to confider as important, goes on in hope of information; and, as there is nothing to fatigue attention, if he is disappointed he can hardly complain. It is easily to perceive, from every page, that though ambition preffed Swift into a life of bustle, the wish for a life of ease was always returning.

He went to take poffeffion of his deanery as foon as he had obtained it; but he was not fuffered to stay in Ireland more than a fortnight before he was recalled to England, that he might reconcile Lord Oxford and Lord Bolingbroke, who began to look on one another with malevolence, which every day increased, and which Bolingbroke appeared to retain in his last years.

Swift contrived an interview, from which they both departed discontented; he procured a fecond, which only convinced him that the feud was irreconcileable: he told them his opinion, that all was loft. This denunciation was contradicted by Oxford; but Bolingbroke whispered that he was right.

Before this violent diffenfion had shattered the Miniftry, Swift had published, in the beginning of the year (1714)," The publick Spirit of the Whigs," in answer to "The Crifis," a pamphlet for which Steele was expelled from the Houfe of Commons. Swift was now fo far alienated from Steele, as to think him no longer entitled to decency, and therefore treats him fometimes with contempt, and fometimes with abhorrence.

In this pamphlet the Scotch were mentioned in terms fo provoking to that irritable nation, that, refolving "not to be offended with impunity," the Scotch Lords in a body demanded an audience of

the

the Queen, and folicited reparation. A proclamation was iffued, in which three hundred pounds were offered for the discovery of the author. From this ftorm he was, as he relates, "fecured by a fleight;" of what kind, or by whose prudence, is not known; and fuch was the increase of his reputation, that the Scottish "Nation applied again that he would be "their friend."

He was become fo formidable to the Whigs, that his familiarity with the Minifters was clamoured at in Parliament, particularly by two men, afterwards of great note, Aislabie and Walpole.

But, by the difunion of his great friends, his importance and defigns were now at an end; and feeing his fervices at last useless, he retired about June (1714) into Berkshire, where, in the house of a friend, he wrote what was then fuppreffed, but has fince appeared under the title of " Free thoughts on the pre"fent State of Affairs."

While he was waiting in this retirement for events which time or chance might bring to pafs, the death of the Queen broke down at once the whole fyftem of Tory Politicks; and nothing remained but to withdraw from the implacability of triumphant Whiggism, and shelter himself in unenvied obfcurity.

The accounts of his reception in Ireland, given by Lord Orrery and Dr. Delany, are fo different, that the credit of the writers, both undoubtedly veracious, cannot be faved, but by fuppofing, what I think is true, that they speak of different times. When Delany fays, that he was received with refpect, he means for the first fortnight, when he came to take legal poffeffion; and when Lord Orrery tells that he was

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pelted

pelted by the populace, he is to be understood of the time when, after the Queen's death, he became a fettled refident.

The Archbishop of Dublin gave him at first some difturbance in the exercise of his jurifdiction; but it was foon discovered, that between prudence and integrity he was feldom in the wrong; and that, when he was right, his spirit did not eafily yield to oppofition.

Having fo lately quitted the tumults of a party, and the intrigues of a court, they ftill kept his thoughts in agitation, as the fea fluctuates a while when the ftorm has ceafed. He therefore filled his hours with fome hiftorical attempts, relating to the "Change of the Minifters," and "the Conduct of "the Ministry." He likewife is faid to have written a" Hiftory of the Four laft Years of Queen Anne," which he began in her life-time, and afterwards laboured with great attention, but never published. It was after his death in the hands of Lord Orrery and Dr. King. A book under that title was published, with Swift's name, by Dr. Lucas; of which I can only fay, that it seemed by no means to correfpond with the notions that I had formed of it, from a converfation which I once heard between the Earl of Orrery and old Mr. Lewis.

Swift now, much againft his will, commenced Irishman for life, and was to contrive how he might be beft accommodated in a country where he confidered himfelf as in a state of exile. It seems that his firft recourfe was to piety. The thoughts of death rushed upon him, at this time, with fuch inceffant importu

nity, that they took poffeffion of his mind, when he firft waked, for many years together.

He opened his house by a publick table two days a week, and found his entertainments gradually frequented by more and more vifitants of learning among the men, and of elegance among the women. Mrs. Johnson had left the country, and lived in lodgings not far from the deanery. On his publick days fhe regulated the table, but appeared at it as a mere gueft, like other ladies.

On other days he often dined, at a ftated price, with Mr. Worral, a clergyman of his cathedral, whofe house was recommended by the peculiar neatnefs and pleasantry of his wife. To this frugal mode of living, he was firft difpofed by care to pay fome debts which he had contracted, and he continued it for the pleasure of accumulating money. His avarice, however, was not fuffered to obftruct the claims of his dignity; he was ferved in plate, and used to say that he was the pooreft gentleman in Ireland that ate upon plate, and the richeft that lived without a coach.

How he spent the reft of his time, and how he employed his hours of ftudy, has been enquired with hopeless curiofity. For who can give an account of another's ftudies? Swift was not likely to admit any to his privacies, or to impart a minute account of his bufinefs or his leisure.

Soon after (1716) in his forty-ninth year, he was privately married to Mrs. Johnson, by Dr. Afhe, Bishop of Clogher, as Dr. Madden told me, in the garden. The marriage made no change in their. mode of life; they lived in different houfes, as before;

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fore; nor did she ever lodge in the deanery but when Swift was feized with a fit of giddinefs. "It would

"be difficult," fays Lord Orrery, "to prove that "they were ever afterwards together without a third perfon."

66

The Dean of St. Patrick's lived in a private manner, known and regarded only by his friends; till, about the year 1720, he, by a pamphlet, recommended to the Irish the use, and confequently the improvement, of their manufacture. For a man to use the productions of his own labour is furely a natural right, and to like beft what he makes himself is a natural paffion. But to excite this paffion, and enforce this right, appeared fo criminal to thofe who had an intereft in the English trade, that the printer was imprisoned; and, as Hawkesworth justly observes, the attention of the publick being by this outrageous resentment turned upon the proposal, the author was by confequence made popular.

In 1723 died Mrs. Van Homrigh, a woman made unhappy by her admiration of wit, and ignominioufly distinguished by the name of Vaneffa, whofe conduct has been already fufficiently difcuffed, and whofe history is too well known to be minutely repeated. She was a young woman fond of literature, whom Decanus, the Dean, called Cadenus by transpofition of the letters, took pleasure in directing and instructing; till, from being proud of his praise, fhe grew fond of his perfon. Swift was then about fortyseven, at an age when vanity is strongly excited by the amorous attention of a young woman. If it be faid that Swift fhould have checked a paffion which he never meant to gratify, recourse must be had to

that