, vol. v. p. 696. [4] Nichols's Literary
Anecdotes, vol. v, p. 15
[5] Ibid. vol. viii.
[6] Warburton's Letters, 8vo. Edit. p. 369.
[7] This defect has probably been remedied by Mr. Todd's enlargement of
the Dictionary.
[8] Wooll's Life of Joseph Warton, p. 230.
[9] The writers, besides Smart, were Richard Holt, Garrick, and Dr.
Percy. Their papers are signed with the initials of their surnames.
Johnson's are marked by two asterisks.--_See Hawkins's Life of
Johnson_, p.351.
[10] Miss Seward's letters, vol. i. p. 117.
[11] Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, vol. ii.
[12] Vol. xix. p. 71. Ed. 1815.
[13] Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 532.
[14] Wooll's Memoirs of Dr. Joseph Warton.
[15] Plato de Republica, 1. v. 476.

* * * * *

JOHN ARMSTRONG.

John Armstrong, the son of a Scotch minister, was born in the parish of
Castleton, in Roxburghshire. The date of his birth has not been
ascertained, nor is there any thing known concerning the earlier part of
his education. The first we hear of it is, that he took a degree in
medicine at Edinburgh, on the fourth of February, 1732; on which
occasion he published his Thesis, as usual, and chose De Tabe Purulenta
for the subject of it. A copy of a Latin letter, which he sent to Sir
Hans Sloane with this essay, is said to be in the British Museum. In an
advertisement prefixed to some verses which he calls Imitations of
Shakspeare, he informs the reader that the first of them was just
finished when Thomson's Winter made its appearance. This was in 1726,
when he was, he himself says, very young. Thomson having heard of this
production by a youth, who was of the same country with himself, desired
to see it, and was so much pleased with the attempt, that he put it into
the hands of Aaron Hill, Mallet, and Young. With Thomson, further than
in the subject, there is no coincidence. The manner is a caricature of
Shakspeare's.

In 1735, we find him in London, publishing a humorous pamphlet, entitled
An Essay for abridging the Study of Physic, which, though he did not
profess himself the writer, Mr. Nichols says [1], he can, on the best
authority, assert to be his. In two years after he published a Medical
Essay. This was soon followed by a licentious poem, which I have not
seen, and the title of which I do not think it necessary to record.--
While thus employed, it was not to be expected that he should rise to
much eminence