, son to the preceding, by his wife Miss Macpherson, daughter of a Scotch gentleman, was
, son to the preceding, by his wife Miss Macpherson, daughter of a Scotch gentleman, was born at Quilca in Ireland, the residence of Swift, in 1721. Swift was one of his sponsors, and treated him with kindness as long as he lived. The early part of his education he received from his father, who in 1734 sent him to Westminster school, at a time when he could very ill afford it. Our author was there immediately taken notice of upon examination, and although a mere stranger, was by pure merit elected a king’s scholar. But this maintenance sometimes falling short, his father could not add fourteen pounds to enable his son to finish the year, which if he had done, he would have been removed to a higher class, and in another year would have been elected to Oxford or Cambridge. Being thus obliged to return to Dublin, he was sent to the university there, and took his master’s degree in arts. In 1738 he lost his father, and at that time intended to devote himself to the education of youth, and would immediately after taking his degree have entered upon this office, had he not now conceited that high opinion of the art of oratory from which he never afterwards receded, and in the restoration of which art (for he considered it as lost) he laboured with an uncommon degree of enthusiasm. In order to qualify himself for this undertaking, he fancied that he must himself learn the practice of oratory, and that the stage was the only school. With this last strange notion, he appeared on the theatre in Smock- alley, in January 1743, in the character of Richard III. and met with the greatest encouragement. His career, however, was soon interrupted by a petty squabble, the first of many in which it was his fate to be involved, with Gibber about Cato’s robe. The abusive correspondence which passed on this important occasion was printed in a pamphlet entitled * The Buskin and Sock, being controversial letters between Mr. Thomas Sheridan, tragedian, and Mr. Theophilus Gibber, comedian," 12 mo.