expert politicians of the times joined in this paper, his effays were peculiarly relished by the public. However it is the fate of things written to an occafion, feldom to survive that occafion: the Craftf man, though written with great spirit and sharpness, is now almoft forgotten, although when it was publifhed as a weekly paper, it fold much more rapidly than even the Spectator. Befide this work he publifhed feveral other feparate pamphlets, which were afterwards reprinted in the fecond edition of his works, and which were very popular in their day.

This political warfare continued for ten years, during which time he laboured with great ftrength and perfeverance, and drew up fuch a fyftem of politics, as fome have fuppofed to be the most complete now exifting. But, as upon all other occafions, he had the mortification once more to see thofe friends defert him, upon whofe affiftance he most firmly relied, and all that web of fine fpun fpeculation actually destroyed at once by the ignorance of fome and the perfidy of others. He then declared that he was perfectly cured of his patriotic phrenzy; he fell out not only with Pulteney for his felfifh views, but with his old friends the tories, for abandoning their cause as defperate, averring that the faint and unfteady exercise of parts on one fide was a crime but one degree inferior to the iniquitous mifapplication of them on the other. But he could not take leave of a controverfy in which he had been fo many years engaged, without giving a parting blow, in which he feemed to fummon up all his vigour at once, and where, as the poet says,

Animam in vulnere pofuit.

This inimitable piece is intituled, "A Differtation on Parties," and of all his mafterly pieces it is in general esteemed the best.

Having finished this, which was received with the utmoft avidity, he refolved to take leave not only of his enemies and friends, but even of his country; and in this refolution in the year 1736 he once more retired to France, where he looked to his native country with a mixture of anger and pity, and upon his former profeffing friends with a fhare of contempt and indignation. I expect little, fays he, from the principal actors that tread the ftage at prefent. They are divided not fo much as it seemed, and as they would have it believed, about measures. The true divifion is about their different ends. Whilft the minifter was not hard pushed, nor the profpect of fucceeding to him near, they appeared to have but one end, the reformation of the government. The deftruction of the minifter was purfued only as a preliminary, but of effential and indifputable neceffity, to that end: but when his deftruction feemed to approach, the object of his fucceffion interpofed to the fight of many, and the reformation of the government was no longer their point of view. They had divided the skin, at least in their thought, before they had taken the beaft. The common fear of haftening his downfall for others, made them all faint in the chace. It was this, and this alone, that faved him, and put off his evil day.

Such were his cooler reflections, after he had laid down his political pen, to employ it in a manner that was much more agreeable to his ufual profeffions, and his approaching age. He had long employed the few hours he could fpare, on fubjects of a more general and important nature to the interefts of mankind; but as he was frequently interrupted by the alarms of party, he made no great proficiency in his defign. Still, however, he kept it in view, and he makes frequent mention in his letters to Swift, of his intentions to give meta

4

phyfics

phyfics a new and ufeful turn. I know, fays he, in one of thefe, how little regard you pay to writings of this kind; but Imagine, that if you can like any, it must be those that strip metaphyfics of all their bombaft, keep within the fight of every well conftituted eye, and never bewilder themfelves, whilft they pretend to guide the reafon of others.

Having now arrived at the fixtieth year of his age, and being bleffed with a very competent fhare of fortune, he returned into France, far from the noise and hurry of party; for his feat at Dawley was too near to devote the reft of his life to retirement and ftudy. Upon his going to that country, as it was generally known that difdain, vexation, and disappointment had driven him there, many of his friends as well as his enemies fuppofed, that he was once again gone over to the Pretender. Among the number who entertained this fufpicion was Swift, whom Pope in one of his letters very roundly chides for harbouring such an unjuft opinion. "You fhould "be cautious," fays he," of cenfuring any motion. "or action of Lord Bolingbroke, because you hear it only from a fhallow, envious, and malicious reporter. What you writ to me about him, I find, "to my great fcandal, repeated in one of yours to "another. Whatever you might hint to me, was "this for the profane? The thing, if true, fhould "be concealed; but it is, I affure you, abfolutely "untrue in every circumftance. He has fixed in a

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very agreeable retirement, near Fontainbleau, " and makes it his whole bufinefs vacare litteris."

This reproof from Pope was not more friendly than it was true; Lord Bolingbroke was too well acquainted with the forlorn ftate of that party, and the folly of its conductors, once more to embark in their defperate concerns. He now faw that he had gone as far towards reinftating himself in the full poffeffion of his former honours, as the mere dint of

parts and application could go, and was at length experimentally convinced, that the decree was abfolutely irreverfible, and the door of the House of Lords finally shut against him. He therefore at Pope's fuggeftion retired merely to be at leifure from the broils of oppofition, for the calmer pleasures of philofophy. Thus the decline of his life, though lefs brilliant, became more amiable, and even his happiness was improved by age, which had rendered his paffions more moderate, and his wishes more attainable.

But he was far from fuffering even in folitude his hours to glide away in torpid inactivity. That active restless difpofition ftill continued to actuate his pursuits; and having loft the feafon for gaining power over his contemporaries, he was now refolved upon acquiring fame from pofterity. He had not been long in his retreat near Fontainbleau, when he began a course of letters on the ftudy and ufe of hiftory, for the ufe of a young nobleman. In thefe he does not follow the methods of St. Real and others who have treated on this fubject, who make hiftory the great fountain of all knowledge; he very wifely confines its benefits, and fuppofes them rather to confift in deducing general maxims from particular facts, than in illuftrating maxims by the application of hiftorical paffages. In mentioning ecclefiaftical hiftory he gives his opinion very freely upon the fubject of the divine original of the facred books, which he fuppofes to have no fuch foundation. This new fyftem of thinking, which he had always propagated in converfation, and which he now began to adopt in his more laboured compofitions, feemed no way fupported either by his acutenefs or his learning. He began to reflect feriously on thefe fubjects too late in life, and to fuppofe thofe objections very new and unanswerable, which had been already confuted by thousands. "Lord Bolingbroke," says Pope,

in one of his letters," is above trifling; when he "writes of any thing in this world, he is more than "mortal. If ever he trifles, it must be when he "turns divine."

In the mean time, as it was evident that a man of his active ambition, in chufing retirement when no longer able to lead in public, must be liable to ridicule in refuming a refigned philofophical air in order to obviate the cenfure, he addreffed a letter to Lord Bathurft, upon the true ufe of retirement and ftudy; in which he fhows himself still able and willing to undertake the cause of his country, whenever its diftreffes fhould require his exertion. I have, fays he, renounced neither my country nor my friends; and by friends I mean all those, and those alone, who are fuch to their country. In their profperity they fhall never hear of me; in their dif trefs always. In that retreat, wherein the remainder of my days shall be spent, I may be of fome use to them, fince even thence I may advife, exhort, and warn them. Bent upon this purfuit. only, and having now exchanged the gay ftatefman for the grave philofopher, he fhone forth with diftinguished luftre. His converfation took a different turn from what had been usual with him; and as we are affured by Lord Orrery, who knew him, it united the wisdom of Socrates, the dignity and ease of Pliny, and the wit of Horace.

Yet ftill amid his refolutions to turn himself from politics, and to give himself up entirely to the calls of philofophy, he could not refift embarking once more in the debates of his country; and coming back from France, fettled at Batterfea, an old feat which was his father's, and had been long in the poffeffion of the family. He fuppofed he faw an impending calamity, and though it was not in his power to remove, he thought it his duty to retard its fall. To redeem or fave the nation from perdition, he

thought