Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 4.djvu/333

Rh were the obligations which he had formerly received from Anne, the poet appears to aim at something of the same sort from George. Of the poem the intention seems to have been, to shew that he had the same extravagant strain. of praise for a king as for a queen. To discover, at the very outset of a foreigner's reign, that the Gods bless his new subjects in such a king, is something more than praise. Neither was this deemed one of his excuseable pieces. We do not find it in his works.

Young's father had been well acquainted with Lady Anne Wharton, the first wife of Thomas Wharton, Esq. afterwards Marquis of Wharton; a lady celebrated for her poetical talents by Burnet and by Waller.

To the Dean of Sarum's visitation sermon, already mentioned, were added some verses "by that excellent poetess Mrs. Anne Wharton," upon its being translated into English, at the instance of Waller by Atwood. Wharton, after he became ennobled, did not drop the son of his old friend. In him, during the short time he lived, Young found a patron, and in his dissolute descendant a friend and a companion. The Marquis died in April 1715. In the beginning of the next year Rh