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LETTER

TO THE EDITOR OF 'MY GRANDMOTHER'S REVIEW.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE 'LIBERAL,'

In the First Canto of Don Juan appeared the follow-cause, and you have done well to sound the alarm. ing passage:

"For fear some pradish readers should grow skittish,
I've bribed My Grandmother's Review,-the British
"I sent it in a letter to the editor,

Who thank'd me duly by return of post-
I'm for a handsome article his creditor;
Yet if my gentle Muse he please to roast,
And break a promise after having made it her,
Denying the receipt of what it cost

And sinear his page with gall instead of honey,
All I can say is that he had the money."

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myself, in my humble sphere, will be one of your echoes. In the words of the tragedian Liston, 'I love a row' and you seem justly determined to make one.

"It is barely possible, certainly improbable, that the writer might have been in jest; but this only aggravates his crime. A joke, the proverb says, 'breaks no bones;' but it may break a bookseller, or it may be the cause of bones being broken. The jest is but a bad one at te best for the author, and might have been a still wa so one for you, if your copious contradiction did not certify

On the appearance of the Poem, the learned editor to all whom it may concern your own indignant innoof the Review in question allowed himself to be decence, and the immaculate purity of the British Review, coyed into the ineffable absurdity of taking the charge I do not doubt your word, my dear Roberts, yet I cans serious, and, in his succeeding number, came forth not help wishing that in a case of such vital importance, with an indignant contradiction of it; to which Lord it had assumed the more substantial shape of an affidaByron replied in the following letter:vit sworn before the Lord Mayor.

"TO THE EDITOR OF THE BRITISH REVIEW. "MY DEAR ROBERTS,

"I am sure, my dear Roberts, that you will take these observations of mine in good part; they are written in a spirit of friendship not less pure than your own edito"As a believer in the Church of England-to say knowing any shape which friendship and admiration rial integrity. I have always admired you; and not nothing of the State-I have been an occasional reader, can assume more agreeable and useful than that of good and great admirer of, though not a subscriber to, your advice, I shall continue my lucubrations, mixed with Review, which is rather expensive. But I do not know here and there a monitory hint as to what I conceive that any part of its contents ever gave me much surprise to be the line you should pursue, in case you should till the eleventh article of your twenty-seventh number ever again be assailed with bribes, or accused of taking made its appearance. You have there most vigorously them. By the way, you do n't say much about the refuted a calumnious accusation of bribery and corrup- poem, except that it is 'flagitious.' This is a pity tion, the credence of which in the public mind might not-you should have cut it up; because, to say the truth, only have damaged your reputation as a barrister and an in not doing so, you somewhat assist any notions which editor, but, what would have been still worse, have injured the malignant might entertain on the score of the anothe circulation of your journal; which, I regret to hear, nymous asseveration which has made you so angry. is not so extensive as the 'purity (as you well observe) "You say, no bookseller was willing to take upon

of its,' &c. &c. and the present taste for propriety, would himself the publication, though most of them disgrace induce us to expect. The charge itself is of a solemn themselves by selling it.' Now, my dear friend, though nature, and, although in verse, is couched in terms of such we all know that those fellows will do any thing fo circumstantial gravity, as to induce a belief little short money, methinks the disgrace is more with the pur of that generally accorded to the thirty-nine articles, to chasers; and some such, doubtless, there are, for there which you so frankly subscribed on taking your degrecs. can be no very extensive selling (as you will perceive It is a charge the most revolting to the heart of man, from by that of the British Review) without buying. You its frequent occurrence; to the mind of a lawyer, from then add,' what can the critic say?' I am sure I don't its occasional truth; and to the soul of an editor, from its know; at present he says very little, and that not much moral impossibility. You are charged then in the last to the purpose. Then comes, 'for praise, as far as reline of one octave stanza, and the whole eight lines of the gards the poetry, many passages might be exhibited; next, viz. 209th and 210th of the first canto of that 'pes- for condemnation, as far as regards the morality, all.' tilent poem,' Don Juan, with receiving, and still more Now, my dear good Roberts. I feel for you and for your foolishly acknowledging the receipt of, certain monies, reputation; my heart bleeds for both; and I do ask to eulogize the unknown author, who by this account you, whether or not such language does not come posi must be known to you, if to nobody else. An impeach-tively under the description of the puff collusive,' for ment of this nature, so seriously made, there is but one which see Sheridan's farce of The Critic' (by the way, way of refuting; and it is my firm persuasion, that whe- a little more facetious than your own farce under the ther you did or did not (and I believe that you did not) same title) towards the close of scene second, act the receive the said monies, of which I wish that he had first. specified the sum, you are quite right in denying all knowledge of the transaction. If charges of this ne- Byron; but you feel yourself at liberty to suppose it seems, sold as the work of Lord farious description are to go forth, sanctioned by all the not Lord B.'s composition.' Why did you ever sup solemnity of circumstance, and guaranteed by the vera-pose that it was? I approve of your indignation-I city of verse (as Counselior Phillips would say) what applaud it-I feel as angry as you can; but perhaps is to become of readers hitherto implicitly confident in your virtuous wrath carries you a little too far, when the not less veracious prose of our critical journals? you say that no misdemeanour, not even that of send• what is to become of the reviews? And if the reviews ing into the world obscene and blasphemous poetry, the fail. what is to become of the editors? It is common product of studious lewdness and laboured impiety, ap

"The poem is, it

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pears to you in so detestable a light as the acceptance should be the author, not only because as a British peer, of a present by the editor of a review, as the condition and a British poet, it would be impracticable for him to of praising an author.' The devil it does n't! Think have recourse to such facetious fiction, but for some other a little. This is being critical overmuch. In point of reasons which you have omitted to state. In the first Gentile benevolence or Christian charity, it were surely place, his lordship has no grandmother. Now the author, less criminal to praise for a bribe, than to abuse a fel--and we may believe him in this-doth expressly state low-creature for nothing; and as to the assertion of the that the British' is his Grandmother's Review;' and comparative innocence of blasphemy and obscenity, con- if, as I think I have distinctly proved, this was not a fronted with an editor's 'acceptance of a present,' I mere figurative allusion to your supposed intellectual shall merely observe, that as an editor you say very age and sex, my dear friend, it follows, whether you be well, but as a Christian barrister, I would not recommend she or no, that there is such an elderly lady still extant. you to transplant this sentence into a brief. And I can the more readily credit this, having a sexagenary aunt of my own, who perused you constantly, till unfortunately falling asleep over the leading article of your last number, her spectacles fell off and were broken against the fender, after a faithful service of fifteen years, and she has never been able to fit her eyes since; so that I have been forced to read you aloud to her; and this is in fact the way in which I becaine acquainted with the subject of my present letter, and thus determined to become your public correspondent. "In the next place, Lord B.'s destiny seems in some

"And yet you say, the miserable man (for miserable he is, as having a soul of which he cannot get rid')But here I must pause again, and inquire what is the meaning of this parenthesis. We have heard of people of little soul,' or of 'no soul at all,' but never till now of the misery of having a soul of which we cannot get rid a misery under which you are possibly no great sufferer, having got rid apparently of some of the intellectual part of your own when you penned this pretty piece of eloquence,

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"But to continue. You call upon Lord Byron, al-sort like that of Hercules of old, who became the author ways supposing him not the author, to disclaim with all gentlemanly haste,' &c. &c. I am told that Lord B. is in a foreign country, some thousand miles off it may be; so that it will be difficult for him to hurry to your wishes. In the mean time, perhaps you yourself have set an example of more haste than gentility; but 'the more haste the worse speed.'

"Let us now look at the charge itself, my dear Roberts, which appears to me to be in some degree not quite explicitly worded:

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of all unappropriated prodigies. Lord B. has been supposed the author of the Vampire,' of a 'Pilgrimage to Jerusalem,' To the Dead Sea,' of 'Death upon the Pale Horse,' of odes to 'Lavalette,' to Saint Helena,' to the 'Land of the Gaul,' and to a sucking child. Now he turned out to have written none of these things. Besides, you say, he knows in what a spirit of, &c. you criticise-Are you sure he knows all this? that he has read you like my poor dear aunt? They tell me he is a queer sort of a man; and I would not be too sure, if I were you, either of what he has read or what he has written. I thought his style had been the serious and terrible. As to his sending you money, this is the first time that ever I heard of his paying his reviewers in that coin; I thought it was rather in their own, to judge from some of his earlier productions. Besides, though he may not be profuse in his expenditure, I should conjecture that his reviewer's bill is not so long as his tailor's.

"I bribed my Grandmother's Review, the British."' "I recollect hearing, soon after the publication, this subject discussed at the tea-table of Mr. S. the poet, who expressed himself, I remember, a good deal surprised that you had never reviewed his epic poem, nor any of his six tragedies, of which, in one instance, the bad taste of the pit, and in all the rest, the barbarous repugnance of the principal actors, prevented the performance. Mrs. and the Misses S. being in a corner of the room "Shall I give you what I think a prudent opinion. I perusing the proof sheets of some new poems on Italy, do n't mean to insinuate, God forbid! but if, by any ac (I wish, by the by, Mrs. S. would make the tea a little cident, there should have been such a correspondence stronger,) the male part of the conversazione were at between you and the unknown author, whoever he may liberty to make a few observations on the poein and be, send him back his money: I dare say he will be very passage in question, and there was a difference of opi-glad to have it again: it can't be much, considering the nion. Some thought the allusion was to the British value of the article and the circulation of the journal; Critic; others, that by the expression, my Grandmo- and you are too modest to rate your praise beyond its ther's Review,' it was intimated that my grandmother' real worth.-Don't be angry,-I know you won't,--at was not the reader of the review, but actually the this appraisement of your powers of eulogy; for on the writer; thereby insinuating, my dear Roberts, that you other hand, my dear friend, depend upon it your abuse were an old woman; because, as people often say, is worth, not its own weight-that's a feather,—but 'Jeffrey's Review,' 'Gifford's Review,' in lieu of Edin- your weight in gold. So do n't spare it: if he has barburgh and Quarterly; so my Grandmother's Review' gained for that, give it handsomely, and depend upon and Roberts's might be also synonymous. Now, what-your doing him a friendly office. ever colour his insinuation might derive from the cir- "But I only speak in case of possibility; for, as 1 cumstance of your wearing a gown, as well as from your time of life, your general style, and various passages of your writings,-I will take upon myself to exculpate you from all suspicion of the kind, and assert, without calling Mrs. Roberts in testimony, that if ever you should be chosen Pope, you will pass through all the previous ceremonies with as much credit as any pontiff since the parturition of Joan. It is very unfair to judge of sex from writings, particularly from those of the British Review. We are all liable to be deceived; and it is an indisputable fact, that many of the best articles in your journal, which were attributed to a veteran female, were actually written by you yourself; and yet to this day there are people who could never find out the difference. But let us return to the more immediate question.

"I agree with you that it is impossible Lord Byron

said before, I cannot believe in the first instance, that you would receive a bribe to praise any person whatever; and still less can I believe that your praise could eve: produce such an offer. You are a good creature, my dear Roberts, and a clever fellow; else I could almost suspect that you had fallen into the very trap set for you in verse by this anonymous wag, who will certainly be but too happy to see you saving him the trouble of making you ridiculous. The fact is, that the solemnity of your eleventh article does make you look a little more absurd than you ever yet looked, in all probability, and at the same time does no good; for if any body believed before in the octave stanzas, they will believe still, and you will find it not less difficult to prove your negative, than the learned Partridge found it to demonstrate his not being dead, to the satisfaction of the readers of alınanacs.

314

LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF MY GRANDMOTHER'S REVIEW.'

"Most truly yours, "WORTLEY CLUTTERBUCK.

"Sept.-, 1819.

"Little Pidlington.

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"What the motives of this writer may have been for of this letter, however far short my expressions may (as you magnificently translate his quizzing you)' stating, have fallen of the sincere good will, admiration, and with the particularity which belongs to fact, the forgery thorough esteem, with which I am ever, my dear of a groundless fiction,' (do pray, my dear R. talk a Roberts, little less in King Cambyses' vein,') I cannot pretend to say; perhaps to laugh at you, but that is no reason for your benevolently making all the world laugh also. I approve of your being angry; I tell you I am angry 100; but you should not have shown it so outrageously. Your solemn if somebody personating the Editor of the,' &c. &c. has received from Lord B. or from any other person,' reminds me of Charley Incledon's usual exordium when people came into the tavern to hear him sing without paying their share of the reckoning-If a maun, or ony maun, or ony other maun,' &c. &c. ; you have both the same redundant eloquence. But why should you think any body would personate you? No body would dream of such a prank who ever read your compositions, and perhaps not many who have heard your conversation. But I have been inoculated with a ittle of your prolixity. The fact is, my dear Roberts, that somebody has tried to make a fool of you, and what he did not succeed in doing, you have done for him and for yourself.

"With regard to the poem itself, or the author, whom I cannot find out, (can you?) I have nothing to say; my business is with you. I am sure that you will, upon second thoughts, be really obliged to me for the intention

"P. S. My letter is too long to revise, and the post is going. I forget whether or not I asked you the meaning of your last words, the forgery of a groundless fiction. Now, as all forgery is fiction, and all fiction a kind of forgery, is not this tautological? The sentence would have ended more strongly with forgery;' only it hath an awful Bank of England sound, and would have ended like an indictment, besides sparing you several words, and conferring some meaning upon the remainder. But this is mere verbal criticism. Good byeonce more yours truly.

"W. C.

"P. S. 2d. Is it true that the Saints make up the losses of the review ?-It is very handsome in them to be at so great an expense-Pray pardon my taking up so much of your time from the bar, and from your clients, who I hear are about the same number with the readers of your journal. Twice more yours,

'W.C."

LORD BACON'S APOPHTHEGMS.

BACON'S APOPHTHEGMS.

91.

Michael Angelo, the famous painter, painting in the pope's chapel the por

traiture of hell and damned souls, made one of the damned souls so like a cardinal that was his enemy, as every body at first sight knew it; whereupon the cardinal complained to Pope Clement, humbly praying it might be defaced. The pope said to him, Why, you know very well I have power to deliver a soul out of purgatory, but not out of hell.

155. Alexander, after the bat

tle of Granicum, had very

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It was after the battle of
Issus, and during the siege

158.

Antigonus, when it was told him that the enemy had such volleys of arrows, that they did hide the sun, said, That falls out well, for it is hot weather, and so we shall fight in the shade.

162.

There was a philosopher that disputed with Adrian the Emperor, and did it but weakly. One of his friends that stood by, afterwards said unto him, Methinks you were not like yourself last day, in argument with the Emperor : I could have answered better mysef. Why, said the philosopher, would you have

great offers made him by of Tyre, and not immedi-me contend with him that

Darius. Consulting with

ately after the passage of

his captains concerning the Granicus, that this is
them, Parmenio said, Sure, said to have occurred.
I would accept of these of
fers, if I were as Alexander.
Alexander answered, So
would I, if I were as Par-
menio.

commands thirty legions?

164.

There was one that found a great mass of money digged under ground in his grandfather's house, and being somewhat doubtful of the case, signified it to the

This was not said by Antigonus, but by a Spir tan, previously to the battle of Thermopyla.

This happened under Augustus Cæsar, and not during the reign of Adrian.

This happened to the father of Herodes Atticus, and the answer was made by the emperor Nerva, who deserved that his name should have been stated by

emperor that he had found such treasure. The emperor made a rescript thus: Use it. He writ back again, that the sum was greatet than his state or condition could use. The emperor writ a new rescript, thus: Abuse it.

178.

One of the seven was

wont to say, that laws were like cobwebs: where the small flies were caught, and the great brake through.

203.

An orator of Athens said to Demosthenes, The Athenians will kill you if they Demosthenes wax mad. replied, And they will kill you, if they be in good

sense.

221.

There was a philosopher about Tiberius that, looking into the nature of Caius, said of him, That he was inire mingled with blood.

97.

There was a king of Hungary took a bishop in batlie, and kept him prisoner; whereupon the pope writ a monitory to him, for that he had broken the privilege of holy church, and taken his son: the king sent an einbassage to him, and sent withal the armour wherein the bishop was taken, and

is only in writing--Vids num hæc sit vestis filii tui? Know now whether this be thy son's coat?

the " greatest-wisest-
meanest of mankind."

This was said by Anacharsis the Scythian, and not by a Greek.

This was not said by Demosthenes, but to Demosthenes by Phocion.

This was not said of Caius (Caligula, I presume, is intended by Caius,) but of Tiberius himself.

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Having stated that Bacon was frequently incorrect in his citations from history, I have thought it necessary in what regards so great a name (however trifling,) to support the assertion by such facts as more immediately occur to me. They are but trifles, and yet for such trifles a schoolboy would be whipped (if still in the fourth form); and Voltaire for half a dozen similar er. rors has been treated as a superficial writer, notwithstanding the testimony of the learned Warton:-" Voltaire, a writer of much deeper research than is imagined, and the first who has displayed the literature and customs of the dark ages with any degree of penetration and comprehension." For another distinguished testimony to Voltaire's merits in literary research, see also Lord Holland's excellent Account of the Life and Writings of Lope de Vega, vol. i. p. 215. edition of 1817.

Voltaire has even been termed "a shallow fellow," by some of the same school who called Dryden's Ode "a drunken song "-a school (as it is called, I presume, from their education being still incomplete) the whole of whose filthy trash of Epics, Excursions, &c. &c. &c. is not worth the two words in Zaire, "Vous pleurez,' or a single speech of Tancred:-a school, the apostate lives of whose renegadoes, with their tea-drinking neuThis reply was not made trality of morals, and their convenient treachery in by a King of Hungary, but politics-in the record of their accumulated pretences sent by Richard the first, to virtue can produce no actions (were all their good Cœur de Lion, of England deeds drawn up in array) to equal or approach the sele to the Pope, with the breast-defence of the family of Calas, by that great and uneplate of the bishop of Beau-qualled genius-the universal Voltaire.

vais.

I have ventured to remark on these little inaccuracies of the greatest genius that England or perhaps any other country ever produced,"* merely to show our national injustice in condemning generally, the greatest genius of France for such inadvertencies as these, of which the highest of England has been no less guilty. Query, was Bacon a greater intellect than Newton?

•Pape, in Spence's Anecdotas p. 194. Alu one's enluon

TRANSLATION OF

TWO EPISTLES FROM THE ARMENIAN VERSION

THE EPISTLE OF THE CORINTHIANS
TO ST. PAUL THE APOSTLE.*

1 STEPHEN, and the elders with him, Dabnus, Eubulus, Theophilus, and Xinon, to Paul, our father and evangelist, and faithful master in Jesus Christ, health. 2 Two men have come to Corinth, Simon, by name, and Cleobus,§ who venemently disturb the faith of some with deceitful and corrupt words;

3 Of which words thou shouldst inform thyself:

4 For neither have we heard such words from thee, nor from the other apostles:

5 But we know only that what we have heard from thee and from them, that we have kept firmly.

6 But in this chiefly has our Lord had compassion, that, whilst thou art yet with us in the flesh, we are again

about to hear from thee.

7 Therefore do thou write to us, or come thyself

among us quickly.

8 We believe in the Lord, that, as it was revealed to Theonas, he hath delivered thee from the hands of the unrighteous.||

9 But these are the sinful words of these impure men, for thus do they say and teach:

10 That it behooves not to admit the Prophets.¶ 11 Neither do they affirm the omnipotence of God: 12 Neither do they affirm the resurrection of the flesh: 13 Neither do they affirm that man was altogether created by God:

14 Neither do they affirm that Jesus Christ was born 'n the flesh from the Virgin Mary:

15 Neither do they affirm that the world was the work of God, but of some one of the angels.

16 Therefore do thou make haste** to come among us. 17 That this city of the Corinthians may remain without scandal.

18 And that the folly of these men may be made fest by an open refutation. Fare thee well.tt

doctrine, behold, grief arises upon grief, and any trouble adds a weight to my chains; when I behold this calamity. and progress of the machinations of Satan, who searcheth to do wrong."

And thus with deep affliction Paul composed his reply to the Epistle.*

EPISTLE OF PAUL TO THE CORINTHIANS.

1 Paul, in bonds for Jesus Christ, disturbed by so many errors, to his Corinthan brethren, health.

2 I nothing marvel that the preachers of evil have made this progress.

coming, verily on this account do certain men pervert and despise his words.

3 For because the Lord Jesus is about to fulfil his

4 But I, verily, from the beginning, have taught you that only which I myself received from the former apostles, who always remained with the Lord Jesus Christ.

5 And I now say unto you, that the Lord Jesus Christ David, was born of the Virgin Mary, who was of the seed of

6 According to the annunciation of the Holy Ghost sent to her by our Father from heaven;

7 That Jesus might be introduced into the world,§ and deliver our flesh by his flesh, and that he might raise

us up from the dead;

8 As in this also he himself became the example:

9 That it might be made manifest that man was created by the Father,

10 He has not remained in perdition unsought;||

11 But he is sought for, that he might be revived by adoption.

12 For God, who is the Lord of all, the Father of our mani-Lord Jesus Christ, who made heaven and earth, sent firstly, the Prophets to the Jews:

The deacons Thereptus and Tichus‡‡ received and conveyed this Epistle to the city of the Philippians.§§

13 That he would absolve them from their sins, and bring them to his judgment.

Prophets;

When Paul received the Epistle, although he was then 14 Because he wished to save, firstly, the house of in chains on account of Stratonice,|||| the wife of Apofo-Israel, he bestowed and poured forth his Spirit upon the tanus, yet, as it were forgetting his bonds, he mourned over these words, and said, weeping, "It were better for me to be dead, and with the Lord. For while this body, and hear the wretched words of such false

am in

Some MSS. have the title thus: Epistle of Stephen the Elder to Paul the Apostle, from the Corinthians.

In the MSS. the marginal verses published by the Whistons are wanting.

In some MSS. we find, The elders Numenus, Eubulus, Theophilus, and Nomeson, to Paul their brother, health!

§ Others read, There came certain men,... and Clobeus, who vehemently lake.

Some MSS. have, We believe in the Lord, that his presence was made manifest; and by this hath the Lord delivered us from the hands of the unrighteous.

Others read, To read the Prophets.

Some MSS. have. Therefore, brother, do thou make haste..

11 Others read, Fare thee well in the Lord.

1 Some MSS, have, The Dearons Therepus and Techus.

The Whistons have, To the city of Phoenicia: but in all the

MSS. we find, To the city of the Philippians.

all Others read, On account of notice.

The Whistons have, Of Apoll phanus but in all the MSS. we

ead, Apofolanus.

15 That they should for a long time preach the worship of God, and the nativity of Christ.

16 But he who was the prince of evil, when he wished to make himself God, laid his hand upon them, 17 And bound all men in sin, T

ing.

18 Because the judgment of the world was approach

unwilling to abandon his creature;
19 But Almighty God, when he willed to justify, was

20 But when he saw his affliction, he had compassion upon him:

In the text of this Epistle there are some other variations in he words, but the sense is the same.

+ Some MSS. have. Paul's Epistle from prison, for the instruc tion of the Corinthians.

Others read, Disturbed by various compunctions.

$ Some MSS. have, That Jeaus might comfort the world.
Others read, He has not remained indiferent.

Some MSS. have, laid his hand, and them and all body hound in site.

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