"other fubject, through all art or na"ture, could have produced Tindal for "a profound author, or furnished him "with readers? It is the wife choice "of the fubject that alone adorns and "diftinguishes the writer. For had ant "hundred fuch pens as thefe been employed on the fide of religion, they "would have immediately funk into "filence and oblivion."

The reafonablenefs of a Test is not hard to be proved; but perhaps it must be allowed that the proper teft has not been chofen..

The attention paid to the papers published under the name of Bickerstaff, induced Steele, when he projected the Tatler, to affume an appellation which:

had

had already gained poffeffion of the

reader's notice.

In the year following he wrote a Projet for the Advancement of Religion, addreffed to Lady Berkley; by whofe kindness it is not unlikely that he was advanced to his benefices. To this pro-ject, which is formed with great purity of intention, and difplayed with fpritelinefs and elegance, it can only be objected, that, like many projects, it is, if not generally impracticable, yet evidently hopeless, as it fuppofes more zeal,. concord, and perfeverance, than a view of mankind gives reafon for expecting. He wrote likewife this year a Vindication of Bickerstaff; and an explanation of an Ancient Prophecy, which, though not B.4

com

completed in all its parts, cannot be read

without amazement.

He was

Soon after began the bufy and important part of Swift's life. employed (1710) by the Primate of Ireland to folicit the Queen for a remiffion of the First Fruits and Twentieth Parts to the Irish Clergy. With this purpose he had recourfe to Mr. Harley, to whom he was mentioned as a man neglected and oppreffed by the last ministry, because he had refused to co-operate with fome of their fchemes. What he had refused, has never been told; what he had fuffered was, I fuppofe, the exclufion from a bishoprick by the remonftrances of Sharpe, whom he defcribes as the harmless tool of others hate, and

whom he represents as afterwards fuing

for pardon.

Harley's defigns and fituation were fuch as made him glad of an auxiliary fo well qualified for his fervice; he therefore foon admitted him to familiarity, whether ever to confidence fome have made a doubt; but it would have been difficult to excite his zeal without perfuading him that he was trufted, and not very easy to delude him by false perfuafions.

He was certainly admitted to those meetings in which the firft hints and original plan of action are fupposed to have been formed; and was one of the fixteen Ministers, or agents of the Miniftry, who met weekly at each other's houses,

houses, and were united by the name of Brother.

- Being not immediately confidered as an obdurate Tory, he converfedindifcriminately with all the wits, and was yet the friend of Steele; who, in the Tatler, which began in 1710, confeffes the advantages of his converfation, and mentions fomething contributed by him to his paper. But he was now immerging. into political controverfy; for the fame year produced the Examiner, of which Swift wrote thirty-three papers. In argument he may be allowed to have the advantage; for where a wide fyftem of conduct, and the whole of a publick character, is laid open to enquiry, the accufer having the choice of facts, must be very unskilful