wisdom of my fate,
Which knew to value me at such a rate,
As at my fall to trouble all the sky,
Emptying upon me Jove's full armoury.
Serve in your sharpest mischiefs; use your rack,
Enlarge each joint, and make each sinew crack;
Thy soul before was straitened; thank thy doom,
To show her virtue she hath larger room.
Yet sure if every artery were broke,
Thou wouldst find strength for such another stroke.
And now I leave thee unto Death and Fame,
Which lives to shake Ambition with thy name;
And if it were not sin, the court by it
Should hourly swear before the favourite.
Farewell! for thy brave sake we shall not send
Henceforth commanders, enemies to defend;
Nor will it ever our just monarch please,
To keep an admiral to lose our seas.
Farewell! undaunted stand, and joy to be
Of public service the epitome.
Let the duke's name solace and crown thy thrall;
All we by him did suffer, thou for all!
And I dare boldly write, as thou dar'st die,
Stout Felton, England's ransom, here doth lie![259]

This is to be a great poet. Felton, who was celebrated in such elevated
strains, was, at that moment, not the patriot but the penitent. In
political history it frequently occurs that the man who accidentally has
effectuated the purpose of a party, is immediately invested by them with
all their favourite virtues; but in reality having acted from motives
originally insignificant and obscure, his character may be quite the
reverse they have made him; and such was that of our "honest Jack." Had
Townley had a more intimate acquaintance with his Brutus, we might have
lost a noble poem on a noble subject.

JOHNSON'S HINTS FOR THE LIFE OF POPE.

I shall preserve a literary curiosity, which perhaps is the only one of
its kind. It is an original memorandum of Dr. Johnson's, of hints for
the Life of Pope, written down, as they were suggested to his mind, in
the course of his researches. The lines in Italics Johnson had scratched
with red ink, probably after having made use of them. These notes should
be compared with the Life itself. The youthful student will find some
use, and the curious be gratified, in discovering the gradual labours of
research and observation, and that art of seizing on those general
conceptions which afterwards are developed by meditation and illustrated
by genius. I once thought of accompanying these _hints_ by th