Steele, who was a
violent writer on the Whig side, held various public offices, such as
Commissioner of Stamps, and Commissioner for Forfeited Estates, and sat
in Parliament. After the Revolution of 1688 the manners and morals of
English society were somewhat on the mend. The court of William and
Mary, and of their successor, Queen Anne, set no such example of open
profligacy as that of Charles II. But there was much hard drinking,
gambling, dueling, and intrigue in London, and vice was fashionable till
Addison partly preached and partly laughed it down in the _Spectator_.
The women were mostly frivolous and uneducated, and not unfrequently
fast. They are spoken of with systematic disrespect by nearly every
writer of the time, except Steele. "Every woman," wrote Pope, "is at
heart a rake." The reading public had now become large enough to make
letters a profession. Dr. Johnson said that Pope was the first writer in
whose case the book-seller took the place of the patron. His translation
of Homer, published by subscription, brought him between eight and nine
thousand pounds and made him independent. But the activity of the press
produced a swarm of poorly-paid hack-writers, penny-a-liners, who lived
from hand to mouth and did small literary jobs to order.
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