still retreats of contemplation.  In this retirement did he spend his few remaining years, universally loved and honoured; he was familiar with all men of learning in his time, and contracted friendship with persons of the greatest eminence as well in literature as politics; Gower, Occleve, Lidgate, Wickliffe were great admirers, and particular friends of Chaucer; besides he was well acquainted with foreign poets, particularly Francis Petrarch the famous Italian poet, and refiner of the language.  A Revolution in England soon after this happened, in which we find Chaucer but little concerned; he made no mean compliments to Henry iv, but Gower his cotemporary, though then very old, flattered the reigning prince, and insulted the memory of his murdered Sovereign.  All acts of parliament and grants in the last reign being annulled, Chaucer again repaired to Court to get fresh grants, but bending with age and weakness, tho’ he was successful in his request, the fatigue of attendance so overcame him, that death prevented his enjoying his new possessions.  He died the 25th of October in the year 1400, in the second of Henry iv, in the 72d of his age, and bore the shock of death with the same fortitude and resignation with which he had undergone a variety of pressures, and vicissitudes of fortune.

Dryden says, he was poet laureat to three kings, but Urry is of opinion that Dryden must be mistaken, as among all his works not one court poem is to be found, and Selden observes, that he could find no poet honoured with that title in England before the reign of Edward iv, to whom one John Kaye dedicated the Siege of Rhodes in prose by the title of his Humble Poet Laureat.

I cannot better display the character of this great man than in the following words of Urry.  “As to his temper, says he, he had a mixture of the gay, the modest and the grave.  His reading was deep and extensive, his judgment sound and discerning; he was communicative of his knowledge, and ready to correct or pass over the faults of his cotemporary writers.  He knew how to judge of and excuse the slips of weaker capacities, and pitied rather than exposed the ignorance of that age.  In one word, he was a great scholar, a pleasant wit, a candid critic, a sociable companion, a stedfast friend, a great philosopher, a temperate oeconomist, and a pious christian.”  As to his genius as a poet, Dryden (than whom a higher authority cannot be produced) speaking of Homer and Virgil, positively asserts, that our author exceeded the latter, and stands in competition with the former.

His language, how unintelligible soever it may seem, is almost as modern as any of his cotemporaries, or of those who followed him at the distance of 50 or 60 years, as Harding, Skelton and others, and in some places it is so smooth and beautiful, that Dryden would not attempt to alter it; I shall now give some account of his works in the order in which they were written, so far as can be collected from them, and subjoin a specimen of his poetry, of which profession as he may justly be called the Morning Star, so as we descend into later times; we may see the progress of poetry in England from its great original, Chaucer, to its full blaze, and perfect consummation in Dryden.