SONNE T. A LONELY Man he was, from whom these lays High thoughts, unchanging visions, that the leaven Of earth partake not; - Rich then must he be, Who of this cloudless world, this mortal heaven, Possesseth in his right the Sovereignty. THE LIFE OF THOMAS GRAY. BY JOHN MITFORD. THOMAS GRAY, the subject of the present narrative, was the fifth child of Mr. Philip Gray, a respectable citizen and money-scrivener in London. His grandfather was also a considerable merchant in that place. The maiden name of his mother was Dorothy Antrobus. Thomas was born in Cornhill, the 26th of December, 1716; and was the only one of twelve children who survived. The rest died in their infancy, from suffocation, produced by a fullness of blood; and he owed his life to a memorable instance of the love and courage of his mother, who removed the paroxysm, which attacked him, by opening a vein with her own hand: an instance of affection that seems to have been most tenderly preserved by him through his after life, repaid with care and attention, and remembered when the object of his filial solicitudes could no longer claim them. Mason informs us, "that Gray seldom mentioned his mother without a sigh." He was educated at Eton, under the protection of Mr. Antrobus, his maternal uncle, who was at b |