PART IV.

BIOGRAPHICAL

ESSAY II.

AND CRITICAL SKETCHES OF THE OCCASIONAL CORRESPONDENTS OF STEELE AND ADDISON.

In the preceding essay we have allotted a larger space to the Biography of Budgell, Hughes, Berkeley, and Pope, owing to the number and importance of their contributions, than can possibly be given to the characters who form the subjects of this and the following essay; for however ample their exertions might be in other departments of literature, as they brought not much assistance to the periodical works under our consideration, their claim for extended notice, cannot, in accordance with the plan which we have adopted, be great.

5. THOMAS TICKELL, son of the Rev. Richard Tickell, Vicar of Bridekirk, near Carlisle in Cumberland, was born in 1686. After a competent education in his native country, he entered

a member of Queen's College, Oxford, in April, 1701; was made Master of Arts in 1708, and was chosen Fellow in 1710. The statutes of the university, however, requiring orders previous to an admission to the fellowship, he obtained a dispensation from the Crown.

The genius and inclinations of Mr. Tickell appear to have early led him to a public and literary life; and his acquirements were such as were well calculated to forward and support his wishes. To considerable classical learning he added an elegant and correct taste, much skill in the art of versification, and a shrewdness and knowledge of human life fully adequate to the routine of political or diplomatic employment.

With these talents he was fortunate enough to obtain the patronage of Addison, through the medium of a copy of verses in praise of his Rosamond. The friendship thus obtained was never for a moment violated: Addison, it is said, had the affection of a father for Tickell, who, in return, loved and venerated this great man with a zeal which no filial duty could exceed.

An early consequence of this connection was the assistance of Tickell in the Spectator and Guardian, and an intimacy with Steele and his associates. During the progress of the first of these periodical papers, and while the public

was impatiently expecting the issue of the negotiation which preceded the peace of Utrecht, our author published his Prospect of Peace, a poem; the purport of which was to reconcile the nation to the idea of sacrificing some advantages for the sake of tranquillity; and to show that the result of conquest, however glorious or extensive, was less valuable and permanent than the blessings attendant on an honourable peace. To the Whigs, of whom Addison was the leader, and who had but too much reason for reprobating the treaty then pending, this production of Tickell must have been extremely unwelcome; more especially as it obtained a rapid circulation, and saw a sixth edition in the space of a very short period. Addison, nevertheless, had too great a regard for Tickell to suffer his political opinions to operate to the prejudice of his friend, and has therefore, in N° 523 of the Spectator, spoken of this poem in terms of warm approbation, and with a particular commendation of the author's judgment in refusing to employ the stale mythology of Greece and Rome; an edict against the use of which, and written in a vein of exquisite humour, terminates the paper.

The versification both of this poem and of its predecessor on the Opera of Rosamond, is, in general, spirited and sweet; and the sentiment

and imagery, if not entitled to the praise of much originality, are, at least, correct and pleasing.

He shortly afterwards inserted a poem, addressed "To the supposed Author of the Spectator," in N° 532 of that work; and in the succeeding volume* another entitled The Royal Progress, written on the arrival of George the First in this island, and of which, as Johnson observes, “it is just to say that it is neither high nor low."

The accession of this monarch, however, opened a new path to the career of Tickell. He had been a vigorous defender of the House of Hanover and its disputed rights, and had written a political poem under the appellation of an "Epistle to a Gentleman at Avignon;" it is an attack upon the Chevalier and his supporters, and which, says Johnson, "ranks high among party poems; it expresses contempt without coarseness, and superiority without insolence." It was much read; passed through five editions, and was esteemed to have been highly serviceable to the cause which he had espoused. He had a claim, therefore, upon the new dynasty, and met accordingly with patronage at Court.

The intimacy which had so long subsisted between Mr. Addison and our author, was now rendered still more close by the ties of business and * N° 620.

interest. Addison was appointed Secretary to the Earl of Sunderland, and took Tickell with him to Ireland, as a person well calculated to assist him in the detail of official employment. The connection proved so mutually subservient to the interests of each, that, when Addison became Secretary of State in 1717, he immediately advanced Tickell to the post of Under Secretary; a situation which he filled with equal advantage to himself and his patron.

The decease of Addison, which took place in 1719, was severely felt and sincerely lamented by Tickell. To the collected works of his great patron, who had on his death-bed left him the charge of publishing them, he prefixed an Elegy in memory of their author, which we have inserted at the close of the life of Addison, and to whose beauty and pathos no language can do justice. I know indeed of no verses which more immediately find their way to the heart, or which indicate greater warmth of affection, or greater sincerity of praise.

It is a remarkable proof of the force of prejudice, that when Steele, who never entertained a high opinion of Tickell, and who even endeavoured to dissuade Addison against appointing him to the secretaryship, published the second edition of The Drummer, he thus speaks of this