would pursue and perfect this plan, he would do equal justice to the living and to the dead."

In 1772, the late Lord Orford gave to the world two Numbers of a work, entitled "Miscellaneous Antiquities; or, a collection of curious papers, either republished from scarce Tracts, or now first printed from Original MSS." "The Numbers," says the Advertisement, “will not appear with periodic regularity, but as it shall suit the leisure and convenience of the gentlemen who have undertaken the work, which is in imitation of Peck's Desiderata Curiosa, and is solely calculated for amusement; for which reason the Editors make no promises, enter into no engagements; but shall take the liberty of continuing, varying, or dropping the plan, when and in what manner they please; a notice they think right to give, that no man may complain hereafter of being disappointed."

The object of the present undertaking is to combine some of the advantages of all these works. But the Editor, living at a distance from the Capital, having only the amusement of literary occupation in view, and being often distracted by other pressing a vocations, will neither engage for regular periods of publication, nor be unalterably confined to any plan. He is aware, that what he has to offer will be principally adapted to the curious; and therefore he has printed but a moderate number of copies. Under these circumstances, but still more, if this small impression should not find purchasers, he will consider himself free to drop, at any time, this attempt to convey harmless information or pleasure.

But should it, contrary to his expectations, receive encouragement, he trusts to the assistance of his lite rary friends, more especially for the titles and abstracts of scarce books, and original lives of unjustly neglected authors. And in that case no literary discussion will be unacceptable to these pages.

The Editor cannot avoid thinking that while eight or ten Reviews are supported in giving accounts (often ridiculously opposite) of new books, one surely may usefully be occupied in reviving the treasures of past ages.

Such was the plan originally designed for this publication; but the first sheet had not been worked off at the press, when, by the urgent advice of friends, it was altered and enlarged. The size has been augmented, and the number of copies, which was originally so small, as, even after the sale of the whole, to have subjected the Editor, in the progress of the work, to a great loss, has been moderately increased. But whether this undertaking, commenced from the purest love of literature, and executed hitherto in hurry and distraction, will support itself, seems a matter of serious doubt.

The Editor does not hesitate to acknowledge (what it consoles his pride to recollect that even Johnson had once occasion to confess *), that "he has never been much a favourite with the public." But, like Johnson, he may honestly say, that he "has never descended to the arts by which favour

* Rambler, No. 208.

an important consideration which has impelled him to sign it to this advertisement. Though this work of criticism will principally be conversant with authors who are dead, it will occasionally give opinions on the works of the living. To secure it, therefore, from the imputation to which other Reviews are sometimes liable; to prevent its being even suspected of ever being the vehicle of personal malice under the form of judgments on authors, which have too frequently been written by concealed enemies, or under the influence of prejudices privately conveyed from such quarters (an assassin-like species of treatment, under which the present Editor has himself too severely suffered,) to protect this undertaking from the possibility of conduct so immoral and base, he reluctantly, and with diffidence, affixes the signature of

Feb. 24, 1805.

SAMUEL EGERTON BRYDGES.

POSTSCRIPT*

TO

VOLUME I. OF THE FIRST EDITION.

HAVING thus, by the candid and unexpected encouragement of the public, brought to a conclusion one volume of the CENSURA LITERARIA, it may perhaps be not improper to make a few observations on its contents. Of the works here mentioned, some are so scarce that they never occur in the catalogues even of the most eminent booksellers; and if by any chance one of this description is accidentally met with, it of course finds an immediate purchaser at an extravagant price. But their scarcity alone is but a foolish recommendation. Their intrinsic value is for the most part great.

It is well known, that a copy of Lord Berners's Froissart is not to be bought under twenty guineas, if at all; and to the wealthy it is, even at this rate, by no means dear; for it contains a very rich treasure of the English language. The Poetical Miscellanies of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth are all rare and valuable. Of "The Handeful of Plesant Delites, by Clement Robinson, 1584," which appears to have been a popular book in Shakespeare's time,

This Postscript, it must be recollected by the reader, relates to the contents of Volume I. as they stood in the first Edition.

as he quotes several songs from it, only one copy and that wanting a leaf, now exists. Both the editions of England's Helicon are of extreme value, more especially the first. Nor are these the only uncommon books, of which some account is given in this work. I could enumerate only fifteen volumes, here recorded, of which the lowest price, if they could be procured at all, (which would not happen very soon) would be nearly 120 guineas.

Mr. Gifford, in his Introduction to the new edition of Massinger, very justly censures the ridiculous tests of merit set up by vain and selfish collectors. But most of the books I have mentioned do not derive their claim to notice merely from the infrequency of their occurrence, but furnish matter well worthy of the attention of the most enlightened eritic or historian. The reign of the Tudors, more especially of the last glorious heroine of that House, was the reign of poetical genius; and after the fancy, the moral charms, the Doric delicacy, and the harmony and force of language, which the Miscellanies of Queen Elizabeth's time exhibit, we observe with astonishment and disgust, the lapse of taste and refinement and imagination, of which the main body of the poetry of the three or four succeeding reigns produces such glaring proofs. It is true that in this period arose Milton, and Cowley, and Dryden; but Milton was so notoriously of the former school, that he never obtained popularity among his cotemporaries. The inimitable brilliance and beauty of Cowley's genius was so vitiated by the bad taste of the age in which he lived, as to deform almost all his compositions, and at this day to depress him nearly

Lately reprinted in Heliconia, 1815.