, an English lady of profound learning and genius, was the eldest
, an English lady of profound
learning and genius, was the eldest daughter of the rev.
Dr. Nicholas Carter, a clergyman in Kent, who, with
other preferment, held the cure of the chapel of Deal,
where this daughter was born, Dec. 16, 1717, and educated by her father. At first she discovered such a slowness of faculties, as to make him despair of her progress ia
intellectual attainment, even with the aid of the greatest
industry, and the most ardent desire, which characterized
her efforts. She herself, however, though mortified and
sorrowful at her own difficulties, resolved to persevere, and
her perseverance was crowned with unexampled success.
She early became mistress of Latin, Greek, French, German, and afterwards understood Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Hebrew, and last of all acquired something of
Arabic. Before she was seventeen years of age, many of
her poetical attempts had appeared, particularly in the
Gentleman’s Magazine for 1734, with the signature of
Eliza. This extraordinary display of genius and acquirements procured her immediate celebrity, and the learned
flocked about her with admiration. In 1738, when she
was about twenty, Cave, the proprietor of the Gentleman’s
Magazine, published some of her poems in a quarto
pamphlet, now little known, as it was published without
her name. It is probable she did not think many of these
worthy of her; as in 1762, when she published a small collection with her name, she admitted only two from the former publication, the “Lines on her birth-day,
” and the
“Ode of Anacreon.
”