476 MAS 
Fifteen Difconrfes, Devotional and Practical. 5. An El- 
fay on Elocution, 1750, which was exceedingly well re- 
ceived, and went through three editions in a very fhort 
fpace of time, and may be confidered as the foundation of 
many of our popular treatifes on the fame fuhjeft. 6. An 
Eflay on the Power and Harmony of Profaic Numbers; 
and An EiTay on the Power of Numbers, and the Princi¬ 
ples of Harmony in Poetical Compofitions, In 1761, the 
author reprinted thefe and the Efiay on Elocution, in one 
8vo. volume, now become exceedingly fcarce. 
Mr. Mafon’s religious fentiments were what are com¬ 
monly called moderately orthodox : he was an enemy to 
controverfy, and a friend to peace. His fermons were 
correct, perfpicuous, nervous, always il 111 ft rati ve of the 
text and doftrine which he had undertaken to explain ; 
and they were ever adapted to promote the purpofes of 
piety and charity. In the pulpit he was grave and foiemn. 
His voice was clear, his delivery deliberate, diltindt, and 
void of all affefhation, and his manner was eafy and natu¬ 
ral. His perfonal charadter was an exemplification of the 
duties and virtues which it was the bufinefs of his life to 
enforce; and in his intercourfe with the world, he was 
free, eafy, communicative, and pleafant in coilverfation ; 
and much of the gentleman appeared in all his behaviour. 
Befides the articles mentioned in the preceding narrative, 
lie publilhed fome fingle fermons preached on particular 
occafions; and the polemical ledlures which he read to 
his pupils were printed in the Proteftant Difienter’s Ma¬ 
gazine for the years 1794., 1795, and 1796. Life prefixed, to 
the fifteenth Edition of Self-Knowledge. 
MA'SON (Rev. William), an Englifii poet of dillinc- 
tion, born in 1725, was the (on of a clergyman who held 
the living of Hull. He was admitted of ,St. John’s Col¬ 
lege, Cambridge, where lie took his degree ofB.A. in 1745. 
Thence he removed to Pembroke College, of which he 
was eledted a fellow in 1747. He became M.A. in 1749, 
entered into holy orders in 1754, and obtained the pa¬ 
tronage of the earl of Holdernelfe, by whom lie was pre- 
fented to the valuable redfory of Alton in Yorkfhire, add 
wlio procured for him the appointment of chaplain to his 
majefty. The firit public fpecimep he gave of his poe¬ 
tical talentswas in 1749, when he printed an “ Ode on 
the Inftallation of the Duke of Newcaltle,” as chancellor 
of the univerfity of Cambridge; which, though little fa¬ 
voured by its fubjedt, gained him reputation. “ A Mo¬ 
nody to the Memory of Pope,” and a poem entitled, “ His, 
an Elegy,” added to his fame ; which received a great ac- 
ceffion from the publication, in 1752, of his dramatic poem 
of “ Elfrida.” In this, and alfo in his “ Caradiacus,” firit 
publilhed in 1759, it was his objedt to attempt the relto- 
ration of the ancient Greek chorus in tragedy. As his 
own genius was rather lyric than dramatic, lie fucceeded 
In producing fome fublime and richly-ornamented odes, 
which placed him, in the public opinion, next to his friend 
Gray in that fpecies of compolition ; but he failed in ex¬ 
citing the intereffc which is the true end and purpofe of 
tragedy. Indeed, the chorus is fo evidently an appendage 
of the infant and imperfedt Hate of the drama, and fo ma- 
nifeltly injurious to the development of piQt and the dif- 
play of pallion, that a pedantic attachment to the ancients 
could alone fuggeft its revival. Mafon did not originally 
compofe thefe pieces for the modern llage, which, with a 
kind of lofty difdain that adhered to his literary dharadfer, 
lie confidered as funk below his level by the corrupt talle 
of the public ; and though attempts were afterwards made 
to fit them for reprefentation, and they were brought upon 
the theatre, they could obtain no permanent place there. 
In 1756, Mafon publilhed a-fmall colledlion of “ Odes:” 
an imitation of the great objedt of his poetical reverence. 
Gray, in the gorgeous array of his didtion, and the daz¬ 
zling fplendour of his imagery, charadterifes thefe pieces, 
winch were generally confidered as difplaying more of the 
artificial mechanifm of poetry than of its genuine fpirit. 
Some “Elegies,” which he publilhed in 1763, with much 
elegance; and fome fuperfluity of ornament, are in general 
O N. 
marked with the (Implicit}’ oflangtiage proper to this fps- 
cies of compolition, and breathe noble fentiments of free¬ 
dom and virtue. Mafon, indeed, is throughout one of th# 
pureft of poets in point of'morality, as well as one of the 
warmeft of thofe literary friends of civil liberty who dif- 
tinguilhed that peyiod. A colledlion of all his poems, 
with the exception of the Inltallation Ode, and I As, was 
publilhed in an 8vo. volume, in 1764, and afterwards 
went through feveral editions. 
In 1772 appeared the firit book of his “ Englifii Garden.” 
a didadtic and deferiptive poem in blank verfe, of which 
the fourth and concluding book was printed in 1781. 
The purpofe of this work was to recommend, by the 
charms of poetry, the modern lyftem of natural or land- 
fcape-gardening, which the writer adheres to with all the 
rigour of exclulive talfe. The verfification of the poem 
is formed upon the belt models, and the defeription is 
in many parts rich and vivid ; but a general air of lliff- 
uels, and the dry miiuitenefs of the preceptive part, pre¬ 
vented it from attaining any conliderable degree of popu¬ 
larity. 
As a fuitable tribute to the memory of his dear friend 
Gray, he publilhed, in 1775, “ The Poems of Mr. Gray, 
to which are prefixed Memoirs of his Life and Writings,” 
4to. To the poems a few additions were made of hitherto 
unpubblhed pieces. With the Memoirs were agreeably 
interfperfed, original Letters, connected by narrative, in a 
manner which has fince been adopted in feveral biogra¬ 
phical works, and which was peculiarly fuitable in this 
inftance, on account of the paucity of anecdotes and 
events in the life of the fubjedt. Mafon’s own obferva- 
tions on the character and genius of his friend did honour 
to his talte and feelings, and the volume was favourably 
received by the public. 
The mind of our poet had been early imprefled with a 
fondnefs for the filler-art of painting, and at a juvenile age 
he had attempted a tranflation of Frefnoy’s Latin poem 
on that art. This he reviled and improved “ to the ut- 
moll of his mature abilities,” and publilhed in 1783, in a 
4to. volume, enriched with the annotations of fir Jofliua 
Reynolds, and other additions. Few metrical verfions 
have been better executed than this, which unites great 
elegance of language and verfification with a corredl: re- 
prelentation of a difficult original. 
Mafon had - hitherto fcarcely appeared in his charadler 
of a clergyman. Befides the living with which he was 
prefented foon after taking orders, lie obtained the prefer¬ 
ments of precentor and canon-refidentiary of the cathe¬ 
dral of York. At that church he preached in 1788, an 
“ Occafional Difcourfe” on the fubjedl of the fiave-trade, 
which was an animated declamation againlt the inhuma¬ 
nity of that traffic. In the fame year he appeared as the 
editor of the Poems of his friend W. Whitehead, the poet- 
laureat, to which he prefixed a biographical memoir. 
The centenary commemoration of the Revolution in that 
year called forth a new exertion of his lyric powers in a 
“ Secular Ode,” which breathed the ufunl fpirit of his 
mufe of freedom. A tafte for mufie has in many inftances 
been totally disjoined from the poetical faculty ; but this 
was not the cafe with Mafon, who was both a warm lover 
of that art, and a proficient in it. He properly made his 
mufical knowledge fubfervient to his clerical office, in a 
publication of “ Effays, hifiorical and critical, on Englilh 
Church Mufic,” which appeared in 1795, 12010, This 
work is allowed to contain many judicious and uleful ob- 
fervations, even by thofe who think he has carried much 
too far the idea of Amplifying church-mufic, and call in 
queftion the jufinefsof fome of his principles. An addi¬ 
tional volume of his “Poems” was given to the public 
in 1797, confiding of mifcellaneous pieces, partly the re¬ 
viled productions of his youth, partly theeffufions of his 
old age. Among the latter is a “ Palinody to Liberty,” 
which exprefies the change wrought in his political prin¬ 
ciples by the unhappy events of the French revolution. 
Although this volume cpntains feveral compofitions which 
4 may 
