Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/33

Rh On the publication of a new edition of Swift's works, the proprietors applied to Dr. Hawkesworth to write his Life. He was an author of no small eminence; a man of clear judgment, and great candour. He quickly discerned the truth from the falsehood; wiped away many of the aspersions that had been thrown on Swift's character; and placed it, so far as he went, in its proper light. But as he had no new materials of his own, and was confined to such only as were contained in former publications, the view he has given of his life is very imperfect; many of the most important articles are omitted, and others still left in a very doubtful state.

The last writer who has given any account of Swift, is Dr. Johnson; who seems to have undertaken this task, rather from the necessity he was under of taking some notice of him in the course of his Biographical History of the English Poets, than from choice. He has presented us only with a short abstract of what he found in Dr. Hawkesworth, for which he makes the following apology. "An account of Dr. Swift has been already collected with great diligence and acuteness, by Dr. Hawkesworth, according to a scheme which I laid before him in the intimacy of our friendship. I cannot therefore be expected to say much of a life, concerning which I had long since communicated my thoughts, to a man capable of dignifying his narration, with so much elegance of language, and force of sentiment." Accordingly he has produced little new on the subject, except some observations of his own, which are far from being favourable to the character of Swift. It is much to be lamented, that a man of his great abilities did not choose to follow his friend worth