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WILLIAM CONGREVE defcended from a family in Staffordshire, of so great antiquity that it claims a place among the few that extend their line beyond the Norman Conqueft; and was the fon of William Congreve, fecond fon of Richard Congreve of Congreve and Stratton. He visited, once at leaft, the refidence of his ancestors; and, I believe, more places than one are ftill fhewn, in groves and gardens, where he is related to have written his Old Batchelor,

Neither the time nor place of his birth are certainly known; if the infcription upon his monument be true, he was born in 1672. For the place; it was faid by himself, that he owed his nativity to England, and by every body else that he was born in Ireland. Southern mentioned him with fharp cenfure, as a man that meanly difowned his native country. The biographers affign his nativity to Bardfa, near Leeds in Yorkshire, from the account given by himself, as they suppose, to Jacob.

Το

To doubt whether a man of eminence has told the truth about his own birth, is, in appearance, to be very deficient in candour; yet nobody can live long without 'knowing that falfehoods of convenience or vanity, falfehoods from which no evil immediately visible enfues, except the general degradation of human teftimony, are very lightly uterred, and once uttered, are fullenly fupported. Boileau, who defired to be thought a rigorous and steady moralift, having told a petty lie to Lewis XIV, continued it afterwards by falfe dates; thinking himself obliged in honour, fays his admirer, to maintain what, when he faid it, was fo well re ceived.

Wherever Congreve was born, he was educated first at Kilkenny, and afterwards at Dublin, his father having fome military employment that stationed him in Ireland: but after having paffed through the ufual preparatory studies, as may be reafonably fuppofed, with great celerity and fuccefs, his father thought it proper to affign him a profeffion, by which fomething proper might be gotten; and about the time of the Revolution fent him, at the age of fixteen, to study 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 poffelled that copioufnefs' of fentiment, by which intellectual pleafure can be given. His firft performance was a novel, called Incognita, or Love and Duty reconciled: It is praifed by the biographers, who quote fome part of the preface, that is indeed, for fuch a time

of

of life, uncommonly judicious. I would rather praise it than read it.

14.

• His first dramatick labour was the Old Batchelor; of which he fays, in this defence against Collier, "ithat "comedy was written, as feveral know, fome years be "fore it was acted. When I wrote it, I had little thoughts of the ftage; but did it, to amufe myself "in a flow recovery from a fit of fickness. After"wards, through my indifcretion, it was feen, and in "fome little time more it was acted; and I, through "the remainder of my indifcretion, fuffered my felf to "be drawn in, to the profecution of a difficult and "thankless study, and to be involved in a perpetual "war with knaves and fools."

There feems to be a strange affectation in authors of appearing to have done every thing by chance. The Old Batchelor was written for amusement, in the languor of convalefcence. Yet it is apparently compofed with great elaboratenefs of dialogue, and inceffant ambition of wit. The age of the writer confidered, it is indeed 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 first play; but they found it deficient in fome things requifite to the fuccefs of its exhibition, and by their greater experience fitted it for the ftage. 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,

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 im mediately made him one of the commiffioners for licenfing 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 furely have been at leaft equally pleafing with his writings.

Such a comedy, written at such 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 prefupposes a familiar knowledge of many characters, and exact obfervation 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 furnished with comick characters by the perufal of other poets, without much actual commerce with mankind. The dialogue is one conftant reciprocation of conceits, or clash 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 those of Heartwell and the Ladies; or easy and common, as Wittol a tame idiot, Bluff a fwaggering coward, and Fondlewife a jealous puritan; and the catastrophe arifes from a mistake not very probably produced, by marrying a woman in a mask.

Yet

Yet this gay comedy, when all these deductions are made, will ftill remain the work of very powerful and fertile faculties: the dialogue is quick and fparkling, the incidents fuch, as feize the attention, and the wit fo exuberant that it o'er-informs its tenement.

Next year he gave another specimen 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 useless; de guftibus non eft difputandum; men may be convinced, but they cannot be pleased, against their will. But though taste is obftinate, it is very variable, and time often prevails when arguments have failed.

Queen Mary conferred upon both thofe plays the honour of her presence; and when she died, foon after, Congreve teftified his gratitude by a despicable 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 of Forefight was then common. Dryden calculated nativities; both Cromwell and king William had their lucky days; and Shaftesbury himself, though he had no religion, was faid to regard predictions. The Sailor is not accounted very natural, but he is very pleasant.

With this play was opened the New Theatre, under the direction of Betterton the tragedian; where he exhibited two years afterwards (1697) The Mourning

Bride,