Lives of the Poets | Page 9

had the Guardian of the
Lizards to do with clubs of tall or of little men, with nests of ants, or
with Strada's prolusions? Of this paper nothing is necessary to be said
but that it found many contributors, and that it was a continuation of the
Spectator, with the same elegance and the same variety, till some
unlucky sparkle from a Tory paper set Steele's politics on fire, and wit
at once blazed into faction. He was soon too hot for neutral topics, and
quitted the Guardian to write the Englishman.
The papers of Addison are marked in the Spectator by one of the letters
in the name of Clio, and in the Guardian by a hand; whether it was, as
Tickell pretends to think, that he was unwilling to usurp the praise of
others, or as Steele, with far greater likelihood, insinuates, that he could
not without discontent impart to others any of his own. I have heard
that his avidity did not satisfy itself with the air of renown, but that

with great eagerness he laid hold on his proportion of the profits.
Many of these papers were written with powers truly comic, with nice
discrimination of characters, and accurate observation of natural or
accidental deviations from propriety; but it was not supposed that he
had tried a comedy on the stage, till Steele after his death declared him
the author of The Drummer. This, however, Steele did not know to be
true by any direct testimony, for when Addison put the play into his
hands, he only told him it was the work of a "gentleman in the
company;" and when it was received, as is confessed, with cold
disapprobation, he was probably less willing to claim it. Tickell omitted
it in his collection; but the testimony of Steele, and the total silence of
any other claimant, has determined the public to assign it to Addison,
and it is now printed with other poetry. Steele carried The Drummer to
the play-house, and afterwards to the press, and sold the copy for fifty
guineas.
To the opinion of Steele may be added the proof supplied by the play
itself, of which the characters are such as Addison would have
delineated, and the tendency such as Addison would have promoted.
That it should have been ill received would raise wonder, did we not
daily see the capricious distribution of theatrical praise.
He was not all this time an indifferent spectator of public affairs. He
wrote, as different exigences required (in 1707), "The Present State of
the War, and the Necessity of an Augmentation;" which, however
judicious, being written on temporary topics, and exhibiting no peculiar
powers, laid hold on no attention, and has naturally sunk by its own
weight into neglect. This cannot be said of the few papers entitled the
Whig Examiner, in which is employed all the force of gay malevolence
and humorous satire. Of this paper, which just appeared and expired,
Swift remarks, with exultation, that "it is now down among the dead
men." He might well rejoice at the death of that which he could not
have killed. Every reader of every party, since personal malice is past,
and the papers which once inflamed the nation are read only as
effusions of wit, must wish for more of the Whig Examiners; for on no
occasion was the genius of Addison more vigorously exerted, and on

none did the superiority of his powers more evidently appear. His
"Trial of Count Tariff," written to expose the treaty of commerce with
France, lived no longer than the question that produced it.
Not long afterwards an attempt was made to revive the Spectator, at a
time indeed by no means favourable to literature, when the succession
of a new family to the throne filled the nation with anxiety, discord,
and confusion; and either the turbulence of the times, or the satiety of
the readers, put a stop to the publication after an experiment of eighty
numbers, which were actually collected into an eighth volume, perhaps
more valuable than any of those that went before it. Addison produced
more than a fourth part; and the other contributors are by no means
unworthy of appearing as his associates. The time that had passed
during the suspension of the Spectator, though it had not lessened his
power of humour, seems to have increased his disposition to
seriousness: the proportion of his religious to his comic papers is
greater than in the former series.
The Spectator, from its re-commencement, was published only three
times a week; and no discriminative marks were added to the papers.
To Addison, Tickell has ascribed twenty-three. The Spectator had many
contributors; and Steele, whose negligence kept him always in a hurry,
when it was his turn to furnish a