Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 4.djvu/369

Rh count of Addison, it is proper rather to say "nothing that is false, than all that is true."

But the son of Young would almost sooner, I know, pass for a Lorenzo, than see himself vindicated, at the expence of his father's memory, from follies which, if it may be thought blameable in a boy to have committed them, it is surely praise-worthy in a man to lament, and certainly not only unnecessary but cruel in a biographer to record.

Of the "Night Thoughts," notwithstanding their author's professed retirement, all are inscribed to great or to growing names. He had not yet weaned himself from Earls and Dukes, from Speakers of the House of Commons, Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, and Chancellors of the Exchequer. In "Night" Eight the politician plainly betrays himself

Yet it must be confessed, that at the conclusion of "Night" Nine, weary perhaps of courting earthly patrons, he tells his soul, Rh