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A slight. paralytick stroke had weakened his constitution: his frame was frequently disordered, and his mind easily ruffled. During the contest about the visitato rial power, when Bishop Moore, with whom he had long lived in habits of intimacy, appeared in court, on the opposite party, he was so affected with the sight of his old friend, in such a situation, that he immediately fainted away.

Bentley was very severely though surely very improperly satirized by Pope, in the fourth book of the Dunciad. The lines are well known, and were occasioned by an opinion, which was forced from Bentley, with respect to the translation of Homer, at Atterbury's table, while Pope was present. The bishop very imprudently and indelicately asked the critick what he thought of the English Homer. The Doctor eluded the question for some time, but at last, when he was urged to speak his sentiments freely, he said; "The verses are good verses, but the work is not Homer, at is Spondanus !" Pope seldom forgot injuries, and many years after this conversation, he assigned a place in the Dunciad to our British Aristarchus. Never was satire more illiberal or unjust. Pope was not sufficiently acquainted with ancient literature to be capable of deciding on Bentley's critical abilities.

He might see that many of his notes on Milton were trifling, and that his remarks on Horace were often bold and hazardous, but of his solid learning, his extensive knowledge, and his diversified erudition he was certainly not competent to form a judgment.

In the year 1735 he wrote an answer to some queries of an Oxford Gentleman, concerning the

date of a Persick manuscript of the four Gospels, which had been sent from Ispahan. This letter has likewise been preserved by Dr. Taylor, and is published with his valuable little tract, De debitore dissecando. He says in his preface, that it is: "Mole quidem parva, £xgua autem et subtilitate plenissima. Qua diligenter perlecta eruditus Lector mecum sentiet nihil unquam argutius, nihil solidius aut verius ex Tripode fuisse responsum.”

In 1738 a libel was exhibited before the vicar-general of the Bishop of Ely, against Dr. Colbatch, rector of Orwell, who refused to pay the proxies due to Dr. Bentley, as archdeacon of Ely. In his defence Dr. Colbatch, who bore an excellent character, though his virtue was rather of the severer cast, alleged, that though Bentley had been archdeacon forty years, he had never, in obedience to the ecclesiastical laws, been known to visit one church or chapel. Sentence, however, was passed against Colbatch, with costs of suit, upon which in 1741 he published a pamphlet, intituled, The State of Proxies payable to Ecclesiastical Visitors fully stated.

In 1739 appeared the Astronomicon of Manilius, with corrections and notes, by Dr. Bentley. This edition was ushered into the world by a dedication to the Duke of Newcastle, and a preface by Mr. Richard Bentley, a nephew of the Doctor; with whose approbation both these introductory pieces were written.

In the preface he gives a full account of his uncle's opinion of the work, and its author, as well as of the various manuscripts and prințed copies which he consulted, in order to perfect this edition. Bentley places Malinius in the age of Augustus ; and among

other proofs, he vindicates his assertion by the termination of the genitive cases of words in ius, and ium, which always terminated in a single i, before that period: as Auxilium, Auxili: Consilium, Consili: Imperium, Imperi: &c. Propertius is the first of the Ro2 man poets, whose works are extant, in whom this rule is infringed, and by him only in two or three instances. Ovid, who lived rather later, frequently uses the double i; and after him, it became general. This change, however, took place long after the accession of Augustus to the government. This remark we owe to Bentley, and it is worthy of the British Aristarchus. He first promulgated it in his notes on the Andria of Terence, where he candily corrects a mistake which he had made in a passage of Horace, and justifies his observation on these genitive cases, by citing a passage from Nigidius Figulus, Romanorum a Varrone doctissimus, which is preserved by Gellius †, by which it is evident, that in his age accent was the only distinction between the genitive and vocative cases of words in ius, as N. Valerius, G. Valeri, V. Valeri. Bentley, therefore, as Manilius, or the au

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thor of the poem, whatever was his name, except in one Greek word, never uses the double i, in the Casus interrogandi, determines the Astronomicon to have been written in the early part of the age of Augustus.

The author, according to our critick, was a foreigner, and, therefore, the peculiarities of style which occur in his work do not militate against his having been contemporary with Augustus: especially as many of the exceptionable passages are proved by Bentley to be spurious. Of his name nothing certain can be pronounced. Neither the manuscript copies of the poem, nor the author in the course of his work, nor the testimony of other writers, bring any certain assistance.

With regard to the text, Bentley generally follows the edition of Scaliger, and has preserved all the readings which he rejected. In some passages, his corrections seem extravagantly different from the common copies: which appears to be in some measure excuseable, when it is known, that no single piece on ancient literature was ever so much depraved by the negligence or ignorance of transcribers; for the various readings are more numerous even than the verses of the poem.

To be concluded next month.

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I have no skill to read the stars, nor ever pried in toads' entrails.

OF the effects, resulting from the general effusion of knowledge, one of the most useful, and perhaps the most extensive, is our eman

cipation from the tyranny of superstition. An eclipse was once the portent of revolution, the forerunner of defeat, the warning of

famine and of pestilence; but I have heard of only one man, that thought the darkness on the sixteenth day of June last sent, as a judgment for our sins. The most artful politician, the most profound philosopher, the most heroick and prudent commander had less influence on the state of society, than the crafty juggler, the master of the ceremonies at the temple of Delphi. The armies of the ancients were often restrained from combat at a favourable opportunity, because the traiterous soothsayers declared the omens inauspicious; so that, says Bayle, a diviner was as necessary an officer as a general.

Sailors have always been more prone to this weakness, than other classes of men; and the commander of the most numerous maritime expedition ever fitted out, was, while his fleet was detained by contrary winds, so ignorant of the common operation, or so distrustful of the kindness of heaven, as to sacrifice his daughter to propitiate a change. At present, though they hardly dare to commence their voyage without a horse-shoe on the foot of their foremast, yet in battle they rise above such follies, and, whether it thunder on the right or the left, are as heedless of auspices, as their captains of danger. Some have even ventured to depart on Fridays, though that has been always reckoned among the dies nefasti; and I have never heard, that any special punishment has marked their presumption.

As arts and sciences are in our days cultivated by greater numbers than formerly, they have also become easier of acquisition: so that if the worship be less honourable, the devotees are more

numerous.
tices of astrology and palmistry,
of witch-craft and of fortune-tell-
ing, required the labours of a life.
The beard of the cunning man
was always as long as the tail of
the comet, from which he derived
his predictions. The instruction
must have commenced in child-
hood to prepare the adept at the
age of puberty for solemn dedica-
tion to the devil. This is the
course to eminence, pointed out
by universal experience. Of the
hero of the Iliad we should proba-
bly have suspected the truth, had
the scholiasts never informed us,
that the food of the infant Achilles
was the marrow of lions.

The mystical prac

The punishment of sorcerers by our laws was formerly terrible. The statute of Jac.I, who equalled me in hating, and much surpassed me in dreading, these miscreants, orders, that "such as consult, covenant with, entertain, employ, feed, or reward any evil spirit to any intent" shall be punished with death.— But we have gradually parted with our fear, and doomed to contempt those, whom we once dreaded as ministers of hell. The evil has increased by this neglect. Superstition is nearly as prevalent in the country, as fanaticism in the city. Those who claim communication with familiar demons, are deserving of punishment; and it is hoped the law may be executed against fortune tellers and fanaticks,against pretenders to inspiration from above or from below. To shew the necessity of this, I relate what happened a few months since in our neighbourhood, an instance of credulity equal lamentable and ridiculous.

Three men, of whom one was a justice in Vermont, and another a conjuror, came to a gentleman, re

siding on the banks of the Connecticut, and requested leave to dig in his garden for a chest of money. That this treasure was deposited there he could not doubt, when one of them assured him, that he had twice dreamed, that on the right hand of the road was a high rock, strangely notched at the top, and at four rods distance in a north-east course from the rock, a red picket fence, near which was buried the wealth which would reward their search. The dreamer had not been in the vicinity for many years, and had come from a great distance, so that his circumstantial description was sufficient proof of his sincerity. The own er of the soil could have no objection to such a request; he only demanded one half of what should be found; but was prevailed on to accept a quarter.

The cunning man with his rod of witch hazle, to be holden in both hands, like an old-fashioned pair of curling-tongs, stalked in solemn silence over the garden, till his rod suddenly pointed downwards. Under this spot lay the treasure. Another person took the rod; but in his hands it was uniformly inflexible. He was reminded by the adept,that the witch hazle never designates the place, where money is buried, unless it be wielded by the hands of a seventh son of a seventh son, born under the full blaze of a certain planet. Around this spot our conjuror described a circle, and on the North, South, and East points spread an open bible. West was left unprotected, because on that side was the river, which the evil spirit would not dare approach.

The

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which was a human skull. The owner of the soil knew, that this had been one of the favourite resting places of the Indians, as from the neighbouring river they were always sure of a supply of fish. However to encourage these miners he affirmed, that he had once, in digging on his farm, thrown out human bones, which bled freely. Nothing could be a stronger confirmation of their hopes. The pick axe and spade now rattled on the lid of the chest; and the reward of their labours, the consummation of their fortunes, and the confusion and conviction of incredulous scoffers was now within their reach.

The famous pirate, Capt. Kidd, who about a century and a half ago had amassed wealth by his depredations, never since equalled but by the imperial vagabond from Corsica, buried this money here. He was once chased by an English frigate in Long-Island sound, and was obliged to enter the Connecticut. Here he debarked, and, loading his men with treasure, marched across the country to descend the St. Lawrence, his only safe avenue to the ocean. In their journey through the wilderness, when any one fell sick, his money was immediately buried, and he himself, horresco referens, murdered and deposited upon the chest to mark the spot. In the same way money was buried by pirates under the famous poised rock on the left hand of the Salem turnpike, and I have never yet heard of its removal.

Whether Capt. Kidd ever reached the St. Lawrence was beyond the information of these labourers; but it had been commonly believed, that he had penetrated so far, one hundred miles from the ocean, and the indication of the witch hazle

was now incontestably established of breaking silence, instantly sunk the chest and its treasure fifty feet lower, where it has never since been heard from.

by these mouldering relicks. Unhappily one of the company asked another to lend him his spade, and the evil spirit, resenting the insult

From the Censura Literaria, September, 1806.

BEATTIE, WITH

"A SKETCH OF THE GENIUS AND WRITINGS OF DR. EXTRACTS FROM HIS LIFE AND LETTERS," LATELY PUBLISHED BY SIR WILLIAM FORBES."

SIR William Forbes's long-expected Life of Dr. Beattie has at length appeared in two quarto volumes and I cannot refrain from indulging myself with a few cursory remarks, and a few extracts, while my heart and my head are warm with the subject. Has it added to our admiration of him as an author and a man? It has done both. There are many circumstances which combine to qualify Sir William, in a very uncommon degree, for the biographer of this great poet and philosopher: their long, intimate, and uninterrupted friendship, their habits of constant correspondence, and their congenial turns of mind, in particular; while the talents, and the character of the survivor, and his very extensive & near acquaintance with the most eminent men in the literary world, give a force and authority to his narration, which few eulogists can confer.

But with due respect to the examples of Mr. Mason, and Mr. Hayley, I confess I am not entirely satisfied with the plan of leaving a man to be principally his own biographer, by means of a series of letters, connected by a few short and occasional narratives. I do not mean indeed to depreciate those of Mr. Hayley,

*We are happy to hear, that the above work will shortly appear from the press of I. Riley & Co., New-York.

by comparing them with his predecessor's, which always from a boy disgusted me with their stiff and barren fiigidity; while those of the former glow with all the warmth of friendship, and congenial poetick feeling: but I allude only to the plan.

There are many points,on which there is no doubt that an author can best delineate his own character: but there are others, of which he is totally disqualified to give a fair portrait, and of which, if he were qualified, it is highly improbable that his Letters should furnish an adequate account.

I trust therefore I may be excused for venturing the opinion, which I have long formed, that, though Letters are an excellent, and almost necessary, accompaniment of a Life; and though appropriate extracts from them, and continued references to them may well be introduced in the narrative, yet they should not form the principal part of that narrative, which, as it seems to me, should exhibit one unbroken composition. To leave the generality of readers to collect and combine an entire portrait, or a regular series of events, from the scattered notices of a variety of desultory letters, is to give them credit for a degree of attention, and a power of draw ing results, which few will be found to possess, and fewer stillhave leisure to exercise.

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