Review for April laft; there is, however, great reafon to fuppofe, that the Author of Ambition and of this Letter are the fame; fimilitude of hands is very strong evidence, and this evidence we fhall bring in favour of our fuppofition. There is 'nonsense from a redundancy of words in Ambition, fo there is in this Letter; I could not find,' fays the Author, in his epistle dedicatory, to whom with greater propriety the following pages might be more appofitely dedicated than to you;' that is, I could not find to whom more properly the following pages might more properly be dedicated. The Author of Ambition attempts illuftration by figures that do not illuftrate, so does the Letter-writer: he infinuates that no literary performance will fland the test of fevere criticifm, and immediately adds, fome particular parts of here and there a fingular performance, like fome uncommon inftances of fortitude upon the rack, may be fafely put to this ordeal, yet the whole of no compofition ever did, or ever will bear it.' The principle to be illuftrated is, that particular parts of a literary compofition may appear to be faultlefs when brought to the teft of criticifm; the figure is, a perfon on the rack, who makes no confeffion, whether innocent or guilty: the rack is a telt of fortitude and not of innocence: the ordeal indeed was a teft of innocence and not of fortitude: the Letter-writer has fuppofed the rack and the ordeal to be the fame, which is another inftance of his resemblance to the Author of Ambition. That Author fuppofes minstrels to be courtezans; the Letter-writer is as grofsly ignorant in the fame particular, for he fuppofes them to be women educated with a view to proftitution. Minstrel is a word of nearly the fame import with bard, and was used to fignify a man who fung historical veries to an inftrument; it has been fince ufed to fignify an itinerant fidler who plays at country wakes, but it is not lefs abfurd to fuppofe parfon and harlot to be fynonimous terms, than harlot and fidler. The Author of Ambition uses metaphors that are mixed and incongruous in the highest degree; the Letter-writer thinks that metaphors are not the worfe for mixture and incongruity; the Poet talks of a baplet of poifon to debauch a mind; let us hear the Apologift: "A chaplet of poifon to debauch the mind."-Here, I fuppofe, is thought to be a clashing, or confufion of ideas-Be it fo-it nevertheless expreffes what it was intended to mean (and fo much it certainly should) one of thofe fallacious and infinuating arts that are made use of to debauch or vitiate the mind, by pleafing, in order to impofe, upon the fenfes; or rather by them upon the imagination, and thereby gaining an irrefiftable afcendancy over both the affections and the will; of whofe pollution the fenfes become the inftruments, as the object itself was of their deception.-Now, gentlemen, viewed in this light, (and in what other ought it to be viewed?) tho' your AcCURACIES may object to the metaphor, the moral is clear enough to intelligence: and if only by the courtesy of criticism, would have been tolerated in almost any thing but an address in behalf of Mr. Wilkes; or "Ambition, an Epistle to Faoli." But if a metaphor thould not be cenfured as tranfgreffing the rules of poetry or rhetoric, provided its general meaning can be gueffed, neither should a literal expreffion be cenfured as tranfgreffing the rules of grammar, fuppofing it not to be wholly unintelligible, and the Let ter-writer ter-writer may be juftified in making the noun-fingular, and the pronoun plural, when he afks Whether we have not recommended many a production which, exclufive of their futility, have had no other merit than that they were advertised for our bookfeller.' But whether this Apologift for Ambition is or is not the Author, is a queftion of little importance either to us or to the public: we apprehend our Readers are fufficiently fatisfied with refpect to his learning and abilities: his candour and politenefs are equally confpicuous; we have remarked the most glaring faults of a performance in which there is nothing to commend, for which he accufes us of rancour, partiality, and invidioufnefs, has ftigmatized us as the enemies of liberty and religion, as commending only from intereft and condemning merely from envy, as mean, selfish, foolish; nay, as folly itself. Erafmus, fays he, has written your encomium.' We answer nothing to these charges, but with him a better temper, and a more reputable employment. His paraphraftic inverfion of Agur's prayer is a rhapsody altogether unintelligible; it seems to have been intended as a cenfure of what was faid of Agur's prayer in a late Review, but it neither implies nor expreffes any juft impeachment of that article: it is a mixture of blaf-. phemy and nonfenfe, of which a parallel can fcarcely be found: let the Reader judge, from the following extract: O Thou! whatever is thy nature or thy name; who art not only unknown and invifible, and therefore quite out of reach and unapproachable but who, as it appeareth to us, at times art equally trange and unreasonable; whose ways, (if indeed they are thine) are really beyond our accounting for; but only that, as they must be fomebody's, and we are willing to put the moft charitable construction upon even the most fufpicious and unfavourable appearances, we are therefore ready to believe, art better than appearances would reprefent-behold! we the most truity and deferving, (though to be fure not the most favoured or beloved) of all thy injured and ill-treated creatures, are now going to make our most just and rational complaints; as the generous and voluntary advocates and interceffors, as well in the behalf of our fpecies in general, as for that mot ufeful and refpectable part of it ourselves and Co. in particular: who are, as indeed we have long been, moft bafely and fhamefully permitted to be, the most eminent lofers and fufferers; not only by the fcandalous and unjuftifiable inequality, and want even of common fenfe, which is fo notoriously confpicuous in the diftribution of that which, our own obfervation convinces us, alone can or ought to conflitute the real felicity of any fuch intelligent and fenfible beings as we are. either in this or any other ftate that we know any thing about and which, for many reafons, by the bye, we ought to have had without atking; but by the stupid, irrational, and contradictory documents and infructions lugged out of a certain old worm-eaten volume, tranflated, as we are informed, by a fet of religious aftrologer, from a jargon, by their own account, confounded at Babel, are precluded from feeking any redrefs; and only recommended to the example of one Agur, (whom we believe to have been no better than a forcerer) and, what is more astonishing fill, all this (for the more effectually accomplishing their execrable and fanguinary intentions) is pretended to have been written written under the fanction of thy infpiration and appointment, by which not only our interefts are prejudiced, but our very fenfes and reafon are infulted: nay, more, we are, under the feverest penalties, not only prohibited from complaining; but are, by the fame cruel and defpotic authority, commanded and required to take our sufferings as a FAVOUR, and the moft tyrannical fubjugation under them as an efpecial and extraordinary PRIVILEGE: fo that by this means our miseries are buckled on us like a burden on the back of an afs, or,: a collar on the neck of a dog; as if we had either forfeited our exiftences, or existed only to be SCARIFIED! This being then our fituation, (but a fituation we are refolved not to fubmit to a moment longer than we can help,) We now make it our bufinefs to inform Thee of it, as well as of our refolutions upon it; and that as we are not only our own, but indeed, our own best friends too, instead of crouching, -cringing,-fawning, and whimpering, as others have often done, to be miferable, or defiring the honour of being permitted to remain fo, we make no ceremony to declare, that we will stand to no fuch bargains, and fhould look upon ourselves unworthy of the shape or attitudes of men if we did, and our fouls no bigger than a nutmeg-A parcel of frigid, timid, narrow, felf-concentred animals, undeferving the notice of a grasshopper-To pretend from flattery or fear to make Thee imagine we approved of any fuch ufage, when at the fame time we are fure, that if they were to be placed in our ftead, who preach up this flavery to us, the very first thing they would attempt would be to get rid of that or their-being! Amen.' After eight pages more of the fame jargon, the Author concludes with what he calls the effence of the foregoing, extracted for the eafe and comfort of the lazy, the infirm, or impatient : "I befeech Thee do not give me poverty for then I shall only be laughed at: nor yet a mere mediocrity, for that will be no better than my daily bread-A petition hardly fit for a dormouse-But give me riches in abundance, and then, though I fhould deferve to be hanged, every body will pull off their hats I fhall have all I want in this world, and be treated like a gentleman in the NEXT! Amen." Now follows an ejaculation containing the Ether of both; and may be used at court or the India house. "O JAFFIER! make me a NABOB! Amen for ever and ever!" Perhaps from this paffage the Reader will conceive an opinion of the Author's brain, from which it will follow that his morals are fecured at the expence of his understanding. Ha. Art. 11. A Treatise on Fruit-trees. By Thomas Hitt, formerly Gardener to Lord Robert Manners, at Blexholm in Lincolnshire; and to Lord Robert Bertie, at Chislehurst, in Kent. The 3d Edition. 8vo. 5 s. 3 d. Boards. Robinfon and Roberts. 1768. The first edition of this work came out in the year 1755; and our Readers will find it recommended, at large, in the 13th volume of this Review. From the time of its first publication, Mr. Hitt declares he has made fuch additions, fucceffively, to his work, as a very extenfive practice afforded him opportunities for doing; and thefe, he affures his Readers, are all faithfully inferted, together with fome neceffary corrections, in this third edition: which we look upon as a very rational and ufeful publication. Art. 12: Art. 12. A Rhapsody. By Philippina Burton. 4to. 2s. 6d. Love, and all its raptures, is the fubject of this Lady's incoherent rant, which he calls a Rhapfody. Her performance undoubtedly calls for cenfure; but her motives for printing may poffibly entitle her to compaffion. We fhall, therefore, at prefent, take no farther notice of this Nat. Lee in petticoats. Art. 13. The New Foundling Hofpital for Wit, Part III. 8vo. See Reviews for May, and for December, 1768: the Catalogues. Art. 14. The Female Captive: a Narrative of Facts, which happened in Barbary, in the Year 1756. Written by herself. 12mo. 2 Vols. 5s. fewed. Bathurst. to Contains, if we are not deceived by fair appearances, the real ftory of a young lady, who, in ker paffage from the island of England, having the misfortune to be taken by a Salletine, is carried into Barbary, where the with great difficulty avoids the efforts made by the emperor of Morocco to engage her in his feraglio; is at laft fet at liberty; arrives in England; and is married to a gentleman who was the companion of her captivity.-There is nothing marvellous in the narration; which, moreover, affords very few intereiling events, and will, perhaps, like many a dull ftory, be the less regarded for its being true. Art. 15. The Cafe of the Orphan and Creditors of John Ayliffe, Efq; for the Opinion of the Public. With an Addenda of interefing Queries for the Anfwer of those whom it concerns. The whole fairly ftated, and indifputably authenticated from Criginals. Svo. for the Author. Is. d. Frinted This pamphlet being lately advertifed, as a new publication, it came of courfe into our hands; but as it appears, by the date of the title-page, to have been printed in 1761, it does not now properly fall under our notice. Befide, who does not remember the flory of the unfortunate Ayliffe? Art. 16. The Works, in Verse and Profe, of William Shenfione, Efq; Vol. III. containing Letters to particular Friends, from the ear 1739, to 1763. 8vo. 6s. Dodfley. 1769. Some of these letters are very trivial, but many others in the collection are no way unworthy of the attention of the public and they will be particularly acceptable to the admirers of Mr. Shenstone's writings. which, for the most part, have undoubtedly very confiderable merit. Mr. Shenstone, confidered merely as an author, had the uncommon felicity of attracting the love of his readers: and those who from readers had the happiness of becoming acquainted with him as a man, never felt any diminution of that pre-conceived esteem for him, infpired by his works.-In thefe letters, his perfonal character appears in the fame amiable light as in his poetical compofitions:they contain the hiftory of his mind for the last twenty-four years of his life.' Art. 17. Art. 17. Genuine Memoirs of the Life of Mifs Ann Elliot. Written by a whom the com12mo. 2s. 6d. An impudent and grofs impofition on the public; and, in all refpects, a moft worthlefs production. Mifs E. was admired as an actrefs. She was more admired as a miftrefs;-particularly by a gen tleman of distinction in the literary world, and by a perfon of very high rank in the C-t of St. J-s's :-and, even after the cold hand of death had chilled the lillies and rofes of her lovely face, the could not but be viewed as a tempting object, by the lurking poachers of Grubftreet, who are conftantly lying in wait for fuch game-Like the hungry jackalls in Turkey, watching the places of interment, in order to harrow up and devour the dead bodies, the moment after they are depofited in the earth. POLITICAL. Art. 18. An Addrefs to the Proprietors of India Stock, fhewing from the political state of Indoitan, the Neceffity of fending Commiffioners to regulate and direct their affairs. 8vo. 1S. Bladon The Author ftrenuously recommends the joining a fervant of the crown-(a military or naval officer) in the commiffion of fuperviforfhip: a measure not very agreeable to the free fpirit and jealous temper of the times. Art. 19. Obfervations on Public Liberty, Patriotifm, Minifterial Def potifm, &c. In a Letter to the Freeholders of Middlesex, and the Livery of London. By an Independent Citizen of London. Svo. 6 d. Towers. Written on the popular fide, with more judgment and moderation, than we ufually meet with in party-pamphlets. Art. 20. The Prefent State of Liberty in Great Britain and her Colonies. By an Englishman. 8vo. 6 d. Johnfon and Payne. On the fame fide with the foregoing obfervations: and contains a very good political Catechifm. Art. 21. The Comments of Bull-face Double Fee, on the Petition of the Freeholders of the County of Middlesex. 8vo. 2 s. Fell. A perfon of great eminence in the law is here made the author of a refutation of the feveral articles contained in the Middlefex petition; which refutation, or comment, was detailed in the Daily Gazetteer, in a series of that paper, for the month of June laft.-The Editor recommends this comment, as abounding with the most fcurrilous abuse, indecent invectives, and audacious menaces against the Petitioners, and every other perfon concerned in preparing and fupporting that petition.' It contains, however, many very juft obfervations. In his title-page. Art. 22. A Reply to the Comments and Menaces of Bull-face Double Fre, on the Petition of the Freeholders of Middlefex. Wherein the |