DE QUINCEY .;., Qta, an < tciiMvc mill, bakeries, an . :i ,i(l cooper shops. There ..nil private dockyards in tin- town, and at, including large
- ,n.l boiler works. '1'he retail trade is
. and tin- market gardens are fa- Thc workhouse stands on the site of Saves court, tin- mansion of John Evelyn, in , tin- (ircut resided, and the once beautiful grounds are covered in part by the victualling yard. I)K Qll.VCEY, Thomas, an English author, known as the "English Opium Eater," born at (ircciihav, a suburb of Manchester, Aug. 15, ied in Edinburgh, Dec. 8, 1859. He was the fifth child of a merchant who at his death k-ft to his family a fortune of 1,600 . His childhood was chiefly passed in rural seclusion, with three sisters for play- lie was sent to various schools, and early distinguished himself by proficiency in (ireek. After vainly entreating his guardian to s nd him to the university, he ran away from school in 1802, and wandered about the coun- try until he reached London, where he suffer- ed" terribly from exposure and hunger. Long afterward he wrote sketches of his life at this pi-rind ; how much of these is true, how much fiction, it is impossible to say. According to his own. account, he had in vain resorted to a Jew for an advance of money on the strength of his expectations, when at length an opening
- ade for reconciliation with his friends;
and he attended school and visited in different parts of England and Ireland till he went to Oxford in December, 1803, where he remained till 1808. He first resorted to opium on a visit don in the autumn of 1804, to dull the f rheumatism, and afterward took it ha- bitually. He says that for ten years he "lived on the earth the life of a demiurgus, and kept the keys of par:idi>-." It a> his custom at this drink laudanum either on a Tuesday or Saturday night once in three weeks. On Tues- day night he went to the opera, where in the elaborate harmony and scenic display he saw unfolded the whole of his past life,' with its passions exalted, spiritualized, and sublimed; not as if recalled by an act of memory, but as nd incarnated in the music. On Jit he used to wander tlirouirh the l.ond.m, and listen to the consulta-
- family parties on their ways and mean-,
- himself familiar with their wi>ln->, dif- -, and ..pinions. I,, jsim J K . took the !;ich Wordsworth had mi, and lived there con-tant- ing his associates were Words-
- it Cra-mere, Southey
Charles I.h.yd at Brathay, and He afterward passed much n London, Hath, and Kdinlmr-h tiraate fri.-nd in l...nl,n being for many v., i; - n,,. celebrated peripatetic known wart." He was occupied es- th the study of German literature and philosophy, made translations from Lessing and Richter, and was among the first in Eng- land to interpret Kant, Fichte, and Schelling. In 1813 an irritation of the stomach, the con- sequence of his early sufferings, returned with a violence which yielded to no remedies but opium. From this time he became a regular and confirmed opium eater, taking sometimes as much as 320 grains a day. It had been the aim of his whole life to construct one single work, to which he proposed giving the title of an unfinished work of Spinoza, De Emen- datione Ilumani Intellectus. The studies of many years had laid the foundation, but he could not command the efforts to rear the su- perstructure. In what he terms his state of imbecility he turned his attention for amuse- ment to political economy.. He welcomed the treatise of Ricardo as the first profound work on the subject, and it roused him to an activity which enabled him to draw up his " Prolegomena to all Future Systems of Polit- ical Economy." Yet opium paralyzed his ef- forts to complete even that short work. He failed to accomplish the preface ; the arrange- ments for its publication were countermanded, and it first appeared in the "London Maga- zine," in 1824, under the title of "Templars' Dialogues." It is one of the most thorough as well as briefest exhibitions of the Ricardian theory of value. After two unsuccessful trials, he overcame his besetting habit, though it cost him a long and terrible struggle. In 1821 he went to London, and, as collaborator in the "London Magazine," became at once associated with Charles Lamb, Hazlitt, Allan Cunningham, Hood, Gary, and other writers. His u Confes- sions of an English Opium Eater" appeared in that periodical in 1821, and in a volume in 1822, and immediately obtained for him a high reputation. He contributed frequently to British periodicals, chiefly to " Blackwood's Magazine," " Tait's Edinburgh Magazine," and the "North British Review," furnishing auto- biographical sketches, literary reminiscences, miscellaneous essays, and historical, philosoph- ical, and critical discussions. He also furnished several articles to the "Encyclopaedia Britan- nica," including the memoirs of Shakespeare and Pope. All his works show a wide range of learning and speculation, a delicate and sub- tle critical faculty, and a felicitous selection of words. He divides them into three classes : 1, papers whose chief purpose is to interest and amuse; 2, speculative, critical, and philosophi- cal essays ; 3, prose-poetry. His highest and most peculiar merit is in this third class, the best examples of which are his "Confessions " and "Suspiria de Profundis." In 1843 he re- moved to Lasswade, a village about 12 miles from Edinburgh. Here he returned to some of his earlier studies, and produced a volume entitled "The Logic of Political Economy." The first collective edition of his works was issued in Boston (21 vols., 1851-'9) ; it proba- bly included a few things not written by him.
