f the "Night Thoughts" much has been told of which
there never could have been proofs, and little care appears to have been
taken to tell that of which proofs, with little trouble, might have been
procured.

Edward Young was born at Upham, near Winchester, in June, 1681. He was
the son of Edward Young, at that time Fellow of Winchester College, and
Rector of Upham, who was the son of Jo. Young, of Woodhay, in Berkshire,
styled by Wood, GENTLEMAN. In September, 1682, the poet's father was
collated to the prebend of Gillingham Minor, in the church of Sarum, by
Bishop Ward. When Ward's faculties were impaired through age, his duties
were necessarily performed by others. We learn from Wood that, at a
visitation of Sprat's, July the 12th, 1686, the prebendary preached
a Latin sermon, afterwards published, with which the Bishop was so
pleased, that he told the chapter he was concerned to find the preacher
had one of the worst prebends in their Church. Some time after this,
in consequence of his merit and reputation, or of the interest of Lord
Bradford, to whom, in 1702, he dedicated two volumes of sermons, he was
appointed chaplain to King William and Queen Mary, and preferred to the
Deanery of Sarum. Jacob, who wrote in 1720, says, "he was Chaplain and
Clerk of the Closet to the late Queen, who honoured him by standing
godmother to the poet." His Fellowship of Winchester he resigned in
favour of a gentleman of the name of Harris, who married his only
daughter. The Dean died at Sarum, after a short illness, in 1705, in
the sixty-third year of his age. On the Sunday after his decease, Bishop
Burnet preached at the cathedral, and began his sermon with saying,
"Death has been of late walking round us, and making breach upon breach
upon us, and has now carried away the head of this body with a stroke,
so that he, whom you saw a week ago distributing the holy mysteries,
is now laid in the dust. But he still lives in the many excellent
directions he has left us both how to live and how to die."

The dean placed his son upon the foundation at Winchester College, where
he had himself been educated. At this school Edward Young remained till
the election after his eighteenth birthday, the period at which those
upon the foundation are superannuated. Whether he did not betray his
abilities early in life, or his masters had not skill enough to discover
in their pupil any marks of genius for which he merited reward, or no
vacancy at Oxfor