Chapter 407

Strawberry Hill, Dec. 2, 1794. (page 564)

I do beg and beseech you, good Sir, to forgive me, if I cannot possibly consent to receive the dedication you are so kind and partial as to propose to me. I have in the most positive, and almost uncivil manner, refused a dedication or two lately. Compliments on virtues which the persons addressed, like me, seldom possessed, are happily exploded and laughed out of use. Next to being ashamed of having good qualities bestowed on me to which I should have no title, it would hurt to be praised on my erudition, which is most superficial; and on my trifling writings, all of which turn on most trifling subjects. They amused me while writing them; may have amused a few persons; but have nothing solid enough to preserve them from being forgotten with other things of as light a nature. I Would not have your judgment called in question hereafter, if somebody reading your Aulus Gellius should ask, "What were those writings of Lord O. which Mr. Beloe so much commends? Was Lord O. more than one of the mob of gentlemen who wrote with ease?" Into that class I must sink; and I had rather do so imperceptibly, than to be plunged down to it by the interposition of the hand of a friend, who could not gainsay the sentence.

For your own sake, my good Sir, as well as in pity to my feelings, who am sore at your offering what I cannot accept, restrain the address to a mere inscription. You are allowed to be an excellent translator of classic authors; how unclassic would a dedication in the old-fashioned manner appear! If you had published a new edition of Herodotus or Aulus Gellius, would you have ventured to prefix a Greek or Latin dedication to some modern lord with a Gothic title'! Still less, had those addresses been in vogue at Rome,. would any Roman author have inscribed his work to Marcus, the incompetent son of Cicero, and told the unfortunate offspring of so great a man, Of his high birth and declension of ambition? which would have excited a laugh on poor Marcus, who, whatever may have been said of him, had more sense than to leave proofs to the public of his extreme inferiority to his father.

(893) Rector of Allhallows, London Wall, prebendary of Pancras in St. Paul's cathedral, and prebendary of Lincoln. In 1791, be published a translation of Herodotus, and in 1795, the translation of the "Attic Nights of Aulus Gellius," referred to in the above letter. He was also the author of " Anecdotes of Literature and Scarce Books," in six volumes octavo; and after his death, which took place in 1817, appeared "The Sexagenarian, or Recollections of a Literary Life;" which, though a posthumous publication, was printed under his inspection.-E.