public advantage.'

The following year he wrote (in prose) a book called, An Enquiry into
the Merit of Assassination, with a View to the Character of Cæsar; and
his Designs on the Roman Republic.

About this time, he in a manner left the world, (though living near so
populous a part of it as London) and settled at Plaistow in Essex; where
he entirely devoted himself to his study, family, and garden; and the
accomplishment of many profitable views; particularly one, in which for
years he had laboured through experiments in vain; and when he brought
it to perfection, did not live to reap the benefit of it: The discovery
of the art of making pot-ash like the Russian, which cost this nation,
yearly, an immense sum of money.

In the year 1743 he published The Fanciad, an Heroic Poem; inscribed to
his grace the duke of Marlborough: Who as no name was then prefixed to
it, perhaps, knew not the author by whom he was distinguished in it.

Soon after he wrote another, intitled the Impartial; which he inscribed,
in the same manner, to the lord Carteret (now earl of Granville). In the
beginning of it are the following lines,

Burn, sooty slander, burn thy blotted scroll;
Greatness is greatness, spite of faction's soul.

Deep let my soul detest th'adhesive pride,
That changing sentiment, unchanges side.

It would be tedious to enumerate the variety of smaller pieces he at