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notwithstanding which his having that interest seems to be a corroborating proof of his being a citizen's fon*.

Of bis being a citizen's fon.] It seems to have been a doubt with Leland whether Oxfordshire or Berkshire produced this great man, but he thought he had reafon to think that he was born in one of thofe counties. If Berkihire was to be preferred, then Dunnington would bid thefairett for it, which was certainly Chaucer's feat; but then it feems to be no less certain that he purchased it from Sir Richard Adderbury. Pitts affirms roundly that he was born at Woodstock, and Camden, fpeaking of that place, fays, that having nothing in it elfe remarkable it boats of having produced our English Homer, Geoffrey Chaucer: but he was too knowing a man to credit this; he knew the reafon of it to be that Chaucer had a house there, and Ewelm and Hocknorton in the fame county were also belonging to his family, and might therefore with as much juftice as Woodstock put in a claim to his birth. But Chaucer himself feems to have determined the point as clearly as man could do, for speaking of the troubles that had happened in this place he fays, "The "city of London, that is to me fo dear and fweet, in which I "was forth-grown; and more kindly love have I to that place "than any other on earth, as every kindly creature hath full "appetite to that place of his kindly engendruer," . and therefore Camden very juffly takes occafion, speaking of another poet, to affirm that London was our Author's birthplace: Edmund Spenfer," fays he, a Londoner, was fo fmiled on by the Mufes at his birth that he excelled all the English "poets that went before him, if we except only his fellow-cf"tizen Chaucer." It may feem a little difficult to reconcile what is faid in this note to what has been advanced in the former, and yet it may be done tolerably well, for though we now confider a citizen of London as a trader of course, yet in the times when Chaucer lived men of great quality and diftinction refided in the city, where the court was alfo kept, and therefore he might very well be in this fenfe the fon of an inhabitant of London, and ftill his father might not be either merchant or vintner, but in fome poft about the court; and this in

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The time of his birth is pretty well fixed, for most of the writers who mention it agree that it was in the fecond year of Edward III. A. D. 1328.

Here again we fall into the dark, for as to his earlier years we know not where or how they were fpent ; but as foon as he was fit for academical ftudies he was fent to Cambridge, where he gave early teftimonies of his abilities by feveral elegies and fonnets, as well as by a poem called The Court of Love, which he compofed when he was about eighteen, and which carries in it very pregnant proofs of fkill and learning, as well as quickness of wit and great strength of genius. It is

fo dark a matter, and which has employed fo many learned pens, without letting in much light upon it, feems the moft probable account of the matter: for in that difcourfe in which he fpeaks of London as his birthplace he very clearly confeffes that he had been but too deeply engaged in the popular di fturbances that happened there, through his attachment to his patron the Duke of Lançafter, which thows the intereft he had among the people; and yet he affirms that in what he did he had no evil intention, much lefs meant to throw all things into confufion; and offers it as a reason why he thould be believed in declaring this, that he was a native of London, and loved it better than any place upon earth, as every creature naturally does the place from which it fprings. After clearing up thefe points as far as poffible we thall be more brief in our remarks upon other points of this hiftory, though a large and full life of Chaucer seems to be a work ftill wanting to the learned world after all the pains that has been hitherto taken about it.

+ And great Arength of genius.] The moft certain accounts we have of Chaucer are thofe taken from his own writings, in which there are a great variety of circumftances that occur not

not by any means certain in what college or hall of that university he studied, but it is conjectured, and

in any of the ancient relations of his life, infomuch that it is very doubtful whether we should ever have heard any thing of his being a student at Cambridge if he had not left us that particular himself. In like manner it might have been prefumed, but it could hardly have been proved, that his Court of Love was not his first performance, or at leaft his first performance that made any great figure. But from the perufal of this poem we learn from himself that he had written many things before in honour of the deity of Love. Indeed the poem itself speaks it probable, for though we have a very high idea of the natural genius of Chaucer, yet it would be impoffible to perfuade any judge of poetry that this was his first essay, for not only the ftructure of the poem manifefts an extraordinary skill in that, kind of writing, but the harmony of his numbers, even at this distance of time, fufficiently thew that they could not fall from the pen of an unpractifed poet. It is generally believed, upon the credit I apprehend of the rubrick placed at the head of this performance, that it was written in imitation of The Romant of the Rose; but I must confefs I am not very well satisfied of that, and thould rather be of opinion that our Author compofed it after the manner of those Italian poems that were then fo generally efteemed, and for which the famous Francis Petrarch had been crowned foine years before with great solemnity at Rome. The honours which that celebrated poet acquired, and which he had never acquired but in an age of the greatest gallantry, excited all who had any turn that way to emulate his performances. We may very plainly perceive in this work of Chaucer's that he meant to make his entrance by it into the region of Parnassus, and boldly resolved, on the ftrength of his own judgment as well as of his genius, to declare himself a poet, and put himself that way into the road to fame. If this had not been his intention he would have scarce written The Court of Love, the ground of which poem is to thew, that it was a tribunal to which every man owed obedience, which fooner or later he was obliged to pay. As for

not without fome fhew of reason, that it might be in Solere's Hall, which he has fo particularly and humorously described in his story of The Miller of Trompington.

He removed from Cambridge, for reasons which we find no where affigned, to the university of Oxford, and completed his ftudies there, fome fay at Canterbury College, which however is improbable, fince it was not founded till Chaucer was thirty-five years of age, others in Merton College, which is more likely; for though his name does not appear among the celebrated members of it at that time, yet we find most of his contemporaries, as Strode, Occleve, &c. were of that college. After a confiderable flay here, and a strict application to the publick lectures of the univerfity, he became, as Leland tells us, a ready logician, a smooth rhetorician, a pleasant poet, a grave

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himself, he profeffes that he was fummoned to do fuit and fervice at the age of eighteen, which affords him an opportunity of defcribing the Court, the manner of its proceedings, and the ftatutes of Love by which thofe proceedings are regu lated. This poem is very long, confifting of upwards of fourteen hundred verses, and concludes with the feftival of Love, which with great elegance our poet fixes upon the nt of May, and makes it celebrated by the birds: yet this part of the poem is the most exceptionable of any, and thows what a range taile prevailed in that age, for in this feftival not only the hymns of the church but the Pfalms themselves are very fcandalously profaned, and applied to the god of Love and his mother, which thows the bad confequences that naturally flow from fuperftitious devotion.

Volume I.

B

philofopher, an ingenious mathematician, and a holy divine. That he was a great master in aftronomy is plain from his Discourses of the Astrolabe; that he was verfed in the Hermetick philosophy appears by his Tale of the Chanon's Yeoman; his knowledge in divinity is evident from his Parfon's Tale; and his philofophy from The Teftament of Love.

After he left this university he travelled abroad through France and the Low Countries in order to fee the world, and to improve the knowledge which he had acquired from books; but when he went abroad or at what time he returned are circumstances not eafy to be determined. Yet fure there is a probability that he spent not many years out of his own country, fince the best writers feem to be well fatisfied that after his return he entered himself of the MiddleTemple, and became a student there of the municipal laws of this land. Of this learning having received fome tincture he betook himself to the court, which was indeed the place in the world fitteft for a man of his accomplishments to thrive in. His firftemployment there was in quality of the King's Page,in those times a very honourable office, as it gave near and frequent accefs to the royal prefence; but one would imagine this was not a poft to which any but a young man could be advanced upon his coming to court, and therefore it seems noft confiftent with truth

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