[Footnote 3: May not this be owing to envy? are not most wits jealous of their cotemporaries? how readily do we pay adoration to the dead? how slowly do we give even faint praise to the living? is it a wonder Beaumont and Fletcher were more praised and versified than Shakespear? were not inferior wits opposed, nay preferred, to Dryden while living? was not this the case of Addison and Pope, whose works (those authors being no more) will be read with admiration, and allowed the just pre-eminence, while the English tongue is understood.] [Footnote 4: Preface to Fletcher's plays.] * * * * * Sir JOHN DAVIES Was born at Chisgrove, in the parish of Tysbury in Wiltshire, being the son of a wealthy tanner of that place. At fifteen years of age he became a Commoner in Queen's-college, Oxford 1585, where having made great progress in academical learning, and taken the degree of Batchelor of arts, he removed to the Middle-Temple, and applying himself to the study of the common law, was called to the bar; but having a quarrel with one Richard Martyn, (afterwards recorder of London) he bastinadoed him in the Temple-hall at dinner-time, in presence of the whole assembly, for which contempt, he was immediately expelled, and retired again to Oxford to prosecute his studies, but did not resume the scholar's-gown. Upon this occasion he composed that excellent poem called Nosce Teipsum[1]. Afterwards by the favour of Thomas lord Ellesmere, keeper of the Great Seal, being reinstated in the Temple, he practised as a counsellor, and became a burgess in the Parliament held at Westminster 1601. Upon the death of Queen Elizabeth our author, with Lord Hunsdon, went into Scotland to congratulate King James on his succession to the English throne. Being introduced into his Majesty's presence, the King enquired of Lord Hunsdon, the names of the gentlemen who accompanied him, and when his lordship mentioned John Davies, the King presently asked whether he was Nosce Teipsum, and being answered he was, embraced him, and assured him of his favour. He was accordingly made Sollicitor, and a little after Attorney-general in Ireland, where in the year 1606, he was made one of his Majesty's serjeants at law, and Speaker of the House of Commons for that kingdom. In the year following, he received the honour of knighthood from the King at Whitehall. In 1612 he quitted the post of Attorney-general in Ireland, and was made one of his Majesty's English serjeants at law. He married Eleanor Touchet, youngest daughter of George lord Audley, by whom he had a son, an idiot who died young, and a daughter named Lucy, married to Ferdinand lord Hastings, and afterwards Earl of Huntingdon. His lady was a woman of very extraordinary character; she had, or rather pretended to have a spirit of prophecy, and her predictions received from a voice which she often heard, were generally wrapped up in dark and obscure expressions. It