famoùs extract of Mr. Goulard, is liable, in my opinion, to the fame objection. It is hardly requifite to add, that there is a neceffity of making the application of cold water as fpeedily as poffible after the accident; for, if it be delayed til bliftering has taken place, which will happen in a very short space of time, any application made, with a view to effect a complete cure, muft prove ineffectual. WILLIAM MAY. I Mr. URBAN, Oct. 18. N answer to your correfpondent J. H. p. 799, refpecting the pretty compilation, intituled, "Letters on the Hiftory of England," I have to obferve, that Lord Lyttelton had no dear Charles to whom he could have addreffed them. The fame remark fufficiently proves Lord Chesterfield to have been the author. Lord Orrery was meant to be fported on the world as the vehicle of this very useful work; and, when the -real writer fat down to the first letter or two, as they are called, the idea of Orrery's Obfervations on the Life of Swift ftruck him as the most refpectable channel of deception. There is nothing of marked style in the two volumes after you have got through the first 20 pages: the talking-horfe is then put afide, and all that follows is of Gimilar plain phrafeology, fuitable to the subje&t. The words in inverted commas, "When all is done," &c. are not afferted by the compiler to be a quotation from any author's published works, - but are thrown out merely as a fage obfervation. I cannot charge my memory, becaufe I have not the volume to refer to, but I think there is extant a biographical piece on a Mr. King, or a Knight of that name, afcribed to the great LOCKE; and that in it thofe very words are cited as having been uttered by Lord Shaftesbury, or fome' other perfon well-known both to Locke and the perfon biographized. Johnny Gay's remark, that "The child, whom many fathers share, Hath feldom known a father's care," is not entirely applicable to the fmall progeny in queftion. It has certainly been produced by no mean parent; and, however unequal, upon the whole it manife fts the agency of the fame compiler. Who he was, I believe a gentleman of well-known name, and of refpe&table character and fortune, near St. Paul's fchool, could beft inform your correspondent. That it really was Dr. Oliver Goldsmith I have no doubt, if the Hiftory of England, in four vo lumes 8vo, which goes under his name, was indeed of his fabrication; they bear a family likenefs, and do not dif credit the relationship. From good Sir Thomas More and honest John Bunyan, down to the prefent times, deception, Mr. Urban, is become fo fashionable, and feems fo gratifying to the deceiver, that one is almoft led to doubt whether even the author of Lemuel Gulliver's Travels really bore that name; or, if that motley mountebank Peter Pindar ever exifted, to difgrace his noble ancestor by foul degeneracy, to offend the decent by obícene wit and bold profaneness, by low and mean allufions, as inhuman and to affront the greateft and the best worthy Robert Dodfley's "Oeconomy as they are infolent. I remember when of Homan Life" had alfo its Lyttelton and Chesterfield for reputed parents; removed from uncertainty, and the exthat conjecture, however, is long fince cellent piece is given to its ingenious owner; who yet, if one may judge from the Bramin's lank figure in the frontispiece, had no objection to its beof Hagley's noble lord. I recollect too ing fupposed to be the communication when a JUNIUS's Letters were affigned to many a godfather, who yet, notwithftanding, were never hardy enough to Sackville; a Burke; a Hamilton; and own them; a Dunning, for instance; a fome afferted them as the production of the queen's elephant. Of the latter I can say no more than that John Hunter and Cruikshanks, being his executors (poft obit.), must best know, from his remains on cutting up, whether the affertion be or be not well-founded. Some of his tracts, however, are laid to have been deposited in feveral of our museums. How far the anonymous editor, if it were Goldfmith, is to be credited in his claim, wil be no mystery to fuch as, like your humble fervant, knew that fingular and highly-ufeful character. His pen was a focus, to which the rays of many a brilliant and many a plodding genius were concentrated. His claim undoubtedly was the defire "to live and have a being;" and thofe, whether living or dead, who contributed to its gratification, have had no cause to regent of being fo happily inftrumental. After After all, Mr. Urban, I can fee no good reafon why publications, so juftly approved as that now under notice, fhould play at hide-and-feek with the liberal of mankind. Whoever be the letter-writer, diù celari non potefi: and, fhould you or your correfpondent with to know more, I believe, if you ask the trunk-maker, or his near neighbour, the object may foon be obtained. I am, Sir, without a fiction, yours very fincerely, MUS IN ANGULO. Mr. URBAN, IT Nov. 22. were heartily to be wished, that "wars of principle," as it is now fashionable to term thofe where nations fight nations, in order, as is alleged, to make them orthodox Chriftians and found Legiflators, terminated with the fame eafe, and left as few traces behind them, as thofe wars of words in which fome of our most refpe&table Divines, men of active fpirits, embarked with eagerness, at a time when it was deem ed no reproach on ecclefiafticks to be more of fcholars and lefs converfant in politicks. In the literary conteft between Bishop Warburton and Dr. Lowth, Mr. Toup appears to have fided with the former, to whom he addreffed a critical epistle, which forms a part of his obfervations on Suidas, in 1767, when his patron's antagonist was recently raifed to the bench. By adroitly apologifing for himfelf, if he Ghould in his hafte, "currente rotâ," have faid any thing difre fpectful of the great Bentley, quem nemo vituperare aufit nifi fungus," Toup clearly marks out whom he aims at. Individually confidered, Dr. Lowth was worthy of any station; but there are hardly any two fituations in life fo widely different as that of a private Clergyman and the new-created Bishop, who, the moment his name has made its appearance in the Gazette, affumes a dominion over those who yesterday were upon an equal footing with him, in a manner far beyond what any Tem poral Peers exercile over their former comrades who ftill remain plebeians. It is no unutual fimile to compare a newmade bishop to a fungus, which sprouts up in but few hours to fuch bloated magnitude as frequently to overtop every plant which had ftood befide it. But what fixes the application ftill more precifely, is Dr. Lowth having just before fpoken of Bentley as a fubaltern pioneer in literature; the exact words, I think, are, "caprimulgus aut foffor;" which drew on a fevere expoftulatory pamphlet from Mr. Cumberland, the grandfon of the celebrated critick. Mr. Warton's edition of Theocritus, with a confiderable appendix of notes by Mr. Toup, made its appearance about three years after, in 1770. If Dr. Wetherell was then vice-chancellor, and Dr. Kennicot a delegate of the Clarendon prefs, Dr. Lowth was alfo fituated in the neighbourhood, in his epifcopal refidence at Cuddefden, and was faid to be confulted. The expreffion quoted by your correfpondent, "homo malè fedulus qui nec me nec mea fatis intellexit," only fhews difpleasure, and may be understood of one man as well as another; but what follows is more pointed: "parco homini qui nemini pepercit." Neither Dr. Wetherel nor Dr. Kennicot were confidered as controverfial writers; but Dr. Lowth had drawn upon himself many enmities by the part he took, fome years before, in a difpute with his fellow-collegians, about the conduct of Bishop Hoadly their vifitor, and afterwards by his quarrel with Warburton. You, Mr. Urban, are too well con.. verfant with the works of the learned Parifian printers, who flourished in the fixteenth century, to fo get the device fometimes prefixed by Christian Wechel, of two birds fighting on a shrub laden with fruit, till one of them fails, together with the broken fprig on which it had perched. It is accompanied by the motto, "unicum arbuftum non alit duos Erythaços." The last bard word induced me to confult the Latin Thefaurus of Robert Stephens, whole editors referred me, for farther elucidation, to the Greek of his fon Henry; and I find they both concur in reprefenting the "Erythacus" as a fpecies of the feathered race, which changes its name and nature with the different feasons of the year. This interpretation leaves me, who am no ornithologist, almost as much in the dark as ever; though, on farther recollection, methinks I have fomewhere read of a parrot which all winter is in a moulting itate, and jult capable of articulating yes or no." as the bowman dict-es; but, in the fummer-time, its plumage grows to an immenfe length, and it will occafionally cold the little wrens and tits that flutter round it in the molt imperious ftrain. Dr. Wetherel, the prefent dean of Hereford, is not diftinguished for his attainments in Hebrew literature, and therefore therefore ftands perfectly clear of the farcafm, "homunculi qui in Hebraicis per omnem fere vitam turpiter volutati in literis elegantioribus plane hofpites funt." It clearly applies to Dr. Kennicot, who was known only from his fuperiority in that language; but whether it was meant to include my Lord Bishop of Oxford will admit of fome doubt. Dr. Lowth in his Leatures. feveral years before, had exprefly confined himself to the fubject of Hebrew poetry, in which he ably illuftrated many of the moft ftriking paffages in the Pfalms, the Prophets, and other parts of the infpired writings. Learning, frength of genius, and a total want or neglect of all tafte, form his three great characterifticks. In the latter part of the celebrated double fimile from Ifaiah, where the Meffiah is firft compared to a victorious warrior, then to one who treads the wine prefs, Dr. Lowth's poetical paraphrafe, which has been fo greatly admired for its claffic and harmonious purity, is remarkable for aukwardly blending together the two refemblances which, in our vulgar English verfion, ftand far more clear and diftin&t. It is needlefs to cite more than the concluding lines: centi "falit attritas Calcator in uras Congeftamque ftruem fubigit: cæde atra re[veftes." Crura madent, fpumantque infperfæ fanguine The two words cæde and fanguine, bere introduced, are evidently a confufion of ideas, and bring us back again to the warrior, whom we had, the moment before, done with. Great expectations were entertained from a new English profe verfion of Ifaiah, published inany years after by one who had given fuch fpecimens of having caught the fire of the original; but Dr. Lowth had, in the mean time, performed the untoward task of publishing a grammar of our language, in which he had pointed out abundant errors from our first writers. It therefore behoved him to be fuperaccurate. Not having his book, I cannot minutely point out the paffages in which he finks below his predeceffors by being thus cramped; but particularly recollect almoft every chapter containing "people" when the Jews are fpoken of; and the plural of a plural, peoples," to fignify the Gentile nations; which, occurring an bundred times, had as unfavourab e an effect as the "hig, hag, hog," of Sir Hugh, Evans, Shakspeare's, Welth parfon in which Mr. Duncombe reprints, and gravely calls an improvement on the original. Such are the fcales of Criti cifm, in which fubaltern ecclefiafticks weigh the writings of a prelate! In the grand conteft with Warburton I perfectly remember a paffage in which Lowth, for the fake of railing a laugh at the expence of his antagonist, applies to him the paffage in which the Pfalmif introduces the great Creator of the univerfe as faying, "Moab is my watkpot, over Edom will I caft out my shoe." This, in Voltaire, would have been called the height of profane ribaldry; but in Lowth it was the mere auk wardnefs of a man, who knew not how, attempting to be facetious. No part of the quarrel was laid more ftrefs on by his adverfaries than his publishing let ters written to him by Warburton while they were on better terms; in one of which he expreffly mentions, that what he faid to him was "in confidence;" but his probity and undaunted fpirit were fo well known, that they who hated him only imputed this ftrange condu to his being agitated with paffion when he took up the pen. On turning to, or recollecting, only the above passages (and I have not the fmallest doubt but many more, equally ftriking, might be produced), I cannot fuppofe that Toup, accounted "a man of war from his youth," in fpeaking of Hebraifis, fought only to encounter Kennicot, an adverfary numbered among the " pecora inertia," when, anfwerably to the ardent withes of the gallant hun ter, ter, Iulus, he had full in view the "fulvum Leonem," against whom he had once, at leaft, already huried his fpear. With the works of Warburton I am by far too flightly acquainted; but, if Fame fpeak true, he alfo, like Lowth, had the ftrength, the warm temper, and the vulnerable heel, of an Achilles. We now furvey their conflits with as much indifference as thofe of a TamerJane and a Bajazet, when stript of all Rage-colouring, and delineated by the pen of impartial hiftorians. But, with all their defects, they beftrode the literary world like two Coloffufes; they both rofe to the highest ftatious in the church by their own fuperior talents, without stooping to any abject or difhonourable compliances; and may juftly be confidered as fons of Anak," or giants of antient times, when brought into comparifon with the modern brood of ecclefiafticks, the " Qualia nunc hominum producit corpora tellus ;" which I would conftrue, "fuch returns as Deans and Chapters have been recommended to make to the various congés d'élire' which, fince their days, haye appeared in our Gazettes." Diftinguished literary talents are not eafily appreciated by ftatelinen; but good family connexions carry with them a due ftamp of authenticity: fcholars are not always eafy to be led, much lefs to be driven; but they who are exalted in the hierarchy merely on account of their birth, feeling themfelves already in fituations, both as to rank and opulence, to which no other profeffional Jine could, in all probability, have rai. fed them, and daily hoping for yet farther tranflations, will not troublefomely cenfure any war or any public meafures whatever; but, like primitive Chriftians, will fer themfeives down and cat the loaves and tithes, of which fuch abundant portions are before them, with gladneis, if not with fingleness, of heart. Yours, &c. L. L. P.S. A fhort, detached fentence appears to have accidentally been omitted towards the latter end of my letter on libels and riots, inferted in your Auguft Magazine, where Mr. Freind's banishment was alluded to. This must have been owing to my having copied from foul notes, ill-arranged. The following are nearly the words: "It was announced of yore, that fome fhould fall combating against foreign enemies; others, at home, by means of their own fupreme magiftrate; and that. they who weathered out both these dangers were but referved for the exterminating fury of a new-created prophet. "Him that efcapeth the fword of Ha"zael fhall Jehu flay, and him that "efcapeth the fword of Jehu shall "Elisha flay." L. L. Mr. URBAN, Kingfland, Nov. 2. SOLICITOUS to preferve the me mory of ingenious though indigent merit, however the talents may have been mifapplied, I once more importune you to admit the following memorandum of one of the improvident fons of the Mufes, lately deceafed, who, with all his imperfections on his head, deserved yet well of the publick, for many mall pieces of entertainment which he prepared for their amufeH. LEMOINE. meat. JOHN OAKMAN, the fubject of this memoir, was born at Hendon, where he received a grammatical education, about 1748. He was apprenticed to an engraver, Emanuel Bowen, Kitchen's predeceffor as geographer royal. It feems, he did not ferve his time out; for the volatility of his difpofition led him into fo many follies, that his mafter was glad to get clear of him: however, he found means to feduce his daughter, but married her when he became of age. About, or foon after, this time, he kept a hop for the fale of ludicrous prints, in conjunction with Darley and Harry Howard, of facetious memory. It does not appear that this co-partnership lasted long; for, they parted fome time bcfore the death of the latter, which happened in an accidental feuflle after a midnight debauch, in the Hag-market. When the Nobles were in the height of business, he found them very neceffary to his extravagances, and wrote for them fome of the cheapest, if not the beft, of their novels; amongft which was 'Sir Benjamin Brafs," "The Hiftory of Sir Roger and his Son Joe," "The Hifiory of Sir Edward Haunch," "Adventures of Captain Greenland," "The Fault was all her own," and an innumerable lift of others; and, I believe, the last thing he did this way was "The Adventures of William Williams, an African Prince," with whom he became acquainted in Liverpool gaol. This was confeffedly a good thing againft the fo-much-clamoured impious practice of flaving, and he accordingly made fomething of it among the Qua kers. |