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LYTTLETΟΝ.

GEORGE LORD LYTTLETON, the eldest son of Sir Thomas Lyttleton, of Hagley, in Worcestershire, where he was born in 1709, held a considerable rank among the noblemen who have cultivated letters and shone in the double capacity of statesman and poet. His easy and sprightly talent, added to the amiableness of his disposition, made him very generally admired. The sex in a particular manner courted his conversation, and was the object of all the effusions of his muse. His friend, Mr. Pope, became his model, whose manner he attempted to imitate, and familiar with the harmony of his versification, he had at times the good fortune of approaching to the elegance of his master. His verses are more commendatory than critical; they please the female of sensibility rather than the man of science, and perfectly fulfil, says Johnson, the aim of the author, who only aspired to please. But this young nobleman, so tender towards the sex, so courteous in his manners, and polished as a poet, was in the House of Commons a determined whig and exalted patriot, and one of the most violent men of the opposition; his style so delicate in poetry, assumed in parliament an air of asperity. He spoke only in madrigals in society, and in epigram in public life.

Lyttleton announced at an early age his genius and facility. He was educated at Eton, from whence he removed to Christ Church, Oxford. While at Eton, where his application was much commended, he pub

lished his "Monologue of a young Beauty retired into the country," an ingenious pleasantry, which displayed in the author a greater knowledge of the female mind than might have been expected from his years. His Persian Letters soon followed. This work, in the opinion of Johnson, bears all the character of youth; it is full of that ardent love of liberty, so frequently conspicuous in the mind of a man of genius on his entrance into the world; which he insensibly loses in proportion as he advances in life, when enabled to appreciate men rather than things.

In 1728 he travelled through France and Italy. On his return he obtained a seat in parliament, where he distinguished himself on the side of opposition, although his father, who was one of the lords of the admiralty, voted always with Sir Robert Walpole.

In the struggles which at that time took place between the ministry and the opposition, he vehemently condemned the introduction of the excise, and the organization of a standing army. He supported the petition to the king for the dismissal of Sir Robert Walpole, who, upon his being displaced, used all his efforts to exclude Lyttleton from the privy council.

In this attempt, however, Sir Robert failed; and from that moment Lyttleton pursued with much energy his political career. In 1737, he became secretary to Frederick Prince of Wales, who adhered to the opposition party. In 1741 he married Miss Lucy Fortescue, sister of Lord Fortescue, by whom he had a son and two daughters. This amiable lady died in 1747, and Mr. Lyttleton throwing a crape over his lyre, wrote a beautiful Monody to her memory. On the change of ministry in 1744, by the resignation of

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Sir Robert Walpole, he was appointed one of the lords of the treasury. In 1749 he took for his second wife the daughter of Sir Robert Rich. Having in his younger years, as he acknowledges, been led into scepticism, he published his observations on the con-, version of St. Paul, a work of infinite value. In 1751 he succeeded to the title of baronet, by the death of his father, and in 1754 he was made cofferer and privy counsellor. Some years afterwards a new reign producing a new administration, he was raised to the peerage, and in a great measure retired from the intrigues and dissensions of politics.

But the labours of the statesman did not prevent Lyttleton from devoting his time to literary pursuits; while on his travels he wrote two epistles in verse, one to Dr. Ayscough, the other to Mr. Pope. On his return to London he consecrated his muse to love, and wrote only on amatory subjects. After the death of his first wife, whom he had the misfortune to lose in child-birth, his lyre assumed a more plaintive and melancholy

tone.

In the year 1755, Lyttleton published his Dialogues of the dead, one of his best productions in prose, and in 1764 his "History of the Reign of Henry II." made its appearance.

It was upon this occasion that Doctor Johnson notices the ambitious exactness of Lyttleton, in regard to punctuation. So solicitous was he to render his history perfect in that respect, that many of the sheets were reprinted four and five times. The first edition of this work cost the author one thousand guineas. Notwithstanding all his anxiety in point of precision, the third edition of his book, which he printed in three volumes,

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