eanwhile he was writing political papers and advancing in the political
profession. He went Secretary to Ireland. He was appointed Secretary of
State in 1717. And letters of his are extant, bearing date some year or
two before, and written to young Lord Warwick, in which he addresses him
as "my dearest lord", and asks affectionately about his studies, and
writes very prettily about nightingales, and birds'-nests, which he has
found at Fulham for his lordship. Those nightingales were intended to
warble in the ear of Lord Warwick's mamma. Addison married her ladyship in
1716; and died at Holland House three years after that splendid but dismal
union.(89)

But it is not for his reputation as the great author of _Cato_ and the
_Campaign_, or for his merits as Secretary of State, or for his rank and
high distinction as my Lady Warwick's husband, or for his eminence as an
Examiner of political questions on the Whig side, or a Guardian of British
liberties, that we admire Joseph Addison. It is as a Tatler of small talk
and a Spectator of mankind, that we cherish and love him, and owe as much
pleasure to him as to any human being that ever wrote. He came in that
artificial age, and began to speak with his noble, natural voice. He came,
the gentle satirist, who hit no unfair blow; the kind judge who castigated
only in smiling. While Swift went about, hanging and ruthless--a literary
Jeffries--in Addison's kind court only minor cases were tried: only
peccadilloes and small sins against society: only a dangerous libertinism
in tuckers and hoops;(90) or a nuisance in the abuse of beaux' canes and
snuff-boxes. It may be a lady is tried for breaking the peace of our
sovereign lady Queen Anne, and ogling too dangerously from the side-box:
or a Templar for beating the watch, or breaking Priscian's head: or a
citizen's wife for caring too much for the puppet-show, and too little for
her husband and children: every one of the little sinners brought before
him is amusing, and he dismisses each with the pleasantest penalties and
the most charming words of admonition.

Addison wrote his papers as gaily as if he was going out for a holiday.
When Steele's _Tatler_ first began his prattle, Addison, then in Ireland,
caught at his friend's notion, poured in paper after paper, and
contributed the stores of his mind, the sweet fruits of his reading, the
delightful gleanings of his daily observation, with a wonderful profusion,
and as it seemed an