Note 80 — Chapter I · N THE LIFE OF A STATESMAN,

Ambrose Phillips, "one of the wits at Button's," and Addison's constant associate at that resort of the literati. In the latter part of Queen Anne's reign, being a Whig, he was secretary to the Hanover Club, and was, soon after the accession of George the First, put into the commission of the peace; and, in 1717, appointed one of the Commissioners of the Lottery. Paul Whitehead relates that when Addison became Secretary of State, Phillips applied to him for some preferment, but was coolly answered, that it was thought he was already provided for, by being made a justice for Westminster. To this observation Phillips with some indignation replied, "Though poetry was a trade he could not live by, yet he scorned to owe subsistence to another which he ought not to live by." Phillips will be long remembered by his translation from Racine of the tragedy of the "Distressed Mother." He died, struck with palsy, in Hanover-street, Hanover-square, June 18, 1749.