ats not to be banished again:--

For, rather than I'll to the west return,
I'll beg of thee first, here to have mine urn.

The Devonians were avenged; for the satirist of the _English Arcadia_
was condemned again to reside by "its rockie side," among "its rockie
men."

Such has been the usual chant of provincial poets; and, if the
"silky-soft Favonian gales" of Devon, with its "Worthies," could not
escape the anger of such a poet as Herrick, what county may hope to be
saved from the invective of querulous and dissatisfied poets?

In this calamity of authors I will show that a great poet felicitated
himself that poetry was not the business of his life; and afterwards I
will bring forward an evidence that the immoderate pursuit of poetry,
with a very moderate genius, creates a perpetual state of illusion;
and pursues grey-headed folly even to the verge of the grave.

Pope imagined that PRIOR was only fit to make verses, and less
qualified for business than Addison himself. Had Prior lived to finish
that history of his own times he was writing, we should have seen how
far the opinion of Pope was right. Prior abandoned the Whigs, who had
been his first patrons, for the Tories, who were now willing to adopt
the political apostate. This versatility for place and pension rather
shows that Prior was a little more "qualified for business than
Addison."

Johnson tells us "Prior lived at a time when the rage of party
detected all which was any man's interest to hide; and, as little ill
is heard of Prior, it is certain that not much was known:" more,
however, than Johnson supposes. This great man came to the pleasing
task of his poetical biography totally unprepared, except with the
maturity of his genius, as a profound observer of men, and an
invincible dogmatist in taste. In the history of the times, Johnson is
deficient, which has deprived us of that permanent instruction and
delight his intellectual powers had poured around it. The character
and the secret history of Prior are laid open in the "State
Poems;"[138] a bitter Whiggish narrative, too particular to be
entirely fictitious, while it throws a new light on Johnson's
observation of Prior's "propensity to sordid converse, and the low
delights of mean company," which Johnson had imperfectly learned from
some attendant on Prior.

A vintner's boy, the wretch was first preferr'd
To wait at Vice's gates, and pimp for bread;
To hold the candle, and sometimes