Louis has written his own life, restrained by no very strong
considerations of delicacy, nor at all abashed by the circumstantiality
of what he has disclosed. His parentage, his education, his early and
his late amours, the variety of his efforts to get on in the world, his
obsequiousness to his superiors, and his final arrival at wealth and
independence, are all communicated without the smallest reserve, as if
his object, aim, principle, first and last determination, was “_Quærenda
Pecunia_.” He does not seem much to have cared about the opinions of
mankind, and to have exclaimed with Horace, “_Populus me sibilet_,” &c.
“_ad cœlum jusseris ibo_.”
Our Sexagenarian, as appears from his notes, was very frequently in his
society, and though he expresses himself as greatly pleased and amused
with his vivacity, his inexhaustible fund of anecdotes, his knowledge of
the world, and it must be said of books also, indeed he knew something of
every thing, yet he evidently felt no strong disposition to give him his
esteem.
There was a man in the time of Gray, and of the same college with the
Bard, whose name was Etough, or Etoph. He had been brought up among the
most rigid Dissenters, but seeing better prospects before him in our
Church establishment, he took orders. This man, by some means or other,
had made himself acquainted with the secret history, connections, and
particularities, of all the great families in the kingdom.
On account of this knowledge, though exceedingly disliked, and indeed
despised, he was very much courted and invited to entertainments. Our
friend Louis greatly resembled him. He was for some years resident
abroad, in a situation which commanded respect, and in a place which all
our young nobility, who make the tour of Europe, never fail to visit. He
was necessarily introduced to their acquaintance, and thus in succession
became informed of the more important circumstances involved in the
history of their respective families.
This he turned to very good account, so good indeed, that his domestic
expences were always on a very limited scale. The invitations he
received to dinner, in the full season, were perpetual, and there were
many considerable houses, at which a place was always left for him,
without the formality of previous notice.
To the very last period of life, he retained his vivacity of intellect,
and great activity of body. When turned of seventy, he played billiards
with great spirit, and practised all the finesse of the Queue with
considerable success.
It was whimsical enough, that never having acquired a sufficient
knowledge of the English language, to read or converse in it without an
offensive intermixture of his foreign idiom, he should have valuable
preferment in the Church bestowed upon him. He had the good sense not to
attempt any professional duties, and some ludicrous stories are told of
the surprize and astonishment excited among his northern auditors, when
he first appeared among them to take possession of his living.
He died rich, which indeed might be expected, for he saved much and
spent little; independent of what he received from one noble family,
his pension, and his living, he did not inherit less than twenty-four
thousand pounds from two other personages of rank, to whom, for a
continued series of years, he had paid assiduous and obsequious
attention.
In his account of himself, he slurs over the circumstance of his being
most affectionately received, and most generously entertained, by his
relations in this country; but the fact is, on his arrival he went to
the house of his uncle, who had retired from the business of a jeweller
with a handsome fortune, and for many years resided in Leicester-square.
When the subject of this article died, he left a niece, who had kept his
house, but whether she was a daughter of this uncle above-mentioned, or
not, was not known to the writer. Whoever she might be, he left her but a
scanty provision.
Though frivolity and levity would better characterize him, than to call
him a lover of science and philosophy, yet the book he wrote on the
discoveries of the ancients, attributed to the moderns, and his edition
of the works of Leibnitz, demonstrate him capable of profounder thinking,
and evidently prove that he was well acquainted with books.
In the matter in which he was involved with the venerable Archbishop of
Moscow, he does not stand in quite so fair a light. He committed himself
unadvisedly, nor was his explanation quite perspicuous or satisfactory.
Take him for all in all, he was an eccentric character, and if we do not
meet with his like again, it is of no material importance.
Numerous are the anecdotes which occur in our manuscript, as communicated
by this singular personage, but lest our detail should be too far
extended, one only is inserted.
A society was established under the most fortunate auspices, of which,
the object was, to bring together individuals, who from their relative
situations in life, were otherwise less likely to meet upon equal and
familiar terms: men of rank, properly so denominated, and those who had
exhibited such unequivocal proofs of learning and of talent, as to claim
and deserve that countenance, which the conscious dignity of superior
intellect is seldom disposed to solicit. Accordingly, the first promoters
of the plan endeavoured, in the invitations which they circulated, to
assemble personages of distinction, who were universally considered and
acknowledged as friendly to the interests of literature, and men of
literary character, whose studies and productions had conciliated the
general esteem.
To Louis this seemed a mighty fantastical project, and as the invitation
immediately came from one, who, though much employed, and exceedingly
anxious in the business, did not add much to its allurement, from the
splendour of his rank, or the popularity of his name; he declined it with
a sort of faint praise and civil sneer, at the same time undertaking to
predict that the scheme would fall to the ground. But it turned out far
otherwise. The success exceeded the most sanguine hopes of the first
projectors. In a very short space of time, the society comprehended a
very large proportion of
The great, and the good, and the learned, and the wise.
It would not be very easy to describe the mortification and chagrin which
was felt by him, who had rejected, what he would afterwards have made
great sacrifices to obtain. But it was too late. The door was shut, not
again to be opened to any force, within his power to apply.
Τ. Αυτος μετειληφὼς της καλῆς εκεινής συνουσιας, η παρ αλλου
μαθων τοις ετεροις διεξηεις;
Α. Αυτος μετασχων.