society, on grounds less culpable and more disinterested, there was doubtless a mixture of prudence and vanity in his selection of his friends. A boy of his parentage was flattered by the friendship of the great. And he lived in days when, unless a poor man had transcendent parts, he could not prosper without patronage.
"Principibus placiusse viris haud ultima laus est,"
was a line in those days much quoted, and very freely translated; and though Whitehead lived in what has been called called the transition age, from the protection of patrons to that of the public, many men will be found in that era, and later too, who, in dedications and elsewhere, have laid themselves open to the charge of toadyism, as much as ever he did. We should also remember, that a boy of such humble birth would scarcely have been received as an equal by the sons of gentlemen; and if he was to be a dependent at all, he doubtless preferred being so among the greatest.
In September, 1735, he stood among the candidates for New College, but was placed so low on the roll that he was not sent up. Being superannuated, he was compelled to leave Winchester. He returned to his mother at Cambridge, and now derived more advantage from his humble extraction, than from his own abilities, or his aristocratic school-friendships. Mr. Thomas Pyke, a baker at Cambridge, had founded some scholarships at Clare Hall. Whitehead's claim, as the orphan son of a man of the founder's vocation, was admitted, and he entered as a sizar. His career as an author commenced at the University; for as a student little is known of him, except that he was industrious and economical, and enjoyed the friendship of Hurd, Stebbing, Ogden, and other distinguished contemporaries. He wrote some verses in 1736, as did many other young men at both
