a man for being able to
write them, as for being able to write his name. But in the days of
William the Third such versification was rare; and a rhymer who had any
skill in it passed for a great poet, just as in the dark ages a person
who could write his name passed for a great clerk. Accordingly, Duke,
Stepney, Granville, Walsh, and others whose only title to fame was that
they said in tolerable metre what might have been as well said in prose,
or what was not worth saying at all, were honored with marks of
distinction which ought to be reserved for genius. With these Addison
must have ranked, if he had not earned true and lasting glory by
performances which very little resembled his juvenile poems.

Dryden was now busied with Virgil, and obtained from Addison a critical
preface to the Georgics. In return for this service, and for other
services of the same kind, the veteran poet, in the postscript to the
translation of the Aeneid, complimented his young friend with great
liberality, and indeed with more liberality than sincerity. He affected
to be afraid that his own performance would not sustain a comparison
with the version of the fourth Georgic, by "the most ingenious Mr.
Addison of Oxford." "After his bees," added Dryden, "my latter swarm is
scarcely worth the hiving."

The time had now arrived when it was necessary for Addison to choose a
calling. Everything seemed to point his course towards the clerical
profession. His habits were regular, his opinions orthodox. His college
had large ecclesiastical preferment in its gift, and boasts that it has
given at least one bishop to almost every see in England. Dr. Lancelot
Addison held an honorable place in the Church, and had set his heart on
seeing his son a clergyman. It is clear, from some expressions in the
young man's rhymes, that his intention was to take orders. But Charles
Montague interfered. Montague had first brought himself into notice by
verses, well timed and not contemptibly written, but never, we think,
rising above mediocrity. Fortunately for himself and for his country, he
early quitted poetry, in which he could never have attained a rank as
high as that of Dorset or Rochester, and turned his mind to official and
parliamentary business. It is written that the ingenious person, who
undertook to instruct Rasselas, prince of Abyssinia, in the art of
flying, ascended an eminence, waved his wings, sprang into the air, and
instantly dropped into the lake.