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OF this pamphlet, Mr. Lauder gives the following account: "An ingenious gentleman (for whose amazing abilities I had conceived the highest veneration, and in whose candour and friendship I reposed the most implicit and unlimited confidence,) advised me to make an unreserved disclosure of all the lines I had interpolated against Milton, with this view, chiefly, that no future critics might ever have an opportunity of valuing themselves upon small discoveries of a few lines, which would serve to revive my error, and keep the controversy eternally alive.

"With this expedient I then cheerfully complied, when that gentleman wrote for me the letter that was published in my name to Mr. Douglas, in which he committed one error that proved fatal to me, and at the same time injurious to the public. For, in place of acknowledging that such and such particular passages only were interpolated, he gave up the whole Essay against Milton as delusion and misrepresentation, and thereby imposed more grievously on the public than I had done, and that too in terms much more submissive and abject than the nature of the offence required.

66 'Though this letter, in many respects, contained not my sentiments, as plainly appears from the contradictory Postscript subjoined to it: yet such was my infatuation at that time, and implicit confidence in my friend, that I suffered it to be printed in my name, though I was previously informed by one of the greatest men of the age of its hurtful tendency, which I have since fully experienced to my cost.

"That the gentleman meant to serve me, and was really of opinion that the method he proposed might probably prove effectual for rescuing me from the odium of the public, and, in some measure restoring my character to the honour it had lost, I was then disposed to believe. His repeated acts of friendship to me on former occasions, in conjunction with a reputation universally established for candour and integrity, left me little room to doubt it: though it is certainly a most preposterous method for a criminal, in order to obtain pardon for one act of felony, to confess himself guilty of a thousand. However, I cannot but condemn myself for placing so implicit a confidence in the judgment of any man, how great or good soever, as to suffer his mistakes to be given to the public as my opinion." King Charles vindicated from the charge of plagiarism brought against him by Milton, and Milton himself convicted of forgery, and a gross imposition on the public, 8vo. 1754. p. 3.

E.

TO THE

REVEREND MR. DOUGLAS.

SIR,

CANDO

ANDOUR and tenderness are in any relation, and on all occasions, eminently amiable; but when they are found in an adversary, and found so prevalent as to overpower that zeal which his cause excites, and that heat which naturally increases in the prosecution of argument, and which may be, in a great measure, justified by the love of truth, they certainly appear with particular advantages; and it is impossible not to envy those who possess the friendship of him whom it is even some degree of good fortune to have known as an enemy.

I will not so far dissemble my weakness, or my fault, as not to confess that my wish was to have passed undetected; but since it has been my fortune to fail in my original design, to have the suppositious passages which I have inserted in my quotations made known to the world, and the shade which began to gather on the splendour of Milton totally dispersed, I cannot but. count it an alleviation of my pain, that I have been defeated by a man who knows how to use advantages with so much moderation, and can enjoy the honour of conquest without the insolence of triumph..

It was one of the maxims of the Spartans, not to press upon a flying army, and therefore their enemies were

always ready to quit the field, because they knew the danger was only in opposing. The civility with which you have thought proper to treat me, when you had incontestible superiority, has inclined me to make your victory complete, without any further struggle; and not only publicly to acknowledge the truth of the charge which you have hitherto advanced, but to confess, without the least dissimulation, subterfuge, or concealment, every other interpolation I have made in those authors, which you have not yet had opportunity to examine.

On the sincerity and punctuality of this confession, I am willing to depend for all the future regard of mankind; and cannot but indulge some hopes, that they, whom my offence has alienated from me, may, by this instance of ingenuity and repentance, be propitiated and reconciled. Whatever be the event, I shall at least have done all that can be done in reparation of my former injuries to Milton, to truth, and to mankind; and entreat that those who shall continue implacable, will examine their own hearts, whether they have not committed equal crimes, without equal proofs of sorrow, or equal acts of atonement.*

*The interpolations are distinguished by Italic characters.

PASSAGES interpolated in MASENIUS.

The word pandemonium in the marginal notes of Book I. Essay, page 10.

CITATION VI. Essay, page 38.

Adnuit ipsa dolo, malumque (heu! longa dolendi
Materies! & triste nefas !) vesana momordit
Tanti ignari mali. Mora nulla, solutus Avernus
Exspuit infandas acies; fractumque remugit
Divulsa compage solum. Nabathæa receptum
Regna cedere sonum, Pharioque in littore Nereus
Territus erubuit: simul adgemuere dolentes
Hesperiæ valles, Libyæque calentis arenæ
Exarsere procul. Stupefacta Lycaonis ursa
Constitit, & pavido riguit glacialis in axe:
Omnis cardinibus submotus inhorruit orbis ;
Angeli hoc efficiunt, cælestia jussa secuti.

CITATION VII. Essay, page 41..

Illa quidem fugiens, sparsis per terga capillis,
Ora rigat lacrimis, & cœlum questibus implet :
Talia voce rogans. Magni Deus arbiter orbis!
Qui rerum momenta tenes, solusque futuri
Præscius, elapsique memor: quem terra potentem
Imperio, cœlique tremunt; quem dite superbus
Horrescit Phlegethon, pavidoque furore veretur :
En! Styge crudeli premimur. Laxantur hiatus.
Tartarei, dirusque solo dominatur Avernus,
Infernique canes populantur cuncta creata,
Et manes violant superos: discrimina rerum
Sustulit Antitheus, divumque oppressit honorem.

Respice Sarcotheam: nimis, heu! decepta momordit
Infaustas epulas, nosque omnes prodidit hosti..

CITATION VIII. Essay, page 42, the whole passage.

Quadrupedi pugnat quadrupes, volurcrique volucris;
Et piscis cum pisce ferox hostilibus armis

Pralia sava gerit : jam pristina pabula spernunt,
Jam tondere piget viridantes gramine campos :
Alterum & alterius vivunt animalia letho:

Prisca nec in gentem humanam reverentia durat ;
Sed fugiunt, vel si steterant fera bella minantur
Fronte truci, torvosque oculos jaculantur in illam.

CITATION IX. Essay, page 43.

Vatibus antiquis numerantur lumine cassis,
Tiresias, Phineus, Thamyrisque, & magnus Homerus;

The above passage stands thus in Masenius, in one line.

Tiresias cœcus, Thamyrisque, & Daphnis, Homerus

N. B. The verse now cited is in Masenius's Poems, but not in the Sarcotis.

CITATION X. Essay, page 46.

In medio, turmas inter provectus ovantes
Cernitur Antitheus, reliquis hic altior unus
Eminet, & circum vulgus despectat inane :
Frons nebulis obscura latet, torvumque furorem
Dissimulat, fidæ tectus velamine noctis:
Persimilis turri præcelsæ, aut montibus altis
Antique cedro, nudate frondis honore.

Passages interpolated in Grotius.

CITATION I. Essay, page 55.

Sacri tonantis hostis, exsul patriæ
Cœlestis adsum; tartari tristem specum

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