While De Foe in this manner busied himself in writing adventures which have charmed every reader, a rhyming fit returned on him. He published in 1720, The complete Art of Painting, which he did into English from the French of Du Fresnoy. Dryden had given, in 1695, a translation of Du Fresnoy's poem, which has been esteemed for its knowledge of the sister arts. What could tempt De Foe to this undertaking it is not easy to discover, unless we may suppose that he hoped to gain a few guineas, without much labour of the head or hand. Dryden has been justly praised for relinquishing vicious habits of composition, and adopting better models for his muse. De Foe, after he had seen the correctness, and heard the music of Pope, remained unambitious of accurate rhymes, and regardless of sweeter numbers. His politics and his poetry, for which he was long famous among biographers, would not have preserved his name beyond the fleeting day; yet I suspect that, in imitation of Milton, he would have preferred his Jure Divino to his Robinson Crusoe. De Foe lived not then, however, in pecuniary distress; for his genius and his industry were to him the mines of Potosi: and in 1722, he obtained from the corporation of Colchester, though my inquiries have not discovered by what interposition, a ninety-nine years' lease of Kingswood-heath, at a yearly rent of a hundred and twenty pounds, with a fine of five hundred pounds[89]. This transaction seems to evince a degree of wealth much above want, though the assignment of his lease not long after to Walter Bernard equally proves, that he could not easily hold what he had thus obtained. Kingswood-heath is now worth 300_l._ a year, and is advertised for sale by Bennet, the present possessor. Whatever may have been his opulence, our author did not waste his subsequent life in unprofitable idleness. No one can be idly employed who endeavours to make his fellow subjects better citizens and wiser men. This will sufficiently appear if we consider his future labours, under the distinct heads of voyages; fictitious biography; moralities, either grave or ludicrous; domestic travels; and tracts on trade.