The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings

The Works of William Hogarth:
In a Series
by John Trusler

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Title: The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings With
Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency
Author: John Trusler
Contributor: John Hogarth John Nichols
Engraver: William Hogarth
Release Date: September 4, 2007 [EBook #22500]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration: WILLIAM HOGARTH.]

THE WORKS OF WILLIAM HOGARTH;
IN A SERIES OF ENGRAVINGS: WITH DESCRIPTIONS, AND A
COMMENT ON THEIR MORAL TENDENCY,
BY THE REV. JOHN TRUSLER.
TO WHICH ARE ADDED, ANECDOTES OF THE AUTHOR AND
HIS WORKS, BY J. HOGARTH AND J. NICHOLS.
London: PUBLISHED BY JONES AND CO. TEMPLE OF THE
MUSES, (LATE LACKINGTON'S,) FINSBURY SQUARE.
1833.
C. BAYNES, PRINTER, 13 DUKE STREET, LINCOLN'S INN
FIELDS.

THE LIFE OF HOGARTH.
William Hogarth is said to have been the descendant of a family
originally from Kirby Thore, in Westmorland.
His grandfather was a plain yeoman, who possessed a small tenement
in the vale of Bampton, a village about fifteen miles north of Kendal, in
that county; and had three sons.

The eldest assisted his father in farming, and succeeded to his little
freehold.
The second settled in Troutbeck, a village eight miles north west of
Kendal, and was remarkable for his talent at provincial poetry.
Richard Hogarth, the third son, who was educated at St. Bees, and had
kept a school in the same county, appears to have been a man of some
learning. He came early to London, where he resumed his original
occupation of a schoolmaster, in Ship-court in the Old Bailey, and was
occasionally employed as a corrector of the press.
Mr. Richard Hogarth married in London; and our artist, and his sisters,
Mary and Anne, are believed to have been the only product of the
marriage.
William Hogarth was born November 10, and baptised Nov. 28, 1697,
in the parish of St. Bartholomew the Great, in London; to which parish,
it is said, in the Biographia Britannica, he was afterwards a benefactor.
The school of Hogarth's father, in 1712, was in the parish of St. Martin,
Ludgate. In the register of that parish, therefore, the date of his death, it
was natural to suppose, might be found; but the register has been
searched to no purpose.
Hogarth seems to have received no other education than that of a
mechanic, and his outset in life was unpropitious. Young Hogarth was
bound apprentice to a silversmith (whose name was Gamble) of some
eminence; by whom he was confined to that branch of the trade, which
consists in engraving arms and cyphers upon the plate. While thus
employed, he gradually acquired some knowledge of drawing; and,
before his apprenticeship expired, he exhibited talent for caricature.
"He felt the impulse of genius, and that it directed him to painting,
though little apprised at that time of the mode Nature had intended he
should pursue."
The following circumstance gave the first indication of the talents with
which Hogarth afterwards proved himself to be so liberally endowed.

During his apprenticeship, he set out one Sunday, with two or three
companions, on an excursion to Highgate. The weather being hot, they
went into a public-house; where they had not long been, before a
quarrel arose between some persons in the same room; from words they
soon got to blows, and the quart pots being the only missiles at hand,
were sent flying about the room in glorious confusion. This was a scene
too laughable for Hogarth to resist. He drew out his pencil, and
produced on the spot one of the most ludicrous pieces that ever was
seen; which exhibited likenesses not only of the combatants engaged in
the affray, but also of the persons gathered round them, placed in
grotesque attitudes, and heightened with character and points of
humour.
On the expiration of his apprenticeship, he entered into the academy in
St. Martin's Lane, and studied drawing from the life: but in this his
proficiency was inconsiderable; nor would he ever have surpassed
mediocrity as a painter, if he had not penetrated through external form
to character and manners. "It was character, passions, the soul, that his
genius was given him to