Essayists From England

"Does the expression Jugulatio, orjugulatus est, in the Ulster annals, imply strictly the cutting of a mans throat, or merely the putting him to death?"

"Wintons chronicle, I understand, is to be published early this winter. The editor is Mr. Macpherson, (not the Highland impostor); and I am assured that the utmost accuracy and integrity is to be manifested on the occasion: either of which, you know, is pretty extraordinary in a Scotchman. Indeed, I am apt to suspect the publishers abilities rather than his honesty: but he has got a very masterly assistant."

"Like a skilful husbandman you must force the soil which nature has left sterile; and depend upon it the produce will be answerable to the cultivation."

"As human sacrifices were a natural effect of that superstitious cruelty which first produced the slaughter of animals, so is it equally natural that those accustomed to eat the brute, should not long abstain from the man: more especially as; when toasted or broiled on the altar, the appearance, savour, and taste of both would be nearly, if not entirely, the same."

"I do not think that man honest who would avail himself of a quirk of law to obtain what in reason and justice he can possibly have no right to."

"One story's good, they say, till another's told. Your clients, I will do you the justice to believe, can lye no faster than you can swear. But you seem to forget that the judge and jury generally have the curiosity to hear both sides. You will find it no difficult matter perhaps to black-ball Sam S. but if you can white-wash Mr. H. you'll be a clever fellow indeed."

"My desire to reside for a few weeks at or near Paris has been increasing ever since the Revolution, and is in reality very strong; which you will easily conceive when I give it as a decided opinion that no people ancient or modern was ever so deserving of admiration."

"Copies honestly come by are a thousand times more eligible than swindled originals."

"Your reflections are still worse founded, and could only arise from your considering me in the light of a pettyfogging attorney."

"...as to the people, I don't care a single farthing what they say, indeed I am too well acquainted with their natural propensity to lying and scandal, to expect either thanks or good words for my endeavours to serve them."

"Wolleys reflection on your proposal of drawing under the bar is certainly just...if it had not been for that little dirty place in the Savoy, I should most probably at this moment have been either in a jail, an attorneys office, or stationers shop; and it would be hard to say which of those situations is the worst."

"You would be a slave to the attorneys, Whom I Have Found NOT ONLY THE MOST IGNORANT AND CAPRICIOUS, BUT THE MOST INSINCERE, UNPRINCIPLED, AND IN EVERY RESPECT, WORTHLESS OF MEN. In a word you had much better hang yourself at once than begin to draw under the bar. If you do not immediately accept Wolleys offer you may resign yourself to everlasting damnation, as there will not be a chance left of your doing well."

"Of every species of pride or expence I abominate and detest that most which is lavished on the dead."

"I confess it is a case I know not how to handle, since the actor can bear raillery no worse than the action will applause."

"Shoals of Scotchmen are arriving here every day; the difficulty, I should imagine, would be to find one going back. Edinburgh, at the same time, is so very small a place, that you may be easily acquainted with the motions of every individual from your shop-door. Formerly, I have been told, when a Scotchman intended a journey to the South, he used to ring the cryers bell for a quarter of a year beforehand, in order to indemnify himself against the enormous expences of the Newcastle waggon, by the packets and parcels he got the charge of from his neighbours; but at present, I suppose, the neighbours go too— not in the Newcastle waggon, I mean, but the mail-coach—Tempora mutantur!"

"You will certainly find yourself healthier, and if you have either conscience or humanity, happier, in abstaining from animal food than you could possibly be in depriving, by the indulgence of an unnatural appetite and the adherence to a barbarous custom, hundreds, if not thousands, of innocent creatures of their lives, to the enjoyment of which they have as good a right as yourself."

"You will perceive by to-days paper that lord Malmsbury is about to return as wise as he went. Whatever the ministers object was in this ridiculous embassy, he has been apparently disappointed. It is a notorious fact that the embarrassments of government are beyond anything ever known. The treasury is unable to pay the smallest bill, though perpetually besieged by clamorous duns: and it turns out that even the miserable pittance collected from the police-offices (being the weekly amount of fees, fines, &c.) has, most rapaciously and dishonestly, been applied to the exigencies of the state, while the tradesmen, constables and other persons, who should be paid out of the money, are in the greatest distress and have actually advertised a general meeting to consider how they can obtain relief. Not a soul seems to have the remotest conception how Mr. Pitt will be able to weather the impending storm."

"Always prefer Tory or Jacobite writers; the Whigs are the greatest liars in the world. You consult history for facts, not principles. The Whigs, I allow, have the advantage in the latter, and this advantage they are constantly labouring to support by a misrepresentation of the former. A glaring instance of this habitual perversion is their uniform position that the King, Lords and Commons, are the three estates of the realm; than which nothing can be more false. Now, it so happens, that the bad principles of the Tories are corroborated by the facts and records of history, which makes it their interest to investigate and expose the truth: and I can readily believe that all the alterations which Hume professes to have made in his history in favour of that party were strictly just. The revolution itself was so iniquitous a transaction, and we have had such a succession of scoundrels since it took place, that you must not wonder if corruption or pusillanimity have prevented historians from speaking of both as they deserve."

"I shall only request the favour to add that it would be most absurd nay inexpressibly impertinent and foolish in me to dispute the right you have in common with every other person of controverting my opinions or correcting my errors: a liberty of which no one perhaps has made a greater use than myself. I think I need call no ghost from the grave to explain the difference between information and attack. Far from being offended, you say, with any person who should acquaint you that you had a hole in your stocking or some dirt on your face, you would think yourself much obliged to him; and so should I, but not if he accompanied the information with a kick on the shin or a box on the ear. I have nothing to object to your inserting the notes of Mr. Tyrwhitt and Mr. Malone. They had received some provocation, and if they have advanced any thing I dislike I can find a speedier method of being even with them than that you are so obliging as to point out. And do you seriously think that after being gibbeted for eight or ten years in the margin of your edition it is a sufficient compensation that I stand a chance of obtaining a reversal of my sentence from your successor? No, no, e'en let me hang on."

"Ritson: "That same power, one may answer, which authorises kings to take where it can be worst spared, and give it where it is least wanted. Our hero, in this respect, was a knight-errant; and wanted no other commission than that of justice, whose cause he militated.""

"Dr. Fuller to Ritson: "But Who made him[Robin Hood] a judge? or gave him a commission to take where it might be best spared, and give where it was most wanted?""

"The general election, which I suppose is entirely over on your side of the gutter, is here in the very zenith of confusion. It affords nothing remarkable however; the usual charges of feasting, drunkenness, bribery, perjury, &c. are every where rung, and fully justify an observation made by somebody or other, that the English, who are only free once in seven years, make such an ill use of their liberty as to be altogether unworthy even of so small a particle of it."

"I am much obliged by the pains you have taken in detecting the blunders of the English Anthology. Some of them, however, are those of the author himself, or of the authority, at least, whence the piece is taken, and for these, of course, neither editor nor printer seems responsible: as to the rest one or other of us must plead guilty."

"Your blunders are beyond computation, "out of all cess;" and I have neither the leisure nor the patience to detect you in every one. But your ignorance is so amazing and unaccountable, in many of them, that I cannot choose but bestow more attention upon them than I otherwise would do. For instance, how could you contrive to misinterpret, and corrupt the above simple phrase hedde ferly..."

"You must either, Mr. Warton, deal in very strange histories, or else you are very unmindful of what you read, or careless of what you say. And, indeed, I cannot but think, if that good and wholesome discipline, which the name of MILTON may probably call to your remembrance, were still in use at Trinity College, the more than childish ignorance of a certain near friend of yours would hardly escape without experiencing its salutary effects."

"Such a shuffleing, nonsensical paragraph was, I firmly believe, never put together since the invention of letters. That which I do not, and which, I think, no one can, understand. I shall not meddle with."

"For my own part, I often think that if I were some years younger and perfectly independent, I would venture myself among the inhospitable savages of Connaught or Munster, of whom Twiss was so much afraid, in order to acquire their language in its original purity...I can make nothing, however, of his "Vindication of the Ancient History of Ireland." He seems to be somewhat in the condition in which Festus (I think it was) supposed Paul; as, if much learning have not made him mad, it has made him, at least, completely ridiculous and absurd."

"This faucon brode you most sagaciously interpret to be a bird ...Though such unparalleled ignorance, such matchless effrontery, is not, Mr. Warton, in my humble opinion, worthy of any thing but castigation or contempt, yet, should there be a single person, beside yourself, who can mistake the meaning of so plain, so obvious a passage (which I much suspect to have been corrupted in coming through your hands) I shall beg leave to inform him, that a faucon brode is nothing more or less than a broad fauchion."

"It is, in my opinion, a most extraordinary, and, I hope and believe, unparalleled circumstance, that a man of eminence in the literary world should, in order to enhance the bulk and price of his writings, hazard his reputation upon, and descend to, or rather be guilty of, such low, such paltry, such dishonourable, and even dishonest artifices, as almost to deserve the name and punishment of a--SWINDLER."

"I have lost my old friend Tom Warton —Well!" I war not with the dead," and shall treat his ashes with the reverence I ought possibly to have bestowed on his person. Unfortunately he is introduced, not always in the most serious or respectful manner, in a work which has been long printed, but which I think my bookseller does not choose to publish till both the editor and all his friends and enemies are buried in oblivion."

"You complain, I see, that I have too much acidity in my composition; and, I think, you have too much puritanism. St. Matthew, vii. 5."

"I inclose you a pamphlet lately published by Stewart (he does not deserve the name of citizen) which he represented to me as the first political production of the age. I mean of course to have no further acquaintance with him..."

"I am sorry to learn the death of poor Smellie, whose name reminds me of a whimsical anecdote. In the course of a conversation one evening at the Tripe-club (when I was last in Edinburgh,) upon the aversion which the people of Scotland had formerly borne to the family at present on the throne, Smellie remarked, as an equally strong and singular instance, that they had given the royal name, Geordie, to a sir-reverence [human feces]. Now, on looking casually over "The works of Captain Alex. Ratcliffe," printed in 1696, but apparently written some years before, I find that this illustrious name had been thus lamentably degraded before the present family was heard of; from which, of course, as a loyal subject, I am anxious to remove so dirty an imputation. The actual origin of this curious appellation it is now, perhaps, impossible to ascertain."

"I called some days since at the White Bear, but was informed that citizen Bruin was out of town. Taking a walk however on Sunday evening to Bagnigge Wells I saw him entering one of the rooms, disguised, like a gentleman, in a new white coat and an umbrella in his hand, which made me the less forward to accost him, as I presume he is no longer "the individual John" than he wears a blue coat with a red cape. Indeed, I am so disgusted with his bigotted prejudices and absurd opinions, that the continuation of our acquaintance will be owing rather to ceremony than to esteem..."

"I observe with pleasure, what Mr. Herd has remarked upon the confusion made by Pinkerton of the two Pennecuiks. He has, with equal ignorance, confounded the two Hamiltons (of Bangour and Gilbertfield). But, indeed, his blunders are venial when compared with the more criminal parts of his literary and moral character."

"From the falsehood, impudence and scurrility of The Critical Review, I conclude that Pinkerton is one of its principal authors, and particularly the gentleman to whom I and my little publication are so much obliged. You will think me too revengeful when I wish he were compelled to subscribe his name to his criticisms. The Shakspeare papers, of which you have heard so much, and which I have carefully examined, are, I can assure you, a parcel of forgeries, studiously and ably calculated to deceive the public: the imposition being, in point of art and foresight, beyond any thing of the kind that has been witnessed since the days of Annius Viterbiensis..."

"You will before this I suppose, have heard of the dismission of those miscreant blockheads who formed the late infamous administration, some of whom it is to be hoped will yet hop headless. You'll see more in time. The national ship is now without either pilot or officers, there not being a minister in place. A mutiny among the crew is every moment expected. However I think you may begin to prepare yourself for a trip to the Netherlands. Peace! Peace! will be the undoubted blessing of the new government...We may now begin to hope for the representation of a New Comedy called, "The Blessings of the Constitution restored.""

"Stewart is just arrived from America, and as mad as ever. He now proposes a course of lectures upon mental capacity, or, in other words, to teach people to think; which he seems to flatter himself will be attended with success: I am of a different opinion."

"I am sorry to say that Dr. Farmer has not been able to find the volume of tracts containing "Sir D. Lindsays Satire." He supposes it to have been lent to Mr. Malone, to whom Mr. Steevens has promised to make immediate application. But perhaps you have already learned that Pinkerton has lately published these satires from a (very incorrect) copy of the Hyndford MS. together with the various readings of the printed edition: published under the name of J. Nichols, for C. Dilly in the Poultry, 3 vols, crown 8vo. price 9s. He has had the impudence and dishonesty to insert in this collection a curious old MS. poem in my possession, of which a friend of his had some years since surreptitiously obtained a copy, and which on that friends application from him, I positively refused my leave to print."

"Mr. Pinkerton is neither the first, nor likely to be the last, fabricator of Old Scotish Ballads."

"Pinkerton seems busy in his intended history of Scotland; whether it is to be the same with that advertised under the name of Robert Heron, I cannot learn. His treatment of the " Celtic savages" is to be speedily resented in print by the Reverend John Lane Buchanan, nominal author of "Travels in the Western Hebrides," who seems in fact, to be as very a Celt as his antagonist could possibly wish for. I am sorry to find so good a cause in the hands of such an incompetent advocate."

"Our friend Pinkerton, I am told, to complete the infamy of his character, has turned critical reviewer, a situation, of course, which admits neither truth nor honesty. He will therefore have the pleasure of thundering his own damnation upon the heads of others, among whom, I suppose, he will take care not to forget...J. Ritson"

"Dr. Percy has confounded the vesper bell with the curfew. The reason of this temporary cessation of bloodshed, proceeded from respect to the Virgin Mary; for, at this hour, the angelical salutation was sung; whence it was sometimes called the Ave Maria bell. It is still customary, upon the Spanish stage, for the actors, in the midst of the grossest and most indecent buffoonery, to fall down on their knees, and pull out their beads, at the sound of this bell."

"Mr. Fraser Tytler, who promised me to look after it, is probably dissatisfied with the manner in which I have thought myself obliged to differ from his father; but which is no other, I believe, than he himself differed from Hume and Robertson. Magis amica Veritas was his motto, and is mine."

"It will be difficult, however, if not impracticable to form a complete collection of David Williamses publications...You probably overrate the merit of the above… Godwin says he is never without an eye to self; and, in fact, a man of talents, who can puff Velnos vegetable sirop, and fawn upon the Prince of Wales, cannot be a very virtuous character. I have a notion, indeed, that he is a plausible parasite, and that it was as much by well-managed flattery as by profound politics he insinuated himself into the good graces of the citizeness Roland."

"It has been frequently said that fools make knaves; it is equally true, I believe, that credulity is the parent of falsehood."

"Though I rather think he went a little too far, in putting his friend Mrs. Wisemans cat to death for killing a mouse, which, perhaps nature, certainly education, had taught her to look upon as a duty...."

"Mr. Malone can not read, and is totally ignorant of the consequences of his own absurd ideas; he could never else have thought such a line as the following consistent with the laws of metre: '"What wheels? Racks? fi-ers? What flaying? boiling?' Thus, however, he insists that Shakespeare intended us to read--swor-en, char-rums, instead of sworn, charms; su-ar, for sure, &c. &c. converting one syllable into two, two into three or four and so on."

"But it is not the want of ear and judgement only of which I have to accuse Mr. Malone: he stands charged with divers other high crimes and misdemeanors against the divine majesty of our sovereign lord of the drama; with deforming his text, and degrading his margin, by intentional corruption, flagrant misrepresentation, malignant hypercriticism, and unexampled scurrility. These charges shall be proved--not, as Mr. Malone proves things, by groundless opinion and confident assertion, but--by fact, argument, and demonstration. How sayest thou, culprit? Guilty or not guilty?"

"Every reader of this incomparable edition will have frequent occasion to observe that the editor "draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument." The present instance, indeed, is nothing in comparison to pages of inanity with which the work abounds, and which, on account of their "true no-meaning," are actually incapable of refutation or discussion."