THE SALE OF AUTHORS, A DIALOGUE, In IMITATION of LUCIAN'S SALE OF PHILOSOPHERS. LONDON: Printed, and fold by the BooKSELLERS in LONDON PREFACE. IF T was a fenfible mortification to me fome few days after the dialogue of Lexiphanes appeared, when a Gentleman enquired at a bookfeller's what fort of a thing it was, to hear him answered by the boy in the fhop, that it was fomething written against Dr. 7----n. For the fame reason the compliments which I have fometimes had paid me, by being told, that I had very well ridiculed Dr. J--n, have been received by me, almost as coolly, as a Great Man, who is either conscious of higher accomplishments, or, what is the fame thing, thinks he poffeffes them, would receive his led Captain, who should tell him,that his Lordship danced an excellent Hornpipe, or played a good Stick on the fiddle. The truth is, my intention was not to ridicule Dr. J---n, whom I have only once feen, Virgilium tantum vidi, nor Dr. A---e, nor any other particular Doctor or Writer, but their manner of writing, and expreffing themselves on all fubjects, and the pompous affected style used by them, and many other Doctors and Writers. Boffu in bis in- genious treatife on the Epick Poem, imagines that Homer first of all fixed upon his moral, and then invented his fable,and chofe his Hero. I cannot conceive this was really the cafe with Homer; neither do I affert it was literally fo at first with myfelf. I can only say, that I bave at last conducted my plan, as if it had In the fame manner, respecting the prefent ject of my fatire. For instance, when the Dra- matick Authors are expofed to fale, the ridicule of of real merit are dismissed without being offered to fale at all, it is levelled against the low and trifling taste of the age in general; when Harris, Hoyle, and Heber are put up, against Debauchees and Gamefters, and when the anony mous Authors are fold, many frauds and artifices of the Bookfellers, or rather Bookmakers, are detected and expofed. Even in Lexiphanes's Rhapsody fomething more than a bare ridicule of that style is intended; it is a faithful picture of a certain class in modern life, and two very common characters, that of the vociferating Grocer, and the sentimental Hibernian, are drawn in it. Befides, the whole ftory of the quarrel betwen the Grocer and the Caledonian Emigrant, (Jee Lexiphanes, from page 31 to 37) is defigned as a fatire on the animofity which then fubfifted between the two nations,and the ridiculous caufes which occafioned it. It may be thought fomewhat officious in any writer to explain and comment upon his own productions; but perhaps it is now neceffary, for our Criticks ap pear |