Much about this time Stephen Duck, who had wrote a poem called The Thresher, reaped very great advantages from it, and was caressed by persons in power, who, in imitation of the Royal patroness, heaped favours upon him, perhaps more on account of the extraordinary regard Queen Caroline had shewn him, than any opinion of his merit.  Mr. Banks considered that the success of Mr. Duck was certainly owing to the peculiarity of his circumstances, and that the novelty of a thresher writing verses, was the genuine cause of his being taken notice of, and not any intrinsic excellence in the verses themselves.  This reflexion inspired him with a resolution of making an effort of the same kind; but as curiosity was no more to be excited by novelty, the attempt was without success.  He wrote, in imitation of The Thresher, The Weaver’s Miscellany, which failed producing the intended effect, and, ’tis said, never was reckoned by Mr. Banks himself as any way worthy of particular distinction.  His business of selling books upon a stall becoming disagreeable to him, as it demanded a constant and uncomfortable attendance, he quitted that way of life, and was received into the shop of one Mr. Montague a bookbinder, and bookseller, whom he served some time as a journeyman.  During the time he lived with Mr. Montague, he employed his leisure hours in composing several poems, which were now swelled to such a number, that he might sollicit a subscription for them with a good grace.  He had taken care to improve his acquaintance, and as he had a power of distinguishing his company, he found his interest higher in the world than he had imagined.  He addressed a poem to Mr. Pope, which he transmitted to that gentleman, with a copy of his proposals inclosed.  Mr. Pope answered his letter, and the civilities contained in it, by subscribing for two setts of his poems, and ’tis said he wrote to Mr. Banks the following compliment,

  ’May this put money in your purse: 
  For, friend, believe me, I’ve seen worse.’

The publication of these poems, while they, no doubt, enhanced his interest, added likewise something to his reputation; and quitting his employment at Mr. Montague’s, he made an effort to live by writing only.  He engaged in a large work in folio, entitled, The Life of Christ, which was very acceptable to the public, and was executed with much piety and precision.

Mr. Banks’s next prose work, of any considerable length, was A Critical Review of the Life of Oliver Cromwell.  We have already taken notice that he received his education among the Anabaptists, and consequently was attached to those principles, and a favourer of that kind of constitution which Cromwell, in the first period of his power, meant to establish.  Of the many Lives of this great man, with which the biography of this nation has been augmented, perhaps not one is written with a true dispassionate candour.  Men are divided in their sentiments concerning the measures which, at that critical AEra, were pursued