were two sorts of people out of reach by the world, he said those that are above, and those that are below it; they might be equally happy, for aught he knew; and between them he was not unwilling to accept the lot, which, as it placed him below envy, yet lifted him far above pity. In the school of affliction, he bethought him he had learned more philosophy than at the academy, and more divinity than from the pulpit; in prison he had learned to know that liberty does not consist in open doors, or the free egress and regress of locomotion. He had seen the rough and smooth sides of the world, and tasted the difference between the closet of a King and the Newgate dungeon. Here, in the dungeon, he had still," with humblest acknowledgments," to remember that a glorious Prince had "loved" him; and, whatever Fortune had still in store, he felt himself not unfit, by all this discipline, for serious application to the great, solemn, and weighty work, of resignation to the will of Heaven. George I George II. and THE cheerful and pious resignation for which De Foe had so prepared himself, he needed when the crisis came. It is not our province here to dwell on the memorable 1714-1731. scenes of 1714, which consigned Oxford to the Tower and Bolingbroke to exile; shattered the Tory Party; settled the succession of Hanover; and fixed the Whigs in power. The principles for which De Foe had contended all his life were at last securely established; and for his reward he had to show the unnoticed and unprotected scars of thirty-two years' incessant political conflict. But he retired as he had kept the field -with a last hearty word for his patron Harley; and with a manly defence against the factious slanders which had opened on himself. He probably heard the delighted scream of Mr. Boyer as his figure disappeared; to the effect of how fully he had been "confuted by the ingenious “and judicious Joseph Addison, esquire." Doubtless he also smiled to observe what Whig rewards for pure Whig service were now most plentifully scattered. The ingenious Joseph Addison, esquire, Secretary of State; Mr. Steele, Sir Richard and Surveyor of the royal stables; Mr. Tickell, Irish Secretary; Mr. Congreve, twelve hundred a-year; Mr. Rowe, Mr. Hughes, Mr. Ambrose Phillips, all snugly and comfortably sinecured. For himself, he was in his fifty-fourth year; and, after a life of bodily and mental exertion that would have worn down a score of ordinary men, had to begin life anew. Into that new life we shall enter but briefly. It is plain to all the world. It is the life by which he became immortal. It is contained in the excellent books which are named at the head of this article; and there the world may read it, if they will. What we sought to exhibit here, we trust we have made sufficiently obvious. After all the objections that may be justly made to his opinions, on the grounds of shortcoming or excess, we believe that in the main features of the career we have set before the reader, will be recognised a noble English example of the qualities most prized by Englishmen. De Foe is our only famous politician and man of letters, who represented, in its inflexible constancy, sturdy dogged resolution, unwearied perseverance, and obstinate contempt of danger and of tyranny, the great Middle-class English character. We believe it to be no mere national pride to say, that, whether in its defects or its surpassing merits, the world has had none other to compare with it. He lived in the thickest stir of the conflict of the four most violent party reigns of English history; and if we have at last entered into peaceful possession of most part of the rights at issue in those party struggles, it the more becomes us to remember such a man with gratitude, and with wise consideration for what errors we may find in him. He was too much in the constant heat of the battle, to see all that we see now. He was not a philosopher himself, but he helped philosophy to some wise conclusions. He did not stand at the highest point of toleration, or of moral wisdom; but, with his masculine active arm, he helped to lift his successors over obstructions which had stayed his own advance. He stood, in his opinions and in his actions, alone and apart from his fellow men; but it was to show his fellow men of later times the value of a juster and larger fellowship, and of more generous modes of action. And when he now retreated from the world Without to the world Within, in the solitariness of his unrewarded service and integrity, he had assuredly earned the right to challenge the higher recognition of Posterity. He was walking towards History with steady feet; and might look up into her awful face with a brow unabashed and undismayed. 66 66 Here was his language, when, withdrawn finally and for ever from the struggle, he calmly reviewed the part he had taken in it. "I was, from my first entering into the knowledge of public matters, and have ever been to this day, a sincere lover of the constitution of my country; "zealous for Liberty and the Protestant interest: but a "constant follower of moderate principles, and a vigorous 66 opposer of hot measures in all. I never once changed my opinion, my principles, or my party; and let what will "be said of changing sides, this I maintain, that I never "once deviated from the Revolution principles, nor from "the doctrine of liberty and property on which it was "founded." Describing the qualities that should distinguish a man who, in those critical times, elected so to treat of public affairs, he added: "Find him where you 66 66 66 will, this must be his character. He must be one that, searching into the depths of truth, dare speak her aloud. "in the most dangerous times; that fears no face, courts no favour, is subject to no interest, bigoted to no party, " and will be a hypocrite for no gain. I will not say I am "the man. I leave that to posterity." His last political Essay was written in 1715; and while. the proof-sheets lay uncorrected before him, he was struck with apoplexy. After some months' danger he rallied; and in the three following years sent forth a series of works, chiefly moral and religious, and of which the Family Instructor and the Religious Courtship may be mentioned as the types, which were excellently adapted to a somewhat limited purpose, and are still in very high esteem. They are far too numerous even for recital here. They had extraordinary popularity; went through countless editions; and found their way not only in handsome setting-forth to the King's private library, but on rough paper to all the fairs and markets of the kingdom. In the fact that Goldsmith makes his lively Livy Primrose as thoroughly acquainted with the dialogue in Religious Courtship, as she is with the argument of man Friday and his master in Robinson Crusoe, and with the disputes of Thwackum and Square in Tom Jones, we may see in what vogue they continued to that date. But beyond, and up to the beginning of the century, they were generally among the standard prize books of schools; and might be seen lying in coarse workman-garb, with Pomfret's Poems or Hervey's Meditations, on the window-seat of any tradesman's house. Grave moral and religious questions had, in truth, not before been approached with anything like that dramatic liveliness of manner. To the same popu larity were also in later years committed, such halfsatirical, half-serious books, as the Political History of the Devil; of which, strong plain sense, and a desire to recommend, by liveliness of treatment, the most homely and straightforward modes of looking into moral and religious questions, were again the distinguishing characteristics. Other works of miscellaneous interest will be found recited in the careful catalogue of De Foe's writings (upwards of two hundred in all) compiled by Mr. Walter Wilson. The most remarkable of these was probably the Complete English Tradesman, in which you see distinctly reflected many of the most solid and striking points of De Foe's own character; and, let us add, of the general character of our middle-class countrymen. The plays of Heywood, Massinger, and Ben Jonson, do not give us the citizens of their time more vividly, nor better contrast the staidness and the follies of old and of young, than De Foe has here accomplished for the traders of William and Anne. We are surprised to be told that this book was less popular than others of its class; but perhaps a certain surly vein of satire which was in it, was the reason. A book which tends, however justly, to satirize any community in general, readers included, is dangerous to its author's popularity, however the public may like satire in particular, or when aimed at special classes. Our hasty summary would be incomplete, without a reference to his many publications on points of domestic economy, and questions of homely, domestic morals; to his occasional satires in verse; or to a timely and powerful series of strictures on London Life, in which he earnestly suggested the necessity of a Metropolitan University, of a Foundling Hospital, and of a well-organised system of Police. He also again attacked the stage on the success of the Beggar's Opera; and here, confusing a little the prose and poetry of the matter, made that excellent piece responsible for a coarse drama on the subject of the recently hanged Jack Sheppard. In this discussion he again encountered his old enemy, now the Dean of St. Patrick's; 1 "Our rogues," he says, are grown more wicked than ever; and "vice of all kinds is so much winked "at, that robbery is accounted a "pretty crime. We take pains to "puff them up in their villainy, and "there is one set out in so amiable a "light in the Beggar's Opera, it has "taught them to value themselves on "their profession, rather than to be "ashamed of it. Not content with "the mischief done by the Beggar's "Opera, we must have a Quaker's "Opera forsooth, of much more evil "tendency than the former for in "this, Jack Sheppard is made the "head of the drama, and runs "through such a scene of riot and "success, that but too many weak "minds have been drawn away; and "many unwary persons so charmed "with his appearance on the stage, "dressed in that elegant manner, and 1 "his pockets so well lined, they have in the same pamphlet De Foe makes a |