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JOHN POMFRET was born, in 1667, at Luton, in Bedfordshire, a parish of which his father was rector. He was educated at Queen's College, Cambridge, where he obtained his Bachelor's degree in 1684. On leaving the University he took orders, and was presented to the living of Malden, in his native county. He was not destined, however, to meet with church preferment; it was withheld from him in consequence of an absurd misinterpretation of a passage in one of his poems, from which it was inferred that he considered the society of a mistress preferable to that of a wife. The passage occurs in "The Choice;"

"And as I near approach the verge of life,
Some kind companion (for I'd have no wife)
Should take upon him all my worldly care,
Whilst I did for a better state prepare."

Although he was actually married, at the time he made application for a more valuable appointment, his enemies were successful in marring his hopes; disappointment preying upon a naturally sensitive mind, prepared his constitution for the attacks of disease: he continued for some time in London pressing his claims, and arguing against the suspicion, which he had refuted by his marriage, and which ought not to have existed in opposition to the many proofs he had supplied of a virtuous and wellregulated mind;-caught the small pox, and died in 1703, in the very prime of life, and when he had given little more than a promise of the great things of which he was capable.

His poems were published in 1699; they became at once popular, and that popularity they have continued to maintain. "The Choice" is, however, the only one which supports his claim to be classed among the Poets of Great Britain. If it does not possess merit of the highest order, it is an easy and graceful composition, "adapted to common notions and equal to common expectations," and undoubtedly calculated to "please the many." It has always been a favourite, because the desires it expresses, the hopes at which it aims, the pleasures it enumerates, and the calm quiet it describes, are such as harmonize with the feelings and sentiments of the larger proportion of human kind, whose search after happiness is neither confined within too limited a circle, nor extended over too wide a space. The enjoyments of which the poet speaks are such only as are easy of attainment.

To these advantages we may add those of smooth and agreeable versification; the ideas, though neither nervous nor original, are always pleasantly and gracefully expressed. The earliest edition was accompanied by a modest and sensible preface, and the author is almost the first of our bards who had the courage and independence to break through the slavish and humiliating custom of ushering his production into the world "under the protection of some Lord or Right Honourable." "If," he says, "a poem have no intrinsic excellencies and real beauties, the greatest name in the world will never induce a man of sense to approve of it; and if it has them, Tom Piper's is as good as my Lord Duke's."

The principal other poems of Pomfret are-"Love Triumphant over Reason;" "Cruelty and Lust," founded on the well-known story of the infamous Kirke; and "An Essay on the Divine Attributes." There is not, as we have intimated, one of them at all to be compared with "The Choice;" they barely merit the compliment they have. extorted from Dr. Johnson," the pleasure of smooth metre is afforded to the ear, and the mind is not oppressed with ponderous or entangled with intricate sentiments."

Such is the sum of our knowledge of the personal and poetical career of John Pomfret. Even the few facts we have recorded are known only in consequence of "a slight and confused account prefixed to his poems by a nameless friend." We may believe, however, that his life was not such as he has pictured in his poem,-easy, tranquil, and happy; that the income he derived from the discharge of his pastoral duties was insufficient to obtain for him the objects of his desires,--friends, , books, "a clear and competent estate;" and that his longing to obtain these acquirements of "a better fortune," led to his removal from life at an age when much is seldom done to obtain immortality. His poem of "Reason," written in 1700, affords us proof of this

"What little fruit he gains

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WHO from a race of noble heroes came,
And added lustre to its ancient fame:
Round her the virtues of the Cecils shone,
But with inferior brightness to her own:
Which she refin'd to that sublime degree,
The greatest mortal could not greater be.
Each stage of life peculiar splendour had;
Her tender years with innocence were clad :
Maturer grown, whate'er was brave and good,

And then, to make them pass the glibber,
Revis'd by Tibbalds, Moore, and Cibber.
He'll treat me as he does my betters,
Publish my will, my life, my letters;
Revive the libels born to die:
Which Pope must bear as well as I.

Here shift the scene, to represent

How those I love my death lament.
Poor Pope will grieve a month, and Gay
A week, and Arbuthnot a day.

St. John himself will scarce forbear
To bite his pen, and drop a tear.
The rest will give a shrug, and cry,
"I'm sorry-but we all must die!"

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My female friends, whose tender hearts Have better learn'd to act their parts, Receive the news in doleful dumps: “The Dean is dead: (Pray what is trumps?) Then, Lord have mercy on his soul! (Ladies, I'll venture for the vole.)

Six deans, they say, must bear the pall:
(I wish I knew what king to call.)
Madam, your husband will attend
The funeral of so good a friend?"
"No, madam, 'tis a shocking sight;
And he's engag'd to-morrow night :
My Lady Club will take it ill,
If he should fail her at quadrille.
He lov'd the Dean—(I lead a heart :)
But dearest friends, they say, must part.
His time was come; he ran his race;
We hope he 's in a better place."

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Suppose me dead; and then suppose
A club assembled at the Rose;
Where, from discourse of this and that,
I grow the subject of their chat.

And while they toss my name about,
With favour some, and some without;
One, quite indifferent in the cause,

"Perhaps I may allow the Dean
Had too much satire in his vein,
And seem'd determin'd not to starve it,
Because no age could more deserve it.
Yet malice never was his aim;

He lash'd the vice, but spar'd the name.
No individual could resent,

Where thousands equally were meant :
His satire points at no defect,
But what all mortals may correct;
For he abhorr'd the senseless tribe
Who call it humour when they gibe :
He spar'd a hump, or crooked nose,
Whose owners set not up for beaux.
True genuine dulness mov'd his pity,
Unless it offer'd to be witty.
Those who their ignorance confest,
He ne'er offended with a jest ;
'But laugh'd to hear an idiot quote
A verse from Horace learn'd by rote.
Vice, if it e'er can be abash'd,
Must be or ridicul'd or lash'd.
If you resent it, who's to blame?

He neither knows you, nor your name.
Should vice expect to 'scape rebuke,
Because its owner is a duke?
His friendships, still to few confin'd,
Were always of the middling kind;
No fools of rank, or mongrel breed,
Who fain would pass for lords indeed :
Where titles give no right or power,
And peerage is a wither'd flower;
He would have deem'd it a disgrace,
If such a wretch had known his face.

"He never thought an honour done him, Because a peer was proud to own him; Would rather slip aside, and choose

To talk with wits'in dirty shoes ;

And scorn the tools with stars and garters,
So often seen caressing Chartres.
He never courted men in station,

Of no man's greatness was afraid,
Because he sought for no man's aid.
Though trusted long in great affairs,
He gave himself no haughty airs:
Without regarding private ends,
Spent all his credit for his friends;
And only chose the wise and good;
No flatterers; no allies in blood:
But succour'd virtue in distress,
And seldom fail'd of good success;
As numbers in their hearts must own,
Who, but for him, had been unknown.

"He kept with princes due decorum ;
Yet never stood in awe before 'em.
He follow'd David's lesson just;
In princes never put his trust:
And, would you make him truly sour,
Provoke him with a slave in power.
The Irish senate if you nam'd,
With what impatience he declaim'd!
Fair LIBERTY was all his cry;
For her he stood prepar'd to die;
For her he boldly stood alone;
For her he oft expos'd his own.
Two kingdoms, just as faction led,
Had set a price upon his head;
But not a traitor could be found,
To sell him for six hundred pound.

"Had he but spar'd his tongue and pen,

He might have rose like other men :
But power was never in his thought,
And wealth he valued not a groat:
Ingratitude he often found,

And pitied those who meant the wound;
But kept the tenour of his mind,
To merit well of human-kind;

Nor made a sacrifice of those

Who still were true, to please his foes.
He labour'd many a fruitless hour,
To reconcile his friends in power;
Saw mischief by a faction brewing,
While they pursued each other's ruin;
But finding vain was all his care,
He left the court in mere despair."

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