Page:Life of Edmond Malone.djvu/461

441 the observations of Swift. They are short, he says, but very pointed and characteristick.

Hawkesworth, the writer, was introduced by Garrick to, who thinking to put a few hundred pounds into his pocket, appointed him to revise and publish Cook’s Voyages. He scarcely did anything to the MSS., yet sold it to Cadell and Strahan, the printer and bookseller, for 6,000l. Soon after this he purchased some portion of India stock; and having made a speech or two at the India House, was much feasted by the directors, &c.

About this time he was severely attacked in the newspapers, particularly in letters signed “A Christian,” for certain passages in the Voyages, from which it was inferred he did not believe in a Providence. These attacks affected him so much that, from low spirits he was seized with a nervous fever, which on account of the high living he had indulged in had the more power on him; and he is supposed to have put an end to his life by intentionally taking an immoderate dose of opium.—(From the Bishop of Salisbury. The opinion from Dr. Fordyce.)

He was originally a watchmaker, or some other mechanick trade. By reading Dr. Johnson’s writings he acquired his style, and a certain moral and sentimental air, though nothing mortified him so much as to suppose that he was an imitator of Johnson. He lived much with him, and Johnson was fond of him, but latterly owned that Hawkesworth—who had set out a modest, humble man—was one of the many whom success in the world had spoiled. He was