were the exercises of substantial virtue
and gallantry, and _men_, like _setting dogs_, were rather
_bred up_ unto, than _taught_ reason and worth, it were a more
tolerable proposal (though the different policy of these times
would not admit of it); but this _working_, so recommended, is
but the _feeding of carp in the air_, &c. As for the study of
Politics, and all critical learning, these are either
pedantical, or tedious, to those who have _a shorter way of
studying men_."--_Preface to "Legends no Histories."_

[276] "Legends no Histories," p. 5.

[277] Dr. King was allied to the families of Clarendon and Rochester;
he took a degree as Doctor of Civil Law, and soon got into
great practice. "He afterwards went with the Earl of Pembroke,
Lord-Lieutenant, to Ireland, where he became Judge Advocate,
Sole Commissioner of the Prizes, Keeper of the Records,
Vicar-General to the Lord Primate of Ireland; was countenanced
by persons of the highest rank, and might have made a fortune.
But so far was he from heaping up riches, that he returned to
England with no other treasure than a few merry poems and
humorous essays, and returned to his student's place in Christ
Church."--_Enc. Brit._ He was assisted by Bolingbroke; but
when his patronage failed, Swift procured him the situation of
editor to "Barber's Gazette." He ultimately took to drinking;
Lintot the bookseller, told Pope, "I remember Dr. King could
write verses in a tavern three hours after he could not
speak." His last patron was Lord Clarendon, and he died in
apartments he had provided for him in London, Dec. 25, 1712,
and was buried in the cloisters of Westminster Abbey at the
expense of his lordship.--ED.

[278] Sloane describes Clark, the famous posture-master, "Phil.
Trans." No. 242, certainly with the wildest grammar, but with
many curious particulars; the gentleman in one of Dr. King's
Dialogues inquires the secretary's opinion of the causes of
this man's wonderful pliability of limbs; a question which
Sloane had thus solved, with colloquial ease: it depended upon
"bringing the body to it, by using himself to it."

In giving an account of "a child born without a brain"--"Had
it lived lon