For a story of Swift's relations to him, see p. 289, 1. 11. John Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave, Marquis of Normanby, and Duke of Buckingham, 'Very proud, insolent, and covetous, and takes all advantages. In paying his debts, unwilling: neither esteemed nor beloved.'(Macky's Characters of Q. Anne's Court.) 'This character,' adds Swift in MS., 'is the truest of any.' His Essay on Satire, and that On Poetry, in verse, had early given him a considerable literary reputation: and he added to this by various prose writings — including some on philosophy, filled with that arrogant latitudinarianism which was one of the vices of the time, and which is embodied in the pretentious epitaph in Westminster, composed by himself, and invoking the Deity under the title of ' Ens Entium.' His literary facility, and perhaps still more his high station, obtained for him the lavish flattery of Dryden, in whose Absalom and Achitophel he appears as 'Sharp-judging Adriel, the Muses' friend.' He had now succeeded the Duke of Devonshire as Lord Steward.