LIFE 



DR. LANGHORNE. 



Of all classes of literature^ it is generally admitted, that none is 

 more pleasing to writers, or more interesting to readers of taste, than 

 biographical accounts of characters who have been eminent for their 

 learning or their talents. Indeed, this sort of knowledge has ever 

 been sought after with avidity, for it is to the biography of departed 

 eminence, when composed with characteristic truth, that posterity 

 must refer for examples of every quality and action that is praise- 

 worthy; great, and glorious. But, of all others, the lives of poets 

 have ever proved particularly entertaining ; because, as Horace justly 

 observes, thej' are born, but not made. " Poeta nascitur, nonjit;" 

 and because, in all ages, they have from the greatest to those of 

 the most meagre pretensions, generally experienced the utmost ex- 

 tremes of good and evil, the most extraordinary vicissitudes arid 

 shades of calamity. 



Gibbon has observed, that " the nobility of the Spencers has 

 been illustrated and enriched by the trophies of a Marlborough, but 

 that the Fairy Queen is the most precious jewel in their coronet/' 

 by which he evidently means, that titles receive additional lustre, 

 when those to whom they descend, or are given, possess poetical 

 qualifications. It therefore follows, that these qualifications, when 

 uiiited with piety and genius, are holden by the world in such de- 

 servedly high estimation, that no earthly recompense can reflect on 

 them additional grandeur. 



But the labours of the necrologist, though excessive, are, when 

 weighed in the scale of impartiality and justice, generall3- found 



