The Dean placed his fon upon the foundation at Winchester College, where he had himself been educated. At this fchool Edward Young remained till the election after his eighteenth birth-day, the period at which those upon the foundation are fuperannuated. 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 fucceed. By chance, or by choice, New College does not number 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 expence 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-fouls. In a few months the warden of New College

died. He then removed to Corpus College. The Prefident of this Society, from regard alfo for his father, invited him thither, in order to leffen his academical expences. In 1708, he was nominated to a law fellowship at All-fouls by Archbishop Tennison, into whose hands it came by devolution.-Such repeated patronage, while it justifies Burnet's praise of the father, reflects credit on the conduct of the fon. The manner in which it was exerted feems to prove that the father did not leave behind him much wealth.

On the 23d of April, 1714, Young took his degree of Batchelor of Civil Laws, and his Doctor's degree on the 10th of June, 1719.

Soon after he went to Oxford, he difcovered, it is faid, an inclination to take pupils. Whether he ever commenced tutor is not known, None has hitherto boasted to have received his academical inftruction from the author of the Night Thoughts. It is certain that his college was proud of him no less as a scholar than as a poet; for, in 1716, when the foundation of the Codrington Li

brary

brary was laid, two years after he had taken his Batchelor's degree, he was appointed to fpeak the Latin oration, which is at least panicular for being dedicated in English To the Ladies of the Codrington Family. To these he fays, that he was unavoidably flung into a fingularity, by being obliged to write an epistle-dedicatory void of common-place, and fuch an one as was never published before by any author whatever;—that this practice abfolved them from any obligation of reading what was prefented to them;and that the bookfeller approved of it, because it would make people ftare, was abfurd enough, and perfectly right." Of this oration there is no appearance in his own edition of his works; and prefixed to an edition by Curll and Tonfon, in 1741, is a letter from Young to Curll (if Curll may be credited), dated December the 9th, 1739, wherein he says he has not leisure to review what he formerly wrote, and adds, "I have "not the Epifle to Lord Lanfdowne. If you "will take my advice, I would have you " omit that, and the oration on Codrington. "I think the collection will fell better with" out them."

There

There are who relate, that, when first Young found himself independent, and his own master at All-fouls, he was not the ornament to religion and morality which he afterwards became. The authority of his father, indeed, had ceafed by his death 1705; and Young was certainly not ashamed to be patronized by the infamous Wharton. But Wharton befriended in Young, perhaps, the poet, and particularly the tragedian. If virtuous authors must be patronized only by virtuous peers, who fhall point them

out?

Yet Pope is faid by Ruffhead to have told Warburton, that " Young had much of a fublime genius, though without common fense; fo that his genius, having no guide, was perpetually liable to degenerate into bombaft. This made him, pafs a foolish youth, the fport of peers and poets: but his having a very good heart enabled him to support the clerical character when he affumed it, first with decency, and afterwards with honour."

...

They

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-fouls. "The other boys," faid the atheist, "I can always "answer, because I always know whence they have their arguments, which I have "read an hundred times; but that fellow "Young is continually peftering me with

fomething of his own." After all, Tindal and the cenfurers of Young may be reconcileable. Young might, for two or three years, have tried that kind of life, in which his natural principles would not fuffer him to wallow long. If this were fo, he has left behind him not only his evidence in favour of virtue, but the potent teftimony of experience against vice.

Young perhaps ascribed the good fortune of Addison to the Poem to his Majesty, prefented, with a copy of verfes, to Somers; and hoped that he also might foar to wealth and honours on wings of the fame kind. His

3

firft