James, the author of the Meditations among the Tombs, was born in 1714 at Hardingstone, and educated at the grammar school of Northampton, whence in 1731, he passed to Lincoln College, Oxford. At that university he became deeply imbued with the views of the Methodists then struggling into influence and notice; and though he never openly identified himself with their sect, yet the whole tenor of his life was in strict accordance with their views. Entering the English church in 1740 as curate of Biddeford, in Devonshire, he was three years later appointed to succeed his father in the living of Weston Favell in Northampton, to which he afterwards added those of Weston and Collingtree. In this sphere he wrought with the disinterested zeal and fervour of an apostle, sacrificing his health, and finally his life, in the duties of the good cause. He died of consumption brought on by overwork, December 25, 1758. His works, which are numerous, and all on religious subjects, long enjoyed a popularity quite out of proportion to their deserts. His literary merits are very small; and even his Meditations among the Tombs, his best work, is so viciously rhetorical, tasteless and diffuse, that it is matter of wonder how it still finds admirers or even readers. Of his other works may be mentioned his Contemplations on the Night and Starry Heavens; Theron and Aspasio, a Series of Dialogues on the most important Subjects; and his Letters, published in 1811, which illustrate his amiable character and the whole history of his life.

John, Lord, the Sporus and Lord Fanny of Pope's satire, a nobleman of political and social distinction in the reign of George II. He was son of the first Earl of Bristol, and born in 1696. Educated and trained for public life, he became a favourite at the court of the prince and princess (afterwards George II. and Queen Caroline), to which Pope, Gay, Arbuthnot, Chesterfield, and other wits resorted, and which was celebrated for the beauty and accomplishments of its ladies—as Miss Bellenden (afterwards Duchess of Argyle), Miss Howe, Miss Lepell, and Mrs Howard, names which will live for ever in the poetry of Pope, Gay, and Swift, and in the lively memoirs and correspondence of that brilliant circle. Hervey was married to Miss Lepell in 1720. In 1730, he received the appointment of vice-chamberlain to the king; in 1733, Sir Robert Walpole called him up to the House of Lords, where he proved a frequent and effective speaker; and in 1740, he succeeded Lord Godolphin as privy seal, which he held until the Walpole administration was driven from power in 1742. Destitute of any commanding talents or solid principle, a sceptic in religion, and profligate in morals, Lord Hervey was yet far above the intellectual rank assigned him by his merciless satirist, Pope. He wrote and spoke vigorously on public questions, he was studious and laborious, a fair scholar, and a writer of pleasing occasional verses. In his famous quarrel with Pope, the poet seems to have been the aggressor. His pride and jealousy were easily ruffled, and Lord Hervey and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu had, he said, "too much wit for him." Both parties disgraced themselves in their poetical attacks—the lord and lady for having grossly alluded to Pope's obscure birth and personal appearance; and Pope for having indulged in coarse and unmanly slander on Lady Mary, and on the forced sickness and ill health of Lord Hervey. "It would be now idle," as Mr Croker remarks, "to seek for a cause of quarrel which the parties were, a hundred years ago, unable or unwilling to explain; but may it not be sufficiently accounted for by the jealousies almost inevitable between persons of such similar, and therefore discordant tastes and tempers, living together in a circle of title-tattle, scandal, and pasquinades?" Political differences also arose; Lord Hervey and Lady Mary adhered to Walpole, while Pope and his brother wits were chiefly associated with the opposition. Lord Hervey died in 1743. He left behind him Memoirs of the Court of George II., which were not published until 1848, when they appeared in two volumes, edited by Mr Croker. The work throws much light on the interior of the court—its coarseness, dulness, and immorality; but it is as degrading to the author as it is to the English monarchy, for Lord Hervey appears rather in the light of a court parasite and malignant gossip, than in that of an English gentleman or fair historian. (ii. c.—)