PREFACE TO THE FIRST PART OF THE EIGHTY-FIRST VOLUME. July 1811. ONCE more, and with cheerfulness, we enter upon the discharge of our periodical duty; and, with true sincerity, tender our humble tribute of respect and gratitude to our Friends and Correspondents. We may assert with honest pride, that the first are undiminished in number, and that the latter are far from being decreased either in value or importance. Μήτοι τόγ' ἐμὸν πρόθυμον Φίλοισιν ἀπέσω. We, on our part, shall continue our utmost exertions to prove how highly we estimate the place we have so long and so uniformly held in the public favour. If indeed any new stimulus were wanting, it seems to present itself in the form of certain anomalous Competitors, who, under the novel allurement of appearing only once a quarter, assert their claims to curiosity and attention. The World of Literature is large enough for us all; and we neither mean to dispute their equal right with ourselves to become Candidates for distinction and reward, nor by any means to depreciate the value of their labours. We wish modestly and perspicuously to state, for the information of such of our Readers as may be so situated as not precisely to understand the nature of the ground we differently occupy, the following, which we apprehend to be no unimportant Facts: Our Monthly Publication exhibits a systematic History of Literature, in all its various branches: whereas our Brethren who make their appearance but four times in the year, selecting a few, for they cannot comprehend many, of such Works as they may think proper, make them the vehicle of ingenious comment and critical observation, of political political opinion and discussion, perhaps of political prejudice and party. That such may be consulted with benefit, and perused with satisfaction, we by no means pretend to deny ; nay further, we are prepared to pay them the willing tribute of praise, for much acute remark and learned disquisition. Our pretensions are of a different, and, let it be permitted us to add, of a more permanent nature: Their usefulness is more local and temporary; their materials for amusement, and information too, are necessarily more limited. Our Volumes exhibit, and will continue to exhibit, a regularly connected series of information on the Literature of our Country, its Politicks, Domestic History, Antiquities, Biography, and Poetry; a faithful and regular detail also of the Occurrences in Foreign Parts; and every other subject which can tend to make a miscellaneous Periodical Work productive of immediate gratification, or proper hereafter to be consulted as a faithful and authentic record. Having said thus much, and we trust without offence, it is not possible to conclude without reverting, as we always do, to the condition of our beloved Country. Would that it were permitted us to congratulate our Fellow-Citizens on the early prospect of again cultivating without molestation the Peaceful Olive! But the thirst for blood, which has so long tormented the infuriated Tyrant of the Continent, is not even yet satiated. But surely a brighter dawn may be discerned in the Political Hemisphere; it may be contemplated in the Laurel Wreaths which our gallant Countrymen have so gloriously won at Busaco, Albuera, and on the Plains of Portugal: it may be hailed in the moral operation progressively taking its effect in the patriotic bosoms of our oppressed and persecuted Allies. May our hopes be prophetic! and when we shall next again bring ourselves before our Readers, may we have the delightful occasion presented to us, of cheering the return of Liberty to the ravaged and insulted Nations of Europe; and the sweet and grateful task of welcoming the wished-for return of British Heroes from fields of glory to mansions of tranquillity and peace, no more to be disturbed by the ruthless spirit of War and lawless Ambition! LONDON GAZETTE Carli.2--Chester 2 Chelms, Cambria. JANUARY, 1811. LITERARY INTELLIGENCE 40 Meteorol. Diaries for Dec. 1810, and Jan. 1811.2 Richardson's Reply to Salisbury on Fiorin..33 8 REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS; viz. Embellished with Perspective Views of the Churches of ST. ALKMUND in SHREWSBURY; By SYLVANUS URBAN, GENT. Printed by J. NICHOLS and SON, at CICERO'S HEAD, Red Lion Passage, Fleet street, London: where all Letters to the Editor are desired to be addressed, POST-PAID. 1811. Day of cloudy mostly cloudy, frequent light vain foggy, mostly cloudy night rain, hail, thunder, lightning-day frequent rain, cloudy, frequent rain, windy at times cloudy at times, heavy rain, some hail [tempestuous tempest. night and day, heavy rain, thunder and lightning mostly clear, evening rain cloudy at times, with showers cloudy at times, some rain, heavy hail morning cloudy, some light rain. The average temperature, as well as the quantity of rain fallen this month, may be seen in the general statements, to be inserted in our next. METEOROLOGICAL TABLE for January 1811. By W. CARY, Strand. Height of Fahrenheit's Thermometer. Height of Fahrenheit's Thermometer. THE GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE, For JANUARY, 1811. to record it. While it must be confessed that the first quality in an Historian is impartiality; it must at the same time be allowed that perfect impartiality is oftener to be admired than to be expected. Coolness and indifference, freedom from passion and from preconceived opinion, are the conditions which we invariably demand of Historians, without considering that a perfect compliance with these terms, if it were possible, would sometimes interfere with the pleasure which we expect from History, and which plea sure is, perhaps, as ardently expected as the highest object of instruction. Perfect impartiality may give facts, and facts will unquestionably impart instruction. But facts that are not connected by eloquence, nor illustrated by philosophy, although they may contribute to the industry of an Annalist, will never constitute the fame of those Historians whom all read and all admire. The one are restricted by the limitations of an affidavit, but the other are permitted to make excursions into the regions of argument, and even imagination. Facts may form a Strype or a Maitland, but will never give usa Robertson or a Hume, When, therefore, we detect the failings of Historians in the article of impartiality, let us honestly confess the general imperfection of human nature, and reflect that the partiali ties of which we are ready to complain have perhaps been the animating motives to which we owe the very beauties that principally claim and receive our admiration. It is impossible to expect that any man can sit down to write History without some preconceived opinions. Something must have been learned at school; some thing from early reading. Let him take what period he may, a period so remote that it would seem to bar all access to prejudice or affection, yet he cannot proceed a single step, or, certainly, not very far in his inquiries, without feeling that he is beginning to form certain opinions which, in his farther progress, he hopes to confirm, and has a pleasure and a triumph in confirming. The facts upon which he operates are not new; but he has, perhaps, examined their evidence with a nicer eye, and thinks he can represent them in a new light. He is, perhaps, proud in the expectation that, by combating received opinions, he may make those sources of information appear to be original, which were thought to be trite and familiar. It is this expectation which calls forth the higher exertious of his genius, and produces the eloquence, energy, and grandeur of description, which we not only agree to praise, but imperiously demand in those who presume to rival the Historians whom public opinion has placed at the top of their class. Perhaps no writers have more opportunities of exhibiting their own affections and opinions, or are more ready to embrace those opportunities, than Historians. To this they are induced by the great variety of incident of which their narrative is composed, and by the facility, approaching to cunning, with which they can insinuate an opinion, or support a theory, while, to superficial readers, they seem only to be illustrating an event in which they are not particularly interested, or drawing the character of a personage for whom they cannot be suspected of having any close affection. And so invariably has this been the case with all the eminent writers. of History, that there seems no hope of remedy less absurd than that the Historian should give up the privile ges |