Sir Charles Sedley, 5th Baronet in 1702. The relationship with Ann Ayscough lasted to the end of Sedley's life. His reputation as a wit and dissolute was partially responsible for the Sedleys of William Makepeace Thackeray's "Vanity Fair". His most famous song, "Phyllis is My Only Joy", is much more widely known now than the author's name. While Sedley chiefly produced light amatory verse and pastoral dialogues in the 1670s, he turned to satirical epigrams in the 1680s and 1690s. His "Epigrams: or, Court Characters" are modelled on the works of Martial. In his epigram "To Nysus", for example, Sedley describes the function of satire
Amelia (novel) they be of England, they may well be excused if they kiss the cold tomb, as I did, of the author of Amelia, the most singular genius which their island ever produced, whose works it has long been the fashion to abuse in public and to read in secret." In recent years, critics have examined various aspects of the novel that were previous ignored; on the Virgilian images in "Amelia", Ronald Paulson claimed that they "elevate the domestic (marriage) plot and to connect it with public issues of a degenerating society and nation." However, those like Peter Sabor do not