2nd s.N" 81., July 38. '57.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



41 



LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 18, 1857. 

 WILKES AND THE " ESSAY ON WOMAN." 



I mean now to conclude by adducing evidence, 

 internal and external, tending to show that Wilkes 

 was not the writer of the Essay. 



Lord Stanhope says, that in the writing of the 

 poem Wilkes was assisted by Thomas Potter. I, 

 however, have little doubt, after examination, that 

 the poem was written by one person, and that 

 whoever wrote the poem wrote the notes. Potter, 

 continues Lord Stanhope, was the second son of 

 the late Archbishop of Canterbury, who had been 

 secretary to the Prince of Wales; a man of 

 ability, but of lax morals, "as well became one of 

 Wilkes's friends." This is not fail'. Potter, what- 

 ever his morals may have been, was the friend and 

 associate of some of the highest, and some of the 

 best, and most moral men in the kingdom : — 

 Lord Chatham described him as "one of the 

 best fi'iends I have in the world." Potter was un- 

 doubtedly a man of great ability. His first speech 

 in parliament is thus noticed by Lady Hervey : 

 " Mr. Potter is a second Pitt I hear for fluency of 

 words ; he spoke well and bitterly." But Potter 

 not only spoke well, but wrote well — pamphlets 

 and political squibs. 



Like all the fashionable men of the day. Potter 

 was a frequent visitor at Bath. He was intimate 

 with Ralph Allen ; indeed some of his letters are 

 dated from Prior Park. This, of course, brought 

 him into personal intercourse with Warburton, 

 who married Allen's niece ; and though both had 

 probably sufficient self-control to as'sociate with 

 decent civility, it was scarcely possible for two men 

 more opposed in character to have been brought 

 together under the same roof. Certainly, if we 

 may believe contemporary publications and anec- 

 dotes, Potter not only disliked, but squibbed the 

 solemn dictatorial assumption of Warburton in 

 flying paragraphs and epigrams ; and Warburton 

 even in the House of Lords, according to some 

 reports I have read, hinted his suspicions as to 

 Potter being the writer. Disraeli tells us (^Quar- 

 rels of Authors, vol. i. p. 92.), that it was to a 

 like meeting at Allen's, and to the dogmatical 

 presumption of Warburton, that we owe the 

 Canons of Ci'iticism, Is there any evidence to 

 show that Wilkes was ever on a visit at Prior 

 Park — was ever brought into personal communi- 

 cation with Warburton ? If not, we find that the 

 possible animus in Potter was wanting in Wilkes. 



Let us now look to the poem itself, which 

 Lord Stanhope says, and says truly, was written 

 "several years before" 1763. There is not much 

 that can be brought to bear on the subject ; and 

 that little is indirect and inferential, but is worth 

 something. 



In the "Advertisement" prefixed there Is an 

 attempt to raise a laugh at Hogarth — at the " line 

 of Mr. Hogarth's poor ideas of beauty." The 

 reader must not confuse this reference with the 

 publication of the Analysis in 1753 : for when 

 Hogarth published his own portrait, he etched 

 upon the palette a loinding line, with this motto : 

 ^'- Line of Beauty and Grace:" and this print, 

 according to Chalmers, was published in 1745. 

 So Steevens (Nichols, vol. i.) tells us, " the lead- 

 ing idea had been hieroglyphically thrown out in 

 his works in 1745," and been ^Havghed'at long be- 

 fore the Analysis was published." The writer of 

 this poem was certainly one of the laughers. Now 

 Hogarth had some personal dislike to Potter, for, 

 according to the biographers, it is Potter who 

 figures in Hogarth's "Election," published iu 

 1755. 



Wilkes, in 1755, was the especial friend of Ho- 

 garth — actively kind towards him — admired and 

 praised his genius ; and even when they quarrelled 

 (1762), their quarrel was political, not personal, 

 and, as Wilkes said, "/"or several years they 

 had lived on terms of friendship and intimacy. 

 Hogarth (in 1762) as he admitted "to stop a 

 gap" in his income, determined to turn his pencil 

 to political uses ; and the king's sergeant-painter 

 resolved to attack those who were considered hos- 

 tile to the king — Chatham and Temple. Wilkes, 

 in a private and friendly letter, pointed out the 

 folly of giving up " to party what was meant for 

 mankind," — of dipping his pencil "in the dirt of 

 faction," — warned him of the certain consequences, 

 and told him that he never would take notice of 

 "reflections on himself; but, when his friends 

 were attacked, he found himself wounded In the 

 most sensible part, and would, as well as he could, 

 revenge their cause." Hogarth persevered ; pub- 

 lished his caricature, and Wilkes his comment 

 and criticism. Even after this, Hogarth acknow- 

 ledged that Wilkes had been his " friend and flat- 

 terer," was a good-tempered fellow, but now 

 " Pitt-bitten — Pitt- mad." 



Another circumstance, tending I think to 

 strengthen this conjecture as to the date when 

 the poem was written, is the inscription. Fanny- 

 Murray was a Bath beauty — the daughter of a 

 musician at Bath, who subsequently married a Mr. 

 Ross, and died in 1770. Such beauties are but 

 ephemeral ; and this lady, according to incidental 

 notices, must have been in her glory from before or 

 about 1735 to 1745. She had been the mistress of 

 the Hon. John SpencA' — better known as " Jack 

 Spencer;" and was afterwards the mistress of 

 Beau Nash. Spencer died in 1746, and in 1746 

 Nash was seventy-one years of age. It must have 

 been in 1740, or early in 1741, that Lord Hard- 

 wicke saw her picture at Mr. Montagu's in Cam- 

 bridgeshire ; for he bought Wimpole in 1740, and 

 I it is reasonably certain that Mr. Montagu would, 



