THE

POETICAL WORKS

OF

DR. EDWARD YOUNG.

The Life of Dr. Edward Young.

DR. YOUNG's father, whose name was also Edward, was Fellow of Winchester College, Rector of Upham in Hampshire, and in the latter part of his life, Dean of Sarum; chaplain to William and Mary, and afterwards to queen Ann. Jacob tells us that the latter, when Princess Royal, did him the honour to stand godmother to our poet; and that, upon her ascending the throne, he was appointed Clerk of the Closet to her Majesty.

It does not appear that this gentleman distinguished himself in the Republic of Letters, otherwise than by a Latin Visitation Sermon, preached in 1686, and by two volumes of Sermons, printed in 1702, and which he dedicated to Lord Bradford, through whose interest he probably received some of his promotions. The Dean died at Sarum in 1705, aged 63; after a very short illness, as appears by the exordium of Bishop Burnet's sermon at the Cathedral on the following Sunday. "Death (said he) has been of late walking round us, and making breach upon us, and has now carried away the head of this body with a stroke; so that he, whom you saw a week ago distributing the holy mysteries, is now laid in the dust. But he still lives in the many excellent directions he has left us, both how to live and how to die."

the witty and profligate Duke of Whart ›n,* and his gay companions, by whom his finances might be improved, but not his morals. This is the period at which Pope is said to have told Warburton, our young author had "much genius without common sense:" and it should seem likewise that he possessed a zeal for religion with little of its practical influence; for, with all his gaiety and ambition, he was an advocate for Revelation and Christianity. Thus when Tindel, the atheistical philosopher, used to spend much of his time at All Souls, he complained: "The other boys I can always answer, because I know whence they have their arguments, which I have read an hundred times; but that fellow Young is continually pestering me with something of his own."

This apparent inconsistency is rendered the more striking from the different kinds of composi tion in which, at this period, he was engaged: viz. a political panegyric on the new Lord Lansdowne, and a sacred Poem on the Last Day, which was written in 1710, but not published till 1713. It was dedicated to the Queen, and acknowledges an obligation, which has been differently understood, either as referring to her having been his godmother, or his patron; for it is inferred from a couplet of Swift's, that Young was a pensioned advocate of government:

"Whence Gay was banished in disgrace,
Where Pope will never show his face,
Where Y- must torture his invention,
To flatter knaves, or lose his pension."

Our author, who was an only son, was born at ais father's rectory, in 1681, and received the first Fart of his education (as his father had formerly done) at Winchester College; from whence, in his nineteenth year, he was placed on the foundation of New College, Oxford; whence again, on the death of the Warden in the same year, he was removed to Corpus Christi. In 1708, Archbishop This, however, might be mere report, at this peTennison nominated him to a law fellowship at riod, since Swift was not over-nice in his authoriAll Souls, where, in 1744, he took the degree of ties, and nothing is more common than to suppose Bachelor of Civil Law, and five years afterward the advocate, and the flatterer of the great, an hirethat of Doctor. ling. Flattery seems indeed to have been our poBetween the acquisition of these academic hon-et's besetting sin through life; but if interest was ours, Young was appointed to speak the Latin Oration on the foundation of the Codrington Library; which he afterwards printed, with a dedication to the ladies of that family, in English.

In this part of his life, our author is said not to have been that ornament to virtue and religion which he afterwards became. This is easy to be accounted for. He had been released from parental authority by his father's death; and his genius and conversation had introduced him to the notice of

his object, he must have been frequently disappointed; and to those disappointments we probably owe some of his best reflections on human life.

Of his Last Day, (his first considerable performance) Dr. Johnson observes, that it "has an equability and propriety which he afterwards either

At the instigation of this peer he was once candidate for a seat in Parliament, but without success, and the expences were paid by Wharton.

never endeavoured for, or never attained. Many connexion with the Duke of Wharton, who went paragraphs are noble, and few are mean; yet the thither in 1717. But he can not have long rewhole is languid: the plan is too much extended, mained there, as in 1719, he brought out his first and a succession of images divides and weakens tragedy of Busiris, at Drury Lane, and dedicated the general conception. But the great reason why it to the Duke of Newcastle. This tragedy had the reader is disappointed is, that the thought of been written some years, though now first performThe Last Day makes every man more than poeti-ed; for it is to our author's credit, that many of cal, by spreading over his mind a general obscurity his works were laid by him a considerable time beof sacred horror, that oppresses distinction and fore they were offered to the public. Our great disdains expression." The subject is indeed truly dramatic critic pronounces this piece "too far reawful, and was peculiarly affecting to this cele- moved from known life," to affect the passions. brated critic, who never could, without trembling, His next performance was The Revenge, the meditate upon death, or the eternal world. The the dramatic character of which is sufficiently aspoet's theological system, moreover, was not, at certained by its still keeping possession of the stage. least when he wrote this, the most consistent and The hint of this is supposed to have been taken evangelical: I mean he had not those views of the from Othello; "but the reflections, the incidents, Christian atonement, and of pardoning grace, which and the diction, are original." The success of this give such a glory to his Night Thoughts, and induced him to attempt another tragedy, which would much more have illumined this composition. was written in 1721, but not brought upon the All the preparation he seems to have there in view,

is

By tears and groans, and never-ceasing care, "And all the pious violence of prayer,"

stage for thirty years afterwards; and then with-
out success, as we shall have farther occasion to
observe. It has been remarked, that all his plays
conclude with suicide, and I much fear the fre-
quent introduction of this unnatural crime upon
the stage, has contributed greatly to its commission.

We have passed over our Author's Paraphrase
on Part of the Book of Job, in order to bring his
dramatic performances together. The Paraphrase
has been well received, and has often been print-

to fit himself for the Tribunal. Moreover, the
project of future misery is too awful for poetic en-
largement, and makes the piece too terrible to be
read with pleasure; while the attempt to particu-
larize the solemnities of judgment, lowers their
sublimity, and makes some parts of the description,
as Dr. Johnson has observed, appear mean, and ed with his Night Thoughts. This would be ad-
even bordering on burlesque. This poem, how- mired, perhaps, as much as any of his works, could
ever, was well received upon the whole, and the we forget the original; but there is such a dignifi-
better for being written by a layman, and it was ed simplicity even in our prose translation of the
commended by the ministry and their party, be- poetic parts of scripture, that we can seldom bear
cause the dedication flattered their mistress and to see them reduced to rhyme, or modern measures.
her government-far too much, indeed, for the na- His next, and one of his best performances, is
ture of the subject.
entitled The Love of Fame the Universal Passion,
Dr. Young's next poem was entitled, the Force in seven characteristic Satires, originally publish-
of Religion, and founded on the deaths of Lady ed separately, between the years 1725 and 1728.
Jane Grey and her husband. "It is written with This, according to Dr. Johnson, is a "very great
elegance enough," according to Dr. Johnson; but performance. It is said to be a series of epigrams,
was never popular." for "Jane is too heroic to be and if it be, it is what the author intended: his
pitied." The dedication of this piece to the count- endeavour was at the production of striking dis-
ess of Salisbury was also inexcusably fulsome, tichs, and pointed sentences; and his distichs have
and, I think, profane. Indeed, the author himself the weight of solid sentiment, and his points the
seems afterwards to have thought so; for when he sharpness of resistless truth. His characters are
collected his smaller pieces into volumes, he very
Judiciously suppressed this and most of his other
dedications.

often selected with discernment, and drawn with nicety; his illustrations are often happy, and his reflections often just. His species of Satire is beIn some part of his life, Young certainly went tween those of Horace and Juvenal: he has the ! Ireland,* and was there acquainted with the ec- gaiety of Horace without his laxity of numbers; centrical Dean Swift; and his biographers seem and the morality of Juvenal, with greater variety agreed, that this was, most probably, during his of images." Swift, indeed, has pronounced of these Satires, that they should have been either

⚫ From his seventh Satire it appears also, that he was once" more merry, or more severe:" in that case, they auroad, probably about this time, and saw a field of battle covered with the slain; and it is affirmed that once, with a clas mc in his hand, he wandered into the enemy's encampment, and had some difficulty to convince them, that he was only an absent poet, and not a spy.

Our author seems early to have been enamoured with the Tragic Muse, and with the charms of melancholy. Dr. Ridley relates, that, when at Oxford, he would sometimes shy tup his room, and study by a lamp at mid-day