CHARACTER OF DR. SHERIDAN.

WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1738.*

D

OCTOR THOMAS SHERIDAN died at Rathfarnham, the 10th of October, 1738, at three of the clock in the afternoon his diseases were a dropsy and asthma. He was doubtless the best instructor of youth in these kingdoms, or, perhaps, in Europe; and as great a master of the Greek and Roman languages. He had a very fruitful invention, and a talent for poetry. His English verses were full of wit and humour, but neither his prose nor verse sufficiently correct: however, he would readily submit to any friend who had a true taste in He has left behind him a very great prose or verse. collection, in several volumes, of stories, humorous,

* As Swift advanced in years and infirmities, it became more difficult to please him, or even to soothe his habitual irritation. We have mentioned, in his Life, his unfortunate quarrel with Sheridan, the most sincere, as well as the most officious of his friends and admirers. The present character retains some traces of friendship become cold and broken. The defects of imprudence are more strongly insisted upon than is consistent with the respect due to the memory of a departed friend; nor has the praise that affectionate warmth which the long and revered attachment of the deceased so particularly deserved.

witty, wise, or some way useful, gathered from a vast number of Greek, Roman, Italian, Spanish, French, and English writers. I believe I may have seen about thirty, large enough to make as many moderate books in octavo. But among these extracts, there were many not worth regard; for five or six, at least, were of little use or entertainment. He was (as it is frequently the case in men of wit and learning) what the French call a dupe, and in a very high degree. The greatest dunce of a tradesman could impose upon him, for he was altogether ignorant in worldly management. His chief shining quality was that of a schoolmaster: here he shone in his proper element. He had so much skill and practice in the physiognomy of boys, that he rarely mistook at the first view. His scholars loved and feared him. He often rather chose to shame the stupid, but punish the idle, and expose them to all the lads, which was more severe than lashing. Among the gentlemen in this kingdom who have any share of education, the scholars of Dr. Sheridan infinitely excel, in number and knowledge, all their brethren sent from other schools.

To look on the doctor in some other lights, he was in many things very indiscreet, to say no worse. He acted like too many clergymen, who are in haste to get married when very young; and from hence proceeded all the miseries of his life. The portion he got proved to be just the reverse of £500, for he was poorer by a thousand: so many incumbrances of a mother-in-law, and poor relations, whom he was forced to support for many years. Instead of breeding up his daughters to housewifery and plain clothes, he got them at a great expense, to be clad like ladies who had plentiful fortunes; made them only learn to sing and dance, to draw and design, to give them rich silks and other

fopperies; and his two eldest were married, without his consent, to young lads who had nothing to settle on them. However, he had one son, whom the doctor sent to Westminster school, although he could ill afford it. The boy was there immediately taken notice of, upon examination: although a mere stranger, he was, by pure merit, elected a king's scholar. It is true, their maintenance falls something short the doctor was then so poor, that he could not add fourteen pounds to enable the boy to finish the year; which if he had done, he would have been removed to a higher class, and, in another year, would have been sped off (that is the phrase) to a fellowship in Oxford or Cambridge: but the doctor was forced to recall him to Dublin, and had friends in our university to send him there, where he has been chosen of the foundation; and, I think, has gotten an exhibition, and designs to stand for a fellowship.*

The doctor had a good church living, in the south parts of Ireland, given him by Lord Carteret; who, being very learned himself, encourages it in others. A friend of the doctor's prevailed on his excellency to grant it. The living was well worth £150 per annum. He changed it very soon for that of Dunboyn; which, by the knavery of the farmers, and power of the gentlemen, fell so very low, that he could never get £80. He then changed that living for the free school of Cavan, where he might have lived well in so cheap a country, on £80 salary

*This was Thomas Sheridan, an actor of considerable celebrity, and who afterwards distinguished himself by Lectures on Elocution, and an excellent Life of Swift. He was, however, still more remarkable, as the father of the celebrated and highly-gifted Richard Brinsley Sheridan, M.P., one of the most gifted men of a period when talents were the profuse attribute of those who dedicated themselves to the public service.

per annum, besides his scholars; but the air, he said, was too moist and unwholesome, and he could not bear the company of some persons in that neighbourhood. Upon this he sold the school for about £400, spent the money, grew into disease, and died.

It would be very honourable, as well as just, in those many persons of quality and fortune, who had the advantage of being educated under Dr. Sheridan, if they would please to erect some decent monument over his body, in the church where it is deposited.

* "Dr. Sheridan's friend and physician, Dr. Helsham, foretold the manner, and almost the very time of his death. He said his disorder was a polypus in the heart, which was so far advanced, that it would probably put an end to his existence in a short time, and so suddenly as to give him no warning of it; and therefore recommended it to him to settle his affairs. The doctor, upon this, retired to a house of one of his scholars, Mr. O'Callaghan, at Rathfarnham, three miles from Dublin. In a few days he sent for his friend and namesake, Counsellor Sheridan, to draw his will; and when that was done he seemed cheerful and in good spirits. The counsellor, and a brother of Mr. O'Callaghan's, who lent him his house, upon being called away to another part of the kingdom, dined with him that day. Soon after dinner the conversation happened to turn on the weather, and one of them observed that the wind was easterly. The doctor upon this said, 'Let it blow, east, west, north, or south, the immortal soul will take its flight to the destined point.' These were the last words he ever spoke, for he immediately sunk back in his chair, and expired without a groan, or the smallest struggle. His friends thought he had fallen asleep, and in that belief retired to the garden, that they might not disturb his repose; but, on their return, after an hour's walk, to their great astonishment, they found he was dead. Upon opening the body, Dr. Helsham's sagacious prognostic proved to be true, as the polypus in the heart was discovered to be the immediate cause of his death. I know not whether it is worth mentioning, that the surgeon said he never saw so large a heart in a human body."—Sheridan's Life of Swift.

VOL. IX.

U

THE HISTORY

OF

THE SECOND SOLOMON.* 1729.

AMONG all the painful circumstances attendant upon the dissolution of a long and affectionate intercourse between friends of ancient standing, there is none more bitter than when, before a final rupture has taken place, one party avails himself of all the freedom and familiarity of their former relation, to express himself concerning his friend's foibles, with more bitterness than he could pretend to treat those of an enemy. In these moments, every trivial circumstance of untimely raillery, and effusion of temporary resentment, is eagerly mustered and arraigned as an article of indictment against the offender; and former disputes, which, when they happened, were only considered as matter of jest, are then arrayed as grounds of accusation. The following character of Dr. Sheridan, in which his foibles are treated so unmercifully, and where some slight instances of disrespect, occurring in the course of familiar and jocular intercourse, are preferred as charges of ingratitude, argues that state of mind in the author, which could not long consist with intimacy. There is, besides, an assumption of superiority through the whole, which seems to place the "Person distinguished for poetical and other writings," and occupying "an eminent station," in contrast, very degrading to his more humble, and, one would almost suppose, his dependent friend. This is one of the pieces in which Swift has indulged his irritable temperament, at the expense of his head and heart.

* Dr. Sheridan.-D. S.