may read him with pleasure. His way of assuming the question in debate is extremely artful; and his Letter to Crassus is, I think, a masterpiece. As these papers are supposed to have been written by several hands, the criticks will tell you, that they discover a difference in their styles and beauties; and pretend to observe, that the first Examiners abound chiefly in wit, the last in humour. Soon after their first appearance, came out a paper from the other side, called The " Whig Examiner," written with so much fire, and in so excellent a style, as put the tories in no small pain for their favourite hero: every one cried, "Bickerstaff must be the author;" and people were the more confirmed in this opinion upon its being so soon laid down, which seemed to show that it was only written to bind the Examiners to their good behaviour, and was never designed to be a weekly paper. The Examiners therefore have no one to combat with at present, but their friend the Medley; the author of which paper, though he seems to be a man of good sense, and expresses it luckily enough now and then, is, I think, for the most part, perfectly a stranger to fine writing. I presume I need not tell you, that The Examiner carries much the more sail, as it is supposed to be written by the direction, and under the eye, of some great persons who sit at the helm of affairs, and is consequently looked on as a sort of publick notice which way they are steering us. The re puted author is Dr. Swift, with the assistance sometimes of Dr. Atterbury and Mr. Prior*. * "Present State of Wit," supposed to be written by Mr. Gay; see the eighteenth volume of this edition. N. Having completed the design which first engaged him in the undertaking with N°. 45, June 7, 1711; Dr. Swift then took his leave of the town in the last paragraph of that Number; and on the same day wrote thus to Mrs. Johnson. "As for the Examiner, I have heard a whisper, that after that of this day, which tells what this Parliament have done, you will hardly find them so good. I prophecy they will be trash for the future. Methinks, in this day's Examiner, the author speaks doubtfully, as if he would write no more. Observe whether the change be discovered in Dublin, only for your own curiosity, that's all." From this time, Swift had no farther concern with the publication, except by assisting in the single number of the succeeding week. The Examiner indeed still continued to be published; but it sunk immediately into rudeness and ill-manners, being written by some under spurleathers in the City, whose scurrility was encouraged (as Swift himself did not scruple to own) by the ministry themselves, who employed this paper to return the Grub-street invectives thrown out by the authors of the Medley, the Englishman, and some other detracting papers of the same stamp. It is now no longer a secret that N°. 46 was written by Mrs. Manley with the assistance of Dr. Swift; and that the next six numbers were also by the same hand. On the 22d of June (the * "I have instructed an under spur-leather to write so that it is taken for mine." Journal to Stella, Oct. 10, 1711. This was probably the under-strapper noticed Nov. 26, 1711; whom he elsewhere calls, 66 a scrub instrument of mischief of mine." day says, "Yes day after No. 47 was published) Swift terday was a sad Examiner; and last week's was very indifferent; though some scraps of the old spirit, as if he had given hints ;" and on the 15th of July, "I do not like any thing in the Examiner after the 45th, except the first part of the 46th."-Mrs. Manley's last paper was N°. 52, July 26; and in a letter, dated Nov. 3, 1711, Swift says, "The first thirteen Examiners were written by several hands, some good, some bad; the next three and thirty were all by one hand; that makes fortysix; then the author, whoever he was, laid it down, on purpose to confound guessers; and the last six were written by a woman. The printer is going to print them in a small volume; it seems the author is too proud to have them printed by subscription, though his friends offered, they say, to make it worth 5001, to him." On the 6th of December following, the work was resumed by Oldisworth, who completed four volumes * Of Mr. William Oldisworth, little is now remembered but the titles of some of his literary productions. He was editor of the Muses' Mercury, 1707; and published, 1. "A Dialogue between Timothy and Philatheus, in which the Principles and Projects of a late whimsical Book, intitled The Rights of the Christian Church, &c. are fairly stated, and answered in their kind, &c. By a Layman, 1709, 1710," 3 vols. 8vo. 2. "A Vindication of the Bishop of Exeter (Dr. Blackall) against Mr. Hoadly." 3. A volume called "State Tracts." 4. Another called, "State and Miscellany Poems, by the Author of the Examiner, 1715,” 8vo. 5. He translated the "Odes, Epodes, and Carmen Seculare of Horace." 6. The "Life of Edmund Smith," prefixed to his Works, written" with all the partiality of friendship;" said by Dr. Burton, to shew "what fine things one man of parts can say of another;" and which Dr. Johnson has volumes more; and published nineteen numbers more of the sixth volume, when the Queen's death put an end to the work *. During this long period the only articles that are known to be by Dr. Swift are, a hint which he gave about the prorogation of the parliament, and to praise the queen for her tenderness to the Dutch, in giving them still time to submit, which he notices to Mrs. Johnson, Jan. 15, 1712-13; and says, "It suited the occasions at present." The vindication of his friend, Mr. Lewis, in N°. 21 of the third volume, Feb. 2, 1712-13, which is printed at length in the fifth volume of the present edition, is undoubtedly Swift's; which he more than once acknowledges, in his Journal to Stella, Jan. 27, Jan. 31, and Feb. 1. The publick at large, however, still considered the paper to be under the management of Swift; who tells Mrs. Johnson, March 23, 1712-13, "The Examiner has cleared me to-day of being author of his paper, and done it with great civilities to me. I hope it will stop people's mouths; if not, they must go on, and be hang'd; I care not."-The letter alluded to has the following has honoured by incorporating it into his biographical preface on Smith.-That Oldisworth had an attachment to the abdicated royal family, is admitted; which gave occasion to a report in the Weekly Packet, Jan. 17, 1715-16, that he was killed with his sword in his hand, in the engagement at Preston, in company with several others who had the same fate; having resolved not to survive the loss of the battle." But this report was groundless, as he lived till Sept. 15, 1734. * No. 19, was published July 26, 1714; and on the 8th of October came out the first number of "The Controller, being a Sequel to the Examiner;" published also by Morphew. passage passage in the 35th number of vol. III. in which Mr. Oldisworth, speaking of some of his opponents, says, "I shall at once ease them of a great deal of guilt, as well as importance, by putting a final stop to some of their daily clamours, and for ever shutting up one of their most liberal sluices of scandal. They have been a long time laying a load upon a gentleman of the first character for learning, good sense, wit, and more virtues than even they can set off and illustrate by all the opposition and extremes of vice which are the compounds of their party. He is indeed fully accomplished to be mortally hated by them; and they needed not to charge him with writing the Examiner, as if that were a sufficient revenge, in which they show as little judgment as truth. I here pronounce him clear of that imputation; and, out of pure regard to justice, strip myself of all the honour that lucky untruth did this paper; reserving to myself the entertaining reflection, that I was once taken for a man who has a thousand other recommendations, besides the notice of the worst men, to make him loved and esteemed by the best. This is the second time I have humoured that party, by publickly declaring who is not the author of the Examiner. I will lend them no more light, because they do not love it. I could only wish, that their invectives against that gentleman had been considerable enough to call forth his publick resentments; and I stand amazed at their folly in provoking so much ruin to their party. Their intellectuals must be as stupid as their consciences, not to dread the terrors of his pen, though they met him with all that |