Stories, the highest for the Deliberative, the middle for the Demonstrative, and the lowest for the Judicial. These shall be divided into Loci, or Places, being repositories for Matter and Argument in the several kinds of oration or writing; and every Drawer shall again be subdivided into Cells, resembling those of Cabinets for Rarities. The apartment for Peace or War, and that of the Liberty of the Press, may in a very few days be filled with several arguments perfectly new; and the Vituperative Partition will as easily be replenished with a most choice collection, entirely of the growth and manufacture of the present age. Every composer will soon be taught the use of this Cabinet, and how to manage all the registers of it, which * will be drawn out much in the manner of those in an Organ.

The Keys of it must be kept in honest hands, by some Reverend Prelate or Valiant Officer, of unquestioned Loyalty and Affection to every present Establishment in Church and State; which will sufficiently guard against any mischief which might otherwise be apprehended from it.

And being lodged in such hands, it may be at discretion let out by the Day, to several great Orators in both Houses; from whence it is to be hoped much Profit and Gain will also accrue to our Society.

CHAP. XIV 5.

HOW TO MAKE DEDICATIONS, PANEGYRICS, OR SATIRES, AND OF THE COLOURS OF HONOUR-. ABLE AND DISHONOURABLE.

Now of what necessity the foregoing Project may prove, will appear from this single consideration, that nothing is of equal consequence to the success of our Works as Speed and Dispatch. Great pity it is, that solid brains are not like other solid bodies, constantly endowed with a velocity in sinking, proportioned to their heaviness: for it is with the Flowers of the Bathos as with those of Nature, which, if the careful gardener brings not hastily to market in the Morning, must unprofitably perish and wither before Night. And of all our productions none is so short-lived as the Dedication and Panegyric, which are often but the Praise of a Day, and become by

It will be difficult to find more knowledge of life, more wit, more satire, more good sense, in any passage of equal length, than is comprised in this fourteenth chapter. Perhaps Dryden's Dedication of the State of Innocence to the Dutchess of York is a piece of the grossest and most abject adulation that ever disgraced true genius, except indeed the nauseous and fulsome Dedication of such a man as Corneille of his Horace to Cardinal Richelieu, after this proud churchman had treated him so injuriously in the affair of the Cid. If it be thought that I speak disrespectfully of such a great minister as Richelieu, I beg leave to say, that one such poet as Corneille is of more real value than a hundred Richelieus, in the eyes of those who regard merits more than stations.

the next, utterly useless, improper, indecent, and false. This is the more to be lamented, inasmuch as these two are the sorts whereon in a manner depend that Profit which must still be remembered to be the main end of our Writers and Speakers.

We shall therefore employ this chapter in shewing the quickest method of composing them; after which we shall teach a short Way to Epic Poetry. And these being confessedly the works of most Importance and Difficulty, it is presumed we may leave the rest to each author's own learning or practice.

First of Panegyric: Every man is honourable, who is so by Law, Custom, or Title. The Public are better judges of what is honourable than private Men. The Virtues of great Men, like those of Plants, are inherent in them whether they are exerted or not; and the more strongly inherent, the less they are exerted; as a Man is the more rich, the less he spends. All great Ministers, without either private or economical Virtue, are virtuous by their Posts; liberal and generous upon the Public Money, provident upon Public Supplies, just by paying Public Interest, courageous and magnanimous by the Fleets and Armies, magnificent upon the Public Expenses, and prudent by Public Success. They have by their Office, a right to a share of the Public Stock of Virtues; besides, they are by Prescription immemorial invested in all the celebrated virtues of their Predecessors in the same stations, especially those of their own Ancestors. As to what are commonly called the Colours Honourable and Dishonour

able, they are various in different Countries: in this they are Blue, Green, Red".

But forasmuch as the duty we owe to the Public doth often require that we should put some things in a strong light, and throw a shade over others, I shall explain the method of turning a vicious Man into a Hero.

The first and chief Rule is, the Golden Rule of Transformation, which consists in converting Vices into their bordering Virtues. A Man who is a Spendthrift, and will not pay a just Debt, may have his Injustice transformed into Liberality; Cowardice may be metamorphosed into Prudence; Intemperance into good Nature and good Fellowship; Corruption into Patriotism; and Lewdness into Tenderness and Facility.

The second is the Rule of Contraries. It is certain, the less a Man is endowed with any Virtue, the more need he has to have it plentifully bestowed, especially those good qualities of which the world generally believes he hath none at all: for who will thank a Man for giving him that which he has?

The Reverse of these Precepts will serve for Satire, wherein we are ever to remark, that whoso loseth his place, or becomes out of favour of the Government, hath forfeited his share in public Praise and

• A severe sarcasm on three orders of knighthood in this country. But why ridicule such orders? Is it not of public utility, and consequently providential, that there should be a sort of minds in the world capable of being actuated and put into motion by such objects, as wits and philosopers call Trifles?

Honour. Therefore the truly public spirited writer ought in duty to strip him whom the government hath stripped; which is the real poetical Justice of this age. For a full collection of Topics and Epithets to be used in the Praise and Dispraise of Ministerial and Unministerial Persons, I refer to our Rhetorical Cabinet; concluding with an earnest exhortation to all my brethren, to observe the precepts here laid down, the neglect of which hath cost some of them their Ears in the Pillory.

CHAP. XV.

A RECEIPT TO MAKE AN EPIC POEM".

AN Epic Poem, the Critics agree, is the greatest work human nature is capable of. They have al

↑ A severe animadversion is here intended on Bossu; who, after he has been so many years quoted, commended, and followed, by a long train of respectable disciples, must, I am afraid, alas! be at last deserted and given up as a visionary and fantastical critic; especially for imagining, among other vain and groundless conceits and refinements, that Homer and Virgil first fixed on some one moral truth or axiom, and then added a fable or story, with suitable names and characters, proper to illustrate the truth so fixed upon. Before Bossu, Mambrun had advanced the same doctrine, and treated it in a philosophical Aristotelian manner, in a laboured Dissertation, which he exemplified by a woful Latin Epic Poem, entitled Constantinus. He was one of those many critics who may remind us of the fate of Boccalini, when he was appointed by Paul V. governor of a small town, because he had written well on political subjects and on the art of government; but was obliged to be recalled after three months' administration for incapacity in the business. The lamentable Epic Poems that Boileau