land, Holland, and Switzerland, are

entitled to

greater applause than the celebrated republics of antiquity.

No

"Generosity, sincerity, and a love of independence, are the characteristics of the English. nation had ever juster ideas of liberty, or fixed it on a firmer basis. They have concerted innumerable establishments in favour of the indigent, and have even frequently raised subscriptions for the relief of their enemies, when reduced to captivity. Their conduct indeed in India has been excessively unjust. Nor can this appear surprising to those who reflect, that India is under the direction of a commercial society, conducted by its members in a distant country; and that its climate is fatal to the constitutions of the Europeans, who visit it only with the design of suddenly amassing wealth, and are anxious to return as soon as that design is accomplished.

"Holland, however circumscribed in its extent, has acquired liberty by a war of above half a century, and risen to the highest rank among the powers of Europe. Though the Dutch are universally engaged in lucrative pursuits, neither their sentiments' are contracted, nor their ideas confined. They have

erected edifices in which age may repose, and sickness be relieved; and have often liberally contributed to the support of the persecuted. The destruction of the De Witts was entirely the result of a momentary passion.

"Sheltered within the fastnesses of their native mountains, the Swiss look down with security on the revolutions around them. Though never actuated with the spirit of conquest, they have exhibited acts of the most exalted heroism in defence of their country. Industrious, yet liberal; simple, yet enlightened; their taste is not vitiated, nor their manners corrupted, by the refinements of luxury.

"That the Moderns are not inferior to the Ancients in virtue, is obvious therefore on a review of the nations that have acted with most honour in the grand theatre of the world. The present mode of conducting war, not to mention any other instance, is the most humane and judicious that has yet been adopted.

"Let us not then depreciate the Moderns. Let us admire, let us imitate, what is laudable in anti

quity, but be just to the merits of our contempraries."]

The first poetry I published was the Ode to Superstition, in 1786. I wrote it while I was in my teens, and afterwards touched it up. I paid down to the

According to a note in Mr. R.'s collected poems it was "written in. 1785."-The full title of this publication is An Ode to Superstition, with some other Poems. The small pieces annexed to the Ode are, lines "To a Lady on the Death of her Lover," "The Sailor," "A Sketch of the Alps at Day-break," and “A Wish.” The first of these Mr. Rogers thought unworthy of preservation: but it may be subjoined here :

"To a Lady on the Death of her Lover.
"Hail, pensive, pleasing Melancholy, hail!
Descend, and woo, with me, the silent shade;
The curfew swings its sound along the gale,
And the soft moonlight sleeps in every glade.

She comes, she comes! through **'s dusky grove,
In mild Eliza's form, I see her come!
Mourning with all the widow's vows of love
Her Henry's summons to his long, long home.

But hark! from yon bright cloud a voice she hears!
'No more, fond maid, from social pleasures fly:
'I'm sent from heaven to smile away thy tears,
'For Henry shares the triumphs of the sky.

'He's gone before but to prepare for thee;
'And when thy soul shall wing its willing flight,
'His kindred soul, from all its fetters free,
'Will spring to meet thee in the realms of light.

'Know, ye shall then, with mutual wonder, trace
'Each little twinkling star in yon blue sphere,

Explore what modes of being people space,

'And visit worlds whose laws he taught thee here.

十

publisher thirty pounds to insure him from being a loser by it. At the end of four years, I found that he had sold about twenty copies. However, I was consoled by reading in a critique on the. Ode that I was "an able writer," or some such expression.-The short copy of verses entitled Captivity was also composed when I was a very young man. It was a favourite with Hookham Frere, who said that it resembled a Greek epigram.

My lines To the Gnat, which some of the reviewers laughed at, were composed in consequence of my sufferings from the attacks of that insect while I lived at Newington Green. My eyes used to be absolutely swollen up with gnat-bites. I awoke one morning in that condition when I was engaged

'Go, act an angel's part, be misery's friend;
'Go, and an angel's feelings shalt thou gain.
'Each grateful spirit o'er thy couch shall bend,
'And whisper peace, when flattery's voice is vain.

'Wake from thy trance. Can virtue sink in sighs!
'When darkness frowns, she looks beyond the tomb.
'Memory and Hope, like evening stars, arise,
'And shed their mingled rays to gild the gloom.

'Religion speaks. She bids thy sorrows cease:
With gratitude enjoy what God has given.
'Religion speaks. She points the path to peace :
'Attend her call to happiness and heaven.'"

to spend the day at Streatham with Mr. and Mrs. Piozzi, to meet Miss Farren (afterwards Lady Derby); and it was only by the application of laudanum to my wounds that I was enabled to keep my engagement. Nothing could exceed the elegance and refinement of Miss Farren's appearance and manners.

People have taken the trouble to write my Life more than once; and strange assertions they have made both about myself and my works. In one biographical account it is stated that I submitted The Pleasures of Memory in manuscript to the critical revision of Richard Sharp: now, when that poem was first published, I had not yet formed an acquaintance with Sharp (who was introduced to me by the oldest of my friends, Maltby). The.. beautiful lines, "Pleasures of Memory !-oh, supremely blest," &c., which I have inserted in a note on Part Second, were composed by a Mr. Soame,t who died in India in 1803, at which time he was a lieutenant in the dragoons. I believe that he destroyed himself. I had heard that the lines were in a certain newspaper, and went to Peel's Coffee

* See notice at the commencement of the Porsoniana in this Vol.-ED.

† See The Correspondence of Sir T. Hanmer, &c., p. 481.—ED.