the imagination; but what has disease, 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 fifty-nine the pupil of turpitude, and liable to the malignant influence of an ascendant mind. But the truth is, that Gulliver had defcribed his Yahoos before the vifit, and he that had formed those 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 Orrery in these

terms.

"My Lord, when you confider Swift's ❝fingular, peculiar, and moft variegated "vein of wit, always rightly intended (al"though not always fo rightly directed), "delightful in many inftances, and falutary, 46 even where it is most offenfive; when you ❝ confider

5

"confider his strict truth, his fortitude in rê fifting oppreffion and arbitrary power; his

66

fidelity in friendship, his fincere love and "zeal for religion, his uprightness in making right refolutions, and his fteadiness 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 "cathedral, in order to their amendment in "pronunciation and ftyle; as alfo his re"markable attention to the intereft of his

66

fucceffors, preferably to his own prefent "emoluments; invincible patriotism, even to a country which he did not love; his very various, well-devifed, well-judged, "and extenfive charities, throughout his life, and his whole fortune (to fay nothing "of his wife's) conveyed to the same christ"ian purposes at his death; charities from "which he could enjoy no honour, advantage or fatisfaction of any kind in this "world. When confider his ironical "and humorous, as well as his ferious fchemes, "for the promotion of true religion and vir66 tue; his fuccefs in foliciting for the First Fruits and Twentieths, to the unspeakable "benefit of the eftablifhed Church of Ireland;

66

you

"and

"and his felicity (to rate it no higher) in giving occafion to the building of fifty new "churches in London."

"All this confidered, the character of his "life will appear like that of his writings; 66 they will both bear to be re-confidered and "re-examined with the utmost attention, "and always difcover new beauties and ex"cellencies upon every examination.

"They will bear to be confidered as the "fun, in which the brightness will hide the ❝blemishes; and whenever petulant igno

rance, pride, malice, 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 any country than Swift did of

".his.

"friend;

A fteady, perfevering, inflexible

wife, a watchful, and a faithful

counsellor, under many fevere trials and "bitter perfecutions, to the manifest hazard "both of his liberty and fortune.

"He

"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 exercife his powers. They are often humorous, almost always light, and have the qualities which recommend fuch compofitions, eafiness 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 feldom occurs a hardlaboured expreffion, or a redundant epithet; all his verses 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

the author could not be ignorant, who certainly wrote often not to his judgement, but his humour.

It was faid, in a Preface to one of the Irish 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 easily 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.

Gg 2 BROOME.