The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland Volume II Part 24

But when your troubled country call'd you forth, Your flaming courage, and your matchless worth Dazling the eyes of all that did pretend, To fierce contention gave a prosp'rous end.

Still as you rise, the state, exalted too, Finds no distemper while 'tis chang'd by you; Chang'd like the world's great scene, when without noise The rising sun night's vulgar lights destroys.

Had you, some ages past, this race of glory Run, with amazement we shou'd read your story; But living virtue, all atchievements past, Meets envy still to grapple with at last.

This Caesar found, and that ungrateful age, With losing him, went back to blood and rage.

Mistaken Brutus thought to break their yoke, But cut the bond of union with that stroke.

That sun once set, a thousand meaner stars Gave a dim light to violence and wars, To such a tempest as now threatens all, Did not your mighty arm prevent the fall.

If Rome's great senate cou'd not wield that sword Which of the conquer'd world had made them lord, What hope had our's, while yet their pow'r was new, To rule victorious armies, but by you?

You, that had taught them to subdue their foes, Cou'd order teach, and their high sp'rits compose: To ev'ry duty you'd their minds engage, Provoke their courage, and command their rage.

So when a lion shakes his dreadful mane, And angry grows; if he that first took pain To tame his youth, approach the haughty beast, He bends to him, but frights away the rest.

As the vext world, to find repose, at last Itself into Augustus' arms did cast: So England now doth, with like toil opprest, Her weary head upon your bosom rest.

Then let the muses, with such notes as these, Instruct us what belongs unto our peace; Your battles they hereafter shall indite, And draw the image of our Mars in fight;

Tell of towns storm'd, of armies overcome, Of mighty kingdoms by your conduct won, How, while you thunder'd, clouds of dust did choak Contending troops, and seas lay hid in smoke.

Ill.u.s.trious acts high raptures do infuse, And ev'ry conqueror creates a muse; Here in low strains your milder deeds we sing, But there, my lord, we'll bays and olive bring,

To crown your head; while you in triumph ride O'er vanquish'd nations, and the sea beside: While all your neighbour princes unto you, Like Joseph's sheaves, pay reverence and bow.

Footnotes: 1. The ancient seat of the Sydneys family in Kent; now in the possession of William Perry, esq; whose lady is niece to the late Sydney, earl of Leicester. A small, but excellent poem upon this delightful seat, was published by an anonymous hand, in 1750, ent.i.tled, PENSHURST. See Monthly Review, vol. II. page 331.

2. Life, p. 8, 9.

3. History of the Rebellion, Edit. Oxon. 1707, 8vo.

JOHN OGILBY,

This poet, who was likewise an eminent Geographer and Cosmographer, was born near Edinburgh in the year 1600[1]. His father, who was of an ancient and genteel family, having spent his estate, and being prisoner in the King's Bench for debt, could give his son but little education at school; but our author, who, in his early years discovered the most invincible industry, obtained a little knowledge in the Latin grammar, and afterwards so much money, as not only to procure his father's discharge from prison, but also to bind himself apprentice to Mr. Draper a dancing master in Holbourn, London. Soon after, by his dexterity in his profession, and his complaisant behaviour to his master's employers, he obtained the favour of them to lend him as much money as to buy out the remaining part of his time, and set up for himself; but being afterwards appointed to dance in the duke of Buckingham's great Masque, by a false step, he strained a vein in the inside of his leg, which ever after occasioned him to halt. He afterwards taught dancing to the sisters of Sir Ralph Hopton, at Wytham in Somersets.h.i.+re, where, at leisure, he learned to handle the pike and musket. When Thomas earl of Strafford became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, he was retained in his family to teach the art of dancing, and being an excellent penman, he was frequently employed by the earl to transcribe papers for him.

In his lords.h.i.+p's family it was that he first gave proofs of his inclination to poetry, by translating some of aesop's Fables into English verse, which he communicated to some learned men, who understood Latin better than he, by whose a.s.sistance and advice he published them. He was one of the troop of guards belonging to the earl, and composed an humourous piece ent.i.tled the Character of a Trooper. About the time he was supported by his lords.h.i.+p, he was made master of the revels for the kingdom of Ireland, and built a little theatre for the representation of dramatic entertainments, in St.

Warburgh's street in Dublin: but upon the breaking out of the rebellion in that kingdom, he was several times in great danger of his life, particularly when he narrowly escaped being blown up in the castle of Rathfarnam. About the time of the conclusion of the war in England, he left Ireland, and being s.h.i.+pwrecked, came to London in a very necessitous condition. After he had made a short stay in the metropolis, he travelled on foot to Cambridge, where his great industry, and love of learning, recommended him to the notice of several scholars, by whose a.s.sistance he became so compleat a master of the Latin tongue, that in 1646 he published an English translation of Virgil, which was printed in large 8vo. and dedicated to William marquis of Hereford. He reprinted it at London 1654 in fol. with this t.i.tle; The Works of Publius Virgilius Maro, translated and adorned with Sculptures, and ill.u.s.trated with Annotations; which, Mr. Wood tells us, was the fairest edition, that till then, the English press ever produced. About the year 1654 our indefatigable author learned the Greek language, and in four year's time published in fol. a translation of Homer's Iliad, adorned with excellent sculptures, ill.u.s.trated with Annotations, and addressed to King Charles II. The same year he published the Bible in a large fol. at Cambridge, according to the translation set forth by the special command of King James I. with the Liturgy and Articles of the Church of England, with Chorographical Sculptures. About the year 1662 he went into Ireland, then having obtained a patent to be made master of the revels there, a place which Sir William Davenant sollicited in vain. Upon this occasion he built a theatre at Dublin, which cost him 2000 l. the former being ruined during the troubles. In 1664 he published in London, in fol. a translation of Homer's Odyssey, with Sculptures, and Notes. He afterwards wrote two heroic poems, one ent.i.tled the Ephesian Matron, the other the Roman Slave, both dedicated to Thomas earl of Ossory. The next work he composed was an Epic Poem in 12 Books, in honour of King Charles I. but this was entirely lost in the fire of London in September 1666, when Mr. Ogilby's house in White Fryars was burnt down, and his whole fortune, except to the value of five pounds, destroyed. But misfortunes seldom had any irretrievable consequences to Ogilby, for by his insinuating address, and most astonis.h.i.+ng industry, he was soon able to repair whatever loss he sustained by any cross accident. It was not long till he fell on a method of raising a fresh sum of money. Procuring his house to be rebuilt, he set up a printing-office, was appointed his Majesty's Cosmographer and Geographic Printer, and printed many great works translated and collected by himself and his a.s.sistants, the enumeration of which would be unnecessary and tedious.

This laborious man died September 4, 1676, and was interred in the vault under part of the church in St. Bride's in Fleet-street. Mr.

Edward Philips in his Theatrum Poetarum stiles him one of the prodigies, from producing, after so late an initiation into literature, so many large and learned volumes, as well in verse as in prose, and tells us, that his Paraphrase upon aesop's Fables, is generally confessed to have exceeded whatever hath been done before in that kind.

As to our author's poetry, we have the authority of Mr. Pope to p.r.o.nounce it below criticism, at least his translations; and in all probability his original epic poems which we have never seen, are not much superior to his translations of Homer and Virgil. If Ogilby had not a poetical genius, he was notwithstanding a man of parts, and made an amazing proficiency in literature, by the force of an unwearied application. He cannot be sufficiently commended for his virtuous industry, as well as his filial piety, in procuring, in so early a time of life, his father's liberty, when he was confined in a prison.

Ogilby seems indeed to have been a good sort of man, and to have recommended himself to the world by honest means, without having recourse to the servile arts of flattery, and the blandishments of falshood. He is an instance of the astonis.h.i.+ng efficacy of application; had some more modern poets been blessed with a thousandth part of his oeconomy and industry, they needed not to have lived in poverty, and died of want. Although Ogilby cannot be denominated a genius, yet he found means to make a genteel livelihood by literature, which many of the sons of Parna.s.sus, blessed with superior powers, curse as a very dry and unpleasing soil, but which proceeds more from want of culture, than native barrenness.

Footnote: 1. Athen Oxon. vol. ii. p. 378.

WILMOT, Earl of ROCHESTER.

It is an observation founded on experience, that the poets have, of all other men, been most addicted to the gratifications of appet.i.te, and have pursued pleasure with more unwearied application than men of other characters. In this respect they are indeed unhappy, and have ever been more subject to pity than envy. A violent love of pleasure, if it does not destroy, yet, in a great measure, enervates all other good qualities with which a man may be endowed; and as no men have ever enjoyed higher parts from nature, than the poets, so few, from this unhappy attachment to pleasure, have effected so little good by those amazing powers. Of the truth of this observation, the n.o.bleman, whose memoirs we are now to present to the reader, is a strong and indelible instance, for few ever had more ability, and more frequent opportunities, for promoting the interests of society, and none ever prost.i.tuted the gifts of Heaven to a more inglorious purpose. Lord Rochester was not more remarkable for the superiority of his parts, than the extraordinary debauchery of his life, and with his dissipations of pleasure, he suffered sometimes malevolent principles to govern him, and was equally odious for malice and envy, as for the boundless gratifications of his appet.i.tes.

This is, no doubt, the character of his lords.h.i.+p, confirmed by all who have transmitted any account of him: but if his life was supremely wicked, his death was exemplarily pious; before he approached to the conclusion of his days, he saw the follies of his former pleasures, he lived to repent with the severest contrition, and charity obliges all men to believe that he was as sincere in his protestations of penitence, as he had been before in libertine indulgence. The apparent sorrow he felt, arising from the stings and compunctions of conscience, ent.i.tle him to the reader's compa.s.sion, and has determined us to represent his errors with all imaginable tenderness; which, as it is agreeable to every benevolent man, so his lords.h.i.+p has a right to this indulgence, since he obliterated his faults by his penitence, and became so conspicuous an evidence on the side of virtue, by his important declarations against the charms of vice.

Lord Rochester was son of the gallant Henry lord Wilmot, who engaged with great zeal in the service of King Charles I. during the civil wars, and was so much in favour with Charles II. that he entrusted his person to him, after the unfortunate battle of Worcester, which trust he discharged with so much fidelity and address, that the young King was conveyed out of England into France, chiefly by his care, application and vigilance. The mother of our author was of the ancient family of the St. Johns in Wilts.h.i.+re, and has been celebrated both for her beauty and parts.

In the year 1648, distinguished to posterity, by the fall of Charles I. who suffered on a scaffold erected before the window of his own palace, our author was born at Dichley, near Woodstock, in the same county, the scene of many of his pleasures, and of his death. His lords.h.i.+p's father had the misfortune to reap none of the rewards of suffering loyalty, for he died in 1660, immediately before the restoration, leaving his son as the princ.i.p.al part of his inheritance, his t.i.tles, honours, and the merit of those extraordinary services he had done the crown; but though lord Wilmot left his son but a small estate, yet he did not suffer in his education by these means, for the oeconomy of his mother supplied that deficiency, and he was educated suitable to his quality. When he was at school (it is agreed by all his biographers) he gave early instances of a readiness of wit; and those s.h.i.+ning parts which have since appeared with so much l.u.s.tre, began then to shew themselves: he acquired the Latin to such perfection, that, to his dying day, he retained a great relish for the masculine firmness, as well as more elegant beauties of that language, and was, says Dr. Burnet, 'exactly versed in those authors who were the ornaments of the court of Augustus, which he read often with the peculiar delight which the greatest wits have often found in those studies.' When he went to the university, the general joy which over-ran the nation upon his Majesty's return, amounted to something like distraction, and soon spread a very malignant influence through all ranks of life. His lords.h.i.+p tasted the pleasures of libertinism, which then broke out in a full tide, with too acute a relish, and was almost overwhelmed in the abyss of wantonness. His tutor was Dr.

Blandford, afterwards promoted to the sees of Oxford and Worcester, and under his inspection he was committed to the more immediate care of Phinehas Berry, fellow of Wadham College, a man of learning and probity, whom his lords.h.i.+p afterwards treated with much respect, and rewarded as became a great man; but notwithstanding the care of his tutor, he had so deeply engaged in the dissipations of the general jubilee, that he could not be prevailed upon to renew his studies, which were totally lost in the joys more agreeable to his inclination.

He never thought of resuming again the pursuit of knowledge, 'till the fine address of his governor, Dr. Balfour, won him in his travels, by degrees, to those charms of study, which he had through youthful levity forsaken, and being seconded by reason, now more strong, and a more mature taste of the pleasure of learning, which the Dr. took care to place in the most agreeable and advantageous light, he became enamoured of knowledge, in the pursuit of which he often spent those hours he sometimes stole from the witty, and the fair. He returned from his travels in the 18th year of his age, and appeared at court with as great advantage as any young n.o.bleman ever did. He had a graceful and well proportioned person, was master of the most refined breeding, and possessed a very obliging and easy manner. He had a vast vivacity of thought, and a happy flow of expression, and all who conversed with him entertained the highest opinion of his understanding; and 'tis indeed no wonder he was so much caressed at a court which abounded with men of wit, countenanced by a merry prince, who relished nothing so much as brilliant conversation.

Soon after his lords.h.i.+p's return from his travels, he took the first occasion that offered, to hazard his life in the service of his country.

In the winter of the year 1665 he went to sea, with the earl of Sandwich, when he was sent out against the Dutch East India fleet, and was in the s.h.i.+p called the Revenge, commanded by Sir Thomas Tiddiman, when the attack was made on the port of Bergen in Norway, the Dutch s.h.i.+ps having got into that port. It was, says Burnet, 'as desperate an attempt as ever was made, and during the whole action, the earl of Rochester shewed as brave and resolute a courage as possible. A person of honour told me he heard the lord Clifford, who was in the same s.h.i.+p, often magnify his courage at that time very highly; nor did the rigour of the season, the hardness of the voyage, and the extreme danger he had been in, deter him from running the like the very next occasion; for the summer following he went to sea again, without communicating his design to his nearest relations. He went aboard the s.h.i.+p commanded by Sir Edward Spragge, the day before the great sea-fight of that year; almost all the volunteers that went in that s.h.i.+p were killed. During the action, Sir Edward Spragge not being satisfied with the behaviour of one of the captains, could not easily find a person that would undertake to venture through so much danger to carry his command to the captain; this lord offered himself to the service, and went in a little boat, through all the shot, and delivered his message, and returned back to Sir Edward, which was much commended by all that saw it.' These are the early instances of courage, which can be produced in favour of lord Rochester, which was afterwards impeached, and very justly, for in many private broils, he discovered a timid pusillanimous spirit, very unsuitable to those n.o.ble instances of the contrary, which have just been mentioned.

The author of his life prefixed to his works, which goes under the name of M. St. Evremond, addressed to the d.u.c.h.ess of Mazarine, but which M. Maizeau a.s.serts not to be his, accounts for it, upon the general observation of that disparity between a man and himself, upon different occasions. Let it suffice, says he, 'to observe, that we differ not from one another, more than we do from ourselves at different times.' But we imagine another, and a stronger reason may be given, for the cowardice which Rochester afterwards discovered in private broils, particularly in the affair between him and the earl of Mulgrave, in which he behaved very meanly[1]. The courage which lord Rochester shewed in a naval engagement, was in the early part of his life, before he had been immersed in those labyrinths of excess and luxury, into which he afterwards sunk. It is certainly a true observation, that guilt makes cowards; a man who is continually subjected to the reproaches of conscience, who is afraid to examine his heart, lest it should appear too horrible, cannot have much courage: for while he is conscious of so many errors to be repented of, of so many vices he has committed, he naturally starts at danger, and flies from it as his greatest enemy. It is true, courage is sometimes const.i.tutional, and there have been instances of men, guilty of every enormity, who have discovered a large share of it, but these have been wretches who have overcome all sense of honour, been lost to every consideration of virtue, and whose courage is like that of the lion of the desart, a kind of ferocious impulse unconnected with reason. Lord Rochester had certainly never overcome the reproaches of his conscience, whose alarming voice at last struck terror into his heart, and chilled the fire of the spirits.

Since his travels, and naval expeditions, he seemed to have contracted a habit of temperance, in which had he been so happy as to persevere, he must have escaped that fatal rock, on which he afterwards split, upon his return to court, where love and pleasure kept their perpetual rounds, under the smiles of a prince, whom nature had fitted for all the enjoyments of the most luxurious desires. In times so dissolute as these, it is no wonder if a man of so warm a const.i.tution as Rochester, could not resist the too flattering temptations, which were heightened by the partic.i.p.ation of the court in general. The uncommon charms of Rochester's conversation, induced all men to court him as a companion, tho' they often paid too dear for their curiosity, by being made the subject of his lampoons, if they happened to have any oddities in their temper, by the exposing of which he could humour his propensity to scandal. His pleasant extravagancies soon became the subject of general conversation, by which his vanity was at once flattered, and his turn of satire rendered more keen, by the success it met with.

Rochester had certainly a true talent for satire, and he spared neither friends nor foes, but let it loose on all without discrimination. Majesty itself was not secure from it; he more than once lampooned the King, whose weakness and attachment to some of his mistresses, he endeavoured to cure by several means, that is, either by winning them from him, in spite of the indulgence and liberality they felt from a royal gallant, or by severely lampooning them and him on various occasions; which the King, who was a man of wit and pleasure, as well as his lords.h.i.+p, took for the natural sallies of his genius, and meant rather as the amus.e.m.e.nts of his fancy, than as the efforts of malice; yet, either by a too frequent repet.i.tion, or a too close and poignant virulence, the King banished him [from] the court for a satire made directly on him; this satire consists of 28 stanzas, and is ent.i.tled The Restoration, or the History of the Insipids; and as it contains the keenest reflexions against the political conduct, and private character of that Prince, and having produced the banishment of this n.o.ble lord, we shall here give it a place, by which his lords.h.i.+p's genius for this kind of writing will appear.

The RESTORATION, or The History of INSIPIDS, a LAMPOON.

I.

Chaste, pious, prudent, Charles the second, The miracle of thy restoration, May like to that of quails be reckon'd, Rain'd on the Israelitish nation; The wish'd for blessing from Heaven sent, Became their curse and punishment.

II.

The virtues in thee, Charles, inherent, Altho' thy count'nance be an odd piece, Prove thee as true a G.o.d's Vicegerent, As e'er was Harry with his cod-piece: For chast.i.ty, and pious deeds, His grandsire Harry Charles exceeds.

III.

Our Romish bondage-breaker Harry, Espoused half a dozen wives.

Charles only one resolv'd to marry, And other mens he never ----; Yet has he sons and daughters more Than e'er had Harry by threescore.

IV.

Never was such a faith's defender; He like a politic Prince, and pious, Gives liberty to conscience tender, And does to no religion tie us; Jews, Christians, Turks, Papists, he'll please us With Moses, Mahomet, or Jesus.