Page:An Enquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe.djvu/120

, an author possessed of as much wit as any man alive, yet with as little prudence, to turn it to his own advantage. A comedy of his, called La Metromanie, is incomparably the best theatrical production, that has appeared of late in Europe. But I know not, whether I should most commend his genius, or censure his obscenity; his ode a Priape, has justly excluded him from a place in the academy of Belles Lettrês. However, the good-natured Montesquieu, by his interest, procured the starving bard a trifling pension. His own epitaph was all the revenge he took upon the academy for being repulsed.