"Compulsion and laborious flight."

One of these intimates for a while was Charles Townshend, a man
whose name now lives chiefly in the glowing encomium of Burke, a
part of which we may quote:--"Before this splendid orb (Lord Chatham)
was entirely set, and while the western horizon was in a blaze with
his descending glory, on the opposite quarter of the heavens arose
another luminary, and for his hour became lord of the ascendant.
Townshend was the delight and ornament of this House, and the charm
of every private society which he honoured with his presence.
Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in any country, a man
of more pointed and finished wit, and of a more refined, exquisite,
and penetrating judgment. He stated his matter skilfully and
powerfully. He particularly excelled in a most luminous explanation
and display of the subject. His style of argument was neither trite
and vulgar, nor subtle and abstruse. He hit the House between wind
and water. He had no failings which were not owing to a noble cause,
to an ardent, generous, perhaps an immoderate passion for fame; a
passion which is the instinct of all great souls. He worshipped that
goddess wheresoever she appeared: but he paid his particular
devotions to her in her favourite habitation, in her chosen temple,
the House of Commons." With this distinguished man Akenside was for
some time on friendly terms, but for causes not well known, their
friendship came to an abrupt termination; it might have been owing
to Townshend's rapid rise, or to Akenside's presumptuous and
overbearing disposition. Two odes, addressed by the latter to the
former, immortalise this incomplete and abortive amity.

The years 1750 and 1751 were only signalised in Akenside's history
by one or two dull odes from his pen. But if not witty at that time