who, in his "Patriarchia" (1680), upheld the divine right of kings in its extremest form, the other treating of the true original, extent, and end of civil government. In 1690 also appeared his famous "Essay on the Human Understanding" and his interesting tractate on Education. He died in 1704. His "Essay on the Conduct of the Understanding" was published posthumously. It is very highly praised by Hallam, who declares that he cannot think any parent or instructor justified in neglecting to put this little treatise in the hands of a boy about the time his reasoning faculties become developed. "It will give him a sober and serious, not flippant or selfconceited, independency of thinking; and while it teaches how to distrust ourselves and watch those prejudices which necessarily grow up from one cause or another, will inspire a reasonable confidence in what he has well considered, by taking off a little of that deference to authority, which is the more to be regretted in its excess, that, like its cousin-german, party-spirit, it is frequently found united to loyalty of heart. and the generous enthusiasm of youth." Locke's style is simple and graceful; he was called by Landor the most elegant of prose writers. He is a great name in the history of philosophical thought, and his writings on Toleration and Government had considerable political influence. The establishment of the Royal Society dates from about the time of the Restoration. It was incorporated by royal charter in 1662. Its germ was a society which, in 1645, during the turmoil and agitation of the Civil Wars, had been formed in London by some quiet, studious men, of whom the most notable were Dr. Ward, Dr. Wallis, and Dr. Wilkins, "Our business," says Wallis, "was (precluding matters of theology and state affairs) to discourse and consider of philosophical inquiries, and such as related thereto, as Physick, Anatomy, Geometry, Astronomy, Navigation, Staticks, Magneticks, Chymicks, Mechanicks, and Natural Experiments, with the state of these studies and their cultivation at home and abroad. We then discoursed of the circulation of the blood, the valves in the veins, the venæ lacteæ, the lymphatic vessels, Sir Isaac Newton. 161 the Copernican hypothesis, the nature of comets and new stars, the satellites of Jupiter, the oval shape of Saturn, the spots on the sun and the turning on its own axis, the inequalities and selenography of the moon, the several phases of Venus and Mercury, the improvement of telescopes and grinding of giasses for that purpose, the weight of air, the possibility or impossibility of vacuities and Nature's abhorrence thereof, the Torricellian experiment in quicksilver, the descent of heavy bod es and the degrees of acceleration therein, with divers other things of like nature, some of which were then but new discoveries, and others not so generally known and embraced as now [1696] they are; with other things appertaining to what has been called the New Philosophy, which, from the times of Galileo at Florence, and Sir Francis Bacon (Lord Verulam) in England, hath been much cultivated in Italy, France, Germany, and other parts abroad, as well as with us in England." This comprehensive survey well shows the growing interest taken in science. Charles II. was fond of dabbling in chemistry, and his courtiers followed suit, till it became considered gentlemanly to have a tincture of scientific knowledge. The increased orderliness and method of English style which now began to prevail may in some measure be attributed to the scientific spirit abroad, which was intolerant of confusion and carelessness of arrangement. To this period belongs the greatest name in the history of science, Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), who cannot be altogether omitted even in a purely literary history. He succeeded Barrow, whose pupil he had been, as Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge, and published his great work, the "Principia," in 1687. It was written in Latin. Besides his scientific works, he found time to write on ancient chronology, on the Scripture prophecies, and "An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture." These were published posthumously, and are interesting for the light they throw on his religious opinions. Their style is not specially remarkable in any way. 8 V. THE WITS OF QUEEN ANNE'S TIME. Swift, Addison, Steele, Arbuthnot, Bolingbroke, Berkeley, Butler; Pope, Prior, Gay, Young, Churchill, Gray, Collins, and Akenside. URING the reign of Queen Anne and the two first Georges, the government of England was in a very unsettled condition. Jacobitism, till finally crushed in 1745-46, flourished among men who held high places of trust, and was so prevalent among the community at large that the restoration of the Stuart line was looked upon by all sagacious observers as no unlikely event. It was a time of the grossest political immorality, when men shifted sides unhesitatingly for the most selfish motives, and when both the great political parties lived in constant fear of having their secrets betrayed by traitors. Party spirit ran high, and Whigs and Tories alike strained every nerve to win the voice of the public to their side. Both employed armies of hack writers to advocate their cause, and both were ready to shower gifts and offices upon any writer of mark and talent who should employ himself in their defence. The pen was then a much more powerful political agent than it is now. Parliamentary reporting was forbidden, and thus the speech delivered in Parliament, which in our day, by the reports of it in the newspapers, affects the minds of millions, could at the best only influence the three or four hundred members who might happen to hear it. Recess oratory and great political manifestoes at party gatherings were little practised, nor would they have been attended by any widespread results though they had been practised, for there was not yet such a thing as copious newspaper reports of speeches. A well-written pamphlet, or a series of vigorous articles in one of the political periodicals which came into fashion in Queen Anne's time, was as powerful an auxiliary in either averting the ruin of a ministry or in hastening it to its fall as a great oration defending his policy by a Prime Minister or a scathing denunciation of the plans of the Government by an Opposition leader is in the present day. Under these circumstances, and considering the munificent rewards popular and telling party writers often had bestowed upon them, it is not surprising that the literature of the time with which we are now dealing should have been pre-eminently a party literature. Almost every eminent prose writer of the period-Defoe, Swift, Addison, Steele, and others—ranged himself on the side of the Whig or the Tory party, and employed his pen in its defence. The effect of this on prose style was on the whole favourable, giving it greater energy, precision, and lucidity than it had yet possessed. But it had also its evil results. Something of the want of moral elevation and breadth of view which distinguished the politics of the age communicated itself to the literature: with all its many good qualities, the so-called Augustan period of English literature has about it a worldly air and an absence of any spiritual insight. It was only by the Among the men of letters who entered the bustling arena of political controversy was the greatest and most original writer of his time, Jonathan Swift, one of the most powerful, most imperious, and most puzzling figures our literary history presents. He was born in Dublin in 1667. accident of birth that he was an Irishman. from an old Yorkshire family, and had no veins. Even he, though wiser and more far-sighted in regard to Ireland than almost any of his contemporaries, always spoke of the native Irish with that indiscriminating contempt which has since born such bitter fruit. Swift was a posthumous child, and his mother having been left very slenderly provided for, the expenses of his education were defrayed in what appears to have been a sufficiently grudging fashion by his uncle Godwin. He was educated at the school of Kilkenny, and then at Trinity College, Dublin, where he obtained his degree speciali gratia in 1685. In 1689 he became private secretary to Sir William Temple, whose wife was a relative of his mother's. All things considered, Swift entered the world under very promising auspices. Temple (1628-1699) was a veteran diplomatist and statesman, who had taken a leading part in negotiating the Triple Alliance, and he was universally looked up to and consulted in his old age as one of the most wary, sagacious, and politic of men. As an author he ranks high, not so much because his works show great power or genius, as because he was one of the first to obtain a mastery over the great and difficult art of English prose composition. "Sir William Temple," Johnson is reported to have said, "was the first writer who gave cadence to English prose. Before his time they were careless of arrangement, and did not mind whether a sentence ended with an important word or an insignificant word, or with what part of speech it was concluded." In the household of Temple at Moor Park, Swift had ample opportunity for increasing his store of knowledge, and, besides, he was admitted behind the scenes of political life, and even had the honour on one occasion of acting as Temple's mouthpiece in advising King William regarding the policy he should pursue as to the Triennial Bill. Yet he felt his position very galling. He was a dependant, his proud, imperious, self-confident nature chafed bitterly against the chains of servitude, however richly gilded they might be; and Temple, a man of cold, selfish, precise disposition, was a master whose behests it was not always easy to obey with cheerfulness. With but a brief interval, during which, apparently in despair of ever obtaining any lay promotion from his patron, he committed the great mistake of his life by taking orders, Swift remained with Temple till his death in 1699. It was during his residence at Moor Park that he first became acquainted with the woman, then a little girl, whose name is indissolubly connected with |