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Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) by Lewis Melville
page 275 of 345 (79%)
mean sentiments, vulgar prejudices, and endless repetitions? Sometimes
the tittle-tattle of a fine lady, sometimes that of an old nurse, always
tittle-tattle; yet so well gilt over by airy expressions, and a flowing
style, she will always please the same people to whom Lord Bolingbroke
will shine as a first-rate author. She is so far to be excused, as her
letters were not intended for the press; while her labours to display to
posterity all the wit and learning he is master of, and sometimes spoils
a good argument by a profusion of words, running out into several pages
a thought that might have been more clearly expressed in a few lines,
and, what is worse, often falls into contradiction and repetitions,
which are almost unavoidable to all voluminous writers, and can only be
forgiven to those retailers whose necessity compels them to diurnal
scribbling, who load their meaning with epithets, and run into
digressions, because (in the jockey phrase) it rids the ground, that is,
covers a certain quantity of paper, to answer the demand of the day. A
great part of Lord B.'s letters are designed to show his reading, which,
indeed, appears to have been very extensive; but I cannot perceive that
such a minute account of it can be of any use to the pupil he pretends
to instruct; nor can I help thinking he is far below either Tillotson or
Addison, even in style, though the latter was sometimes more diffuse
than his judgment approved, to furnish out the length of a daily
_Spectator_. I own I have small regard for Lord B. as an author, and the
highest contempt for him as a man. He came into the world greatly
favoured both by nature and fortune, blest with a noble birth, heir to
a large estate, endowed with a strong constitution, and, as I have
heard, a beautiful figure, high spirits, a good memory and a lively
apprehension, which was cultivated by a learned education: all these
glorious advantages being left to the direction of a judgment stifled by
unbounded vanity, he dishonoured his birth, lost his estate, ruined his
reputation, and destroyed his health, by a wild pursuit of eminence even
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