The hero is thus exhibited on earth, and in monthly reviewer, who might be the same person, heaven. for that journal writes with the tenderness of a On earth, "a tawny Sibyl," with "an old brother of whatever relates to our hero, pretends striped curtain-" now, But in heaven, among the immortals, never was an unfortunate hero of the vindictive Muses so reduced into nothingness! Jove, disturbed at the noise of this thing of wit, exclaims, that nature had never proved productive in vain before, but "On mere privation she bestow'd a frame, And dignified a nothing with a name; A wretch devoid of use, of sense, and grace, The insolvent tenant of incumber'd space!" Pallas hits off the style of Hill, as "The neutral nonsense, neither false nor true that the Inspector only meant, that "the character ought to be called a character) was the meanest of Harlequin (if a thing so unnatural and ridiculous on the stage!" I will here notice a characteristic incident in Hill's literary life, of which the boldness and the egotism is scarcely paralleled, even by Orator Henley. At the time the Sloane Collection of Natural History was purchased, to form a part of our grand national establishment the British Museum, Hill offered himself, by public advertisement, in one of his Inspectors, as the properest person to be placed at its head. The world will condemn him for his impudence. The most reasonable objection against his mode of proceeding would be, that the thing undid itself; and that the very appearance, by public advertisement, was one motive why so confident an offer should be rejected. Perhaps, after all, Hill only wanted to advertise himself. But suppose that Hill was the man he represents himself to be, and he fairly challenges the test, his conduct only appears eccentric, according to routine.-Unpatronised and unfriended men are depressed, among other calamities, with their quiescent modesty; but there is a rare spirit in him who dares to claim favours, which he thinks his right, in the most public manner. I preserve, in the note, the most striking passages of this extraordinary appeal †. the extraordinary pains the prompter had taken with Hill, in the part of Oroonoko; though, "if he had not quite forgotten it, to very little purpose.” But Phoebus shows there may still be something He reminds Hill of a dramatic anecdote, which produced from inanity. "E'en blank privation has its use and end- The careless style of the fluent "Inspectors," beside their audacity, brought Hill into many scrapes. He called Woodward, the celebrated harlequin, "the meanest of all characters." This Woodward resented in a pamphlet-battle, in which Hill was beaten at all points. But Hill, or the Woodward humorously attributes Hill's attack on him to his jealousy of his successful performance of Harlequin, and opens some of the secret history of Hill, by which it appears, that early in life he trod the theatrical boards. He tells us of he no doubt had forgotten. It seems he once belonged to a strolling company at May-fair, where, in the scene between Altamont and Lothario, the polite audience of that place all chorused, and "Oh agreed with him, when dying he exclaimed, Altamont, thy genius is the stronger." He then shows him off as the starved apothecary in Romeo and Juliet, in one of his botanic peregrinations to Chelsea Garden; from whence, it is said, he was expelled for "culling too many rare plants"— "I do remember an apothecary, Hill, who was often so brisk in his attack on the wits, had no power of retort; so that he was always buffeting and always buffeted. + Hill addresses the Lord Chancellor, Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Speaker, on Sir Hans Sloane's Collection of Natural History, proposing himself as a candidate for nomination At length, after all these literary quarrels, Hill he had a work for publication, his employers stisurvived his literary character. He had written himself down to so low a degree, that whenever pulated, in their contracts, that the author should conceal his name; a circumstance not new among a certain race of writers. But the genius of reading lectures on them at the British Museum, with the living plants before the lecturer and his auditors.-Poor Sir John! he was born half a century too early!-He would, in this day, have made his lectures fashionable; and might have secured at the Opera, every night, an elegant audience for the next morning, in the gardens of the Museum. in the principal office, by whatever name that shall be called :-" I deliver myself with humility; but conscious also that I possess the liberties of a British subject, I shall speak with freedom."He says, that the only means left for a Briton, is to address his sovereign and the public.-"That foreigners will resort to this Collection is certain, for it is the most considerable in the world; and that our own people will often visit it is as sure, because it may be made the means of much useful * It would be difficult to form a list of his as well as curious knowledge. One and the other anonymous works or compilations, among which will expect a person in that office who has suffi- many are curious. Tradition has preserved his cient knowledge: he must be able to give account name as the writer of Mrs. Glasse's Cookery, and of every article, freely and fluently, not only in of several novels. There is a very curious work, his own, but in the Latin and French languages. entitled "Travels in the East," 2 vols. 8vo, of "This, the world, and none in it better than which the author has been frequently and in vain your Lordship, sees, is not a place that any one inquired after. These travels are attributed to a can execute it requires knowledge in a peculiar noble lord; but it now appears that they are a and uncommon kind of study—knowledge which | very entertaining narrative, manufactured by Hill. very few possess; and in which, my Lord, the Whiston, the bookseller, had placed this work in bitterest of my enemies (and I have thousands, | his MS. catalogue of Hill's books. although neither myself nor they know why) will not say I am deficient "My Lord, the eyes of all Europe are upon this transaction. What title I have to your Lordship's favour, those books which I have published, and with which (pardon the necessary boast) all Europe is acquainted, declare. Many may dispute by interest with me; but if there be one who would prefer himself, by his abilities, I beg the matter may be brought to trial. The Collection is at hand; and I request, my Lord, such person and myself may be examined, by that test, together. It is an amazing store of knowledge; and he has most, in this way, who shall show himself most acquainted with it. "What are my own abilities, it very ill becomes me thus to boast; but did they not qualify me for the trust, my Lord, I would not ask it. As to those of any other, unless a man be conjured | from the dead, I shall not fear to say, there is not any one whoever that is able so much as to call the parts of the Collection by their names. "I know I shall be accused of ostentation, in giving to myself this preference; and I am sorry for it but those who have candour, will know it could not be avoided. "Many excel, my Lord, in other studies: it is my chance to have bestowed the labour of my life on this those labours may be of some use to others. This appears the only instance in which it is possible that they should be rewarded." In a subsequent Inspector, he treated on the improvement of Botany by raising plants, and There is still another production of considerable merit, entitled "Observations on the Greek and Roman Classics, 1753." A learned friend recollects, when young, that this critical work was said to be written by Hill. It excels Blackwell and Fenton; and aspires to the numerous composition of prose. The sentimental critic enters into the feelings of the great authors whom he describes, with spirit, delicacy of taste, and sometimes with beautiful illustration. It only wants a chastening hand to become a manual for the young classical student, by which he might acquire those vivid emotions, which many college tutors may not be capable of communicating. I suspect, too, he is the author of this work, from a passage which Smart quotes, as a specimen of Hill's puffing himself, and of those smart short periods which look like wit, without being witty. In a letter to himself, as we are told, Hill writes: "You have discovered many of the beauties of the ancients-they are obliged to you; we are obliged to you: were they alive, they would thank you; we, who are alive, do thank you."—If Hill could discriminate the most hidden beauties of the ancients, the tact must have been formed at his leisure-in his busy hours he never copied them; but when had he leisure? Two other works, of the most contrasted character, display the versatility and dispositions of this singular genius, at different eras. When "The Inspector" was rolling in his chariot about the town, appeared "Letters from the Inspector to a Lady, 1752.” It is a pamphlet, containing Hill was not annihilated by being thrown down so violently on his mother earth; like Anthæus, it rose still fresh; and like Proteus, it assumed new forms. Lady Hill and the young Hills were claimants on his industry far louder than the evanescent epigrams which darted around him: these latter, however, were more numerous than ever dogged an author in his road to literary celebrity *. His science, his ingenuity, and his impu dence, once more practised on the credulity of the public, with the innocent quackery of attributing all medicinal virtues to British herbs. He made many walk out, who were too sedentary: they were delighted to cure head-aches by feverfew tea; hectic fevers by the daisy; colics by the leaves of camomile, and agues by its flowers. All these were accompanied by plates of the plants, with the Linnaean namest. This was preparatory to the Essences of Sage, Balsams of Honey, and chariot. the amorous correspondence of Hill with a reign-Tinctures of Valerian. Simple persons imagined ing beauty, whom he first saw at Ranelagh. On they were scientific botanists in their walks, with his first ardent professions he is contemptuously Hill's plates in their hands. But one of the rejected; he perseveres in high passion, and is newly-discovered virtues of British herbs was, coldly encouraged; at length he triumphs; and undoubtedly, that of placing the discoverer in a this proud and sullen beauty, in her turn, presents a horrid picture of the passions. Hill then becomes the reverse of what he was; weary of her jealousy, sated with the intercourse, he studiously avoids, and at length rejects her; assigning, for his final argument, his approaching marriage. The work may produce a moral effect, while it exhibits a striking picture of all the misery of illicit connexions: but the scenes are coloured with Ovidian warmth. The original letters were shown at the bookseller's: Hill's were in his own hand-writing, and the lady's in a female hand. But whether Hill was the publisher, as an attempt at notoriety-or the lady admired her own correspondence, which is often exquisitely wrought, is not known. Hill, in his serious hours, published a large quarto volume, entitled "Thoughts concerning God and Nature, 1755." This work, the result of his scientific knowledge and his moral reasoning, was never undertaken for the purpose of profit. He printed it with the certainty of a considerable loss, from its abstract topics, not obvious to general readers; at a time, too, when a guinea quarto was a very hazardous enterprise. He published it purely from conscientious and religious motives; a circumstance mentioned in that Apology of his Life which we have noticed. The more closely the character of Hill is scrutinised, the more extraordinary appears this man, so often justly contemned, and so often unjustly depreciated. * It would occupy pages to transcribe epigrams on Hill. One of them alludes to his philosophical as well as his literary character : "Hill puffs himself; forbear to chide! An insect vile and mean In an Apology for the character of Sir John Hill, published after his death, where he is painted with much beauty of colouring, and elegance of form, the eruptions and excrescences of his motley physiognomy, while they are indicated, for they were too visible to be entirely omitted in anything pretending to a resemblance, -are melted down, and even touched into a grace. The Apology is not unskilful, but the real purpose appears in the last page; where we are informed that Lady Hill, fortunately for the world, possesses all his valuable receipts and herbal remedies! Garrick's happy lines are well known, on his farces:— "For physic and farces his equal there scarce is— His farces are physic, his physic a farce is." Another said "The worse that we wish thee, for all thy vile crimes, Is to take thy own physic, and read thy own rhymes." The rejoinder would reverse the wish “For, if he takes his physic first, + Hill says, in his pamphlet on the ، Virtues of British Herbs :"-" It will be happy, if, by the same means, the knowledge of plants also becomes more general. The study of them is pleasant, and the exercise of it healthful. He who seeks the herb for its cure, will find it half effected by the walk; and when he is acquainted with the useful kinds, he may be more people's, beside his own, physician." BOYLE AND BENTLEY. A faction of Wits at Oxford, the concealed movers of this Controversy-Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE's opinions the ostensible cause; Editions of classical Authors, by young Students at Oxford, the probable one-BOYLE's first attack in the Preface to his Phalaris-BENTLEY, after a silence of three years, betrays his feelings on the literary calumny of BOYLE-BOYLE replies by the "Examination of Bentley's Dissertation"-BENTLEY rejoins by enlarging it— the effects of a contradictory Narrative at a distant time-BENTLEY's suspicions of the origin of the Phalaris, and "The Examination," proved by subsequent facts-BENTLEY'S dignity when stung at the ridicule of Dr. KINGapplies a classical pun, and nicknames his facetious and caustic Adversary-KING invents an extraordinary Index to dissect the character of BENTLEY-specimens of the Controversy; BOYLE's menace, anathema, and ludicrous humour-BENTLEY's sarcastic reply not inferior to that of the Wits. THE splendid controversy between BOYLE and BENTLEY was at times a strife of gladiators, and has been regretted as the opprobrium of our literature; but it should be perpetuated to its honour; for it may be considered, on one side at least, as a noble contest of heroism. The ostensible cause of the present quarrel was inconsiderable; the concealed motive lies deeper; and the party-feelings of the haughty Aristarchus of Cambridge, and a faction of wits at Oxford, under the secret influence of Dean Aldrich, provoked this fierce and glorious contest. Wit, ridicule, and invective, by cabal and stratagem, obtained a seeming triumph over a single individual, but who, like the Farnesian Hercules, personified the force and resistance of incomparable strength. "The Bees of Christ-Church," as this conspiracy of wits has been called, so musical and so angry, rushed in a dark swarm about him, but only left their fine stings in the flesh they could not wound. He only put out his hand in contempt, never in rage. The Christ-church men, as if doubtful whether wit could prevail against learning, had recourse to the maliciousness of personal satire. They amused an idle public, who could even relish sense and Greek, seasoned as they were with wit and satire, while Boyle was showing how Bentley wanted wit, and Bentley was proving how Boyle wanted learning. To detect the origin of the controversy, we must find the seed-plot of Bentley's volume in Sir William Temple's "Essay upon Ancient and Modern Learning," which he inscribed to his alma mater, the University of Cambridge. Sir William, who had caught the contagion of the prevalent literary controversy of the times, in which the finest geniuses in Europe had entered the lists, imagined that the ancients possessed a greater force of genius, with some peculiar advantages-that the human mind was in a state of decay—and that our knowledge was nothing more than scattered fragments saved out of the general shipwreck. He writes with a premeditated design to dispute the improvements or undervalue the inventions of his own age. Wotton, the friend of Bentley, replied by his curious volume of "Reflections on Ancient and Modern Learning." But Sir William, in his ardour, had thrown out an unguarded opinion, which excited the hostile contempt of Bentley. "The oldest books," he says, "we have, are still in their kind the best : the two most ancient that I know of, in prose, are Æsop's Fables and Phalaris's Epistles.”— The Epistles, he insists, exhibit every excellence of "a statesman, a soldier, a wit, and a scholar." That ancient author, who Bentley afterwards asserted was only "some dreaming pedant, with his elbow on his desk." Bentley, bristled over with Greek, perhaps then considered, that to notice a vernacular and volatile writer, ill assorted with the critic's Fastus. But, about this time, Dean Aldrich had set an example to the students of Christ-church, of publishing editions of classical authors. Such juvenile editorships served as an easy admission into the fashionable literature of Oxford. Alsop had pub lished the Æsop; and Boyle, among other "young in a new edition of his friend Wotton's book, gentlemen," easily obtained the favour of the dean, "to desire him to undertake an edition of the Epistles of Phalaris." Such are the modest terms Boyle employs in his reply to Bentley, after he had discovered the unlucky choice he had made of an author. published "A Dissertation on the Epistles of the Ancients;" where, reprehending the false criticism of Sir William Temple, he asserted that the Fables of Esop and the Epistles of Phalaris were alike spurious. The blow was levelled at Christ-church, and all the bees" were brushed down in the warmth of their summer-day. For this edition of Phalaris it was necessary to collate a MS. in the King's Library; and Bent- It is remarkable that Bentley kept so long a ley, about this time, had become the royal libra- silence; indeed, he had considered the affair so rian. Boyle did not apply directly to Bentley, trivial, that he had preserved no part of the but circuitously, by his bookseller, with whom the correspondence with Boyle, whom no doubt he doctor was not on terms. Some act of civility, slighted as the young editor of a spurious author. or a Mercury more "formose," to use one But Boyle's edition came forth, as Bentley of his latinisms, was probably expected. The expresses it," with a sting in its mouth." This, MS. was granted, but the collator was negligent; at first, was like a cut finger-he breathed on it, in six days Bentley reclaimed it, "four hours' " and would have forgotten it; but the nerve was had been sufficient for the purpose of colla- touched, and the pain raged long after the stroke. Even the great mind of Bentley began to shrink at the touch of literary calumny, so different from the vulgar kind, in its extent and its duration. He betrays the soreness he would wish to conceal, when he complains that "the false story has been tion. When Boyle's Phalaris appeared, he made this charge in the preface, that having ordered the Epistles to be collated with the MS. in the King's Library, the collator was prevented perfecting the collation by the singular humanity of the library-spread all over England." keeper, who refused any further use of the MS.; pro singulari suâ humanitate negavit: an expression that sharply hit a man marked by the haughtiness of his manners*. Bentley, on this insult, informed Boyle of what had passed. He expected that Boyle would have civilly cancelled the page; though he tells us he did not require this, because, "to have insisted on the cancel, might have been forcing a gentleman to too low a submission;"—a stroke of delicacy which will surprise some to discover in the strong character of Bentley. But he was also too haughty to ask a favour, and too conscious of his superiority to betray a feeling of injury. Boyle replied, that the bookseller's account was quite different from the doctor's, who had spoken slightingly of him. Bentley said no more. The statement of Bentley produced, in reply, the famous book of Boyle's Examination of Bentley's Dissertation. It opens with an imposing narrative, highly polished, of the whole transaction, with the extraordinary furniture of documents, which had never before entered into a literary controversy-depositions—certificates— affidavits-and private letters. Bentley now rejoined by his enlarged Dissertation on Phalaris, a volume of perpetual value to the lovers of ancient literature, and the memorable preface of which, itself a volume, exhibits another Narrative, entirely differing from Boyle's. These produced new replies and new rejoinders. The whole controversy became so perplexed, that it has frightened away all who have attempted to adjust the particulars. With unanimous consent they give up Three years had nearly elapsed, when Bentley, the cause, as one in which both parties studied • Haughtiness was the marking feature of Bentley's literary character; and his Wolseyan style and air have been played on by the wits.Bentley happened to express himself on the King's MS. of Phalaris in a manner their witty malice turned against him. ""Twas a surprise (he said) to find that OUR MS. was not perused."-" OUR MS. (they proceed) that is, his Majesty's and mine! He speaks ont now; 'tis no longer the King's, but our Ms., i. e. Dr. Bentley's and the King's in common, Ego et Rex meus-much too familiar for a library-keeper!"-It has been said that Bentley used the same Wolseyan egotism, on Pope's publications:-"This man is always abusing me or the King!" only to contradict each other. Such was the fate of a Narrative, which was made out of the recollections of the parties, with all their passions at work, after an interval of three years. In each, the memory seemed only retentive of those passages which best suited their own purpose, and which were precisely those the other party was most likely to have forgotten. What was forgotten, was denied; what was admitted, was made to refer to something else; dialogues were given, which appear never to have been spoken; and incidents described, which are declared never to have taken place; and all this, perhaps, without any purposed violation of truth. Such were the dangers and misunderstandings which attended a Narrative framed out of the broken or passionate |