Printed by T. BENSLEY, Bolt Court, Fleet Street, For J. Johnson, J. Nichols and Son, R. Baldwin, F. C. and J. Riving- ΤΟ CHARLES LORD HALIFAX ‘. MY LORD, SIMILITUDE of manners and ftudies is ufually mentioned as one of the strongest motives to affection and efteem; but the paffionate veneration I have for your Lordship, I think, flows from an admiration of qualities in you, of which, in the whole course of these papers, I have acknowledged myfelf incapable. While I bufy myself as a stranger upon earth, and can pretend to no other than being a looker-on, you are confpicuous in the bufy and polite world, both in the world of men, and that of letters. While I am filent and unobferved in public meetings, you are admired by all that approach you, as the life and genius of the converfation. a Charles Montague, grandíon to an earl of Manchester, was taken much notice of at Cambridge, for his City and Country Mouse, a satire on Dryden. Being brought to court at the revolution, he was conftituted one of the lords commiffioners of the treafury, March 2, 1691-2; chancellor of the exchequer, in May 1694. The coin being exceedingly debafed and diminished, he formed the defign of calling in the money, and re-coining it, in 1695; which was effected in two years: to fupply the immediate want of cath, he projected the iffuing of exchequer-bills. For this fervice, he had the thanks of the houfe of commons in 1697. He was next year appointed first lord commiffioner of the treasury; and, refigning that poft in June 1700, obtained a grant of the VOL. II. What an happy conjunction of different talents meets in him whofe whole difcourfe is at once animated by the strength and force of reason, and adorned with all the graces and embellishments of wit! When learning irradiates common life, it is then in its higheft ufe and perfection; and it is to fuch as your lordship, that the sciences owe the efteem which they have with the active part of mankind. Knowledge of books, in reclufe men, is like that fort of lantern, which hides him who carries it, and serves only to pass through fecret and gloomy paths of his own; but, in the poffeffion of a man of bufinefs, it is, as a torch in the hand of one who is willing and able to fhew those who were bewildered, the way which leads to their profperity and welfare. A generous concern for your country, and a paffion for every thing which is truly great and noble, are what actuate all your life and actions; and I hope you will forgive me that I have an ambition this book may be placed in the library of fo good a judge of what is valuable; in that library where the office of auditor of the receipt of the exchequer; and the fame year, Dec. 13, was created baron Halifax. On the acceffion of George I. he was a member of the regency; was appointed firft lord commiffioner of the treasury, Oct. 5, 1714; created vifcount Sunbury and ear! of Halifax, Oct. 15; and died May 15, 1715.-Addifon has celebrated this lord in his account of the greatest English poets. Steele has drawn his character in the fecond volume of the Spectator, and in the fourth of the Tatler; but Pope, in the portrait of Bufo, in the Epiftle to Arbuthnot, has returned the ridicule which his lordship, in conjunction with Prior, had heaped on Dryden's Hind and Panther. Walpole's Catalogue, vol. ii. p. 116. choice is fuch, that it will not be a disparagement to be the meaneft author in it. Forgive me, my lord, for taking this occafion of telling all the world how ardently I love and honour you; and that I am, with the utmost gratitude for all your favours, my lord, your lordship's most obliged, moft obedient, and most humble servant, * THE SPECTATOR. See Tat. with notes, vol. i. p. xlvii. & feq. note to the dedication of Tat. vol. iv. on the character of lord Halifax. THE |
