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When it was published, it was recommended by many Copies of Verses prefixed to it, amongst which the sincerity of Mr. Steele, and the genius of Eusden, deserve to be distinguished: But, as I would not omit any particulars relative to this renowned play, and its great author, I shall insert a letter of Mr.

With the greater cleanliness of our time, with all the additional experience of history, with the greater classical, aesthetic, and theological knowledge of our day, the sins of our poets are as much less excusable than those of Eusden, Blackmore, Cibber, and the rest, as Pope's "Dunciad" on them would be more righteously severe. Has Pope not said it already?

I should miss Jem Eusden. Ah, there is another deserter from the party! my friend the little hussar I do not know his name, and call him after his cap and jacket.

He wrote the bulk of the second part of Absalom and Achitophel with a wonderfully close imitation of Dryden's manner, besides several dramatic pieces and poems. Between Tate, Shadwell, Eusden, and Pye lies the unenviable distinction of being the worst of the laureates of England.

"The Bastard," however it might provoke or mortify his mother, could not be expected to melt her to compassion, so that he was still under the same want of the necessaries of life; and he therefore exerted all the interest which his wit, or his birth, or his misfortunes could procure to obtain, upon the death of Eusden, the place of Poet Laureate, and prosecuted his application with so much diligence that the king publicly declared it his intention to bestow it upon him; but such was the fate of Savage that even the king, when he intended his advantage, was disappointed in his schemes; for the Lord Chamberlain, who has the disposal of the laurel as one of the appendages of his office, either did not know the king's design, or did not approve it, or thought the nomination of the Laureate an encroachment upon his rights, and therefore bestowed the laurel upon Colley Cibber.

His is the only voice never heard in the melee: I doubt, indeed, if he have one, which may be partly the reason of a circumstance that I record to his honour, his fidelity to Jem Eusden, to whom he has adhered through every change of fortune, with a tenacity proceeding perhaps from an instinctive consciousness that the loquacious leader talks enough for two.

It goes straight to the mark like a bullet. He is king of the cricketers from eight to sixteen, both inclusive, and an excellent ruler he makes. Nevertheless, in the best-ordered states there will be grumblers, and we have an opposition here in the shape of Jem Eusden. Jem Eusden is a stunted lad of thirteen, or thereabout, lean, small, and short, yet strong and active.

Since then the succession has included the names of Samuel Daniel, Michael Drayton, Ben Jonson, Sir William Devenant, John Dryden, Thomas Shadwell, Nahum Tate, Nicholas Rowe, Lawrence Eusden, Colley Cibber, William Whitehead, Thomas Warton, Henry James Pye, Robert Southey, William Wordsworth, and Alfred Tennyson.

Eusden died, rector of Conington, Lincolnshire, in 1730, and his death was hastened by intemperance. Of the laurel left for Cibber Pope wrote in the Dunciad, No. 79. Thursday, May 31, 1711. Steele. 'Oderunt peccare boni virtutis amore. Hor.

"At last, in rushed Eusden, and cried, 'Who shall have it, But I, the true Laureate, to whom the King gave it? Apollo begged pardon, and granted his claim, But vowed, though, till then, he ne'er heard of his name." This Laurence Eusden was a scribbling parson, whose model in Art was Sir Richard Blackmore, and whose morality was of the Puritanical stripe.