The Life of Daniel De Foe

by George Chalmers

FOOTNOTES:

[1] It is at last discovered, by searching the chamberlain's books, which have since been burnt, that our author was the son of James Foe, of the parish of Cripplegate, London, citizen and butcher; who was himself the son of Daniel Foe, of Elton, in the county of Northampton, yeoman; and who obtained his freedom by serving his apprenticeship with John Levit, citizen and butcher. Daniel Foe, the son of James, was admitted to his freedom by birth, on the 26th of January, 1687-8. I was led to these discoveries by observing that De Foe had voted at an election for a representative of London; whence I inferred, that he must have been a citizen either by birth or service. But in the parish books I could find no notice of his baptism; as his parents were dissenters.

[2] In his preface to More Reformation, De Foe complains, that some dissenters had reproached him, as if he had said, "that the gallows and the galleys ought to be the penalty of going to the conventicle; forgetting, that I must design to have my father, my wife, six innocent children, and myself, put into the same condition. To such dissenters I can only regret," says he, "that when I had drawn the picture, I did not, like the Dutchman with his man and bear, write under them, This is the man; and this is the bear." De Foe expressly admits that he was a dissenter, though no independent-fifth-monarchy man, or leveller. [De Foe, Works, edit. 1703. p. 326-448.] His grandfather, however, seems to have been of different feelings, as he kept a pack of hounds. From this fact it is inferred by his learned and laborious biographer Mr. Walter Wilson, that he was of the royal party, as the puritans did not indulge in that amusement; and also that he moved in a respectable station of life. De Foe himself thus alludes to his grandfather [Review, vol. vii. preface], "I remember my grandfather had a huntsman that used the same familiarity with his dogs, and he had his Roundhead and his Cavalier, his Goring and his Waller, and all the generals of both armies were hounds in his pack, till the times turning, the old gentleman was fain to scatter the pack and make them up of more doglike surnames." It seems also probable, that the property to which De Foe alludes as possessed by himself, was inherited from this grandfather. "I have both a native and an acquired right of election in more than one place in Britain, and as such am a part of the body that honourable house (of commons) represents, and from hence I believe may claim a right in due manner to represent, complain, address, or petition them." [Review, vol. vi. p. 477.] Mr. Wilson corrects the mistake of Mr. Chalmers and other biographers, as to the date of De Foe's birth, which really took place in 1661, and not as stated by them in 1663.—Ed.

[3] Works, 3rd. edit. vol. ii. p. 276. He was placed there when about fourteen years old, and appears to have been educated to his own satisfaction in afterlife. He described it as an academy where all the lectures, whether in philosophy or divinity, were given in English, and where consequently "though the scholars were not destitute of the languages, yet it is observed of them that they were by this made masters of the English tongue, and more of them excelled in that particular than of any school at that time." Certainly no man ever better understood how to use plain, racy, thorough English style, than De Foe. But still he was not deficient in learning. He boldly asserts himself on this point, in the passage from which Mr. Chalmers has made an extract in the text: "I have no concern to tell Dr. Browne I can read English, nor to tell Mr. Tutchin, I understand Latin; non ita Latinus, sum ut Latine loqui. I easily acknowledge myself blockhead enough to have lost the fluency of expression in the Latin, and so far trade has been a prejudice to me, and yet I think I owe this justice to my ancient father, still living (1705), and in whose behalf I freely testify, that if I am a blockhead, it was nobody's fault but my own; he having spared nothing in my education that might qualify me to match the accurate Dr. Browne, or the learned Observator. As to Mr. Tutchin, I never gave him the least affront; I have, even after base usage, in vain invited him to peace; in answer to which he returns unmannerly insults, calumnies, and reproach. As to my little learning, and his great capacity, I freely challenge him to translate with me any Latin, French, and Italian author, and after that, to retranslate them crossways, for 20l. each book; and by this he shall have an opportunity to show the world how much De Foe, the hosier, is inferior in learning to Mr. Tutchin, the gentleman." [Review vol. ii. p. 149.] He also vindicated Mr. Morton's academy from the charge made against it by the Rev. Samuel Wesley, father of the celebrated founder of Methodism, that antimonarchical and unconstitutional doctrines were taught there. De Foe especially denies this. His domestic education seems to have been according to the system then pursued by the strict and pious dissenters. He mentions that he began the task performed by many others of that then persecuted body, of copying the Bible in shorthand, and that he finished the Pentateuch. [Review vol. vi. p. 573.] He was intended for the ministry; but for what reason he relinquished that profession is not known. "It was his disaster," he says, "first, to be set apart for, and then to be set apart from, the honour of that sacred employ."—Ed.

[4] Review, vol. ii. p. 150.

[5] Appeal, p. 51. This was not the first occasion of his appearing in print. His earliest effort as an author was an answer to Roger L'Estrange's Guide to the Inferior Clergy, and was intituled, Speculum Crape Gownorum; or, A Looking-glass for the Young Academicks, new Foyl'd, with Reflections on some of the late high-flown Sermons; to which is added, An Essay towards a Sermon of the newest fashion. By a Guide to the Inferior Clergy. Ridentem discere verum, quis vitat? It was published in 1682. This work, as might be anticipated, was a satiric attack on the clergy of that day.

De Foe's object in the pamphlet mentioned in the text, was to assert the policy of defending the house of Austria, then closely and vigorously attacked by the Turks. The "prevailing sentiment," referred to by Mr. Chalmers, was a dissatisfaction with the emperor for his cruel persecution of the protestants in Hungary; and which carried the national feeling so far as to make any assistance rendered to the emperor, even against the threatening Turks, extremely unpopular. De Foe, then very young, took the field on the weaker side, and strenuously maintained the danger to Christendom arising from the Mahommedan power being allowed to enter Vienna. Happily, the courage of John Sobieski, king of Poland, prevented that, once imminent, danger. De Foe, in a late period of his life, thus refers to his conduct on this occasion. "The first time I had the misfortune to differ from my friends, was about the year 1683, when the Turks were besieging Vienna, and the whigs in England, generally speaking, were for the Turks taking it; whilst I, having read the history of the cruelty and perfidious dealings of the Turks in their wars, and how they had rooted out the name of the Christian religion in above threescore and ten kingdoms, could by no means agree with, and though then but a young man and a young author, I opposed it and wrote against it, which was taken very unkind indeed." [Vide Appeal to Honour and Justice.]—Ed.

[6] Appeal.

[7] The title of De Foe's pamphlet, or pamphlets, on this subject, does not seem to be known, but he more than once in afterlife proudly refers to his efforts on that important matter. "The next time I differed with my friends, was when king James was wheedling the dissenters to take off the penal laws and test, which I could by no means come into. And as in the first I used to say, I had rather the popish house of Austria should ruin the protestants in Hungary, than that the infidel house of Ottoman should ruin both protestant and papist, by overrunning Germany, so in the other I told the dissenters I had rather the Church of England should pull our clothes off by fines and forfeitures, than that the papists should fall both upon the church and the dissenters, and pull our skins off by fire and fagot." [Appeal to Honour and Justice.] And again: "I never would have had the dissenters to join with king James, to take off the penal laws and test. No; no: I thank God I was of age then to bear my testimony against it, and to affront some who were of a different opinion." [Review, vol. viii. p. 694.]—Ed.

[8] History, vol. ii. p. 37. The following is the passage in Oldmixon: "Their majesties, attended by their royal highnesses and a numerous train of nobility and gentry, went first to a balcony prepared for them at the Angel in Cheapside, to see the show; which for the great number of liverymen, the full appearance of the militia, and the artillery company, the rich adornments of the pageants, and the splendour and good order of the whole proceedings, outdid all that had been seen before, on that occasion; and what deserved to be particularly remembered, says a reverend historian, was a royal regiment of volunteer horse, made up of the chief citizens, who being gallantly mounted and richly accoutred, were led by the earl of Monmouth, now earl of Peterborough, and attended there majesties from Whitehall. Among these troopers, who were for the most part dissenters, was Daniel De Foe, at that time a hosier in Freeman's Yard, Cornhill." [History of England, vol. iii. p. 36.]

[9] Being reproached by Tutchin, in his Observator, with having been bred an apprentice to a hosier, De Foe asserts, in May, 1705, that he never was a hosier, or an apprentice, but admits that he had been a trader. [Review, vol. ii. p. 149.] Oldmixon, who never speaks favourably of De Foe, allows that he had never been a merchant, otherwise than peddling a little to Portugal. [Hist. vol. ii. p. 519.] But, peddling to Portugal makes a trader.

[10] These views of Mr. Chalmers seem confirmed by De Foe's own severe comments on the distraction caused to tradesmen by an over-indulgence in literary pursuits. In his Complete Tradesman, one of the most valuable practical books that was ever published, and which should be the manual of every young man beginning business, he says, "a wit turned tradesman! no apron-strings will hold him; it is in vain to lock him behind the counter, he is gone in a moment. Instead of journal and ledger, he runs away to his Virgil and Horace; his journal entries are all Pindarics, and his ledger is all heroics. He is truly dramatic from one end to the other through the whole scene of his trade; and as the first part is all comedy, so the two last acts are always made up with tragedy; a statute of bankrupt is his exeunt omnes, and he generally repeats the epilogue in the Fleet prison or the Mint." [See ante, vol. xvii.] He is also very severe against tradesmen who are led away into expensive pleasures and idle company. But Mr. Wilson vindicates De Foe, in some degree, by showing from his own statements that he had been the victim of the fraud of others, as well as of his own imprudent habits. In one of the Reviews, [vol. iii. p. 70.] he says, that "nothing was more frequent than for a man in full credit to buy all the goods he could lay his hands on, and carry them directly from the house he bought them at into the Fryars, and then send for his creditors, and laugh at them, insult them, showing them their own goods untouched, offer them a trifle in satisfaction, and if they refuse it, bid them defiance. I cannot refrain vouching this of my own knowledge, since I have more than many times been served so myself." Certainly under such a monstrous system of abuse, an honest tradesman must have been at great disadvantage.—Ed.

[11] The Mercator, No. 101.

[12] Reply to Lord Haversham's Vindication.

[13] Mr. Wilson has some valuable observations on this subject, which justice to the memory of De Foe requires us to transcribe. "The failure of this speculation seems to have been owing rather to the want of encouragement upon the part of the public, than to any imprudence in the projector. Pantiles had been hitherto a Dutch manufacture, and were brought in large quantities to England. To supersede the necessity of their importation, and to provide a new channel for the employment of labour, the works at Tilbury were laudably erected; and De Foe tells us that he employed a hundred poor labourers in the undertaking. The capital embarked in the concern must also have been considerable; for he informs us that his own loss by its failure was no less a sum than three thousand pounds. But besides so serious a misfortune to himself, it was no less so to the public; not only by the failure of an ingenious manufacture, but for the sake of the numerous families supported by it, who were now turned adrift in the world, or thrown upon some other branch of trade. De Foe continued the pantile works it is believed until the year 1703, when he was prosecuted by the government for a libel, and being deprived of his liberty the undertaking soon came to an end." Mr. Wilson adds an extract from one of the Reviews, (March, 1705,) in which De Foe indignantly refers to this undertaking and its calamitous issue. "Nor should the author of this paper boast in vain, if he tells the world that he himself, before violence, injury, and barbarous treatment destroyed him and his undertaking, employed a hundred poor people in making pantiles in England, a manufacture always bought in Holland; and thus he pursued this principle with his utmost zeal for the good of England; and those gentlemen who so easily persecuted him for saying what all the world since owns to be true, and which he has since a hundred times offered to prove, were particularly serviceable to the nation, in turning that hundred of poor people and their families a begging for work, and forcing them to turn other poor families out of work to make room for them, besides three thousand pounds damage to the author of this, which he has paid for this little experience."—Ed.

[14] The sentence in italics is part of the passage in De Foe's Appeal to Honour and Justice, (in which he gives a summary of his life, and vindicates his conduct throughout it,) which particularly refers to this period. We give the whole. "Misfortunes in business having unhinged me from matters of trade; it was about the year 1694, when I was invited by some merchants with whom I had corresponded abroad, and some also at home, to settle at Cadiz, in Spain; and that with the offer of very good commissions. But Providence, which had other work for me to do, placed a secret aversion in my mind to quitting England upon any account, and made me refuse the best offers of that kind, to be concerned with some eminent persons at home, in proposing ways and means to the government for raising money to supply the occasions of the war, then newly begun." [Vide Appeal to Honour and Justice.]

[15] Besides the topics mentioned by Mr. Chalmers, De Foe suggests various improvements in road-making, and an asylum for idiots. He also warmly advocates a great improvement in the system of education, and especially of females. Before the publication of the next work mentioned by Mr. Chalmers, De Foe took part in a controversy then very warmly agitated, viz., of Occasional Conformity. The Dissenters differed on this subject; one party being willing to comply outwardly with the ceremonies of the church, when in certain offices, and the other party objecting to that compliance as a sinful and dastardly desertion from their principles of dissent. De Foe adopted the latter view, and, in 1697, maintained it with his accustomed warmth, in An Inquiry into the Occasional Conformity of Dissenters in Parliament. He also vigorously took the field against the vices and social abuses of the times; and, in 1698, published The Poor Man's Plea in relation to all the Proclamations, Declarations, Acts of Parliament, &c., which have been or shall be made or published, for a Reformation of Manners, and suppressing Immorality in the Nation.—Ed.

[16] 10 and 11 Wm. III. ch. 18.

[17] De Foe says himself, that he had published nine editions fairly printed upon good paper, and sold at the price of one shilling, and that it had been printed twelve times by other persons without his concurrence. We must presume it to have produced a great effect. De Foe himself says, many years afterwards, "National mistakes, vulgar errors, and even a general practice, have been reformed by a just satire. None of our countrymen have been known to boast of being true-born Englishmen, or so much as to use the word as a title or appellation, ever since a late satire upon that national folly was published, though almost thirty years ago. Nothing was more frequent in our mouths before that, nothing so universally blushed and laughed at since. The time I believe is yet to come for any author to print it, or any man of sense to speak of it in earnest; whereas before you had it in the best writers, and in the most florid speeches before the most august assemblies, upon the most solemn occasions." [Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed, p. 400.] The object of the poem is thus stated by the author in the preface: "The intent of the satire is pointed at the vanity of those who talk of their antiquity, and value themselves upon their pedigree, and being true-born; whereas it is impossible we should be true-born; and if we could, should have lost by the bargain. These sort of people who call themselves true-born, and tell long stories of their families, and like a nobleman of Venice, think a foreigner ought not to walk on the same side of the street with them, are owned to be meant in this satire. What they would infer from their long original, I know not, nor is it easy to make out, whether they are the better or the worse for their ancestors. Our English nation may value themselves for their wit, wealth, and courage, and I believe few nations will dispute it with them; but for long originals and ancient true-born families, I would advise them to waive the discourse. A true Englishman is one who deserves a character, and I have nowhere lessened him that I know of."—Ed.

[18] p. 13. We add the remaining part of this passage, which is extracted by Mr. Chalmers from the Appeal to Honour and Justice; "And is only mentioned here as I take all occasions to do, for the expressing the honour I ever preserved for the immortal and glorious memory of that greatest and best of princes, and whom it was my honour and advantage to call master as well as sovereign, whose goodness to me I never forget, and whose memory I never patiently heard abused, and never can do so; and who, had he lived, would never have suffered me to be treated as I have been in this world."—Ed.

[19] This pamphlet was published before the poem of the True-born Englishman, viz., in 1698, and was an answer to one by Mr. Trenchard, "showing that a standing army is inconsistent with a free government, and absolutely destructive to the constitution of the English monarchy." It is supposed that De Foe wrote another pamphlet on this subject, entituled, Some Reflections on a pamphlet lately published, entituled, &c. (Mr. Trenchard's pamphlet.) 1697. But there is great doubt as to this work being De Foe's.—Ed.

[20] Subsequently to the publication of the pamphlet referred to in the text, in the year 1700, the indefatigable De Foe was again in the political arena. The Spanish king had just died, bequeathing the crown to the duke of Anjou, grandson of Lewis XIV. and Europe was anxiously awaiting the French monarch's decision. He subsequently broke through the partition treaty, and placed his grandson on the throne of Spain. In the meanwhile, however De Foe published, a pamphlet, entituled, The Two Great Questions Considered: 1. What the French king will do with respect to the Spanish monarchy? 2. What measures the English ought to take. In the same year, he published The Danger of the Protestant Religion, from the present Prospect of a Religious War in Europe. His object is to point out the powerful front presented by the popish party, and to warn and arouse England to the danger and defence of protestantism.—Ed.

[21] Mr. Polhill, of Cheapstead-place, in Kent, whose father, Mr. David Polhill, was committed to the Gatehouse, and thereby gained great popularity, was so good as to communicate to me the curious anecdote of De Foe's dressing himself in women's clothes, and presenting the Legion paper to the speaker. De Foe says himself in his Original Power of the People, p. 24: "this is evident from the tenor and yet undiscovered original of the Legion paper; the contents of which had so much plain truth of fact; and which I could give a better history of, if it were needful." When De Foe republished his works, in 1703, he thought it prudent to expunge this passage, that too plainly pointed out the real history of the Legion paper, which is not mentioned by the Commons Journals. Mr. Wilson thinks Mr. Chalmers mistaken in supposing that De Foe delivered the petition disguised as a woman. He says, "such a report was certainly current at the time, but the true history of it seems to be that which is related in the history of the Kentish petition; it was said it was delivered to the speaker by a woman, but I have been informed since, that it was a mistake, and it was delivered by the very person who wrote it, guarded by about sixteen gentlemen of quality, who if any notice had been taken of him, were ready to have carried him off by force." The Remonstration is too long a paper to be here reprinted, but the general tone and object of it will be gathered by the conclusion. "We do hereby claim and declare:—

"1. That it is the undoubted right of the people of England, in case their representatives in parliament do not proceed according to their duty, and the people's interest, to inform them of their dislike, disown their actions, and direct them to such things as they think fit, either by petition, address, proposal, memorial, or any other peaceable way.

"2. That the house of commons, separately, and otherwise than by bill legally passed into an act, have no legal power to suspend or dispense with the laws of the land, any more than the king has by his prerogative.

"3. That the house of commons has no legal power to imprison any person, or commit them to custody of sergeants, or otherwise, (their own members excepted,) but ought to address the king, to cause any person, on good grounds, to be apprehended, which person so apprehended, ought to have the benefit of the Habeas Corpus act, and be fairly brought to trial by due course of law.

"4. That, if the house of commons, in breach of the laws and liberties of the people, do betray the trust reposed in them, and act negligently, or arbitrarily and illegally, it is the undoubted right of the people of England, to call them to an account for the same, and by convention, assembly, or force, may proceed against them as traitors and betrayers of their country.

"These things we think proper to declare, as the unquestionable right of the people of England, whom you serve, and in pursuance of that right, (avoiding the ceremony of petitioning our inferiors, for such you are by your present circumstances, as the person sent is less than the sender,) we do publicly protest against all your aforesaid illegal actions, and in the name of ourselves, and of all the good people of England, do require and demand:—

"1. That all the public just debts of the nation be forthwith paid and discharged.

"2. That all persons illegally imprisoned, as aforesaid, be either immediately discharged, or admitted to bail, as by law they ought to be; and the liberty of the subject recognised and restored.

"3. That John Home, aforesaid, be obliged to ask his majesty's pardon for his vile reflections, or be immediately expelled the house.

"4. That the growing power of France be taken into consideration; the succession of the emperor to the crown of Spain supported; our protestant neighbours protected, as the interest of England and the protestant religion requires.

"5. That the French king be obliged to quit Flanders, or his majesty be addressed to declare war against him.

"6. That suitable supplies be granted to his majesty for the putting all these necessary things in execution, and that care be taken that such taxes as are raised, may be more equally assessed and collected, and scandalous deficiences prevented.

"7. That the thanks of this house may be given to those gentlemen who so gallantly appeared in the behalf of their country with the Kentish petition, and have been so scandalously used for it.

"Thus, gentlemen, you have your duty laid before you, which it is hoped you will think of; but if you continue to neglect it, you may expect to be treated according to the resentment of an injured nation; for Englishmen are no more to be slaves to parliaments, than to kings.

"Our name is Legion, and we are Many."

De Foe seems to have written a History of the Kentish Petition. And in the following year, 1702, he is supposed to have written Legion's Newspaper; being a Second Memorial to the Gentlemen of the late House of Commons.—Ed.

[22] This pamphlet was in reply to sir Humphrey Mackworth's Vindication of the Rights of the Commons of England; and recent events, arising out of Stockdale's proceedings against Mr. Hansard for publishing a report of the house of commons, have made both sir Humphrey's and De Foe's pamphlets extremely interesting to the political world. De Foe maintains four general propositions as the foundation of his argument.

"1. That all government is instituted for the protection of the governed.

"2. That its constituent members, whether king, lords, or commons, if they invert the great end of their institution, the public good, cease to be; and power retreats to its original.

"3. That no collective or representative body of men whatever, in matters of politics or religion, have been infallible.

"4. That reason is the test and touchstone of laws, which cease to be binding, and become void, when contradictory to reason." He also maintains that no power has a right to dispense with the laws, and deduces that when such a right is assumed by either of the three powers, the constitution suffers a convulsion, and is dissolved of course. This tract has had considerable reputation. Mr. Wilson tells us, "that during the contest between the house of commons and the celebrated Mr. Wilkes, who was refused his seat, although repeatedly returned by his constituents, it was judged seasonable to reprint this work. It was accordingly published in 8vo. in 1769, by R. Baldwin, accompanied by some distinguished characters of a parliament man, by the same author, and is stated in the title-page to be the third edition. Prefixed to the work is a spirited dedication to the right honourable the lord mayor, the aldermen, and commons, of the city of London." [The dedication, amongst other things, states, "the reprinting of this excellent piece of the celebrated Daniel De Foe, who seems to have understood as well as any man the civil constitution of the kingdom, wherein the nature of our own constitution is set in the clearest light, upon self-evident principles, and the original power of the collective body of the people asserted, seemed to be altogether seasonable and fitting. It is with propriety addressed to the body of men which has always stood, like Mars in the gap, against all encroachments on the liberties of the people, and to which the nation hitherto owes its freedom and prosperity," &c.] The chief magistrate at that time was the patriotic alderman Beckford, who has a noble statue erected by his fellow-citizens in their Guildhall, to commemorate his worth. De Foe's work was reprinted, for the fourth time, at the logographic press, and included in the "Selection" from his writings published by the late Mr. John Walker, in 1790. [Life of De Foe, vol. i. p. 436.]

[23] This pamphlet was published before the events mentioned in the preceding paragraph of the text. It was preceded by another pamphlet of our indefatigable author, entituled, Six Distinguishing Characters of a Parliament man. As the pamphlets of De Foe illustrate not only the character of the author, but the spirit of the times, we give a summary of the 'Distinguishing characteristics' of the member of the house, desired by De Foe. 1. He must be a thorough partisan of the revolution, neither papist nor Jacobite. 2. A man of religion, of orthodox principles, and moral practice. 3. "A parliament man," says the sensible and experienced author, "ought to be a man of general knowledge, acquainted with the true interest of his country as to trade, liberties, laws, and common circumstances, especially of that part of it for which he serves. He ought to know how to deliver his mind with freedom and boldness, and pertinently to the case; to understand when our liberties are encroached upon, and be able to defend them: and to distinguish between a prince, who is faithful to liberty, and the interest of his country, and one whose business it is to invade both liberty and property." 4. He should be a man in years. 5. And of thorough honesty. 6. And of morals. This pamphlet was followed by the one mentioned in the text, and that again almost immediately by The Villany of Stock-jobbers detected; and the Cause of the late Run upon the Banks and Bankers discovered and considered.—Ed.

[24] The author of De Foe's life in the Biographia Britannica, Dr. Towers, says, "in this piece De Foe wrote against the views and conduct of the court, and against what then seemed to be the prevailing sentiment of the nation. He appears however to have been perfectly right, to have exhibited on this occasion great political discernment, and to have been influenced by no motives but those of public spirit." Many opponents entered the field against De Foe upon this subject.—Ed.

[25] De Foe frequently vindicates the memory of William III., but more especially in his Reviews. In 1702, he published The Mock Mourners, a satire by way of elegy on king William. By the author of the True-born Englishman. De Foe's summary of William III.'s character in the reviews is as follows:—

"It may, perhaps, be thought by some people a digression too remote from my present pursuit, when I launch out into the crimes of a party; but, if I am carried into extremes when the memory of king William is touched, I am altogether careless of making an excuse; and I acknowledge myself less master of my temper in that case, than in anything I can be touched in besides. The memory of that glorious monarch is so dear, and so valuable in the hearts of all true protestants, that have a sense both of what they escaped and what they enjoy by his hand, that it is difficult to retain any charity for their principles that can forget the obligation. His name is a word of congratulation; and 'The immortal memory of king William,' will be a health, as long as drinking healths is suffered in this part of the world.

"Let the ungrateful wretch that forgets what God wrought by his hand, look back upon popery coming in like a flood; property trampled underfoot; all sorts of cruelties and butcheries in practice in Scotland, and approaching in England! Let him review the insolence of the soldiery, the inveteracy of the court party, the tyranny, perjury, and avarice of governors; and at the foot of the account let him write, Delivered by king William. Then let him look back on the prince: How great, how splendid, how happy, how rich, how easy, and how justly valued by friends and enemies! He lived before in the field glorious, feared by enemies of his country, loved by the soldiery, having a vast inheritance of his own, governor of a rich state, blessed with the best of consorts, and as far as this life could give, completely happy. Compare this with the gaudy crown we gave him. Had a visible scheme been laid with it, of all the uneasinesses, dangers, crosses, disappointments, and dark prospects which that prince found with it, no wise man would have taken it off the dunghill, or come out of gaol to be master of it.

"Unhappy Englishmen! Is this the man you reproach? Had he any failing but that he bare too much with the most barbarous usage in the world? Had he not the most merit and the worst treatment that ever king in England met with?

"Who can hear men tell us, they helped to make him king, and were not considered for it? You helped to make him king! Pray what merit do you plead, and from whom was the debt? You helped to make him king? That is, you helped to save your country, and ruin him; you helped to recover your own liberties and those of your posterity, as you ought to have been blasted from heaven if you had not, and now you claim rewards from him! I will tell you how he rewarded you fully: he rewarded you by sacrificing his peace, his comfort, his fortune, and his country, to support you. He died a thousand times in the chagrin, vexation, and perplexity he had from the unkindness and treachery of his friends, and the numberless hazards of the field against the enemy. And yet all would not satisfy a craving generation, an insatiable party, who thought all the taxes raised for the war, given, not to the nation, but to the king, and endeavoured to blot the best character in the world with the crimes of those whom they themselves recommended him to trust." [Review, 1707, vol. iv. p. 77.]

[26] See note [15], p. 11-12.

[27] Life of Mr. John How, p. 210.

[28] A Letter to Mr. How, by way of Reply to his Considerations, &c. 1701.

[29] De Foe afterwards described the effect produced by this book. "The soberer churchmen, whose principles were founded on charity, and who had their eye upon the laws and constitution of their country, as that to which their own liberties were annexed, though they still believed the book to be written by a high-churchman, yet openly exclaimed against the proposal, condemned the warmth that appeared in the clergy against their brethren, and openly professed that such a man as Sacheverell and his brethren would blow up the foundations of the church. But either side had scarce time to discover their sentiments, when the book appeared to have been written by a dissenter; that it was designed in derision of the standard held up by Sacheverell and others; that it was a satire upon the fury of the churchmen, and a plot to make the rest discover themselves. Nothing was more strange than to see the effect upon the whole nation which this little book, a contemptible pamphlet of but three sheets of paper, had, and in so short a time too. The most forward, hot, and furious, as well among the clergy as others, blushed when they reflected how far they had applauded the book; raged that such an abuse should be put upon the church; and as they were obliged to damn the book, so they were strangely hampered between the doing so, and pursuing the rage at the dissenters. The greater part, the better to qualify themselves to condemn the author, came earnestly in to condemn the principle; for it was impossible to do one without the other. They laboured incessantly, both in print and in pulpit, to prove that this was a horrible slander upon the church. But this still answered the author's end the more; for they could never clear the church of the slander, without openly condemning the practice; nor could they possibly condemn the practice without censuring those clergymen who had gone such a length already as to say the same thing in print. Nor could all their rage at the author of that book contribute anything to clear them, but still made the better side the worse. It was plain they had owned the doctrine, had preached up the necessity of expelling and rooting out the dissenters in their sermons and printed pamphlets; that it was evident they had applauded the book itself, till they knew the author; and there was no other way to prevent the odium falling on the whole body of the church of England, but by giving up the authors of those mad principles, and openly professing moderate principles themselves." [Present State of Parties, p. 18.]

[30] On the 25th of February, 1702-3, a complaint was made in the house of commons, of a book entituled The Shortest Way with the Dissenters: and the folios 11-18 and 26 being read, resolved, That this book, being full of false and scandalous reflections on this parliament, and tending to promote sedition, be burnt by the hands of the common hangman, to-morrow, in New Palace-yard. 14 Jour. p. 207.

[31] He who is desirous of reading the proclamation, may be gratified by the following copy from the London gazette, No. 3879:—

"St. James's, Jan. 10th, 1702-3.

"Whereas Daniel De Foe, alias De Fooe, is charged with writing a scandalous and seditious pamphlet, entituled The Shortest Way with the Dissenters: he is a middle-sized spare man, about forty years old, of a brown complexion, and dark-brown coloured hair, but wears a wig, a hooked nose, a sharp chin, grey eyes, and a large mole near his mouth; was born in London, and for many years was a hose-factor, in Freeman's-yard, in Cornhill, and now is owner of the brick and pantile Works near Tilbury-fort, in Essex: whoever shall discover the said Daniel De Foe to one of her majesty's principal secretaries of state, or any of her majesty's justices of peace, so as he may be apprehended, shall have a reward of fifty pounds, which her majesty has ordered immediately to be paid upon such discovery."

[32] The next paragraph of the passage further explains De Foe's object. "The 'Sermon preached at Oxford,' the 'New Association,' the 'Poetical Observator,' with numberless others, have said the same things in terms very little darker; and this book stands fair to let these gentlemen know, that what they design can no further take with mankind, than as their real meaning stands disguised by artifice of words; but that, when the persecution and destruction of the dissenters, the very thing they drive at, is put into plain English, the whole nation will start other notions, and condemn the author to be hanged for his impudence. He humbly hopes, he shall find no harder treatment for plain English without design, than those gentlemen for their plain design, in duller and darker English. The meaning then of the paper is, in short, to tell these gentlemen that it is nonsense to go round about and tell us of the crimes of the dissenters, to prepare the world to believe they are not fit to live in a human society; that they are enemies to the government and the laws, to the queen, and the public peace, and the like; the shortest way and the soonest, would be to tell us plainly, that they would have them all hanged, banished, and destroyed."

[33] At his trial he was treated by the then attorney-general, sir Simon Harcourt, in the style of sir Edward Coke. He complained himself bitterly of the conduct of his own counsel. He was sentenced to pay a fine of two hundred marks to the queen, to stand three times in the pillory, be imprisoned during the queen's pleasure, and find sureties for his good behaviour during seven years! Well may the learned and candid biographer, in the Biographia Britannia, exclaim, "The very infamous sentence reflected much more dishonour upon the court by which it was pronounced, than upon De Foe upon whom it was inflicted." But when he stood in the pillory, instead of suffering an ignominious punishment, he appears rather to have enjoyed a striking triumph. He says, "The people, who were expected to treat him very ill, on the contrary, pitied him, and wished those who set him there were placed in his room, and expressed their affections by loud shouts and acclamations when he was taken down." [Consolidator.]

[34] The Hymn was published in 1703, and ran rapidly through several editions. In 1702, before his prosecution, he published a satiric poem on the vices of the age, entitled "Reformation of Manners." During his imprisonment, he continued the subject in another poem, entituled, "More Reformation. A Satire upon himself."—Ed.

[35] The collection contains the following pieces: 1. The True-born Englishman. 2. The Mock Mourners. 3. Reformation of Manners. 4. Character of Dr. Annesley. 5. The Spanish Descent. 6. Original Power of the People of England. 7. The Freeholders' Plea. 8. Reasons against a War with France. 9. Argument on a Standing Army. 10. Danger of the Protestant Religion. 11. Villany of Stock-jobbers. 12. Six Distinguishing Characters of a Parliament Man. 13. Poor Man's Plea. 14. Inquiry into Occasional Conformity; with a Preface to Mr. How. 15. Letter to Mr. How, by way of Reply to his Considerations on the Preface. 16. Two Great Questions considered. 17. Two Great Questions further considered. 18. Inquiry into Occasional Conformity. 19. New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty. 20. Shortest Way with the Dissenters. 21. Brief Explanation of the Shortest Way. 22. Shortest Way to Peace and Union. In the year 1705, another and fuller edition of his works was published. In 1703, and before the publication of the Review, next referred to by Mr. Chalmers, De Foe wrote More Short Ways with the Dissenters, a pamphlet chiefly intended to vindicate the system of education then pursued among the dissenters, and which had been impugned for its alleged disloyalty by the Rev. Samuel Wesley. It was in this work that De Foe so generously alluded to his old master, Mr. Morton, in the passage we have referred to, supra, p. 3, note [2]. During his confinement he engaged with his usual warmth in the controversies of that time. The old dispute of Occasional Conformity still occupied him. He replied to Mr. Owen's pamphlet, Moderation a Virtue, &c., in The Sincerity of the Dissenters vindicated from the Scandal of Occasional Conformity; with some Considerations on a late book, entituled, Moderation a Virtue. 1703. Several other controvertists took the field. In the course of the same year, anxious to put an end if possible to the furious disputes between the church and dissenters, he published, A Challenge of Peace, addressed to the whole Nation, with an Inquiry into Ways and Means of bringing it to pass; and afterwards replied to sir Humphrey Mackworth's Peace at Home, in a pamphlet entituled, Peace without Union. He also reasserted the great principles advocated in his former work on the Original Power of the People, in another published in 1704, which he called Original Right: or the Reasonableness of Appeals to the People: being an Answer to the First Chapter in Dr. Davenant's Essays, entituled, Peace at Home and War Abroad. In this same year, 1704, he had again to vindicate the dissenters, which he did in his pamphlet, The Dissenters' Answer to the High Church Challenge; and honoured the memory of his royal benefactor, William III., by bearing his testimony to his religious principles, which he did in a pamphlet entitled, Royal Religion. He also maintained the claims of the Scotch dissenters, in a pamphlet called The Liberty of Episcopal Dissenters in Scotland truly stated, 1703. And he had to wield his unwearied pen on behalf of the Irish dissenters, against a bill introduced avowedly to prevent the growth of popery, in which were contained some stringent provisions against the protestant dissenters. De Foe ironically headed his pamphlet, The Parallel: or Persecution of Protestants the Shortest Way to prevent the Growth of Popery in Ireland. 1704.—Ed.

[36] Mr. Wilson observes of the Review, "That it did not outlive its day, may be attributed to the great proportion of temporary matter with which it abounded. There are to be found in its pages, however, many instructive pieces of a moral and political nature, besides others devoted to amusement, and also some useful historical documents. A complete copy of the work is not known to be in existence. It deserves to be remarked that De Foe was the sole writer of the nine quarto volumes that compose the work, a prodigious undertaking for one man, especially when we consider his other numerous engagements of a literary nature." Mr. Wilson then refers to an able eulogium by Dr. Drake. [Essays on the Tatler, vol. i. p. 23.] "Contemporary with Leslies' Remains, came forward, under a periodical dress, and of a kind far superior to anything which had hitherto appeared, the Review of Daniel De Foe, a man of undoubted genius, and who, deviating from the accustomed route, had chalked out a new path for himself. The chief topics were as usual, news foreign and domestic, and politics; to these, however, were added the various concerns of trade; and to render the undertaking more palatable and popular, he with much judgment instituted what he termed, perhaps with no great propriety, a 'Scandal Club,' and whose amusement it was to agitate questions in divinity, morals, war, language, poetry, love, marriage, &c. The introduction of this club, and the subjects of its discussion, it is obvious approximated the Review much nearer than any preceding work to our first classical model." The first number of the Review was published Feb. 19th, 1704, as A Weekly Review of the Affairs of France, purged from the Errors and Partiality of Newswriters and Petty Statesmen of all sides. It was at first a weekly publication, but afterwards came out twice a week, as it was changed to half a sheet from a whole one. The price was one penny. Mr. Wilson, in his valuable Life of De Foe, gives long extracts from the Review, a work, he observes, now very difficult to be met with. "A considerable portion of the first volume," observes that gentleman, "is devoted to foreign politics, more particularly the power and grandeur of the French monarchy, for the reduction of which within reasonable limits the principal nations of Europe were then embroiled in an expensive war. In estimating the powers and resources of France, which had attained their summit under Louis XIV., he was anxious to guard his countrymen against the folly of despising such an enemy." Mr. Wilson then gives copious and interesting extracts from the Review, to which we must refer the reader to his able biography, [vol. ii. ch. 10.] The volume closed in one hundred and two numbers, in February, 1705, and had the following title prefixed: A Review of the Affairs of France, and of all Europe, as influenced by that Nation: being Historical Observations on the Public Transactions of the World; purged from the Errors and Partiality of Newswriters and Petty Statesmen of all sides. With an Entertaining Part in every sheet; being Advice from the Scandal Club to the Curious Inquirers, in answer to Letters sent them for that purpose.

[37] The following is the account of this storm by a contemporary historian:—

"About the middle of the night, a violent wind arose, which blew down the steeples of churches, tore off the tiles, and rolled up the leads of houses, tossing them through the air to great distances, rooted up the largest trees, or broke them off short, carried hayricks and stacks of corn to great heights, scattered them abroad, and beat down the chimneys in divers places, to the destruction of many people in the towns. The ships which lay in the mouth of the Thames and other parts, were driven foul of one another. The sailors, not knowing what to avoid, or which way to steer, abandoned themselves to despair, expecting every moment to be their last. Some ships having broke their cables, and lost their anchors, drove before the wind, without helm or steerage, and either dashed one another to pieces, or were swallowed up in the raging deep. Some were driven out to sea, without any rigging; and others run upon the sands, rocks, and shores. The admiral was driven to sea without mast or anchor, from the Downs, and lost together with his ship; and other ships which had been in his squadron were driven to the coast of Holland in five hours' time, with their masts broken, without any art or direction, and others to other places. The watch-towers, with the watchmen, were overthrown together; and the destruction which this storm occasioned was long remembered with awe and horror. In the space of one tempestuous night, a gallant English fleet was reduced to nothing: and it is incredible what a dismal appearance there was at London and other towns. The mathematicians observed that the force of this tempest did not extend further south than the river Loire, in France, nor further north than the river Trent, in England." [Cunningham, vol. i. p. 356.]

[38] By his Appeal, in 1715.

[39] Before the publication of this Hymn, he published a poem on himself, An Elegy on the Author of the True-born Englishman. In the preface to this poem he bitterly complains of the slanders to which he was constantly subject. He might have reflected, however, that such a fate was unavoidable to a political writer in those factious times; and that the more independent the author, the more likely he was to be exposed to the double shafts of partisan malice.—Ed.

[40] It was not on this occasion, but for one of the Reviews published in 1707, in which, he criticises the apparent supineness of Charles XII.—Ed.

[41] The title of a pamphlet published by a Dr. Browne.

[42] The recent discussion of the Poor Law Amendment Act has thrown much additional light on this question. During this year, in addition to the works mentioned by Mr. Chalmers, De Foe advocated the rights of Dissenters in the colony of Carolina, in America, where they had been hardly treated; first deprived of a seat in the house of assembly, and then subjected to stringent laws. De Foe, while their affairs were being made matter of discussion in parliament, published Party Tyranny; or an Occasional Bill in Miniature, as now practised in Carolina. Humbly offered to the Consideration of both Houses of Parliament.—Ed.

[43] The motion of lord Haversham in the house of lords, was to request the queen to invite over the presumptive heir to the crown, which would have produced the mischief of two rival courts. De Foe in this pamphlet gives us one of those passages so extremely interesting, being a sketch of his own life by himself. "If I were to run through the black list of the encouragements I have met with in the world, while I have embarked myself in the raging sea of the nation's troubles, this vindication would be ashamed to call them encouragements. How, in pursuit of peace, I have brought myself into innumerable broils; how many, exasperated by the sting of truth, have vowed my destruction; and how many ways attempted it; how I stand alone in the world, abandoned by those very people that own I have done them service; how I am sold and betrayed by friends, abused and cheated by barbarous and unnatural relations, sued for other men's debts, and stripped naked by public injustice, of what should have enabled me to pay my own; how, with a numerous family, and with no helps but my own industry, I have forced my way with undiscouraged diligence, through a sea of debt and misfortune, and reduced them, exclusive of composition, from seventeen to less than five thousand pounds; how, in gaols, in retreats, in all manner of extremities, I have supported myself without the assistance of friends or relations; how I still live without this Vindicator's suggested methods, and am so far from making my fortune by this way of scribbling, that no man more desires a limitation and regulation of the press than myself; especially that speeches in parliament might not be printed without order of parliament, and poor authors betrayed to engage with men too powerful for them in more forcible arguments than those of reason. A man ought not to be afraid at any time to be mean to be honest. Pardon me, therefore, with some warmth, to say, that neither the Vindicator, nor all his informers, can, with their utmost inquiry, make it appear that I am, or ever was, mercenary. And as there is a justice due from all men, of what dignity or quality soever, the wrong done me in this can be vindicated by nothing but proving the fact, which I am a most humble petitioner that he would be pleased to do, or else give me leave to speak of it in such terms as so great an injury demands. No, my lord, pardon my freedom, I contemn and abhor everything and every man that can be taxed with that name, let his dignity be what it will. I was ever true to one principle; I never betrayed my master or my friend; I always espoused the cause of truth and liberty, was ever on one side, and that side was ever right. I have lived to be ruined for it; and I lived to see it triumph over tyranny, party-rage, and persecution principles, and am sorry to see any man abandon it. I thank God this world cannot bid a price sufficient to bribe me. It is the principle I ever lived by, and shall espouse while I live, that a man ought to die rather than betray his friend, his cause, or his master."—Ed.

[44] 9 Anne, c. 19.

[45] The pieces in this volume are: 1. New Discovery of an Old Intrigue. 2. More Reformation. 3. Elegy on the Author of the True-born Englishman. 4. The Storm: an Essay. 5. A Hymn to the Pillory. 6. Hymn to Victory. 7. The Pacificator. 8. The Double Welcome to the Duke of Marlborough. 9. Dissenters' Answer to the High Church Challenge. 10. A Challenge of Peace to the whole Nation. 11. Peace without Union. 12. More Short Ways. 13. New Test of the Church of England's Honesty. 14. Serious Inquiry. 15. The Dissenters Misrepresented. 16. The Parallel. 17. Giving Alms no Charity. 18. Royal Religion.

[46] In the year 1705, he also published a satirical poem, entituled, The Dyet of Poland: printed at Dantzick. He sketches the leading politicians of the day under Polish names; William III. being represented as Sobieski. He also published A True Relation, of the Apparition of one Mrs. Veal, the next day after her death, to one Mrs. Bargrave, at Canterbury, the 8th of Sept. 1705, which Apparition recommends the perusal of Drelincourt's Book of Consolation against the Fear of Death. This work it is said was written by De Foe to make Drelincourt's sell, which was before a heavy book in the market, and of course produced the desired effect. The future author of Robinson Crusoe may be distinctly seen in this work. Sir Walter Scott considered it one of his happiest efforts, and marked with the distinct impress of De Foe. He observes "that De Foe has put in force within those few pages, peculiar specimens of his art of recommending the most improbable narrative by his specious and serious mode of telling it. Whoever will read it as told by De Foe himself, will agree that could the thing have happened in reality, so it would have been told. In short, the whole is so distinctly circumstantial, that were it not for the impossibility, or extreme improbability at least, of such an occurrence, the evidence could not but support the story." In this year the second volume of the Review was completed. The early part of it refers to matters of trade, which he says he had intended to write more fully upon, but was diverted by domestic affairs; and that his labours in behalf of peace had given great satisfaction.—Ed.

[47] Published the 10th of January, 1705-6. In May, 1706, he published a poem on the duke of Marlborough's great victory, entituled, On the Fight of Ramillies.

[48] It was partly republished in 1821, by Mr. Hone; who says in the preface, "De Foe was the ablest politician of his day, an energetic writer, and, better than all, an honest man; but not much of a poet. The Jure Divino is defective in argument and versification. It is likewise disfigured by injudicious repetitions; a large portion is directed to the politics of the time, and it is otherwise unfit for republication entire; but it abounds with energetic thoughts, forcible touches, and happy illustrations."—Ed.

[49] Appeal, p. 16.

[50] See his History of the Union, p. 401.

[51] Ibid. p. 379.

[52] Daniel De Foe. He had two names through life; and even when letters of administration were granted on his personal estate, some time after his death, De Foe is added with an otherwise. We might thence infer that his father's name was Foe, if we had not now better evidence of the fact.

[53] Ibid. p. 223.

[54] History of the Union, p. 239.

[55] Dr. Towers says, [Biograph. Brit.] "In this poem De Foe celebrates the courage of the Scots, and enumerates some of their military exploits. He endeavours to prove that the situation of Scotland rendered it well adapted for trade; he speaks honourably of the abilities of the inhabitants; he commends them for their learning, and their attention to religion; and he hints at the advantages which they might derive from a union with England. But though De Foe's poem was a panegyric upon Scotland and Scotsmen, it did not wholly consist of commendation. He takes notice of the evils that the common people suffered from their vassalage to their chiefs, and from their ignorance of the blessings of liberty. He also censures the Scots for not improving the natural advantages which their country possessed, and for neglecting their fishery; and he gives them some excellent advice." In 1707, he published a tract called, A Voice from the South; or an Address from some Protestant Dissenters in England to the Kirk of Scotland; the object being, as the title implies, to reconcile the presbyterians to the Union, then on the eve of completion.

He also in that year published a third volume of the Review, in which he dwelt very much upon matters connected with trade. One passage relative to the poor and their management, shows that he was far beyond his age on that point, as on most others. "Perhaps he may give some needful hints as to the state of our poor, in which his judgment may differ from that of others, but he must be plain: and while he is no enemy to charity-hospitals and workhouses, he thinks that methods to keep our poor out of them, far exceed, both in prudence and charity, all the settlements and endeavours in the world to maintain them there. As to censure, he expects it. He writes to serve the world, not to please it. A few wise, calm, disinterested men, he always had the good hap to please and satisfy. By their judgment he desires still to be determined; and if he has any pride, it is that he may be approved by such. To the rest, he sedately says, their censure deserves no notice." In 1708 he published a fourth volume of the Review, in which he discusses the Union at great length. He also discusses the war, the policy of the Swedes, &c.; the insurrection in Hungary, the revolution in Naples. The great principles of liberty are here, as they always were by De Foe, maintained with energy and warmth; but De Foe's mind was essentially practical, and therefore moderate. In the following fine passage he displays his principle of action. "In all my writings, as well as in this paper, it has been my endeavour, and ever shall be, I hope, to steer the middle way between all our extremes, and while I am applauding the lustre of moderation, to practise it myself." He foresees, however, the fate of impartiality in the contests of faction. "If I might give a short hint to an impartial writer, it should be to tell him his fate. If he resolves to venture up the dangerous precipice of telling unbiassed truths, let him proclaim war with mankind, a la mode le pais de Pole, neither to give nor take quarter. If he tells the crimes of great men, they fall upon him with the iron hands of the law; if he tells their virtues, when they have any, then the mob attacks him with slander. But if he regards truth, let him expect martyrdom on both sides, and then he may go on fearless; and this is the course I take myself." [vol. iv. p. 593.]

In 1708, prince George of Denmark, consort of queen Anne, died; and De Foe described his character in one of the Reviews. The recent circumstances in our own day, so analogous to that of prince George and the queen, make De Foe's sketch one of great interest. "Death has made a very deep incision in the public tranquillity, in the person of the prince of Denmark. His royal highness was a great and good man, a friend to England and her interest, and true and hearty in the cause of liberty.... If I had a design to run through the character of the prince, I would observe upon the excellency of his temper, the calmness of his passions, and the sedateness of his judgment, which commanded respect from the whole nation in a manner peculiar to himself; so that every party, however jarring and opposite, paid him their homage, although nothing was more averse to his temper than the divisions which unhappily agitate the nation. Nor can it be doubted that his highness derived peculiar satisfaction from his not interfering in public affairs more than his exalted station obliged him, since he saw it was impossible to do so without committing himself to a party, which he was always averse to. He sincerely lamented our divisions, but never encouraged or approved them. By his steady conduct, joined with a general courtesy to all sorts of people, he acquired the esteem and love of all parties, and that more than any person of his degree that ever went before him. I need not note how next to impossible it is in this divided nation, for the most consummate prudence to steer through the variety of interests and gain an universal good opinion, or indeed avoid universal censure. How the prince attained that great point I shall not attempt to examine; but this I think ought to be recorded to posterity, that one man in Britain was found, of whom no man spoke evil,—and this was he!" [vol. iv. p. 409.]—Ed.

[56] Lord Buchan was so obliging as to communicate the subjoined extract of a letter to his lordship's grandfather, the earl of Buchan, from De Foe, dated the 29th of May, 1711:—"The person, with whom I endeavoured to plant the interest of your lordship's friend, has been strangely taken up, since I had that occasion; viz., first, in suffering the operation of the surgeons to heal the wound of the assassin; and since, in accumulating honours from parliament, the queen, and the people. On Thursday evening her majesty created him earl Mortimer, earl of Oxford, and lord Harley of Wigmore: and we expect that to-morrow in council he will have the white staff given him by the queen, and be declared lord high treasurer. I wrote this yesterday; and this day, May the 29th, he is made lord high treasurer of Great Britain, and carried the white staff before the queen this morning to chapel."

[57] Appeal, p. 16.

[58] With the present Life of De Foe, by Mr. Chalmers, prefixed. In this year he closed the fifth volume of the Review. He goes at great length into the affairs of Scotland, especially religious. For the freedom of his remarks in protesting against innovations upon the Scotch establishment, the Review was prosecuted by the grand jury, but the prosecution was soon stopped. He also contended vigorously against licensing the press, and for the Copyright Bill, which subsequently passed. He attacked Dr. Sacheverell for his celebrated sermon on the 5th of November, at St. Paul's. And he published a sixth volume of the Review. He there exposed stock-jobbing;—he refers to his frequently repeated anticipations of the eventual defeat of Charles XII. in relation to the battle of Pultowa; and he pays great attention, as before, to Scotch affairs.—Ed.

[59] Mr. Chalmers here seems to be mistaken. De Foe wrote neither of these works. The first Mr. Wilson tells us was written by Oldmixon. De Foe, indeed, in order to expose the folly of the high tory party, who had procured several addresses to the queen, and which were published by them as an indication, "that the sense of the nation is express for the doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance, and for her majesty's hereditary title to the throne of her ancestors," published a counter manifesto, A New Test of the Sense of the Nation: being a modest Comparison between the Addresses to the late King James and those to her present Majesty. In order to show how far the sense of the nation may be judged of by either of them. 1710. His object is of course to expose the folly of supposing that the addresses represented the real feeling of the country. In a strain of great irony, he says; "The practice of addressing has cheated many already; a jest that was put upon Richard Cromwell, and yet they deprived him three weeks afterwards. It was a second time put upon king James II. and they all flew in his face a year after. And I could give some instances of the little value that has been put upon it since, even such as one would think the very people themselves expect,—that for time to come addressing should pass for nothing with their princes."—Ed.

[60] Review, vol. vii. No. 95.

[61] The following letter to Mr. J. Dyer, in Shoe-lane, who was then employed by the leaders of the tories, in circulating news and insinuations through the country, will show the literary manners of those times, and convey some anecdotes, which are nowhere else preserved. The original letter is in the Museum, Harl. MSS. No. 7001. fol. 269.

Mr. Dyer,

I have your letter. I am rather glad to find you put it upon the trial who was aggressor, than justify a thing which I am sure you cannot approve; and in this I assure you I am far from injuring you, and refer you to the time when long since you had wrote I was fled from justice: one Sammon being taken up for printing a libel, and I being then on a journey, nor the least charge against me for being concerned in it by anybody but your letter:—also many unkind personal reflections on me in your letter, when I was in Scotland, on the affair of the Union, and I assure you, when my paper had not in the least mentioned you, and those I refer to time and date for the proof of.

I mention this only in defence of my last letter, in which I said no more of it than to let you see I did not merit such treatment, and could nevertheless be content to render any service to you, though I thought myself hardly used.

But to state the matter fairly between you and I [me], a writing for different interests, and so possibly coming under an unavoidable necessity of jarring in several cases: I am ready to make a fair truce of honour with you, viz., that if what either party are doing, or saying, that may clash with the party we are for, and urge us to speak, it shall be done without naming either's name, and without personal reflections; and thus we may differ still, and yet preserve both the Christian and the gentleman.

This I think is an offer may satisfy you. I have not been desirous of giving just offence to you, neither would I to any man, however I may differ from him; and I see no reason why I should affront a man's person, because I do not join with him in principle. I please myself with being the first proposer of so fair a treaty with you, because I believe, as you cannot deny its being very honourable, so it is not less so in coming first from me, who I believe could convince you of my having been the first and most ill-treated—for further proof of which I refer you to your letters, at the time I was threatened by the envoy of the king of Sweden.

However, Mr. Dyer, this is a method which may end what is past, and prevent what is future; and if refused, the future part I am sure cannot lie at my door.

As to your letter, your proposal is so agreeable to me, that truly without it I could not have taken the thing at all; for it would have been a trouble intolerable, both to you as well as me, to take your letter every post, first from you, and then send it to the post-house.

Your method of sending to the black box, is just what I designed to propose, and Mr. Shaw will doubtless take it of you: if you think it needful for me to speak to him it shall be done—what I want to know is only the charge, and that you will order it constantly to be sent, upon hinting whereof I shall send you the names. Wishing you success in all things (your opinions of government excepted.)

I am,
Your humble servant,

De Foe.

Newington, June 17th,
1710.

[62] Arnott's Edinburgh. The second newspaper ever published in Scotland. During this period he published the seventh volume of the Review, which is chiefly occupied by home affairs.

[63] De Foe had, many years before Harley proposed it in parliament, suggested an establishment of a South-sea trade, not only for commercial advantage, but as an effectual mode of crippling Spain and France. "I had the honour to lay a proposal before his late majesty king William, in the beginning of this war, for carrying the war, not into Old Spain, but into America: which proposal his majesty approved of, and fully proposed to put it in execution, had not death, to our unspeakable grief, prevented him. And yet I would have my readers distinguish with me, that there is always a manifest difference between carrying on a war with America and settling a trade there; and I shall not fail to speak distinctly to this difference in its turn." He then points out the circumstances of the trade, and distinctly warns his countrymen against those rash and extravagant speculations which they unfortunately persisted to indulge in, and which caused the ruin of so many persons. "I am far from designing to discourage this new undertaking, which I profess to believe a very happy one; but to correct these wild notions, it seems needful to ascertain what we are to understand by a trade to the South Seas, and what not; that in the first place our enemies may not make a wrong improvement of it, our friends in Spain may not take umbrage at it, and our people at home may not grow big with wild expectations, which might end in chagrin and disappointment. There is room enough on the western coast of America for us to establish a flourishing trade without encroaching upon the Spaniards. The industry and enterprise of the English in such a situation would open a wide door for the consumption of our manufactures, and bring a vast revenue of wealth to our own country." [Review, vol. viii. p. 165. 274.] They are the same views substantially as those he afterwards maintained in the pamphlet mentioned by Mr. Chalmers in the text.—Ed.

[64] He also vindicated the memory of William III., who had been fiercely attacked for the Partition Treaty, by a pamphlet rather long and quaint—The Felonious Treaty: or, an Inquiry into the Reasons which moved his late Majesty King William, of Glorious Memory, to enter into a Treaty at ten several times, with the King of France, for the Partition of the Spanish Monarchy. With an Essay, proving that it was always the sense both of King William and of all the Confederates, and even of the Grand Alliance itself, that the Spanish Monarchy should never be united in the Person of the Emperor. 1711. In the year 1712, he vigorously attacked the persecuting bill introduced by lord Nottingham, by which dissenters were to be excluded from civil employments, and persons in office were forbidden to attend dissenting places of worship, under severe penalties. De Foe not only kept up a galling fire in his Reviews, but published a pamphlet on the subject, entituled, An Essay on the History of Parties and Persecution in Britain: beginning with a brief Account of the Test Act, and an Historical Inquiry into the Reasons, the Original, and the Consequences of the Occasional Conformity of the Dissenters: with some Remarks on the recent attempts already made and now making for an Occasional Bill: inquiring how far the same may be esteemed a Preservative of the Church, or an Injury to the Dissenters. He seems to have renewed the attack not only against that measure, but also against a similar bill introduced to authorise the use of the liturgy in Scotland, in a pamphlet which Mr. Wilson says bears undoubted evidence of being De Foe's, although never inserted in any list of his writings, entituled, The Present State of Parties in Great Britain: particularly an Inquiry into the State of the Dissenters in England, and the Presbyterians in Scotland: their religious and politic Interest considered, as it respects their Circumstances before and since the late Acts against Occasional Conformity in England, and for Toleration of Common Prayer in Scotland. In this work he goes into a lengthened history of the dissenters, and strongly recommends union amongst all bodies of them. He also in this year vigorously opposed the tax upon newspapers, which was enforced in 1712. The eighth volume of the Review closed in July, 1712. Trade and war are the main subjects discussed in it.—Ed.

[65] The first Mercator was published on the 26th of May, 1713; the last on the 20th of July, 1714: and they were written by William Brown and his assistants, with great knowledge, great strength, and great sweetness, considering how much party then embittered every composition. The British Merchant, which opposed the Mercator, and which was compiled by Henry Martyn and his associates, has fewer facts, less argument, and more factiousness. It began on the 1st of August, 1713, and ended the 27th of July, 1714. I have spoken of both from my own convictions, without regarding the declamations which have continued to pervert the public opinion from that epoch to the present times. De Foe was struck at in the third number of the British Merchant, and plainly mentioned in the fourth. Mr. Daniel Foe may change his name from Review to Mercator, from Mercator to any other title, yet still his singular genius shall be distinguished by his inimitable way of writing. Thus personal sarcasm was introduced to supply deficience of facts, or weakness of reasoning. When Charles King republished The British Merchant in volumes, among various changes, he expunged, with other personalities, the name of De Foe.

[66] It is now sufficiently known, that Lord Oxford had relinquished the Treaty of Commerce to its fate, before it was finally debated in parliament. See much curious matter on this subject in Macpherson's State Papers, vol. ii. p. 421-23. It is there said, that he gave up the commercial treaty, in compliment to sir Thomas Hanmer, as he would by no means be an occasion of a breach among friends. The treasurer had other reasons: the treaty had been made by Bolingbroke, whom he did not love; the lords Anglesea and Abingdon had made extravagant demands for their support; and, like a wise man, he thought it idle to drive a nail that would not go. Yet lord Halifax boasted to the Hanoverian minister, that he alone had been the occasion of the treaty being rejected. [Same papers, p. 509-47.]

[67] He attacked it first in 1713, in An Essay on the Treaty of Commerce with France, with necessary Expositions.

[68] It closed May, 1713, with the ninth volume.

[69] State of Wit, 1711, which is reprinted in the Supplement to Swift's Works.

[70] It was ordered to be destroyed.

[71] The late History of Halifax relates, that Daniel De Foe, being forced to abscond, on account of his political writings, resided at Halifax, in the Back-lane, at the sign of the Rose and Crown, being known to Dr. Nettleton, the physician, and the Rev. Mr. Priestley, minister of a dissenting congregation there. Mr. Watson is mistaken when he supposes that De Foe wrote his Jure Divino here, which had been published previously in 1706; and he is equally mistaken, when he says, that De Foe had made an improper use of the papers of Selkirk, whose story had been often published.

[72] The pamphlets mentioned in the text were filled with palpable banter. He recommends the Pretender by saying, That the prince would confer on every one the privilege of wearing wooden shoes, and at the same time ease the nobility and gentry of the hazard and expense of winter journeys to parliament.

[73] The pardon is dated on the 13th of November, 1713, and is signed by Bolingbroke. See it set out verbatim. Appeal to Honour and Justice.

[74] See Boyer's Political State, Oldmixon's History, &c.

[75] It is universally said by the sellers and buyers of old books, that John, duke of Argyle, was the real author of The Secret History of the White Staff. His grace, indeed, is not in the Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors. Whether the duke wrote this petty pamphlet may be doubted; but there can be no doubt that De Foe was not the author: for he solemnly asserts by his Appeal, in 1715, That he had written nothing since the queen's death. The internal evidence is stronger than this positive assertion.

[76] In the year 1714, De Foe pleaded the cause of religious liberty in his most effective manner. He was roused to action by the bill then passing parliament, "to prevent the growth of schism," which was of course only another name for intolerance. By this bill, all schoolmasters were required to be licensed by the bishop, and have a certificate of conformity from the minister of his parish! De Foe of course could not be silent on such an occasion, and he published The Remedy worse than the Disease: or Reasons against passing the Bill for preventing the Growth of Schism; to which is added, a Brief Discourse of Toleration and Persecution, showing their unavoidable effects, good or bad, and proving that neither Diversity of Religion, nor Diversity in the same Religion, are dangerous, much less inconsistent with good Government. In a Letter to a noble Earl. Hæc sunt enim fundamenta firmissima nostræ libertatis, sui quemque juris et retinendi et dimittendi esse dominum. Cic. in Orat. pro Balbo. 1714.

[77] The most solemn asseverations, and the most unanswerable arguments of our author, were not, after all, believed. When Charles King republished The British Merchant, in 1721, he without a scruple attributed The Mercator to a hireling writer of a weekly paper called the Review. And Anderson, at a still later period, goes further in his Chronology of Commerce, and names De Foe, as the hireling writer of the Mercator, and other papers in favour of the French treaty of trade. We can now judge with the impartiality of arbitrators: on the one hand, there are the living challenge, and the death-bed declaration of De Foe; on the other, the mere surmise and unauthorised assertion of King, Anderson, and others, who detract from their own veracity by their own factiousness, or foolery. It is surely time to free ourselves from prejudices of every kind, and to disregard the sound of names as much as the falsehoods of party.

[78] It was entered at Stationers'-hall, for J. Roberts, the 18th of February, 1715-16.

[79] 2nd Mem. p. 27, &c.

[80] The family of George I. had been instructed by the copy of this book, which is in the Museum. It would seem from the title-page and Mr. Wright's letter being printed on a different paper from the work itself, that both were added after the first publication. The Family Instructor and Mr. Wright's letter were entered at Stationers'-hall, for Emanuel Mathews, on the 31st of March, 1715.

[81] When Mr. Chalmers wrote, it had been reprinted at least seventeen times. It is a work which has had great circulation.

[82] Mr. Wilson considers that De Foe, in the year 1717, published the Memoirs of the Church of Scotland, in Four Periods: with an Appendix of some Transactions since the Union. [Life of De Foe, vol. iii. p. 418.] And also the Life of Dr. Daniel Williams, the eminent presbyterian divine, founder of the well-known dissenters' library, in Redcross-street. [Ib. p. 423.]

[83] The title was, The Life and strange surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, who lived eight-and-twenty Years all alone in an uninhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the mouth of the great River Oroonoque, having been cast on shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the men perished but himself. With an Account how he was at last strangely delivered by Pirates. Written by Himself.

[84] "No fiction in any language," said Dr. Blair in his elegant Lectures on Rhetoric, "was ever better supported than the Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. While it is carried on with that appearance of truth and simplicity, which takes a strong hold of the imagination of all readers, it suggests at the same time very useful instruction, by showing how much the native power of man may be exerted for surmounting the difficulties of any external situation." "Robinson Crusoe," said Marmontel, "is the first book I ever read with exquisite pleasure; and I believe every boy in Europe might say the same thing." In his Emile, Rousseau says, "Since we must have books, this is one, which, in my opinion, is a most excellent treatise on natural education. This is the first my Emilias shall read; his whole library shall long consist of this work only, which shall preserve an eminent rank to the very last. It shall be the text to which all our conversations on natural science are to serve only as a comment. It shall be a guide during our progress to maturity of judgment; and so long as our taste is not adulterated, the perusal of this book will afford us pleasure. And what surprising book is this? Is it Aristotle? Is it Pliny? Is it Buffon? No, it is Robinson Crusoe." In this judgment Dr. Beattie concurred.—Ed.

[85] The title was, The further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe; being the second and last Part of his Life, and the strange surprising Accounts of his Travels round three Parts of the Globe. Written by Himself. To which is added, a Map of the World, in which is delineated the Voyages of Robinson Crusoe. 1719.

[86] The whole story of Selkirk is told in Woodes Rogers' voyage, which he published in 1712, from p. 125 to 131, inclusive: whence it appears that Selkirk had preserved no pen, ink, or paper, and had lost his language; so that he had no journal or papers, which he could communicate, or by others could be stolen. There is an account of Selkirk in The Englishman, No. 26, written by Steele. The particular manner how Alexander Selkirk lived four years and four months, in the isle of Juan Fernandez, is related in captain Cooks's voyage into the South Sea, which was published in 1712. And Selkirk's tale was told in the Memoirs of Literature, vol. v. p. 118: so that the world was fully possessed of Selkirk's story, in 1712, seven years prior to the publication of Crusoe's Adventures. Nor were his adventures singular; for, Ringrose mentions in his account of captain Sharp's voyage, a person who had escaped singly from a ship that had been wrecked on Juan Fernandez, and who lived alone five years before he was relieved: and Dampier mentions a Mosquito indian, who having been accidentally left on this island, subsisted three years solitarily, till that voyager carried him off. From which of these De Foe borrowed his great incident, it is not easy to discover. In the preface to The Serious Reflections, he indeed says, "That there is a man alive and well known, the actions of whose life are the just subject of these volumes, and to whom the most part of the story directly alludes." This turns the scale in favour of Selkirk. Nor, was the name of Crusoe wholly fictitious; for, among De Foe's contemporaries, John Dunton speaks of Timothy Crusoe, who was called the Golden Preacher, and was so great a textuary, that he could pray two hours together in scripture language; but, he was not arrived at perfection, as appeared by his sloth in tying the conjugal knot; yet his repentance was sincere and public, and I fear not but he is now a glorified saint in heaven. [Life and Errors, p. 461.] The whole story of Selkirk, as told by Rogers, is reprinted in the present edition. Rob. Crusoe, vol. i. p. xxiii.

[87] Dr. Towers agrees with Mr. Chalmers. [Biog. Brit.] "The fact appears to have been that the charge against De Foe of having taken his work from Selkirk's manuscripts, or from communication of any kind made by Selkirk, is wholly groundless, and of which he himself never heard; for we do not find that the least hint of any such accusation against him was ever published during his lifetime." And Mr. D'Israeli [Curios. of Literat. vol. iii. p. 285.] considers the point settled in favour of De Foe, by captain Burney's Voyages and Discoveries.

[88] It has been frequently imitated, but never with success.

[89] Morant's Colchester, p. 134.

[90] Before the History of Duncan Campbell, De Foe published similar work, called The Dumb Philosopher, or Great Britain's Wonder. Containing, 1. A faithful and very surprising account how Dickory Cronke, a tinner's son, in the county of Cornwall, who was born dumb and continued so for fifty-eight years, and how some days before he died he came to his speech; with memoirs of his life and the manner of his death, &c. This is a curious pamphlet.

[91] Lord Chatham is said to have long considered it a genuine history. In 1726 De Foe published a similar book, The Military Memoirs of Captain George Carleton. From the Dutch war, 1672, in which he served, to the conclusion of the peace at Utrecht, 1713, &c. 1728. This work was a great favourite with Dr. Johnson.

[92] Mr. Wilson quotes this passage from Mr. Chalmers, and refers to another work published by De Foe, in 1720, not mentioned in the text; Christian Conversation, in six dialogues, about Assurance—Mortification—Natural Things—Spiritualized—Union—Afflictions—Death.

[93] These admirable works are reprinted in the present edition.

[94] He also published, Everybody's Business is Nobody's Business; or Private Abuses, Public Grievances. Exemplified in the pride, insolence, and exorbitant wages of our women-servants, footmen, &c. 1725.

[95] And also, in 1727, An Essay on the History and Reality of Apparitions, being an account of what they are, and what they are not. As also how we may distinguish between the Apparitions of Good and Evil Spirits, and how we ought to behave to them. With a great variety of surprising and diverting examples, never published before. These three works of De Foe are reprinted in the present edition. In 1726 he also published an Essay upon Literature, or An Inquiry into the Antiquity and Original of Letters, &c., and An Account of Peter the wild Boy, then lately discovered in one of the German forests. This latter work is entituled Mere Nature Delineated; or, A Body Without a Soul. Being Observations upon the young Forester lately brought to Town from Germany. With suitable applications. Also a Brief Dissertation upon the usefulness and necessity of Fools, whether political or natural. In the year 1727, in addition to the work mentioned by Mr. Chalmers, De Foe published The Protestant Monastery; or, A Complaint against the Brutality of the present Age, particularly the Pertness and Insolence of our Youth to Aged Persons, with a Caution to People in years how they give the staff out of their own hands, and leave themselves at the mercy of others. Concluding with a Proposal for erecting a Protestant Monastery, where persons of small fortunes may end their days in plenty, ease, and credit, without burdening their relations, or accepting public charities, And Parochial Tyranny; or, The Housekeeper's Complaint against the insupportable Exactions and partial Assessments of Select Vestries, &c., with a Plain Detection of many Abuses committed in the distribution of public charities. Together with a practicable proposal for amending the same, which will not only take off great part of the parish taxes now subsisting, but ease parishioners from serving troublesome offices, or paying exorbitant fines. Both these works are published under the assumed name of Andrew Moreton, esq. The last was quoted by Mr. (now sir John) Hobhouse when bringing in his bill for the regulation of parish select vestries into the house of commons, in April 1829. (Hansard, Parl. Deb. vol. xxi. p. 898.)

[96] He says, "The preparations for this work have been suitable to my earnest concern for its usefulness. Seventeen very large circuits, or journeys, have been taken through divers parts separately, and three general tours over almost the whole English part of the island; in all which the author has not been wanting to treasure up just remarks upon particular places and things. Besides these several journeys in England, he has also lived some time in Scotland, and has travelled critically over great part of it: he has viewed the north part of England, and the south part of Scotland, five several times over; all which is hinted here, to let the readers know what reason they have to be satisfied with the authority of the relation."

The first of these Tours was published in 1724, under the title of, A Tour through the whole Island of Great Britain, divided into Circuits and Journeys. Giving a particular and diverting Account of whatever is Curious and worth Observation, viz., I. A Description of the principal Cities and Towns; their Situations, Magnitude, Government, and Commerce. II. The Customs, Manners, Spirit; as also, the Exercises, Diversions, and Employment of the People. III. The Produce and Improvement of the Lands, the Trade and Manufactures. IV. The Sea-ports and Fortifications, the course of Rivers, and Inland Navigation. V. The Public Edifices, Seats, and Palaces of the Nobility and Gentry. With useful Observations on the whole. Particularly fitted for the reading of such as desire to travel over the island. By a Gentleman.

The favourable reception of this volume, encouraged the author to follow it by a second in the next year, with a similar title, and the addition of a map of South Britain, by Herman Moll, the geographer. A third volume, the same also in title, was added in 1727, containing the northern counties of England, and the south of Scotland; and this completes the work. The useful information contained in these volumes, is conveyed in the familiar form of letters. In commending the work to the notice of the public, he says, "I have endeavoured that these letters shall not be a journal of trifles. If it is on that account too grave for some people, I hope it will not for others. I have studied the advancement and increase of knowledge for those that read, and shall be as glad to make them wise, as to make them merry; yet I hope they will not find the story so ill told, or so dull, as to tire them so soon, or so barren as to put them to sleep over it. The observations here made, as they principally regard the present state of things, so, as near as can be, they are adapted to the present state of the times."

[97] This highly useful book is reprinted in the present edition, and should be in the hands of every young tradesman.

[98] The title is as follows: A Plan of the English Commerce. Being a complete Prospect of the Trade of this Nation, as well the Home Trade as the Foreign. In three parts. I. Containing a View of the present Magnitude of the English Trade, as it respects, 1. The Exportation of our own Growth and Manufacture. 2. The Importation of Merchant Goods from Abroad. 3. The prodigious Consumption of both at Home. Part II. Containing an Answer to that great and important Question now depending, whether our Trade, and especially our Manufactures, are in a declining condition or no? Part III. Containing several Proposals entirely new, for extending and improving our Trade, and promoting the Consumption of our Manufactures in Countries wherewith we have hitherto had no Commerce. Humbly offered to the Consideration of King and Parliament.

[99] He appears to have published two or three works after the Plan of English Commerce, under the assumed name of Andrew Moreton. The first a very remarkable work for the suggestions it contains in anticipation of another age. Augusta Triumphans; or, The Way to make London the most flourishing City in the Universe. I. By establishing an University, where Gentlemen may have Academical Education under the Eye of their Friends. II. To prevent much Murder, &c., by an Hospital for Foundlings. III. By suppressing pretended Madhouses, where many of the Fair Sex are unjustly confined, while their Husbands keep Mistresses, &c., and many Widows are locked up for the sake of their Jointure. IV. To save our Youth from Destruction, by clearing our Streets of impudent Strumpets, suppressing Gaming Tables, and Sunday Debauches. V. To avoid the expensive Importation of Foreign Musicians, by forming an Academy of our own. VI. To save our lower Class of People from utter Ruin, and render them useful, by preventing the immoderate Use of Geneva. With a frank exposure of many other common Abuses, and incontestible Rules for Amendment. Concluding with an effectual Method to prevent Street Robberies. And a Letter to Col. Robinson, on Account of the Orphans' Tax.

The second pamphlet, published in 1729, is entituled, Second Thoughts are Best; or a further Improvement of a late Scheme to prevent Street Robberies. In which our Streets will be so strongly guarded, and so gloriously illuminated, that any part of London will be as safe and pleasant at Midnight as at Noonday; and Burglary totally impracticable. With some Thoughts for suppressing Robberies in all the public Roads of England, &c. Humbly offered for the Good of his Country, submitted to the consideration of the Parliament, and dedicated to his sacred Majesty King George II. By Andrew Moreton, Esq.

Mr. Wilson has given the analysis of what must be considered the last literary effort of De Foe. The MS. work is in the possession of the Rev. Henry De Foe Baker, by whose kindness Mr. Wilson was permitted to examine it. [See Life of De Foe, vol. iii. p. 599.] The analysis is as follows:

The Complete Gentleman, containing useful Observations on the general Neglect of Education of English Gentlemen, with the Reason and Remedies. The apparent Differences between a Well-born and Well-bred Gentleman. And Instructions how Gentlemen may recover a Deficiency of their Latin, and be Men of Learning without the Pedantry of Schools.

Chap. I. Of the gentlemen born, in the common acceptation of the word, and as the gentry amongst us are pleased to understand it. Chap. II. Some examples from history, and from good information, of the want of care taken in the education of princes, and children of the nobility in former times, as well in this nation as in foreign countries, and how fatal the effects of it have been in their future conduct; with some few examples of the contrary also. Chap. III. Examples of the different educations of princes and persons of rank from the beginning of the sixteenth century, viz., from the reign of Henry VIII. inclusive. With observations down to the present time, on the happiness of those reigns in general, when the princes have been educated in principles of honour and virtue; and something of the contrary. Chap. IV. Of royal education. Chap. V. The head of this chapter is erased. Chap. VI. Of the G——; of himself, his family, and fortune.

Part the Second. Chap. I. Of the fund for increase of our nobility and gentry in England: being the beginning of those we call bred gentlemen: with some account of difference. Chap. II. There is no head to this chapter. Chap. III. Of the general ignorance of the English gentry, and the true cause of it in the manner of their introduction into life. Chap. IV. Of what may be the unhappy cause of the general defect in the education of our gentry; with a rational proposal for preventing those consequences.

[100] His latter days were stung by the base ingratitude and unfilial and unbrotherly conduct of his son, to whom, in a touching letter to Mr. Baker, he says he transferred his property, with the duty of maintaining his mother and sisters, and that he positively squandered it upon himself! Mr. Wilson has obtained permission from the great great grandson of Mr. Baker, the gentleman mentioned in the text, to publish the letter from De Foe to his ancestor. It gives a most distressing picture of the sorrows amid which his useful life closed; but as it is the duty of history faithfully and not fancifully to relate the lives of illustrious men, and the constant exposure of the world's ingratitude to its best benefactors, may in time shame it to a better feeling, we leave the true but mournful tale to speak its own lesson: and however agreeable it might have been to show the author of Robinson Crusoe gradually quitting the world he had spent his useful life to improve and delight, in the quiet and repose which might seem the harbinger of the peace he anticipated in a brighter, we must take leave of him, while in misery and in anger, surrounded by clouds and darkness, and stung by the worst of sorrows.

"Dear Mr. Baker,

"I have your very kind and affectionate letter of the 1st: but not come to my hand till the 16th; where it had been delayed I know not. As your kind manner, and kinder thought, from which it flows, (for I take all you say to be as I always believed you to be, sincere and Nathaniel-like, without guile) was a particular satisfaction to me; so the stop of a letter, however it happened, deprived me of that cordial too many days, considering how much I stood in need of it, to support a mind sinking under the weight of an affliction too heavy for my strength, and looking on myself as abandoned of every comfort, every friend, and every relation, except such only as are able to give me no assistance.

"I was sorry you should say at the beginning of your letter, you were debarred seeing me; depend upon my sincerity for this, I am far from debarring you. On the contrary, it would be a greater comfort to me than any I now enjoy, that I could have your agreeable visits with safety, and could see both you and my dearest Sophia, could it be without giving her the grief of seeing her father in tenebris, and under the load of insupportable sorrows. I am sorry I must open my griefs so far as to tell her, it is not the blow I received from a wicked, perjured, and contemptible enemy, that has broken in upon my spirit; which she well knows has carried me on through greater disasters than these. But it has been the injustice, unkindness, and, I must say, inhuman dealing of my own son, which has both ruined my family, and, in a word, has broken my heart; and as I am at this time under a weight of very heavy illness, which I think will be a fever, I take this occasion to vent my grief in the breasts who I know will make a prudent use of it, and tell you that nothing but this has conquered me, or could conquer me. Et tu! Brute. I depended upon him, I trusted him, I gave up my two dear unprovided children into his hands; but he had no compassion, and suffered them and their poor dying mother to beg their bread at his door, and to crave, as if it were an alms, what he is bound under hand and seal, besides the most sacred promises, to supply them with; himself at the same time living in a profusion of plenty. It is too much for me. Excuse my infirmity, I can say no more; my heart is too full. I only ask one thing of you as a dying request. Stand by them when I am gone, and let them not be wronged, while he is able to do them right. Stand by them as a brother; and if you have anything within you owing to my memory, who have bestowed on you the best gift I had to give, let them not be injured and trampled on by false pretences, and unnatural reflections. I hope they will want no help but that of comfort and counsel; but that they will indeed want, being so easy to be managed by words and promises.

"It adds to my grief that it is so difficult to me to see you. I am at a distance from London, in Kent; nor have a lodging in London, nor have I been at that place in the Old Bailey since I wrote you I was removed from it. At present I am weak, having had some fits of a fever that have left me low. But those things much more.

"I have not seen son or daughter, wife or child, many weeks, and know not which way to see them. They dare not come by water, and by land here is no coach, and I know not what to do.

"It is not possible for me to come to Enfield, unless you could find a retired lodging for me, where I might not be known, and might have the comfort of seeing you both now and then; upon such a circumstance, I could gladly give the days to solitude, to have the comfort of half an hour now and then with you both for two or three weeks. But just to come and look at you, and retire immediately, it is a burden too heavy. The parting will be a pain beyond the enjoyment.

"I would say, I hope, with comfort, that it is yet well. I am so near my journey's end, and am hastening to the place where the 'weary are at rest, and the wicked cease to trouble;' but that the passage is rough, and the day stormy, by what way soever He pleases to bring me to the end of it, I desire to finish life with this temper of soul in all cases: Te Deum laudamus.

"I congratulate you on the occasion of your happy advance in your employment. May all you do be prosperous, and all you meet with pleasant, and may you both escape the tortures and troubles of uneasy life. May you sail the dangerous voyage of life with a forcing wind, and make the port of heaven without a storm.

"It adds to my grief, that I must never see the pledge of your mutual love, my little grandson. Give him my blessing, and may he be to you both your joy in youth, and your comfort in age, and never add a sigh to your sorrow. But, alas! that is not to be expected. Kiss my dear Sophy once more for me; and if I must see her no more, tell her this is from a father that loved her above all his comforts, to his last breath.

"Your unhappy,
D. F.

"About two miles from Greenwich, Kent,
Tuesday, August 12th, 1730.

"P.S. I wrote you a letter some months ago, in answer to one from you, about selling the house; but you never signified to me whether you received it. I have not the policy of assurance; I suppose my wife, or Hannah, may have it.

"Idem, D. F."

[101] Pope had collected this scandal from Savage, who says in the preface to his Author to be Let, "Had it not been an honester livelihood for Mr. Norton, (Daniel De Foe's son of love by a lady who vended oysters,) to have dealt in a fish-market, than to be dealing out the dialects of Billingsgate in the Flying Post?"

[102] The above-mentioned particulars were discovered by searching the books at Doctors Commons.

[103] Life and Errors, 239-240.

[104] In the preface to his Reformation.

[105] See the Present State of the War, and the necessity of an augmentation. And see his Commercial Papers in the Freeholder.

[106] Biog. Dict. vol. ii. p. 403. art. De Foe.

[107] Vol. iii. p. 436.