disposition made him a general favourite. At this, as at all other periods of his life, Steele sowed wild oats profusely, and reaped their customary harvest of remorse and repentance frequently, and with great intensity. Unfortunately, however, he always soon grew tired of the latter occupation, and broke off in the middle of it to sow wild oats again with as great industry as ever. It was during his temporary fits of repentance that he wrote his first book, "The Christian Hero," which appeared in 1701. Though its intent was good, the difference between the preaching and the practice of the writer was productive of a good deal of irreverent laughter among his comrades. In the following year he wrote a comedy, “The Funeral," which met with a fair share of success. In 1703 and 1704 he wrote two other plays, "The Tender Husband” and "The Dying Lover," of which the first succeeded, while the other failed--on account of its piety, Steele boasted; on account of its dulness, said others. About this time he quitted the army, having received through the influence of his friends the appointment of Gazetteer, with a salary of £300 a year. He now became a politician and a man of letters by profes sion, and entered freely into the literary society of the period. In 1709 the happiest notion of his life occurred to him. Under the name of Isaac Bickerstaff, which Swift had made popular, he resolved to edit a periodical of somewhat the same kind as the Review begun by Defoe in 1704, but, unlike it, excluding party politics. This was the Tatler, of which the first number was published on April 12, 1709. It was published three times a week, and "was intended, in some respects, to serve the purpose of a newspaper, as well as to supply a series of brief essays on life and literature, or any topic, in short, that the quick-witted author could, in the language of the day, entertain the town with." Addison soon discovered, by a passage in the sixth number containing a remark on Virgil which he had made in the course of conversation, that "Isaac Bickerstaff," the editor of the Tatler, was none other than his old companion Dick Steele, and he lent him the invaluable assistance of his pen, not very

The "Spectator."

177

frequently at first, but more often when the work was pretty far advanced. This good office," said Steele, with his usual generosity and freedom from jealousy, "he performed with such force of genius, humour, wit, and learning, that I fared like a distressed prince who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid. I was undone by my auxiliary; when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without dependence on him." In so saying he perhaps overstated the case. If Addison had the more subtle, delicate, and cultured mind, Steele had more originality, and in the Tatler, as elsewhere, he showed that fine chivalrous instinct which runs like a thread of gold through all his writings.

The Tatler was, after a prosperous career, brought to a close on January 2, 1711. On the 1st of March in the same year appeared the first number of another periodical, also conducted by Steele, of somewhat the same character. "No trace of the newspaper or gazetteer was to be admitted; it was to be altogether literary in its character; it was to fulfil the functions of the modern magazine; it was, in fact, the complete inauguration of periodical literature. Brief essays, tales, imaginary correspondence, imaginary conversations, strictures on the manners and the morals of the day-there was nothing new in any of these; but a publication which should present some one of these every morning on the breakfast-table was a novel and bold undertaking." The Spectator-for such was the name of this new periodical-appeared daily, and was carried on without intermission for about a year and nine months, ceasing on December 6, 1712. In 1714 it was revived for a brief period, the papers then published constituting the eighth volume in the old editions. To the Tatler Steele was the most prominent contributor; it is the name of Addison, on the other hand, which is inseparably connected with the Spectator. Many good papers were contributed by Steele, and occasional essays by other writers, some of whose names would now be buried in oblivion had they not gained a sort of immortality through their association with men of genius; but it is to Addison that the Spectator owes the major part of

its fame.

His best and most generally read papers in it are, of course, those descriptive of men and manners. "He walks about the world," writes Thackeray, "watching their petty humours, fashions, follies, flirtations, rivalries, and noting them with the most charming archness. He sees them in public, in the theatre, or the assembly, or the puppet-show; or at the toyshop higgling for gloves and lace; or at the auction, battling together over a blue porcelain dragon or a darling monster in Japan; or at church eying the width of the ladies' hoops; or the breadth of their laces as they sweep down the aisles; or he looks out of the window at the Garter in St. James's Street at Ardelia's coach, as she blazes to the drawingroom with her coronet and six footmen; and remembering that her father was a Turkey merchant in the City, calculates how many sponges went to purchase her earrings, and how many drums of figs to build her coachbox; or he demurely watches behind a tree in Spring Gardens as Saccharissa (whom he knows under her mask) trips out of her chair to the alley where Sir Fopling is waiting." His delicate satire and "gay malevolence," as Johnson cal's it, give his sketches a precision, a neatness, an epigrammatic point which are wanting in Steele's more clumsy and more good-humoured delineations. The delightful papers relating to Sir Roger de Coverley, of which Steele wrote eight, well show the distinctive differences between the two friends. Addison's papers are better written, they contain more fine touches and subtle strokes of humour than Steele's; but to Steele belongs the merit of having introduced most of the features in the good knight's character which make him so lovable. In one point, his just appreciation of women, Steele was far in advance not only of Addison, whose general tone towards the sex is that of quiet contempt, but of his age generally. On Addison's critical papers, those on the "Pleasures of the Imagination," Milton's "Paradise Lost," &c., little remark is necessary. They strike us now as barren and insipid; they show no depth or power of analysis; his descriptions of the fine passages in Milton are such as, apart from the elegance of their style, might be written by any clever school

Addison's "Cato."

179

boy. But considering the time when they were written, they possess considerable merit, and even boldness. At a period when the artificial school of poetry was in vogue, it was a daring thing to praise the fine old ballad of "Chevy Chase," as Addison did. How such pieces of poetry were generally regarded then and for many years afterwards is well shown by Johnson's comment on Addison's disquisition. “In Chevy Chase,'" he says with commendable candour, "there is not much of either bombast or affectation; but there is chill and lifeless imbecility. The story cannot possibly be told in a manner which shall leave less impression on the mind."

It is now time to resume our account of Addison's life. In 1713 he secured one of the greatest triumphs of his career. While travelling in Italy he had projected a tragedy on the subject of Cato's death, and, it would seem, had written part of it. For several years he had had the first four acts of it finished, and such of his friends as saw the manuscript were unanimous in urging him to complete it. Some of them thought it would be best for him to print it; others thought that it should be brought out on the stage. After much demurring and hesitation, he finally agreed to adopt the latter plan. Pope furnished a prologue, Garth an epilogue, and in 1713 "Cato" was acted at Drury Lane Theatre. Officious, enthusiastic Dick Steele had taken care that the fame of his friend Mr. Addison should not be endangered by its reception. The house was carefully packed with an audience willing to applaud it to the echo, and it obtained an almost unequalled success. "The Whigs," says Johnson, "applauded every line in which liberty was mentioned, as a satire on the Tories; and the Tories echoed every clap to show that the satire was unfelt." During a whole month "Cato" was performed to crowded houses; and when it was printed, it was received with wellnigh universal approval. Its pompous monotony was taken for dignity, and its strict adherence to the critical rules then accepted was preferred by Addison's contemporaries to the truth and nature of Shakespeare. In it the dramatic unities— unity of place, unity of time, and unity of action-are observed

with a completeness which leads to some rather ridiculous results; all the characters go through their actions and their speeches with the utmost conventional correctness; but it does not contain a passage which shows genuine poetic feeling, or indeed high artistic skill of any kind. It lives now, if it lives at all, by a few happy lines which have become stock quotations. Amidst the general chorus of praise which hailed the produc tion of "Cato," one dissentient voice made itself heard with considerable vehemence. Old John Dennis, a bitter and vindictive critic, who railed at any successful production with intense malignity and some acuteness, attacked it in a pamphlet, considerable specimens of which are preserved by Johnson in his Life of Addison. The fact that many of his strictures were just did not make them any more palatable, but Addison made no rejoinder. Pope, however, partly by way of courting Addison's favour, partly because he saw, as he thought, a good opportunity of wiping off sundry old scores of his own, published his "Narrative of the Frenzy of John Dennis," a rather coarse and unskilful performance. No doubt he thought he was doing Addison a service, but Addison, whose conduct in the matter does not seem to have been generous, thought otherwise, and caused Dennis to be informed that he was sorry for the insult. This was the beginning of a long literary feud between Pope and Addison. Both appear to have hated each other cordially; and Addison has never been wholly acquitted of the charge of having, by various sly intrigues, endeavoured to injure Pope's reputation. Pope took revenge in the finest piece of satire he ever wrote, the stinging lines on Atticus, with which everybody is, or ought to be, acquainted.

On the death of Queen Anne, Addison was appointed Secretary to the Regency. In 1715 he obtained a seat at the Board of Trade. In the following year he married the Countess Dowager of Warwick, whom he had long courted, and whom he at length obtained, "on terms much like those on which a Turkish princess is espoused, to whom the Sultan is reported to pronounce, 'Daughter, I give thee this man for thy slave.'" This union added nothing to his happiness. He would often