Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 3.djvu/401

Rh all the understanding and virtue of mankind; that their merits filled the world; or that there was no hope of more. They shew the age involved in darkness, and shade the pićture with sullen emulation.

When the Queen's death drove him into Ireland, he might be allowed to regret for a time the interception of his views, the extinction of his hopes, and his ejection from gay scenes, important employment, and splendid friendships; but when time had enabled reason to prevail over vexation, the complaints, which at first were natural, be came ridiculous because they were useless. But querulousness was now grown habitual, and he cried out when he probably had ceased to feel. His reiterated wailings persuaded Bolingbroke that he was really willing to quit his deanery for an English parish; and Bolingbroke procured an exchange, which was rejected; and Swift still retained the pleasure of complaining.

The greatest difficulty that occurs, in analising his character, is to discover by what depravity of intellect he took delight in revolving ideas, from which almost every other, mind shrinks with disgust. The ideas of pleasure,