"The Town Talk, Fish Pool, Plebeian, Old Whig, Spinster, &c. By Sir Richard Steele. Illustrated with Notes, by John Nichols." Svo.

sent for, soon after his arrival, to Mr. Inglis, a gentleman of considerable fortune in the neighbourhood, who was ill with fever, and in so dangerous a state that the attending Physician ad given up the case as hopeless, the Doctor had the good fortune to restore him to health. This gave him so high a degree of reputation at Lichfield, and in the neighbouring towns and villages, that his competitor, who was before in considerable practice, finding himself neglected, and nearly deserted, left the place. Dr. Darwin soon after married the daughter of Mr. Howard, a respectable inhabitant of Lichfield, and had three sons, who lived to the age of manhood; two of them he survived; the third, Dr. Robert Waring Darwin, is now in considerable practice as a Physician at Shrewsbury. In 1781, having married a second wife, Dr. Darwin removed to Derby, where he continued to reside till his death, which happened April 18, 1802, in his 70th year. Six children by the second wife, with their mother, survived him. The Doctor was of an athletic make, much pitted with the small-pox. He stammered much in his speech. He had enjoyed an almost uninterrupted good state of health until towards the conclusion of his life, which he attributed, and reasonably, to his temperate mode of living, particularly to his moderation in the use of fermented liquors. This practice he recommended strenuously to all who consulted him. Miss Seward, from whose Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Darwin these notices are principally taken, gives him the credit of having introduced habits of sobriety among the trading part of Lichfield, where it had been the custom to live more freely before he went to reside there. His frequent journeys into the country on professional business, contributed also in no small degree to the preservation of his health and his faculties, which latter remained unimpaired to the day of his death. His death was sudden, occasioned by a fit of what he was used to call angina-pectoris, which he had several times experienced, and always relieved by bleeding plentifully. His Botanic Garden,' the first of his Poems to which he put his name, was not published till 1781. It is comprised in two parts; in the first of which he treats of the Economy of Vegetables, in the second of the Loves of the Plants. The novelty of the design, the brilliancy of the diction, full of figurative expressions, in which every thing was personified, rendered the Poem for some years extremely popular. In 1793, he published the first volume of Zoonomia, or the Laws of Organic Life, 4to. The second volume, which completed the plan, was printed in 1796. As the eccentric genius of the Author was known, great expectations were formed of this work, the labour, we were told, of more than twenty years. It was to reform, or entirely new model, the whole system of medicine, professing

no

"Essays on various Subjects. By Thomas Monro, Magdalen College, Oxford."

no less than to account for the manner in which man, animals, and vegetables are formed. In 1801, Dr. Darwin published "Phytologia, or the Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening;" but the Publick, tired with the reveries of the Writer, let this large book of 600 pages in quarto pass almost unnoticed. As little attention was paid to a small tract on Female Education, which had little indeed to attract notice. It is,' Miss Seward observes, a meagre work, of little general interest, those rules excepted, which are laid down for the preservation of health. It is, however, harmless- a character that can by no means be accorded to the Zoonomia.' His son, Charles Darwin, who died at Edinburgh, May 15, 1778, while prosecuting his studies in medicine, deserves to be noticed for having discovered a test distinguishing pus from mucus, for which a gold medal was adjudged him by the University. Mr. Darwin left an unfinished Essay on the retrograde motion of the absorbent vessels of ani、 mal bodies in some diseases. This was, some time after the death of the young man, published by his father, together with the dissertation for which he had obtained the prize medal.

"In the 95th page of this Work, the Reader is presented with a Letter, which he is desired to suppose might have been written by Prince Le Boo, just after his arrival in England, to his father in the Pelew Islands. Since these sheets were in the press, and most of them printed off, I have been gratified with the perusal of a work, entituled The Loiterer,' published last year in Oxford. Had I been fortunate enough to have met with that work sooner, I would certainly have prevented a striking resemblance, which now appears, between the letter I allude to and one contained in The Loiterer' from Omai to his friends at Otaheite. The Reader will perhaps be kind enough, instead of accusing me of imitation, to consider this circumstance as illustrating an important maxim which I have somewhere delivered with becoming solemnity; viz. That two great writers of kindred genius, treating upon the same subject, will frequently be betrayed into similar ideas, and sometimes a similarity of expression." Introduction. †The Rev. Thomas Monro (nephew to the late, and first cousin to the present eminent Physician) was educated by Dr. Parr at Norwich; and was afterwards of Magdalen College, Oxford; M. A. 1774. He was always distinguished by literary taste and talent. Whilst at Oxford, he was the principa! conductor of the "Olla Podrida," as stated in p. 40. In 1790 he published the above-noticed volume of “ Essays;" in 1791, in conjunction with the Rev. William Beloe, a Translation of “Alciphron's Epistles;" and in 1795, the Tragedy of Philoctetes in Lemnos ;" and, having been introduced to the friendship of Lord Maynard, was presented by that Nobleman to the Rectory of Eyston Magna in Essex, where he has ever since regularly resided.

"Letters

"Letters to Mr. Archdeacon Travis*, in Answer to his Defence of the Three Heavenly Witnesses, 1 John v. 7. By Richard Porson§." Svo.

*The Rev. George Travis, a native of Royton in Lancashire, was educated at Manchester school, under Mr. Purnell, and admitted a sizar in St. John's College, Cambridge, 1761, under Mr. Abbot. He took his degree of B. A. 1765, M. A. 1768; and was Archdeacon and Prebendary of Chester; and Rector of Handley, and Vicar of East Ham, in that County. Though a Pluralist, and a man of respectable talents, Mr. Travis was remarkably affable, facetious, and pleasant. The universality of his genius was evinced by the various transactions in which he was concerned, and in all of which he excelled. In his manners, the gentleman and the scholar were gracefully and happily blended. Among other branches of knowledge he appears to have been familiarly acquainted with the Law of Tithes; but, turning his mind too eagerly to sacred criticism, he undertook to vindicate the controverted text, 1 John v. 7; and met with powerful antagonists in Griesbach, Porson, Marsh, and Pappelbaum. His labours, however, have proved not a little useful to the world, having excited a closer attention of learned men to the MSS. of Stephens, to the Valesian Readings, and the MS. at Berlin, &c. relative to the authenticity of the present text of the Greek Testament. After a very short illness, he died at Hampstead, whither he had removed for the benefit of the air, Feb. 24, 1797.

+ These Letters, the first regular and avowed publication of Mr. Porson (of whom some particulars shall be given in a future page), Mr. Gibbon pronounced to be the most acute and accurate piece of criticism which had appeared since the days of Bentley. The Author's strictures,' he adds, are founded in argument, enriched with learning, and enlivened with wit; and his Adversary neither deserves, nor finds, any quarter at his hand."

to

+ "In a sensible and manly Preface, Mr. Porson engages make a public recantation of whatever errors may be pointed out in his work, should it come to a second edition. Of this he does not cherish any very sanguine expectations; nor can we say what reception these Letters will receive from the Publick; but we will pronounce them the fruit of much learning; and we can venture to assure their Author, that they will be delivered, though he may not address them, to Posterity." M. Rev. N. S. V. 45.— Admitting the full claim of merit in Mr. Gibbon as an Historian and a Scholar, Mr. Porson observes, that " a rage cency pervades the whole work, but especially the last volume.

for inde

§ This Volume is here noticed, though it came from a different press, as the greater part of the Letters, as well as those to which they were an answer, first appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine. Their rise and progress is briefly this. In a regular

a

"The Goldsmith's Repository: Containing concise Elementary Treatise on the Art of assaying

Review of Mr. Gibbon's "Roman History," in Gent. Mag. vol.LI. p. 521, the following unqualified assertion was extracted: "The three witnesses (1 John, v. 7) have been established in our Greek Testaments by the prudence of Erasinus; the honest bigotry of the Complutensian editors; the typographical fraud, or error, of Robert Stephens, in the placing a crotchet; and the deliberate falshood, or strange misapprehension, of Theodore Beza." This produced, from Archdeacon Travis, a series of excellent Letters in the Magazine (LII. 65, 278, 330, 522); which were dilated into a quarto volume, 1784; and went through a second edition, 1785. To this Mr. Porson's series of Letters in 1790 were addressed; in which, if Mr. Porson had discovered less of the temper of Dr. Bentley, his learning and polemical talents would have appeared to greater advantage; but, notwithstanding this, bis arguments appeared just and satisfactory. In Gent. Mag. LXI. 1138, is the following brief note from Mr. Travis: "A careful collation of the Greek MSS. of the New Testament, now in the Royal Library at Paris, which have been ascribed to Robert Stephens, and a comparison of their readings with those of R. Stephens's margin, have been lately made; the result of which is, that those are NOT the MSS. which he used in his grand Edition of A. D. 1550. On this it was remarked that "the Author of the 'Letters to Mr. Gibbon,' in his second edition, and Dr. Kipling, in his late Commencement-speech at Cambridge (which will be published) seemed to have ascertained this matter beforehand, as far as argument alone could prevail. But positive proof was still called for; and it will be given. And the charges which have been brought against the integrity of R. Stephens will be demonstrated to have been as injurious as they always appeared to be incredible. Mr. Urban will relate this intelligence to his readers with pleasure, because it is always grateful to a liberal mind to see the memories of the illustrious dead rescued from unmerited reproach." A Third Edition, considerably enlarged, appeared in 1794, "built generally on the basis of that which preceded it; but many parts of the superstructure were enlarged by the use of new, and (as it seems) valuable materials." In this new Edition Mr. Porson was passed by unnoticed by the Archdeacon in the general mass of his antagonists It is not to he understood,' says he, that a distinct answer is meant to be given in the following pages to every stricture which has been made on the former Editions of these Letters. Few of them, which I have seen, can claim the credit of originality. A reply to Simon Emlyn, or Wetstein, gives to this class of writers their own confutation. Still fewer are entitled to the praise of candour and liberality. Cum talibus neque amicitias habere volo, neque inimicitias. The argument in every such instance may be attended to, but the man will certainly be overlooked. What the Archdea

сол

Metals, Rules, Directions, and correct extensive Tables, applied to all the possible Occasions of

con, in his second edition, concluded with respect to the MSS. in the King of France's Library, supposed by mistake to have been R. Stephens's, are now fully proved not to have been his." To this it was answered: "Mr. Porson's arguments are in general borrowed, and not original. But, whether original or borrowed, they are now in general done away. If your Reviewer shall have leisure to compare those arguments with the answers given to them in the third edition of the Letters to Mr. Gibbon,' he will perceive the truth of this remark. If he shall be too busily employed in other avocations to engage in such a disquisition, you may perhaps soon receive a breviate of this kind, from the Writer of this present Note. Your Reviewer further remarks, that the Archdeacon' passes by Mr. Porson unnoticed in the general mass of his antagonists.' I fancy myself able to assign one motive for this preterition. Mr. Porson's assault on the Archdeacon was unprovoked; and his language was unbecoming a scholar, and unworthy of a gentleman. In such a situation, the Archdeacon's feeling expressions are, perhaps, the most proper that could have been adopted. 'Cum talibus neque amicitias habere volo, neque inimicitias.' Be this, however, as it may, all the interest which I, as one of the publick, can take in this matter, is, to examine whether Mr. Porson's arguments have received a proper attention. And, for this purpose, I repeat my intentions of soliciting your indulgence on some future occasion; and declare myself to be, in the mean time, A FRIEND TO MR. URBAN." Mr. Porson again stept forward: "I pity you, Mr. Urban, from my heart. More last words of the three heavenly witnesses! The gentleman, who calls himself your friend, comes forth in your last number, and seems desirous to engage in the controversy: O! limed soul, that, struggling to be free, Art more engaged!'

HAMLET.

His letter, I think, may be reduced to three heads :-First, he is angry with your Reviewer for supposing that Mr. Porson's Letters may be sufficient to confute Mr. Travis, even though it should be allowed that not one of the MSS. now found in the Parisian Library belongs to the list used by R. Stephens in his folio edition. Secondly, he asserts that Mr. Porson's arguments are all borrowed.-Thirdly, he half promises to give a Breviate of the controversy. In answer to the first, give my respectful compliments to your Reviewer, and tell him that he has made too hasty a concession. Mr. Travis has done nothing less than proved the non-identity of the MSS. by the specimens already produced. Let him publish his entire collation, and we shall be better enabled to form a judgment. The second is a formidable objection truly! Mr. Porson himself having formally disclaimed all pretensions to novelty, as any of your readers may see by looking at the beginning of his second letter, or in your