d surgeons, who, as it
afterwards appeared, were professed enemies to me and the government,
and revenged their party's quarrel upon my nose and shins. Fourscore and
eleven pamphlets have I written under three reigns, and for the service
of six and thirty factions. But finding the state has no farther
occasion for me and my ink, I retire willingly to draw it out into
speculations more becoming a philosopher; having, to my unspeakable
comfort, passed a long life with a conscience void of offence." [See
Appendix, vol. xviii., art. "Dryden and Swift."--ED.]

[4] [The exact sentence seems to have been "a Pindaric poet." But as
Swift had tried nothing but Pindarics, it was nearly if not quite as
severe as the more usually quoted and more sweeping verdict.--ED.]

[5] Robert Gould, author of that scandalous lampoon against Dryden,
entitled "The Laureat," inscribes his collection of poems, printed
1688-9, to the Earl of Abingdon; and it contains some pieces addressed
to him and to his lady. He survived also to compose, on the Earl's
death, in 1700, "The Mourning Swan," an eclogue to his memory, in which
a shepherd gives the following account of the proximate cause of that
event:

"_Menaleus_. To tell you true (whoe'er it may displease),
He died of the _Physician_--a disease
That long has reigned, and eager of renown,
More than a plague depopulates the town.
Inflamed with wine, and blasting at a breath,
All its _prescriptions_ are receipts for death.
Millions of mischiefs by its rage are wrought,
Safe where 'tis fled, but barbarous where 'tis sought;
A cursed ingrateful ill, that called to aid,
Is still most fatal where it best is paid."

[6] How far this was necessary, the reader may judge from Mirana, a
funeral eclogue; sacred to the memory of that excellent lady, Eleonora,
late Countess of Abingdon, 1691, 4th Aug., which concludes with the
following singular _imprecation_:

"Hear, friend, my sacred imprecation hear,
And let both of us kneel, and both be bare.
Doom me (ye powers) to misery and shame,
Let mine be the most ignominious name,
Let me, each day, be with new griefs perplext,
Curst in this life, nor blessed in the next,
If I believe the like of her survives,
Or if I think her not the best of mothers, and of wives."

[7] 30th August 1693, Dryden writes to Tonson, "I am sure you thought my
Lord Radclyffe would have done something; I guessed more truly, that he
could not."-