“Though he was an academic the greatest part of his life, yet he contracted no sourness of temper, no tincture of pedantry, no itch of disputation, or obstinate contention for the old, or new philosophy, no assuming way of dictating to others, which are faults which some are insensibly led into, who are constrained to dwell within the walls of a private college.”  Thus far Mr. Oldisworth, who has drawn the character of his deceased friend, with a laudable fondness.  Mr. Smith, no doubt, possessed the highest genius for poetry; but it is certain he had mixed but too little in life.  His language, however luxuriously poetical, yet is far from being proper for the drama, and there is too much of the poet in every speech he puts in the mouths of his characters, which produces an uniformity, that nothing could teach him to avoid, but a more general knowledge of real life and characters.  It is acknowledged that Mr. Smith was much inclined to intemperance, though Mr. Oldisworth has glossed it over with the hand of a friend; nor is it improbable, that this disposition sunk him in that vis inertiae, which has been the bane of many of the brightest geniuses of the world.  Mr. Smith was, upon the whole, a good natured man, a great poet, a finished scholar, and a discerning critic.

[Footnote A:  See the Life and Character of Mr. Smith, by Mr. Oldisworth, prefixed to his Phaedra and Hippolitus, edit. 1719.]

[Footnote B:  Oldisworth, ubi supra.]

* * * * *

DANIEL DE FOE,

This gentleman acquired a very considerable name by his political and poetical works; his early attachment to the revolution interest, and the extraordinary zeal and ability with which he defended it.  He was bred, says Mr. Jacob, a Hosier, which profession he forsook, as unworthy of him, and became one of the most enterprizing authors this, or any other age, ever produced.  The work by which he is most distinguished, as a poet, is his True Born Englishman, a Satire, occasioned by a poem entitled Foreigners, written by John Tutchin, esq;[A].  This gentleman (Tutchin) was of the Monmouth faction, in the reign of King Charles ii. and when that unhappy prince made an attempt upon his uncle’s crown, Mr. Tutchin wrote a political piece in his favour, for which, says Jacob, he was so severely handled by Judge Jeffries, and his sentence was so very uncommon, and so rigorously executed, that he petitioned King James to be hanged.

Soon after the revolution, the people, who are restless in their inclinations, and loath that, to-day, for which they would yesterday have sacrificed their lives, began to be uneasy at the partiality their new King discovered to his countrymen.  The popular discontent rose to such a heighth, that King William was obliged to dismiss his Dutch guards, and though he died in possession of the crown of England, yet it proved to him a crown of thorns, and he spent fewer peaceful