Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 19.djvu/235

Rh influenced him, who was unmindful of the past, unconscious of the present, and indifferent to the future.

I am now come to the only part of Swift's conduct which is, in my opinion, deserving of censure; I mean his treatment of Stella and Vanessa. But be it remembered, that censure, though merited, should be proportioned to the crime. Had the dean's accusers taken the trouble of candidly investigating all the circumstances relative to that double connexion, they might possibly have found the unfortunate lover not wholly undeserving of pity.

But before I proceed to inquire how far the treatment Stella experienced was or was not excusable, I shall inform my reader who Stella really was. On this point all the biographers of Swift have been misinformed. The following account I received a few days ago in a letter from Mrs. Hearn, niece to the celebrated Mrs. Johnson, and who now resides at Brighton, near Alresford, Hants, with her daughter, Mrs. Harrison, the wife of a most respectable clergyman of that name.

"Mrs. Esther Johnson, better known by the name of Stella, was born at Richmond in Surry on the 13th of March 168l. Her father was a merchant, and the younger brother of a good family in Nottinghamshire. He died young, and left his widow with three children, a son and two daughters. While Mrs. Johnson lived at Richmond, she had the happiness of becoming first acquainted with lady Gifford, the sister of sir William Temple. The uncommon endowments, both of body and mind, which Mrs. Johnson certainly possessed in a high degree, soon gained " her