Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/362

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HIS gentleman added conſiderably to the republic of letters by his numerous tranſlations. He received the rudiments of his education from Mr. Shaw, an excellent grammarian, maſter of the free ſchool at Aſhby De la Zouch in Leiceſterſhire: he finiſhed his grammatical learning under the revd. Mr. Mountford of Chriſt’s Hoſpital, where having attamed the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew tongues, he was deſigned to be ſent to the univerſity of Cambridge, to be trained up for holy Orders. But Mr. Ozell, who was averſe to that confinement which he mud expect in a college life, choſe to be ſooner ſettled in the world, and be placed in a public office of accounts, having previouſly qualified himſelf by attaining a knowledge of arithmetic, and writing the neceſſary hands. This choice of an occupation in our author, could no other reaſons be adduced, are ſufficient to denominate him a little tinctured with dulneſs, for no man of genius ever yet made choice of ſpending his life behind a deſk in a compting-houſe.

He ſtill retained, however, an inclination to erudition, contrary to what might have been expected, and by much converſation with travellers from abroad, made himſelf maſter of moſt of the living languages, eſpecially the French, Italian, and Spaniſh, from all which, as well as from the Latin and Greek, he has favoured the world with a great