Hans Sloane their prefident, in two dialogues, intituled The Transactioneer.

Though he was a regular advocate in the courts of civil and canon law, he did not love his profeffion, nor indeed any kind of business which interrupted his voluptuary dreams, or forced him to roufe from that indulgence in which only he could find delight. His reputation as a civilian was yet maintained by his judgements in the courts of Delegates, and raifed very high by the addrefs. and knowledge which he discovered in 1700, when he defended the earl of Anglesea against his lady, afterwards dutchess of Buckinghamshire, who sued for a divorce, and obtained it.

The expence of his pleasures, and neglect of bufinefs, had now leffened his revenues; and he was willing to accept of a fettlement in Ireland, where, about 1702, he was made judge of the admiralty, commiffioner of the prizes, keeper of the records in Birmingham's tower, and vicar-general to Dr. Marsh the primate.

But it is vain to put wealth within the reach of him who will not ftretch out his hand to take it. King foon found a friend as idle and thoughtless as himfelf, in Upton, one of the judges, who had a pleasant house called Mountown, near Dublin, to which King frequently retired; delighting to neglect his intereft, forget his cares, and defert his duty.

Here he wrote Mully of Mountown, a poem ; by which, though fanciful readers in the pride of fagacity have given it a political interpretation,

Q2

was

was meant originally no more than it expreffed, as it was dictated only by the author's delight in the quiet of Mountown.

In 1708, when lord Wharton was fent to govern Ireland, King returned to London, with his poverty, his idlenefs, and his wit; and published fome effays called Useful Tranfactions. His Voyage to the land of Cajamai is particularly commended. He then wrote the Art of Love, a poem remarkable, notwithftanding its title, for purity of fentiment, and in 1709 imitated Horace in an Art of Cookery, which he published, with fome letters to Dr. Lifter.

In 1710 he appeared, as a lover of the Church, on the fide of Sacheverell; and was fuppofed to have concurred at least in the projection of The Examiner. His eyes were open to all the operations of Whiggifm; and he bestowed fome ftrictures upon Dr. Kennet's adulatory sermon at the funeral of the duke of Devonshire.

The Hiftory of the Heathen Gods, a book compofed for schools, was written by him in 1711. The work is ufeful; but might have been produced without the powers of King. The fame year he published Rufinus, an hiftorical effay, and a poem, intended to dispose the nation to think as he thought of the duke of Marlborough and his adherents.

In 1711, competence, if not plenty, was again put into his power. He was, without the trouble of attendance, or the mortification of a request, made gazetteer. Swift, Friend, Prior, and other men of the fame party, brought him the key of the gazetteer's

gazetteer's office. He was now again placed in a profitable employment, and again threw the benefit away. An Act of Infolvency made his business at that time particularly troublesome; and he would not wait till hurry fhould be at an end, but impatiently refigned it, and returned to his wonted indigence and amusements.

One of his amufements at Lambeth, where he refided, was to mortify Dr. Tennifon, the archbifhop, by a publick feftivity, on the furrender of Dunkirk to Hill; an event with which Tennison's political bigotry did not suffer him to be delighted. King was refolved to counteract his fullennefs, and at the expence of a few barrels of ale filled the neighbourhood with honeft merriment.

In the Autumn of 1712 his health declined; he grew weaker by degrees, and died on Christmasday. Though his life had not been without irregularity, his principles were pure and orthodox, and his death was pious.

After this rel. tion, it will be naturally fuppofed that his poems were rather the amufements of idlenefs than efforts of study; that he endeavoured rather to divert than aftonish; that his thoughts feldom aspired to fublimity; and that, if his verse was eafy and his images familiar, he attained what he defired. His purpose is to be merry; but perhaps, to enjoy his mirth, it may be fometimes neceffary to think well of his opinions.

SPRAT.

SPRAT.

HOMAS SPRAT was born in 1636, at

T Tallaton in Devonshire, the fon of a clergy

man; and having been educated, as he tells of himself, not at Westminster or Eaton, but at a little fchool by the churchyard fide, became a commoner of Wadham College in Oxford in 1651; and, being chofen fcholar next year, proceeded through the ufual academical course, and in 1657 became master of arts. He obtained a fellowship, and commenced poet.

In 1659, his poem on the death of Oliver was published, with those of Dryden and Waller. In his dedication to Dr. Wilkins he appears a very willing and liberal encomiast, both of the living and the dead. He implores his patron's excufe of his verses, both as falling fo infinitely below the full and fublime genius of that excellent poet who made this way of writing free of our nation, and being so little equal and proportioned to the renown of the prince on whom they were written; fuch great actions and lives deferving to be the fubject of the no

bleft

bleft pens and moft divine phanfies. He proceeds: Having fo long experienced your care and indulgence, and been formed, as it were, by your own hands, not to entitle you to any thing which my meanness produces, would be not only injuftice, but facrilege.

He published the same year a poem on the Plague of Athens; a subject of which it is not easy to say what could recommend it. To thefe he added afterwards a poem on Mr. Cowley's death.

After the Restoration he took orders, and by Cowley's recommendation was made chaplain to the Duke of Buckingham, whom he is faid to have helped in writing the Rehearfal. He was likewife chaplain to the king.

As he was the favourite of Wilkins, at whose house began those philofophical conferences and enquiries, which in time produced the Royal Society, he was confequently engaged in the fame ftudies, and became one of the fellows; and when, after their incorporation, fomething feemed neceffary to reconcile the publick to the new inftitution, he undertook to write its hiftory, which he published in 1667. This is one of the few books which felection of fentiment and elegance of diction have been able to preserve, though written upon a fubject flux and tranfitory. The Hiftory of the Royal Society is now read, not with the wifh to know what they were then doing, but how their transactions are exhibited by Sprat.

In the next year he published Obfervations on Sorbiere's Voyage into England, in a Letter to Mr. Wren. This is a work not ill performed; but perhaps