attachment to the Prince of Wales and his friends; and others assert, that the King thought him sufficiently provided for. Certain it is, that he knew no straits in pecuniary matters; and that, in the method he has recommended of estimating human life, honors are of little value. His merits as an Author have already been considered in a review of his works: and nothing seems necessary to be added, but the following general characters of his composition, from Blair and Johnson. Dr. Blair says (in his celebrated lectures :) " Among moral and didactic poets, Dr. Young is of too great eminence to be passed over without notice. In all his works, the marks of strong genius appear. His Universal Passion possesses the full merit of that animated conciseness of style and lively description of character, which I mention as requisite in satirical and didactic compositions. Though his wit may often be thought too sparkling, and his sentences too pointed, yet the vivacity of his fancy is so great, as to entertain every reader. In his Night Thoughts there is much energy of expression; in the three first, there are several pathetic passages; and scattered through them all, happy images and illusions, as well as pious reflections occur. But the sentiments are frequently over-strained, and turgid; and the style is too harsh and obscure to be pleasing." The same critic has said of our author in another place, that his "merit in figurative language is great and deserves to be remarked. No writer, ancient or modern, had a stronger imagination than Dr. Young, or one more fertile in figures of every kind; his metaphors are often new, and often natural and beautiful. But his imagination was strong and rich, rather than delicate and correct." These strictures may be thought severe; but it should be remembered, that an author derives far more honor from such a discriminate character, from a judicious critic, than from the indiscriminate commendation of an admirer. The following is the conclusion of Dr. Johnson's critique, and shall conclude these memoirs. " It must be allowed of Young's poetry, that it abounds in thought, but without much accuracy or selection. When he lays hold of a thought, he pursues it beyond expectation, [and] sometimes happily, as in his parallel of quicksilver with pleasure.... which is very ingenious, very subtle, and almost exact.... " His versification is his own; neither his blank nor his rhyming lines have any resemblance to those of former writers; he picks up no hemisticks, he copies no favorite expressions; he seems to have laid up no stores of thought or diction, but to owe all to the fortuitous suggestions of the present moment. Yet I have reason to believe that, when once he had formed a new design, he then labored it with very patient industry, and that he composed with great labor and frequent revisions. "His verses are formed by no certain model; he is no more like himself in his different productions, than he is like others. He seems never to have studied prosody, nor to have any direction, but from his own ear. But with all his defects he was a man of genius, and a poet." P. S. The materials of the above Life are taken from the Article referring to our author in Johnson's Lives of the Poets, written by Mr. Herbert Croft, with the Critique of Dr. Johnson, compared with the Biographia Britannica, and other respectable authorities. 8 THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. As the occasion of this Poem was real, not fictitious; so the method pursued in it was rather imposed, by what spontaneously arose in the Author's mind, on that occasion, than meditated or designed; which will appear very probable from the nature of it. For it differs from the common mode of poetry, which is from long narrations to draw short morals. Here, on the contrary, the narrative is short, and the morality arising from it makes the bulk of the Poem. The reason of it is, that the facts mentioned did naturally pour these moral reflections on the thought of the Writer. THE COMPLAINT. NIGHT I. ON LIFE, DEATH, AND IMMORTALITY. TO THE RIGHT HON. ARTHUR ONSLOW, ESQ, T "IR'D Nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep! From short (as usual) and disturb'd repose Night, sable goddess! from her ebon throne, B |