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LADY CHUDLEIGH

Was born in the year 1656, and was daughter of Richard Lee of Winslade, in the county of Devon, esq; She had an education in which literature seemed but little regarded, being taught no other language than her native tongue; but her love of books, incessant industry in the reading of them, and her great capacity to improve by them, enabled her to make a very considerable figure in literature.

She was married to Sir George Chudleigh of Ashton in the county of Devon, Bart, by whom she had issue Eliza Maria, who died in the bloom of life, (much lamented by her mother, who poured out her griefs on that occasion, in a Poem entitled a Dialogue between Lucinda and Marissa) and George, who succeeded to the title and estate, Thomas, and others.

She was a lady of great virtue, as well as understanding, and she made the latter of these subservient to the promotion of the former, which was much improved by study; but though she was enamoured of the charms of poetry, yet she dedicated some part of her time to the severer study of philosophy, as appears from her excellent essays, which discover an uncommon degree of piety, and knowledge, and a noble contempt of those vanities which the unthinking part of her sex so much regard, and so eagerly pursue.

The works which this lady produced, are,

The Ladies Defence, or the Bride-Woman’s Counsellor answered, a Poem; in a Dialogue between Sir John Brute, Sir William Loveall, Melissa, and a Parson.  This piece has been several times printed; the writing it was occasioned by an angry sermon preached against the fair sex, of which her ladyship gives the following account; ’Mr. Lintot, says she, some time since, intending to reprint my poems, desired me to permit him to add to them a Dialogue I had written in the year 1700, on a Sermon preached by Mr. Sprint, a Nonconformist, at Sherbourne in Dorsetshire; I refusing, for several reasons, to grant his request, he, without my knowledge, bought the copy of the Bookseller who formerly printed it, and, without my consent, or once acquainting me with his resolution, added to it the second edition of my poems; and that which makes the injury the greater, is, his having omitted the Epistle Dedicatory, and the Preface, by which means he has left the reader wholly in the dark, and exposed me to censure.  When it was first printed I had reason to complain, but not so much as now:  Then the Dedication was left entire as I had written it, but the Preface so mangled, altered, and considerably shortened, that I hardly knew it to be my own; but being then published without a name, I was the less concerned, but since, notwithstanding the great care I took to conceal it, it is known to be mine; I think myself obliged, in my own defence, to take some notice of it[1].’  The omission of this Preface, which contained an answer