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it the ground of his acceptance in society. Our author on this occasion has found an able vindicator in Mason. In fact, Congreve had gained from literature whatever literature could give him; opulence, applause, the empire of wit, and the conversation of the great. Pope, by laying the translated Iliad at his feet, had acknowledged him to be the chief poet of his time. Thus it was the fortune of Congreve to receive honour from the veteran bard of the generation before him, and from the young aspirant upon whom the hopes of the next were settled. Though he retired long before his death from the field where alone he had reaped true glory, he did not outlive his reputation. He had the more singular felicity to be commended by most, and maligned by

none.

An overturn He returned

Yet his latter years were not without affliction. Cataracts in his eyes terminated in total blindness, and he was a martyr to the gout, from which he vainly sought relief by a visit to Bath. in his chariot made his case hopeless. to London, and expired at his house (situate where now stands Holland House) on the 29th of January, 1728-9. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a monument was erected to his memory, by Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough. This lady, the daughter of the great Duke, and wife of Lord Godolphin, was so warmly attached to Congreve, that, if the common report be true, his loss must have disordered her brain. It is said that she had his image moulded in wax, of the size of life-talked to it as if living, helped it at table to the same dishes which the deceased was known to prefer, and had an imaginary sore on its leg attended with all the care of surgery. There is no possibility of setting limits to madness, but this tale bears marks of gross

exaggeration. Most likely it originated in the report of some discarded waiting maid, who thought she had some time or other overheard her lady talking to Mr. Congreve's bust.

The conduct of Congreve in leaving 10,000l., the amassings of a close economy, to this Duchess, has been severely reprehended. If his relations were poor, he had certainly much better have bestowed his fortune on the poor than on the wealthy. Still, it was not by inheritance from parents, nor by aid of kinsfolk, that he became rich. To the great he owed his property, and to the great he returned it. He offended no rule of justice by so doing.*

From a rapid survey of his life and character, he seems to have been one of those indifferent children of the earth "whom the world cannot hate;" who are neither too good nor too bad for the present state of existence, and who may fairly expect their portion here. The darkest—at least the most enduring-stain on his memory, is the immorality of his writings; but this was the vice of the time, and his

*This is characterised by S. T. C. as "lax morality." Dr. Young thought that Congreve's money ought to have been given "to poor Mrs. Bracegirdle;" and Mr. Leigh Hunt considers this the "most Christian" sentiment he ever uttered. Mr. Macaulay follows in the same strain :-" It might have enabled a retired actress to enjoy every comfort, and, in her sense, every luxury; but it was hardly sufficient to defray the Duchess's establishment for three months." Doubtless Congreve made his "testament as worldlings do,"-according to Shakspeare; but a similar disposition is often shown by attached servants, who prefer leaving their property to their masters, to whom they feel themselves deeply indebted, rather than to their poor relatives, who have done nothing for them, and to whom, as they think, they owe nothing-a feeling of gratitude, however misdirected-D. C.

comedies are considerably more decorous than those of his predecessors. They are too cold to be mischievous; they keep the brain in too incessant inaction to allow the passions to kindle. For those who search into the powers of intellect, the combinations of thought which may be produced by volition, the plays of Congreve may form a profitable study. But their time is fled-on the stage they will be received no more; and of the devotees of light reading, such as could read them without disgust, would probably peruse them with little pleasure.*

It is reported, that in the latter part of his life he expressed much disapprobation of some part of his works. But as this disapprobation was expressed in the presence of a Quaker, it is hard to say how much of it was contrition, and how much politeness. He left several small legacies, and 2007. to Mrs. Bracegirdle, the object of his youthful gallantry. Dr. Johnson's critique on Congreve is one of his happiest.

DR. JOHN FOTHERGILL.

IN a very entertaining little essay, prefixed, we believe, by the late Dr. Beddoes, of Bristol, to an edition of the works of John Brown, is a classification of physicians, according to the Linnæan method,as the canting doctor, the wheedling doctor, the Adonis doctor, and the bully quack doctor; which last genus and species is exemplified by that eminent Yorkshire worthy, and great benefactor to the University of Oxford, Dr. John Radcliffe. But we do not recollect any mention of the Quaker philanthropist doctor. Yet such a one was John Fothergill, a man who rather lives in the gratitude of mankind for the good that he did, than in the archives of science for the facts he discovered, the phenomena he explained, or the theories he constructed.

John Fothergill, the father of our subject, was a member of the Society of Friends, and seems to have had considerable influence among his brethren, and, like many of that public-spirited community, who make a point of conscience of whatever they engage in, a keen politician. In the year 1734 he took a very active part in the contested election for Yorkshire, and in concert with Joseph Storr, wrote a circular letter to the society, lamenting that some of them had given votes inconsistent with unity and good

report, and recommending to their favour Sir Rowland Winn and Cholmondeley Turner. Whether these candidates were conspicuous for opposition to the war which was then raging on the continent, or for advocacy of a general distribution of political privilege, or were distinguished from their opponents by sobriety and sanctity of demeanour, or what other claims they had to the support of the Friends, we are unable to determine.

John Fothergill, the elder, after travelling all over America, settled at Knaresborough as a brewer, was successful, so as to enable him to retire from business to a small farm at Carr End, near Richmond, where his son John was born in 1712, either on the 8th of March or the 12th of October. He was the second son of his father. The eldest, Alexander, studied the law, and inherited the family estate. Joseph, the third, was an ironmonger at Stockport, in Cheshire. Samuel, the youngest, went to America, and became a celebrated Quaker preacher. Anne, the only daughter, became the companion of her brother John, and survived him.

John received his early education under his maternal grandfather, Thomas Houghton, a gentleman of fortune in Cheshire, and afterwards at the school of Sedburgh. His classical attainments were at least respectable, as appears from some of his medical works in Latin. As the principles in which he was educated shut him out from the English Universities, while the turn of his mind disinclined him to the active pursuits of commerce, he chose the medical profession, the only profession in which a Quaker can expect to rise, or indeed can engage, in strict accordance with the spirit of his religion. He was apprenticed to Benjamin Bartlet,* surgeon and

* Chalmer's Biographical Dictionary. Dr. Elliot calls

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