Social England : a record of the progress of the people in religion, laws, learning, arts, industry, commerce, science, literature and manners, from the earliest times to the present day . assumed by one Robert Merry, a leading light amongthem), who had combined to publish an album of absurditiesin Avhich inanity of sentiment and affectation of style contendedenergetically but with varying fortunes for , and Hayleys friend, Miss Seward, coquetted with theschool; and a few writers, who one would have thought hadtoo much wit to be there, like OKeefe and Reynolds, weremore or l
Social England : a record of the progress of the people in religion, laws, learning, arts, industry, commerce, science, literature and manners, from the earliest times to the present day . assumed by one Robert Merry, a leading light amongthem), who had combined to publish an album of absurditiesin Avhich inanity of sentiment and affectation of style contendedenergetically but with varying fortunes for , and Hayleys friend, Miss Seward, coquetted with theschool; and a few writers, who one would have thought hadtoo much wit to be there, like OKeefe and Reynolds, weremore or less formally attached to it. ^Mrs. Thrale, now , had relations with it; and among its other membersAvere a ludicrous person of the name of Upton, in Avhose versesthe habitual flattery of self and fellows became almost harmlessby becoming wildly ridiculous: one Williams, a man of some-what greater ability, but Avorse character and disposition thanhis colleagues; and a train of other simpletons and impostorsAvhose very names are noAV as completely lost as those of thepoetasters and pamphleteers of half a century earlier wouldhave been if Pope had never Avritten the ROBERT MERRA.{From a contemporary print.) LITERATURE. 1802] 601 In the first five or six years onward from 1785, when theirprecious album first appeared, this school of folly and pretencestood much in need of a Dunciad of its own; and this was atlast launched at them fiom the hand of a rougher and lessaccomplished but still a sufficient Pope. William Giftbrd(1757-1826) was a man of humble origin, who by dint ofgreat natural abilities, untiring industry, and the judiciousaid of a benevolent patron, had educated himself into a com-petent scholar and acquired a position of some eminence inthe literary world. His critical taste was none of the mostdelicate, but he knew nonsense when he saAV it, and possess-ing a considerable fund of rough but genuine humour, togetherwith the mastery of a satiric verse w
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