Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/195

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S the brightest and most important part of Swift's life passed during the four last years of queen Anne, when his faculties were all in full vigour, and occasions for displaying them arose adequate to their greatness; I shall omit no circumstance, which may serve to delineate the features and limbs of his mind (if I may be allowed the expression) before disease and age had impaired the bloom of the one, and the strength and agility of the other. To have a perfect portrait and just likeness of a friend, had we our choice of time, we should certainly prefer that period of his life, when he was in his prime, to that of his decay. There have been already given many instances of such a nobleness of mind, such a disinterested spirit in Swift, as are rarely to be found in the annals of history. Yet the part which he acted by his friend Oxford, about the time of the queen's death, exhibits those qualities in a higher point of view, than ever they had appeared in before. It has been already mentioned, that, finding all his endeavours to reconcile his great friends useless, he had retired to Letcomb, in order to make one effort more to compel them to unite for their common interest, by the publication of his "Free Thoughts," &c. Lord Bolingbroke, to whom this piece was shown by Barber, contrived to have the printing of it deferred, as he was then just upon the point of accomplishing his long concerted plan, of turning out lord Oxford, and stepping into his place. This was effected just four days before the VOL. I.