HAYLEY 's LIFE AND POSTHUMOUS-WORKS OF WILLIAM COWPER: 
habits of free intercourse with polite and 
friendly neighbours. 
Another relation is also’at this period 
introduced on the scene, destined to be 
the poet’s most assiduous and affectionate 
comforter when he most stood in need 
of domestic consolation, and highly in- 
teresting to the reader wherever he ap- 
pears. This was Mr. John Johnson, of 
Norfolk, a student at Cambridge, and 
afterwards a clersyman. Cowper seems 
to have regarded him with a love that 
made his company always a cordial to 
him. It is thus expressed in one of the 
earliest letters to him: 
*« My Boy, I long to see thee again. It 
has happened some way or other, that Mrs. 
Unwin and I have conceived a great aflec- 
tion for thee. “That I should, is the less to 
be wondered at, (because thou art a shred of 
my own mother); neither is the wonder 
great, that she should fall into the same 
dicament ; for sue loves everything that 
‘love. You will observe, that your own 
personal right to be beloved makes no part 
of the consideration. ‘There is nothing that 
I touch with so much tenderness as the 
vanity of a young man; because, I know 
how extremely susceptible he is of impres- 
sions that might hurt him in that particular 
part of his composition. If you should 
ver prove a coxcomb, from which character 
you stand just now at.a greater distance than 
any young man I know, it shall never be 
said that | have made you one; no, you will 
gain nothing by me but the honour of being 
much valued by a poor poet, who can do 
you no good while he lives, and has nothing 
to leave you when he dies. If you can be 
contented to be dear to me on these condi- 
tions, so you shall; but other terms, more 
adyant4geous than these, or more inviting, 
none have I to propose.” 
All the other letters to this young 
man, are so compounded of easy hilarity 
and cordial affection, that they inspire the 
most amiable ideas both of the writer and 
his correspondent. 
In 1792, the acquaintance commenced. 
between Cowper and his biographer, 
* with a complimentary sonnet and letter 
on the part of the latter. It was main- 
‘tained with great cordiality on both’ 
sides; and Mr. Hayley deserves much 
esteem for the solid and effectual friend- 
_ ship he manifested on various trying oc- 
gewions towards his brother poet, to 
_ whose genius he always pays the warmest 
homage. He prevailed on Cowper and 
s. Unwin to visit him at his delight- 
ful seat of Eartham; and omitted no- 
~s- 
461 
thing that the kindest and most delicate 
attention could suggest, to render it 
pleasing and salutary to both. His re« 
lation of the circumstances of this visit 
is one of the most agreeable passages of 
the biography. 
Two years more did not elapse before 
the gloom bégan again to gather thick 
rqund the distempered mind of Cowper, 
and the remainder of his history is 
scarcely any thing but a picture of 
varied woe. The kindest attention of 
friends (and few men have ever inspired 
more kindness), the public applause, and 
the honourable and substantial testimony 
to his merit displayed in the royal grant 
of a pension of 3001. per annum, were 
unable to raise him from that fixed de- 
pression into which he was plunged by 
the horrors of religious despair. He first 
saw his aged and beloved companion re- 
duced to second childhood, and daily 
sinking to the tomb. The manner in 
which he was affected by this spectacle 
is described by him in some simple and 
artless stanzas, perhaps the most exqui- 
sitely tender that were ever written. 
When, however, she was finally taken 
away, he was too far gone in self-afflic- 
tion to shew much sensibility. He still, 
however, exercised his pen on various. 
subjects, and attended with some -dili- 
gence to the correction of his. Homer. 
his intellectual faculties therefore were 
not decayed, though the tone of his spi- 
rits was destroyed. His last original 
composition was evidently dictated by 
the pangs of inward distress: it is en- 
titled ‘¢ The Castaway,” and relates the 
pathetic story, from Anson’s: Voyage, of 
aseaman fallen over-board and necessarily” 
left to perish. The concluding: stanza 
points the application. ' 
«© No voice divine the storm allay’d, | 
No light propitious shone, 
When snatch’d from all effectual aid, 
We perish’d, gech alone; 
But I beneath a rougher sea, 
And whelm’d in deeper gulphs than he." 
A gradual decline in his health at- 
tended: -his' mental sufferings, under 
which he tranquilly, sunk on April 25, 
1800. 
» We, have already given our opinion 
on the deficiencies. of the biographical. 
part of this work, and we are persuaded. 
they will be feit by every one who ex 
pected that the obscurity which hun 
upon that part of Cowper's life, which” 
