715 
M O N T 
the day. The ffiare he had with Prior in a humorous 
parody of Dryden’s Hind and Panther, entitled “The 
Country and City Moufe,” gave him the further merit 
of a friend to the conftitution and religion of his country, 
which he enhanced by figning the invitation to the prince 
of Orange. He was chofen a member of the convention 
which declared the throne vacant on the abdication of 
king James ; and, having married the countefs dowager 
of Manchelter, he purchafed the place of one of the 
clerks of the council, renouncing his previous intention 
of entering into the church. The earl of Dorfet, now 
lord-chamberlain, introduced him in fuch favourable 
terms to king William, that a penfion of five hundred 
pounds was conferred upon him till fome adequate pro¬ 
motion ffiould offer. In the houfe of commons, of which 
he was a member, Mr. Montague diftinguilhed himfelf 
by promoting a bill for regulating trials in cafes of high- 
treafon, of which one of the provifions was the allowing 
council to the culprit. On this occafion, having felt an 
embarraffment in his fpeech, which for a time prevented 
him from going on, he made a very happy ufe of the cir- 
cumftance. “If (laid he) I, one of your own members, 
not only innocent but unaccufed, am fo awed by the view 
of a wile and illultrious affembly as to lofe my powers of 
utterance, what mull be the condition of a man obliged 
to plead in a public court for his life ?” 
The increale of his reputation was foon followed by 
political advancement. He was made one of the com- 
miflioners of the treafury, was fworn of the privy-coun¬ 
cil, and in 1694 was nominated chancellor of the exche¬ 
quer and under-treafurer. In 1695 he undertook the 
arduous talk of re-coining all the lilver money of the 
kingdom, which had become extremely defective; which 
ufeful defign he completed within two years. He alfo 
procured the eftablilhment of a general fund, which was 
the parent of the famous linking-fund. For thefe fer- 
vices he had a grant of crown-lands in Ireland, which 
was approved by a vote of the houfe of commons. In 
1698 he was made firlt commiffioner of the treafury, and 
was appointed one of the lords jultices in the king’s 
abfence abroad. In the next year the poll of auditor of 
the exchequer was conferred upon him ; and in Decem¬ 
ber 1700, having refigned his office in the treafury, he 
was called to the houfe of peers by the Ityle of Baron 
Halifax. He fell, however, into difcredit with the houfe 
of commons, which, in the parliament of this year, ad- 
dreffed the king to remove him from his councils, and 
impeached him of high crimes and mifdemeanours. The 
articles again!! him referred to divers grants which he 
had obtained from the crown ; to his pofieffing at the 
fame time the inconfillent offices of commiffioner and 
chancellor of the treafury, and auditor of the exchequer 5 
and to his advifing the partition-treaty, which Jail he 
abfolutely denied. The charges were all difmiffed by the 
houfe of lords, and he continued in king William’s 
favour till the death of that fovereign. Soon after the 
acceffion of Anne he was llruck out of the lift of privy- 
counfellors, and was again attacked by the houfe of 
commons, which voted him guilty of a breach of trull in 
his office of auditor, and addreffed the queen to caufe 
him to be prol'ecuted by the attorney-general. The 
lords, however, again fupported him; and the profecu- 
tion was dropped. During that reign he took the lead 
among thofe who refilled the high principles which were 
again in vogue. He l'uccefsfully oppofed the attempts 
of the houfe of commons for repealing the bill for occa- 
fional conformity; and he made the motion for that 
enquiry into the danger of the church, which terminated 
in a parliamentary declaration, that thofe were enemies 
to the Hate who luggelted the exillence of fuch danger. 
In 1706 he was appointed one of the commiffioners to 
negociate the union with Scotland ; and he propoled that 
equivalent given to the Scotch for their public revenues, 
which was in reality a bribe to their leading men, but 
AGUE. 
without which the me: fare could not have been carried 
When the aft palled for the naturalization of the Han¬ 
over family, and the fecurity of the protellant fucceffion 
to the crown, he was pitched upon to carry it over to 
the eleftoral court. He vigoroufiy maintained the drug¬ 
gie of the whig party to retain a lhare of power; and, 
after their entire defeat, he was a drenuous oppofer of 
the treaty of Utrecht, and a fupporter of the intered of 
the duke of Marlborough. In 1714 he exerted himfelf 
to ward od' the danger which feemed to threaten the 
Hanoverian fucceffion ; and by his contrivance procured a 
writ for calling the electoral prince to the houfe of peers 
as duke of Cambridge. This zeal was rewarded, imme¬ 
diately after the acceffion of George I. by his advance¬ 
ment to the earldom of Halifax, with the order of the 
garter, and reindatement in the pod of firlt commiffioner 
of the treafury. But the high profpedts which now 
opened to him were bladed by a fudden attack of an in¬ 
flammation in the lungs, which carried him od', in May 
1715, at the age of fifty-four. 
Lord Halifax is didinguiffied among Englifh datefrnen. 
for the patronage he afforded to polite literature, which 
has been repaid by the eulogies of many of the moll 
eminent writers of the time, among whom may be men¬ 
tioned Addifon, Congreve, Steele, and Tickell. Of Ad- 
dilon he was the particular friend and patron ; and was 
repaid by various returns of praife, and efpecially by the 
addrefs of his Epidle from Italy. Steele, in dedicating 
the fourth volume of the Tatler to his lordfhip, mentions 
him as having given a new era to wit and learning; and 
by his patronage “ to have produced thofe arts, which 
before Ihunned the commerce of the world, into the ler- 
vice of life; and to have been the caufe that the man of 
wit has turned himfelf to be a man of bulinefs.” How 
far this was of real fervice to letters and bulinefs, may 
remain to be ellimated. Swift and Pope alone, of the 
wits of that time, w r ere holtile to him; the firll, on a 
political account; the lall, probably, through jealoufy 
of his patronage of rival but inferior geniufes. The 
following fevere lines, with feveral that follow, tellify 
this irritable poet’s contempt: 
Proud as Apollo on his forked hill, 
Sat full-blown Bnfo, puff’d by every quill; 
Fed with foft dedication all day long, 
Horace and he went hand in had in fong. 
Pope's Epijlle to Dr. Arbuthnot. 
Pope alfo communicated to Spence a curious anecdote of 
lord Halifax’s mode of afting the critic. By his lord- 
lhip’s defire, Pope read before him the two or three firll 
books of his Iliad, in prefence of Addifon, Congreve, and 
Garth. Lord Halifax llopt him civilly in four or five 
places, and faid there was fomething in thofe paffages 
that did not quite pleafe him, and begged he would re- 
confider them at his leil'ure. On coming away in Garth’s 
chariot. Pope expreffed the difficulty he was laid under 
by his lordffiip’s loofe objections, of which lie could not 
find out the import. “ Garth (fays Pope) laughed 
heartily at my embarraffment; faid, I had not been long 
enough acquainted with lord Halifax to know his way 
yet; that I need not puzzle myfelf about looking thole 
places over and over when I got home. All you need do 
(fays he) is to leave them jult as they are ; call on lord 
Halifax two or three months hence, thank him for his 
kind obfervations on thofe paffages, and then read them 
to him as altered, I have known him much longer than 
you have, and will be anfwerable for the event.” Pope 
followed his advice, and his lordlliip at the fecond read¬ 
ing was extremely pleafed with the lines, and cried out, 
“ Ay, now they are perfectly right: nothing can be 
better.” This Itory, if authentic, jullifies a fufficiently 
contemptible idea of this noble amateur’s critical faga- 
city ; yet it cannot be denied that he contributed much 
to the credit which letters obtained in the reigns of Wil¬ 
liam 
