The heroes of literary as well as civil history have been very often
no less remarkable for what they have suffered than for what they have
achieved; and volumes have been written only to enumerate the miseries
of the learned, and relate their unhappy lives and untimely deaths.

To these mournful narratives I am about to add the Life of RICHARD
SAVAGE, a man whose writings entitle him to an eminent rank in the
classes of learning, and whose misfortunes claim a degree of compassion
not always due to the unhappy, as they were often the consequences of
the crimes of others rather than his own.

In the year 1697, Anne, Countess of Macclesfield, having lived some time
upon very uneasy terms with her husband, thought a public confession
of adultery the most obvious and expeditious method of obtaining her
liberty; and therefore declared that the child with which she was then
great, was begotten by the Earl Rivers. This, as may be imagined,
made her husband no less desirous of a separation than herself, and he
prosecuted his design in the most effectual manner: for he applied, not
to the ecclesiastical courts for a divorce, but to the Parliament for
an Act by which his marriage might be dissolved, the nuptial contract
annulled, and the children of his wife illegitimated. This Act, after
the usual deliberation, he obtained, though without the approbation
of some, who considered marriage as an affair only cognisable by
ecclesiastical judges; and on March 3rd was separated from his wife,
whose fortune, which was very great, was repaid her, and who having,
as well as her husband, the liberty of making another choice, she in a
short time married Colonel Brett.

While the Earl of Macclesfield was prosecuting this affair, his wife
was, on the 10th of January, 1607-8,[sic] delivered of a son: and the
Earl Rivers, by appearing to consider him as his own, left none any
reason to doubt of the sincerity of her declaration; for he was his
godfather and gave him his own name, which was by his direction inserted
in the register of St. Andrew's parish in Holborn, but unfortunately
left him to the care of his mother, whom, as she was now set free from
her husband, he probably imagined likely to treat with great tenderness
the child that had contributed to so pleasing an event. It is not indeed
easy to discover what motives could be found to overbalance that natural
affection of a parent, or what interest could be promoted by neglect or
cruel