Turner, collar-maker; George Pilcocks, late exciseman; Thomas White, wheelwright; and myself. First, of the first, Robert Jenkins.

He was a man of bright parts and shrewd conceit, for he never shoed a horse of a whig or a fanatic, but he lamed him sorely.

Amos Turner, a worthy person, rightly esteemed among us for his sufferings, in that he had been honoured in the stocks for wearing an oaken bough.

George Pilcocks, a sufferer also; of zealous and laudable freedom of speech, insomuch that his occupation had been taken from him.

Thomas White, of good repute likewise, for that his uncle, by the mother's side, had, formerly, been servitor at Maudlin college, where the glorious Sacheverel was educated.

Now were the eyes of all the parish upon these our weekly councils. In a short space, the Minister came among us; he spake concerning us and our councils to a multitude of other Ministers at the visitation, and they spake thereof unto the Ministers at London, so that even the Bishops heard and marvelled thereat. Moreover Sir Thomas, member of Parliament, spake of the same to other members of Parliament; who spake thereof unto the Peers of the realm. Lo! thus did our councils enter into the hearts of our Generals and our lawgivers; and from henceforth, even as we devised, thus did they.

After this, the whole book is turned on a sudden

from his own life, to a history of all the public transactions of Europe, compiled from the newspapers of those times. I could not comprehend the meaning of this, till I perceived at last (to my no small astonishment) that all the measures of the four last years of the Queen, together with the peace at Utrecht, which have been usually attributed to the E- of O-, D- of O-, Lords H- and B—, and other great men, do here most plainly appear to have been wholly owing to Robert Jenkins, Amos Turner, George Pilcocks, Thomas White, but above all, to P.P.

The reader may be sure I was very inquisitive after this extraordinary writer, whose work I have here abstracted. I took a journey into the country on purpose; but could not find the least trace of him: till by accident 1 met an old Clergyman, who said he could not be positive, but thought it might be one Paul Philips, who had been dead about twelve years. And upon inquiry, all he could learn of that person from the neighbourhood, was, That he had been taken notice of for swallowing loaches, and remembered by some people by a black and white cur with one ear, that constantly followed him.

In the church-yard I read his epitaph, said to be written by himself:

O reader, if that thou canst read,

Look down upon this stone;

Do all we can, Death is a man,
That never spareth none.

THE

NARRATIVE

OF

DR. ROBERT NORRIS.*

Ir is an acknowledged truth, that nothing is so dear to an honest man as his good name, nor ought he to neglect the just vindication of his character, when it is injuriously attacked by any man. The person I have at present cause to complain of, is indeed in very melancholy circumstances, it having pleased God to deprive him of his senses, which may extenuate the crime in him. But I should be wanting in my duty, not only to myself, but also to my fellow-creatures, to whom my talents may prove of benefit, should I suffer my profession

* Addison highly disapproved of this bitter satire on Dennis, and Pope was not a little chagrined at this disapprobation; for the narrative was intended to court the favour of Addison, by defending his Cato: in which seeming defence Addison was far from thinking our author sincere. Warton.

The circumstances under which this narrative was written require much further examination than Dr. Warton has bestowed on them, before we can form an impartial judgment of the conduct of the parties. Some observations respecting them may be found in the Life of the Author, prefixed to the present edition, vol. i. chap. 2.

or honesty to be undeservedly aspersed. I have therefore resolved to give the public an account of all that has passed between the unhappy gentleman and myself.

On the 20th instant, while I was in my closet, pondering the case of one of my patients, I heard a knocking at my door, upon opening of which entered an old woman with tears in her eyes, and told me, that without my assistance her master would be utterly ruined. I was forced to interrupt her sorrow, by inquiring her master's name and place of abode. She told me, he was one Mr. Dennis, an officer of the custom-house, who was taken ill of a violent frenzy last April, and had continued in those melancholy circumstances with few or no intervals. Upon this I asked her some questions relating to his humour and extravagancies, that I might the better know under what regimen to put him, distemper was found out.

"this day fortnight in the

when the cause of his
"Alas! Sir,"
"Alas! Sir," says she,

morning, a poor simple

child came to him from the printer's; the boy had no sooner entered the room, but he cried out, the devil was come. He often stares ghastfully, raves aloud, and mutters between his teeth the word Cator, or Cato, or some such thing. Now, Doctor, this Cator is certainly a witch, and my poor master is under an evil tongue; for I have heard him say Cator has bewitched the whole nation. pitied my very heart to think, that a man of my master's understanding and great scholarship, who,

It

as the child told me, had a book of his own in print, should talk so outrageously. Upon this I went and laid out a groat for a horse-shoe, which is at this time nailed on the threshold of his door; but I don't find my master is at all the better for it; he perpetually starts and runs to the window when any one knocks, crying out, S'death! a messenger from the French king! I shall die in the Bastile."

Having said this, the old woman presented me with a vial of his urine; upon examination of which I perceived the whole temperament of his body to be exceeding hot. I therefore instantly took my cane and my beaver, and repaired to the place where he dwelt.

When I came to his lodgings near Charing-cross, up three pair of stairs (which I should not have published in this manner, but that this lunatic conceals the place of his residence, on purpose to prevent the good offices of those charitable friends and physicians, who might attempt his cure), when I came into the room, I found this unfortunate gentleman seated on his bed, with Mr. Bernard Lintot, bookseller, on the one side of him, and a grave elderly gentleman on the other, who, as I have since learned, calls himself a grammarian; the latitude of whose countenance was not a little eclipsed by the fulness of his peruke. As I am a black lean man, of a pale visage, and hang my clothes on somewhat slovenly, I no sooner went in, but he frowned upon me, and cried out with