THE POETICAL WORKS OF DAVID MALLET. WITH THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR. Rapt, I foresee thy MALLET's early aim Shine in full worth, and shoot at length to fame. SAVAGE. Imagination! at whose great command Arise unnumber'd images of things, Thy hourly offspring; thou who canst at will People with air-born shapes the silent wood Where Contemplation hunts; oh! come, ravok'd, THE EXCURSION.; LONDON PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY G. CAWTHORN, BRITISH LIBRARY, STRAND. ADVERTISEMENT. Few particulars relative to Mr. Mallet are known. He was by birth a North-Briton, tutor to his Grace the Duke of Montrose, and his brother, Lord George Graham; and afterwards Secretary to Frederick late Prince of Wales, father to his present Majesty. He also enjoyed the place of Keeper of the Book of Entries for ships in the port of London. Mr. Mallet married a lady of very considerable fortune, and lived and was respected as a gentleman. He died about the year 1765. This Author's dramatic pieces were Eurydice and Mustapha, tragedies, and Alfred and Britannia, masks; Alfred being wrote by Mr. Mallet in conjunction with the late aniiable Mr. Thomson, author of The Seasons. His other poems are faithfully collected in this Volume. Of his Elvira it has been observed, that the indifferent success it met with ought to be ascribed to the unfavourable juncture in which it appeared, the year 1763, when party-prejudice ran high against the Scots, on account of the unpopular, administration of Lord Bute, to whom Elvira was dedicated. The poem of Amyntor and Theodora was originally intended by the Author for the stage; but he afterwards found reason to alter it to the term in which it now appears, from motives partly hinted in the preface to the poem. Mr. Mallet was editor of a complete edition of Lord Bacon's Works, to which he prefixed a life of that 4 great man, though he himself is yet without'a biogra pher. He also published the Philosophical Works of the late Lord Bolingbroke, agreeable to his Lordship's last will and testament---a sufficient evidence of his Lordship's friendship for and sentiments of Mr. Mallet. March, 1780. |