The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland Volume IV Part 16

England's Historical Epistles (Drayton's revived).

The Life of queen Anne.

[Footnote A: See Jacob's Lives of the Poets, p. 197.]

LEONARD WELSTED, Esq;

This gentleman was descended from a very good family in Leicesters.h.i.+re, and received the rudiments of his education in Westminster school. We are informed by major Cleland, author of a Panegyric on Mr. Pope, prefixed to the Dunciad, that he was a member of both the universities.

In a piece said to have been written by Mr. Welsted, called The Characters of the Times, printed in 8vo. 1728, he gives this account of himself; 'Mr. Welsted had in his youth raised so great expectations of his future genius, that there was a kind of struggle between the two universities, which should have the honour of his education; to compound this, he civilly became a member of both, and after having pa.s.sed some time at the one, he removed to the other. From thence he returned to town, where he became the darling expectation of all the polite writers, whose encouragement he acknowledged in his occasional poems, in a manner that will make no small part of the fame of his protectors. It also appears from his works, that he was happy in the patronage of the most ill.u.s.trious characters of the present age. Encouraged by such a combination in his favour, he published a book of poems, some in the Ovidian, some in the Horatian manner, in both which the most exquisite judges p.r.o.nounced he even rivalled his masters. His love verses have rescued that way of writing from contempt. In his translations he has given us the very soul and spirit of his author. His Odes; his Epistles; his Verses; his Love Tales; all are the most perfect things in all poetry.'

If this representation of our author's abilities were just, it would seem no wonder, if the two universities should strive with each other for the honour of his education, but it is certain the world have not coincided with this opinion of Mr. Welsted; who, by the way, can hardly be thought the author of such an extravagant self-approbation, unless it be an irony, which does not seem improbable.

Our author, however, does not appear to have been a mean poet; he had certainly from nature an exceeding fine genius, but after he came to town he became a votary to pleasure, and the applauses of his friends, which taught him to overvalue his talents, perhaps slackened his diligence, and by making him trust solely to nature, flight the a.s.sistance of art.

In the year 1718 he wrote the Triumvirate, or a Letter in Verse from Palemon to Celia from Bath, which was meant as a satire against Mr. Pope. He wrote federal other occasional pieces against this gentleman, who, in recompence of his enmity, has mentioned him twice in his Dunciad. In book ii. 1. 200 where he represents the poets flattering their patrons with the fulsome strains of panegyric, in order to procure from them that which they very much wanted, viz. money, he shews Welsted as unsuccessful.

But Welsted most the poet's healing balm, Strives to extract from his soft giving palm; Unlucky Welsted! thy unfeeling master, The more thou ticklest, gripes his fist the faster.

Mr. Welsted was likewise characterised in the Treatise of the Art of Sinking, as a Didapper, and after as an Eel. He was likewise described under the character of another animal, a Mole, by the author of the following simile, which was handed about at the same time.

Dear Welsted, mark in dirty hole That painful animal a Mole: Above ground never born to go, What mighty stir it keeps below?

To make a molehill all this strife!

It digs, pukes, undermines for life.

How proud a little dirt to spread!

Conscious of nothing o'er its head.

'Till lab'ring on, for want of eyes, It blunders into light-and dies.

But mentioning him once was not enough for Mr. Pope. He is again celebrated in the third book, in that famous Parody upon Benham's Cooper's Hill,

O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme; Tho' deep, yet clear; tho' gentle, yet not dull; Strong without rage; without o'er flowing full.

Denham.

Which Mr. Pope has thus parodied;

Flow Welsted, flow; like thine inspirer, beer, Tho' stale, not ripe; tho' thin, yet never clear; So sweetly mawkish, and so smoothly dull; Heady, not strong; and foaming, tho' not full.

How far Mr. Pope's insinuation is true, that Mr. Welsted owed his inspiration to beer, they who read his works may determine for themselves. Poets who write satire often strain hard for ridiculous circ.u.mstances, in order to expose their antagonists, and it will be no violence to truth to say, that in search of ridicule, candour is frequently lost.

In the year 1726 Mr. Welsted brought upon the stage a comedy called The Dissembled Wantons or My Son get Money. He met with the patronage of the duke of Newcastle, who was a great encourager of polite learning; and we find that our author had a very competent place in the Ordnance-Office.

His poetical works are chiefly these,

The Duke of Marlborough's Arrival, a Poem printed in fol. 1709, inscribed to the Right Hon the Earl of Dorset and Middles.e.x.

A Poem to the Memory of Mr. Philips, inscribed to Lord Bolingbroke, printed in fol. 1710.

A Discourse to the Right Hon. Sir Robert Walpole; to which is annexed Proposals for Translating the whole Works of Horace, with a Specimen of the Performance, viz. Lib. Ist. Ode 1, 3, 5 and 22, printed in 4to. 1727.

An Ode to the Hon. Major General Wade, on Occasion of his disarming the Highlands, imitated from Horace.

To the Earl of Clare, on his being created Duke of Newcastle. An Ode on the Birth-Day of his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. To the Princess, a Poem. Amintor and the Nightingale, a Song. These four were printed together in 1716.

Of False Fame, an Epistle to the Right Hon. the Earl of Pembroke, 8vo. 1732.

A Letter to his Grace the Duke of Chandois.

To the Duke of Buckingham, on his Essay on Poetry.

Several small pieces in the Free Thinker.

Epistles, Odes, &c. written on several Subjects; with a Disseration concerning the Perfection of the English Language.

Mr. Welsted has translated Longinus's Treatise on the Sublime.

JAMES MORE SMYTH, Esq;

This gentleman was son of Arthur More, esq; one of the lords commissioners of trade, in the reign of Queen Anne; his mother was the daughter of Mr. Smyth, a man of considerable fortune, who left this his grandson a handsome estate, on which account he obtained an Act of Parliament to change his name to Smyth.

Our author received his education at Oxford, and while he remained at the university he wrote a comedy called The Rival Modes, his only dramatic performance. This play was condemned in the representation, but he printed it in 1727, with the following motto, which the author of the Notes to the Dunciad, by way of irony, calls modest.

Hic coestus, artemque repono.

Upon the death of our author's grandfather, he enjoyed the place of paymaster to the band of gentlemen-pensioners, in conjunction with his younger brother, Arthur More; of this place his mother procured the reversion from his late Majesty during his father's lifetime. Being a man of a gay disposition, he insinuated himself into the favour of his grace the duke of Wharton, and being, like him, dest.i.tute of prudence, he joined with that volatile great man in writing a paper called the Inquisitor, which breathed so much the spirit of Jacobitism, that the publisher thought proper to sacrifice his profit to his safety, and discontinue it.

By using too much freedom with the character of Pope, he provoked that gentleman, who with great spirit stigmatized him in his Dunciad. In his second book Mr. Pope places before the eyes of the dunces the phantom of a poet. He seems willing to give some account of the possibility of dulness making a wit, which can be done no otherwise than by chance. The lines which have relation to Mr. More are so elegantly satyric, that it probably will not displease our readers to find them inserted here.

A poet's form she plac'd before their eyes, And bad the nimblest racer seize the prize; No meagre muse-rid mope, adult and thin, In a dun night gown of his own loose skin, But such a bulk as no twelve bards could raise, Twelve starv'ling bards of these degenerate days.

All as a partridge plump, full-fed, and fair, She form'd this image of well-bodied air, With pert, slat eyes, she window'd well its head, A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead, And empty words she gave, and sounding strain, But senseless, lifeless! idol void and vain!

Never was dash'd out at one lucky hit, A fool so just a copy of a wit; So like, that critics said, and courtiers swore, A wit it was, and call'd the phantom More.

Though these lines of Pope are sufficiently satirical, yet it seems they very little affected Mr. More. A gentleman intimately acquainted with him informs us, that he has heard Mr. More several times repeat those lines, without discovering any chagrin; and he used to observe, that he was now secure of being transmitted to posterity: an honour which, says he, I could never have arrived at, but by Pope's means. The cause of the quarrel between this gentleman and that great poet seems to have been this.

In a letter published in the Daily Journal March 18, 1728, written by Mr. More, he has the following words, 'Upon reading the third volume of Pope's Miscellanies, I found five lines which I thought excellent, and happening to praise them, a gentleman produced a modern comedy, the Rival Modes, published last year, where were the same verses to a t.i.ttle. These gentlemen are undoubtedly the first plagiaries that pretend to make a reputation, by stealing from a man's works in his own life-time, and out of a public print.' But it is apparent from the notes to the Dunciad, that Mr. More himself borrowed the lines from Pope; for in a letter dated January 27, 1726, addressed to Mr. Pope, he observes, 'That these verses which he had before given him leave to insert in the Rival Modes, would be known for his, some copies being got abroad. He desires, nevertheless, that since the lines in his comedy have been read to several, Mr. Pope would not deprive it of them.'

As a proof of this circ.u.mstance, the testimony of lord Bolingbroke is adduced, and the lady of Hugh Bethel, esq; to whom the verses were originally addressed, who knew them to be Mr. Pope's long before the Rival Modes was composed.

Our author further charges Mr. Pope with being an enemy to the church and state. 'The Memoirs of a Parish Clerk, says he, was a very dull, and unjust abuse of the bishop of Sarum (who wrote in defence of our religion and const.i.tution) who has been dead many years.' 'This also, continues the author of the Notes to the Dunciad, is likewise untrue, it being known to divers, that these Memoirs were written at the seat of the lord Harcourt in Oxfords.h.i.+re, before the death of bishop Burnet, and many years before the appearance of that history, of which they are pretended to be an abuse. Most true it is that Mr. More had such a design, and was himself the man who pressed Dr. Arbuthnot, and Mr. Pope to a.s.sist him therein; and that he borrowed those Memoirs of the latter, when that history came forth, with intent to turn them to such abuse, but being able to obtain from Pope but one single hint, and either changing his mind, or having more mind than ability, he contented himself to keep the said Memoirs, and read them as his own to all his acquaintance. A n.o.ble person there is, into whose company Pope once chanced to introduce him, who well remembered the conversation of Mr. More to have turned upon the contempt he had for that reverend prelate, and how full he was of a design he declared himself to have of exposing him; this n.o.ble person is the earl of Peterborough.'

Thus Mr. Pope was obliged to represent this gentleman as a plagiary, or to pa.s.s for one himself. His case indeed, as the author of the notes to the Dunciad observes, was like that of a man who, as he was sitting in company, perceived his next neighbour had stolen his handkerchief. 'Sir, said the thief, finding himself detected, do not expose me, I did it for mere want; be so good but to take it privately out of my pocket again, and say nothing.' The honest man did so, but the other cried out, See, gentlemen! what a thief we have among us! look, he is stealing my handkerchief.' The plagiarism of this person gave occasion to the following epigram;

More always smiles whenever he recites; He smiles (you think) approving what he writes; And yet in this no vanity is shown; A modest man may like what's not his own.

The smaller pieces which we have heard attributed to this author, are, An Epigram on the Bridge at Blenheim, by Dr. Evans; Cosmelia, by Mr. Pitt, Mr. Jones, &c. The Saw-Pit, a Simile, by a Friend; and some unowned Letters, Advertis.e.m.e.nts, and Epigrams against Mr. Pope in the Daily Journal. He died in the year 1734, and as he wrote but one comedy unsuccessfully, and no other pieces of his meeting with any applause, the reader will probably look upon him as a man of little genius; he had a power however of rendering his conversation agreeable by a facetious and gentleman-like manner, without any of the stiffness of the scholar, or the usual petulance of a poet. He always lived in affluent circ.u.mstances, and by mixing with genteel company, his habit of elegance was never lost, a fate which too frequently happens to those, who, notwithstanding the brightest parts, are excluded the circle of politeness by the oppressions of poverty. In this light Mr. Pope must have considered him, or he, who was one of the politest men of the age, as well as the greatest poet, would never have introduced him to the earl of Peterborough. It does not appear that Mr. More had parts otherwise sufficient to ent.i.tle him to the notice of Pope, and therefore he must have considered him only as a gentleman. Had he possessed as much prudence, as politeness, he would have avoided by all means incurring the displeasure of Pope, who, as he was the warmest friend, was likewise a very powerful and implacable enemy. In this controversy, however, it is evident enough that Mr. Moore was the aggressor, and it is likewise certain that his punishment has been equal to his offence.

He died October 18, 1734, at Whister, near Isleworth in Middles.e.x, for which county he was a justice of peace.

Mr. JOHN DENNIS,