first poetical flight was when Queen Anne called up to the Houfe of Lords the fons of the Earls of Northampton and Aylesbury, and added, in one day, ten others to the number of Peers. In order to reconcile the people to one at least of the new Lords, he published in 1712 An Epifile to the Right Honourable George Lord Lanfdowne. In this compofition the poet pours out his panegyrick with the extravagance of a young man, who thinks his prefent ftock of wealth will never be exhausted.

The poem feems intended alfo to reconcile the publick to the late peace. This is endeavoured to be done by fhewing that men are flain in war, and that in peace harvests wave, and commerce fwells her fail. If this be humanity, it is not politicks. Another purpose of this epiftle appears to have been, to prepare the publick for the reception of some tragedy of his own. His Lordship's patronage, he says, will not let him repent his paffion for the stage ;-and the particular praise bestowed on Othello and Oroonoko feems to fhew that fome fuch character as Zanga was even then in contemplation. The affectionate mention

mention of the death of his friend Harrison of New College, at the close of this poem, is an instance of Young's art, which displayed itself fo fully thirty years afterwards in the Night Thoughts, of making the publick a party in his private forrow.

Should justice call upon you to cenfure this poem, it ought at least to be remembered that he did not insert it into his works; and that in the letter to Curll, as we have feen, he advises its omiffion. The booksellers, in the late Body of English Poetry, should have diftinguished what was deliberately rejected by the refpective authors. This I fhall be careful to do with regard to Young. " I

think, fays he, the following pieces in four volumes to be the most excufeable of "all that I have written; and I wish less

apology was needful for thefe. As there is

no recalling what is got abroad, the pieces "here republished I have revised and corrected, and rendered them as pardonable "as it was in my power to do."-Shall the gates of repentance be shut only against literary finners?

When

When Addison published Cato in 1713, Young had the honour of prefixing to it a recommendatory copy of verses. This is one of the pieces which the author of the Night Thoughts did not republish.

On the appearance of his Poem on the Laft Day, Addifon did not return Young's com pliment; but The Englishman of October 29, 1713, which was probably written by Addifon, speaks handsomely of this poem. The Laft Day was published soon after the peace. The vice-chancellor's imprimatur (for it was first printed at Oxford) is dated May the 19th, 1713. From the Exordium Young appears to have spent fome time on the compofition of it. While other bards with Britain's hero fet their fouls on fire, he draws, he fays, a deeper scene. Marlborough had been confidered by Britain as her bero; but, when the Last Day was published, female cabal had blafted for a time the laurels of Blenheim. This poem was probably finished by Young as early as 1710; for part of it is printed in the Tatler. It was infcribed to the Queen, in a dedication, which, for fome VOL. IV. reason,

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reason, he did not admit into his works. It tells her, that his only title to the great honour he now does himself is the obligation he formerly received from her royal indulgence. Of this obligation nothing is now known. Young is faid to have been engaged at a fettled ftipend as a writer for the Court. Yet who fhall fay this with certain? In all modern periods of this country, the writers on one fide have been regularly called Hirelings, and on the other Patriots.

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Of the dedication, however, the complexion is clearly political. It fpeaks in the highest terms of the late peace ;-it gives her Majesty praise indeed for her victories, but fays that the author is more pleased to fee her rife from this lower world, foaring above the clouds, paffing the first and fecond heavens, and leaving the fixed stars behind her; nor will he lose her there, but keep her still in view through the boundless spaces on the other fide of Creation, in her journey towards eternal blifs, till he behold the heaven of heavens open, and angels receiving and conveying her ftill onward from the stretch

stretch of his imagination, which tires in her pursuit, and falls back again to earth.

The Queen was foon called away from this lower world, to a place where human praise or human flattery are of little confequence. If Young thought the dedication contained only the praise of truth, he should not have omitted it in his works. Was he conscious of the exaggeration of party? Then he fhould not have written it. The poem itself is not without a glance to politicks, notwithstanding the fubject. The cry that the church was in danger, had not yet fubfided. The Last Day, written by a layman, was much approved by the ministry, and their friends.

Before the Queen's death, The Force of Religion, or Vanquished Love, was fent into the world. This poem is founded on the execution of Lady Jane Gray and her hufband Lord Guildford in 1554—a story chosen for the fubject of a tragedy by Edmund Smith, and wrought into a tragedy by Rowe. The dedication of it to the countefs of Salif

bury does not appear in his own edition. He