuous among the controvertists with which every coffee-house was filled on that occafion. He was an indefatigable oppofer of all the claims of ecclefiaftical power, though he did not know on what they were founded; and was therefore no friend to the Bishop of London. But he had another reafon for appearing as a warm advocate for Dr. Rundle; for he was the friend of Mr. Fofter and Mr. Thomfon, who were the friends of Mr. Savage. Thus remote was his intereft in the queftion, which however, as he imagined, concerned cerned him fo nearly, that it was not fufficient to harangue and difpute, but neceffary likewife to write upon it.. He therefore engaged with great ardour in a new Poem, called by him, The Progrefs of a Divine; in which he conducts a profligate prieft by all the gradations of wickedness from a poor curacy in the country, to the highest preferments of the church, and defcribes with that humour which was natural to him, and that knowledge which was extended to all the diverfities of human life, his behaviour in every ftation; and infinuates, that this priest, thus accomplished, found at last a patron in the Bishop of London. When he was afked by one of his friends, on what pretence he could charge the bishop with fuch an action, he had no more to say, than that he had only inverted the accufation, and that he thought it reasonable to believe, that he, who obftructed the rife of a good man without reafon, would for bad reasons promote the exaltation of a villain. The clergy were univerfally provoked by this fatire; and Savage, who, as was his conftant 7 conftant practice, had fet his name to his performance, was cenfured in The Weekly * Mifcellany with feverity, which he did not seem inclined to forget. But * A short fatire was likewife published in the fame paper, in which were the following lines: For cruel murder doom'd to hempen death, Priests, and their flavish doctrines, I defpife. "Shall I "Who, by free-thinking to free action fir'd, "No, arm'd with rhyme, at priefts I'll take my aim, "Though prudence bids me murder but their fame." WEEKLY MISCELLANY. An answer was published in The Gentleman's Magazine, written by an unknown hand, from which the following lines are felected: Transform'd by thoughtless rage, and midnight wine, In equal brawl if Savage lung'd a thrust, The royal hand from guilt and vengeance clears. 86 Savage, in prayer and vain repentant tears;" But a return of invective was not thought a fufficient punishment. The Court of King's Bench was therefore moved against him, and he was obliged to return an answer to a charge of obscenity. It was urged, in his defence, that obfcenity was criminal when it was intended to promote the practice of vice; but that Mr. Savage had only introduced obfcene ideas, with the view of expofing them to deteftation, and of amending the age, by fhewing the deformity of wickedness. This plea was admitted; and Sir Exert thy pen to mend a vicious age, To curb the priest, and fink his high-church rage; But grant Malicioufly that Savage plung'd the fteel, GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE, May 1735. |