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were brought to him by the author, that they might be fairly copied. Every line," said he, "was then written twice over: I gave him a clean transcript, which he sent some time afterward to me for the press, with every line written twice over a second time."

6. His declaration, that his care for his works ceased at their publication, was not strictly true. His parental attention never abandoned them: what he found amiss in the first edition, he silently corrected in those that followed. He appears to have revised the Iliad, and freed it from some of its imperfections; and the Essay on Criticism received many improvements after its first appearance. It will seldom be found that he altered without adding clearness, elegance, or vigor. Pope had perhaps the judgment of Dryden; but Dryden certainly wanted the diligence of Pope.

7. In acquired knowledge, the superiority must be allowed to Dryden, whose education was more scholastic, and who, before he became an author, had been allowed more time for study, with better means of information. His mind has a larger range, and he collects his images and illustra'tions from a more extensive circumference of science. Dryden knew more of man in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, and those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of Dryden, and more certainty in that of Pope.

8. Poetry was not the sole praise of either; for both excelled ikewise in prose; but Pope did not borrow his prose from his predecessor. The style of Dryden is capricious and varied; that of Pope is cautious and uniform. Dryden obeys the motions of his own mind; Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of composition. Dryden is sometimes ve'hement and rapid; Pope is always smooth, uniform, and gentle. Dryden's page is a natural field, rising into inequalities, and diversified by the varied exuberance of abundant vegetation; Pope's is a velvet lawn, shaven by the scythe, and leveled by the roller.

9. Of genius, that power which constitutes a poet-that quality without which judgment is cold, and knowledge is inertthat energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates,— the superiority must, with some hesitation, be allowed to Dry

den. It is not to be inferred, that of this poëtical vigor Pope had only a little, because Dryden had more; for every other writer since Milton' must give place to Pope; and even of Dryden it must be said, that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems.

10. Dryden's performances were always hasty, either excited by some external occasion or extorted by domestic necessity; he composed without consideration, and published without cor rection. What his mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, was all that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory caution of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply his images, and to accumulate all that study might produce, or chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden, therefore, are higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls below it. Dryden is read with frequent astonishment, and Pope with perpetual delight.

11. This parallel will, I hope, when it is well considered, be found just; and if the reader should suspect me, as I suspect myself, of some partial fondness for the memory of Dryden, let him not too hastily condemn me; for meditation and inqui'ry may, perhaps, show him the reasonableness of my determination.

SAMUEL JOHNSON.

Dr. SAMUEL JOHNSON, one of the greatest, if not the greatest, of the literary men of the eighteenth century, was born at Litchfield, England, on the 18th of September, 1709. In the child, the peculiarities which afterward distinguished the man were plainly discernible ;-great muscular strength, accompanied by much awkwardness, and many infirmities; great quickness of parts, with a morbid propensity to sloth and procrastination; a kind and generous heart, with a gloomy and irritable temper. Indolent as he was, he acquired knowledge with such ease and rapidity, that at every school to which he was sent he was soon the best scholar. From sixteen to eighteen he resided at home, and learned much, though his studies were without guidance and without plan. When the young scholar presented himself at Pembroke College, Oxford, he amazed the rulers of that society not more by his ungainly figure and eccentric manners than by the quantity of his extensive and curious information. While here, he early made himself known by turning Pope's Messiah into Latin verse. He was poor, however, even to raggedness; and his appearance excited a mirth and a pity which were equally intolerable to his haughty spirit. After residing at Oxford about three years, JOHNSON's resources failed; and he was under the necessity of quit

'MILTON, see note 4, p. 215.

ting the university without a degree, in the autumn of 1731. In the following winter his father died. The old man left but a pittance; and of that pittance, Samuel received not more than twenty pounds. With many infirmities of body and mind, this celebrated man was thus left, at two-and-twenty, to fight his way through the world. He became usher of a grammar-school in Leicestershire; he soon after married, took a house in the neighborhood of his native town, and advertised for pupils. But eighteen months passed away, and only three pupils came to his academy, one of whom was the celebrated DAVID GARRICK. At length, in the twenty-eighth year of his age, he went to London to seek his fortune as a literary adventurer. Some time elapsed before he was able to form any literary connection from which he could expect more than bread for the day that was passing over him. The effect of the privations and sufferings which he endured at this time was discernible to the last in his temper and deportment. His manners had never been courtly. They now became almost savage. About a year after JoHNSON had begun to reside in London, he fortunately obtained regular employment as a reporter, or rather writer of parliamentary speeches for the "Gentleman's Magazine." A few weeks after he had entered on these obscure labors, he published a stately and vigorous poem, entitled "London," which at once placed him high among the writers of his age. From this period till 1762 he was subjected to anxiety and drudgery; and was only able to gain a bare subsistence by the most intense daily toil. This was, however, in part owing to his having been singularly unskillful and unlucky in his literary bargains, as in the mean time he had published the "Vanity of Human Wishes," in 1749; a" Dictionary of the English Language," in 1755; and Rasselas," in 1759. He also published a paper, entitled the " Rambler," every Tuesday and Saturday, from March, 1750, to March, 1752; and a series of weekly essays, entitled "The Idler," for two years, commencing in the spring of 1758. Able judges have pronounced these periodicals equal, if not superior to the "Spectator." In 1762, through the influence of Lord Bute, he received a pension of £300 a year; and from that period a great change in his circumstances took place. The University of Oxford honored him with a doctor's degree, and the Royal Academy with a professorship. He was now free to indulge his constitutional idleness; still, though he wrote but little, his tongue was active. The influence exercised by his conversation, directly upon the members of the celebrated club over which he predominated, and indirectly upon the whole literary world, was altogether without a parallel. His colloquiai powers were of the highest order. He had strong sense, quick discernment, humor, wit, immense knowledge of literature and of life, and an infinite store of curious anecdotes. Every sentence that fell from his lips was correct in structure. All was simplicity, ease, and vigor. Of all his numerous writings, those that are now most popular are the "Vanity of Human Wishes" and the "Lives of the Poets." In a serene frame of mind, he died on the 13th of December, 1784; and a week later was laid in Westminster Abbey.

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64. THE PURITANS.

HE Puritans' were men whose minds had derived a peculiar character from the daily contemplation of superior beings

'P'ri tans, persons, in the time of Queen Elizabeth and her immediate successors, so called in derision, because they professed to follow the

and eternal interests. Not content with acknowledging, in general terms, an overruling Providence, they habitually ascribed every event to the will of the Great Being, for whose power nothing was too vast, for whose inspection nothing was too minute. To know him, to serve him, to enjoy him, was with them the great end of existence.

2. They rejected with contempt the ceremonious homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deity through an obscuring vail, they aspired to gaze full on the intolerable bright ness, and to commune with him face to face. Hence originated their contempt for terrestrial distinctions. The difference between the greatest and meanest of mankind seemed to vanish, when compared with the boundless interval which separated the whole race from Him on whom their own eyes were constantly fixed. They recognized no title to superiority but his favor; and, confident of that favor, they despised all the accomplishments and all the dignities of the world.

3. If they were unacquainted with the works of philosophers and poets, they were deeply read in the oracles of God; if their names were not found in the registers of heralds, they felt assured that they were recorded in the Book of Life; if their steps were not accompanied by a splendid train of mēnials, legions of ministering angels had charge over them. Their palaces were houses not made with hands: their diadems, crowns of glōry which should never fade away!

4. On the rich and the eloquent, on nobles and priests, they looked down with contempt for they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious treasure, and eloquent in a more sublime language-nobles by the right of an earlier creätion, and priests by the imposition of a mightier hand. The very meanest of them was a being to whose fate a mysterious and terrible importance belonged-on whose slightest actions the spirits of light and darkness looked with anxious interest-who had been destined, before heaven and earth were created, to enjoy a felicity which should continue when heaven and earth should have passed away.

pure word of God, and rejected the ceremonies and government of the Episcopal church.

5. Events which short-sighted politicians ascribed to earthly causes, had been ordained on his account. For his sake, empires had risen, and flourished, and decayed; for his sake, the Almighty had proclaimed his will by the pen of the evangelist and the harp of the prophet. He had been rescued by no common deliverer from the grasp of no common foe; he had been ransomed by the sweat of no vulgar agony, by the blood of no earthly sǎcrifice. It was for him that the sun had been darkened, that the rocks had been rent, that the dead had arisen, that all nature had shuddered at the sufferings of her expiring God! T. B. MACAULAY.'

1.

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65. THE ROCK OF THE PILGRIMS.

ROCK in the wilderness welcomed our sires,
From bondage far over the dark-rolling sea:
On that holy altar they kindled the fires,

Jehovah, which glow in our bosoms for thee.
2. Thy blessings descended in sunshine and shower,
Or rose from the soil that was sown by thy hand:
The mountain and valley rejoiced in thy power,

And heaven encircled and smiled on the land.

3. The Pilgrims of old an example have given Of mild resignation, devotion, and love,

Which beams like a star in the blue vault of heaven; A beacon-light hung in their mansion above. 4. In church and cathedral we kneel in our prayerTheir temple and chapel were valley and hill; But God is the same in the aisle or the air, And he is the Rock that we lean upon still. GEORGE P. MORRIS."

66. ADVANTAGES OF ADVERSITY TO OUR FOREFATHERS.

FROM

ROM the dark portals of the star-chamber, and in the stern text of the acts of uniformity, the Pilgrims received a com

1 See Biographical Sketch, p. 155.--- See Biographical Sketch, p. 98.

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