SCOTS MAGAZINE.

MDCCLIII.

VOLUME XV.

Ne quid falfi dicere audeat, ne quid veri non audeat.

EDINBURG H:

Printed by W. SANDS, A. MURRAY, and J. COCHRAN.

PRE FAC E.

A

Short effay, which tends to improve or recommend the art

of writing, may, without impropriety, be used as a preface to a volume of fuch a work as this.

The defign of a paper employed for that purpofe in our preceeding volume, was to improve the art; we shall now present one, calcalated to encourage the exercise of it, by giving a proper answer to a complaint often heard among inattentive readers, and timorous or indolent writers, That all topics are preoccupied in fuch a manner, that they cannot be further wrote on with any profpect of fuccefs. It cannot indeed be expected, that young beginners fhould all at once be masters of that accuracy and elegance, which can enable them to furpass, or even be in every refpect equal to others, who, in greater maturity, and with the advantage of gradual improvement by practice, may have written on the fame fubjects before them. Yet fome of them may difcover a genius fo pregnant with the prin ciples of more or fewer kinds of excellence, as cannot but afford hopes, that, with due care and diligence, they may one day make a figure in the literary world. The common proverb, That chil dren must creep ere they walk, is applicable to many cafes, and to more ftages in life than one.

When therefore we are defired to introduce any one's compofitions into the world, the rule we follow is very different from that Mr POPE prefcribed to himself with regard to his own productions. He prevented not only many mean things from feeing the light, but many which he thought tolerable." [Mag. 1743, pref. p. iv.]. Whereas when we think a new correfpondent's first piece tolerable, we incline to let the public judge of it; in hopes that a second effay may be better, and a third better ftill.

Such favour to young writers will, we hope, be readily excused. But it may paffibly be fometimes attended with bad confequences. A fanguine young author, on finding that his performance has been thought worthy to appear in print, may perhaps imagine the world is greatly obliged to him, for what really needs indulgence; and fo, tead of labouring after higher degrees of merit, he may abate of the care with which he wrote at first. What must be the fate of a fecond effay in fuch a cafe, is obvious.

Should any correfpondent be difpleafed at our not inferting what he fends us, we would beg of him to perufe the ADVENTURER of Dec. 11. 1753, [613.]. The malady there complained of, is in

a 2

dee

iv

PREFACE.

deed far from being epidemical in this part of the island; but the method prescribed for a cure, will be found every where very requifite, if not directly to that purpose, at least as a good regimen. Nor is it improbable, that the author intended the whole as a counter part to the paper following.

The ADVENTURER, N° 95. October 2. 1753.

-Dulcique animos novitate tenebo.

Ovid.

T is often charged upon writers, that, with all their pretenfions to genius and discoveries, they do little more than copy one another; and that compofitions obtruded upon the world with the pomp of novelty, contain only tedious repetitions of common fentiments, or at best exhibit a tranfpofition of known images, and give a new appearance to truth only by fome flight difference of drefs and decoration.

The allegation of refemblance between authors is indisputably true; but the charge of plagiarism, which is raised upon it, is not to be allowed with equal readiness. A coincidence of fentiment may eafily happen without any communication, fince there are many occafions in which all reasonable men will nearly think alike, Writers of all ages have had the fame fentiments, because they have in all ages had the fame objects of fpeculation the interefts and paffions, the virtues and vices of mankind, have been diversified in different times, only by uneffential and cafual varieties; and we must therefore expect, in the works of all thofe who attempt to defcribe them, fuch, a likeness as we find in the pictures of the fame perfon drawn in different periods of his life.

It is neceffary, therefore, that before an author be charged with plagiarifm, one of the most reproachful, though perhaps not the most atrocious of literary crimes, the fubject on which he treats should be carefully confidered. We do not wonder, that hiftorians, relating the fame facts, agree in their narration; or that authors delivering the elements of fcience, advance the fame theorems, and lay down the fame definitions. Yet it is not wholly without ufe to mankind, that books are multiplied, and that different authors lay out their labours on the fame fubject. For there will always be fome reafon why one fhould, on particular occafions, or to particular perfons, be preferable to another: Some will be clear where others are obfcure; fome will pleafe by their ftyle, and others by their method; fome by their embellishments, and others by their fimplicity; fome by clofenefs, and others by diffufion.

The fame indulgence is to be fhewn to the writers of morality. Right and wrong are immutable; and thofe therefore who teach us to diftinguish them, if they all teach us right, muft agree with one another. The relations of focial life, and the duties refulting from them, muft be the fame at all times and in all nations. Some petty differences may be in-." deed produced, by forms of government, or arbitrary customs; but the general doctrine can receive no alteration.

Yet it is not to be defired, that morality fhould be confidered as interdicted to all future writers. Men will always be tempted to deviate from

their duty, and will therefore always want a monitor to recal them; and new book often feizes the attention of the public, without any other daim than that it is new. There is likewife in compofition, as in other things, a perpetual viciffitude of fashion; and truth is recommended at one time to regard, by appearances which at another would expofe it to neglect the author therefore who has judgment to difcern the taste of his contemporaries, and skill to gratify it, will have always an opportunity to deferve well of mankind, by conveying inftruction to them in a grateful vehicle.

There are likewife many modes of compofition, by which a moralist may deserve the name of an original writer. He may familiarife his fyftem by dialogues after the manner of the ancients, or fubtilize it into a feries of fyllogiftic arguments; he may inforce his doctrine by feriousness and folemnity, or enliven it by fprightlinefs and gaiety; he may deliver !his fentiments in naked precepts, or illuftrate them by hiftorical examples? he may detain the ftudious by the artful concatenation of a continued difcourfe, or relieve the bufy by fhort ftrictures and unconnected effays. To excel in any of thefe forms of writing, will require a particular cultivation of the genius; whoever can attain to excellence, will be certain to engage a fet of readers, whom no other method would have equally allured; and he that communicates truth with fuccefs, muft be numbered among the first benefactors to mankind.

The fame obfervation may be extended likewife to the paffions. Their influence is uniform, and their effects nearly the fame in every human breast: a man loves and hates, defires and avoids, exactly like his neigh bour; refentment and, ambition, avarice and indolence, discover themfelves by the fame fymptoms, in minds diftant a thousand years from one another.

Nothing therefore can be more unjust, than to charge an author with plagiarism, merely because he affigns to every caufe its natural effect; and makes his perfonages act, as others in like circumstances have always done. There are conceptions in which all men will agree, though each derives them from his own obfervation. Whoever has been in love, will repre fent a lover impatient of every idea that interrupts his meditations on his mistress, retiring to fhades and folitude, that he may mufe without disturbance on his approaching happiness, or affociating himself with some friend that flatters his paffion, and talking away the hours of abfence upon bris darling fubject. Whoever has been fo unhappy as to have felt the miferies of long continued hatred, will, without any affiftance from ancient volumes, be able to relate how the passions are kept in perpetual agita tion, by the collection of injury and meditations of revenge; how the blood boils at the name of the enemy, and life is worn away in contrivances of mischief.

Every other paffion is alike fimple and limited, if it be confidered only with regard to the breaft which it inhabits. The anatomy of the mind, as that of the body, muft perpetually exhibit the fame appearances; and though, by the continued induftry of fucceffive inquirers, new movements will be from time to time difcovered, they can affect only the mimuter parts, and are commonly of more curiofity than importance,

It