'Neverout',' -- says the
'brilliant Miss Notable' in Swift's 'Polite Conversation', 1738,
p. 156.
EPITAPH ON EDWARD PURDON.
The occasion of this quatrain, first published as Goldsmith's* in 'Poems
and Plays', 1777, p. 79, is to be found in Forster's 'Life and Times of
Oliver Goldsmith', 1871, ii. 60. Purdon died on March 27, 1767
('Gentleman's Magazine', April, 1767, p. 192). '"Dr. Goldsmith made this
epitaph," says William Ballantyne [the author of 'Mackliniana'], "in his
way from his chambers in the Temple to the Wednesday evening's club at
the Globe. 'I think he will never come back', I believe he said. I was
sitting by him, and he repeated it more than twice. 'I think he will
never come back."' Purdon had been at Trinity College, Dublin, with
Goldsmith; he had subsequently been a foot soldier; ultimately he became
a 'bookseller's hack.' He wrote an anonymous letter to Garrick in 1759,
and translated the 'Henriade' of Voltaire. This translation Goldsmith is
supposed to have revised, and his own life of Voltaire was to have
accompanied it, though finally the Memoir and Translation seem to have
appeared separately.
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