out of books which are written in other languages. I have heard of a person, who is more famous for his library than his learning, that has asserted this more than once in his private conversation.' Were it true, I am sure he could not speak t from his own knowledge; but had he read the books which he has collected, he would find this accusation to be wholly groundless. Those who are truly learned will acquit me on this point, in which I have been so far from offending, that I have been scru pulous, perhaps to a fault, in quoting the authors of several passages, which I might have made my own. But as this assertion is, in reality, an encomium on what I have published, I ought rather to glory in it, than endeavour to confute it.

Some are so very willing to alienate from me that small reputation which might accrue to me from any of my speculations, that they attribute some of the best of them to those imaginary manuscripts with which I have introduced them. There are others, I must confess, whose objections have given me a greater concern, as they seem to reflect, under this head, rather on my morality than on my invention. These are they who say an author is guilty of falsehood, when he talks to the public of manuscripts which he never saw, or describes scenes of action or discourse in which he was never engaged. But these gentlemen would do well to consider, there is not a fable or parable which ever was made use of, that is not liable to this exception; since nothing, according to this notion, can be related innocently, which was not once matter of fact. Besides, I think the most ordinary reader may be able to discover, by my way of writing, what I deliver in these occurrences as truth, and what as fiction.

Since I am unawares engaged in answering the several objec

1 Supposed to be Mr. Thomas Rawlinson, the Tom Folios of the Tatler, No. 158.-G.

tions which have been made against these my works, I must take notice that there are some who affirm a paper of this nature should always turn upon diverting subjects, and others who find fault with every one of them that hath not an immediate tendency to the advancement of religion or learning. I shall leave these gentlemen to dispute it out among themselves, since I see one half of my conduct patronised by each side. Were I serious on an improper subject, or trifling in a serious one, I should deservedly draw upon me the censure of my readers; or were I conscious of any thing in my writings that is not innocent at least, or that the greatest part of them were not sincerely designed to discountenance vice and ignorance, and support the interest of true wisdom and virtue, I should be more severe upon myself, than the public is disposed to be. In the mean while, I desire my reader to consider every particular paper or discourse as a distinct tract by itself, and independent of every thing that goes before or after it.

I shall end this paper with the following letter, which was really sent me, as some others have been which I have published, and for which I must own myself indebted to their respective writers.

"SIR,

"I was this morning in a company of your well-wishers, when we read over, with great satisfaction, Tully's observations on action adapted to the British theatre: though, by the way, we we were very sorry to find that you have disposed of another member of your club. Poor Sir Roger is dead, and the worthy clergyman dying. Captain Sentry has taken possession of a fair estate; Will Honeycomb has married a farmer's daughter, and the Templer withdraws himself into the business of his own profession. What will all this end in? We are afraid it portends

no good to the public. Unless you very speedily fix a day for the election of new members, we are under apprehensions of losing the British Spectator. I hear of a party of ladies who intend to address you on the subject, and question not, if you do not give us the slip very suddenly, that you will receive addresses from all parts of the kingdom to continue so useful a work. Pray deliver us out of this perplexity, and among the multitude of your readers, you will particularly oblige

"Your most sincere friend and servant,

THOSE who were skilful in anatomy among the ancients, concluded, from the outward and inward make of a human body, that it was the work of a Being transcendently wise and powerful. As the world grew more enlightened in this art, their discoveries gave them fresh opportunities of admiring the conduct of Providence in the formation of a human body. Galen was converted by his dissections, and could not but own a Supreme Being upon a survey of this his handywork. There are, indeed, many parts, of which the old anatomists did not know the certain use; but as they saw that most of those which they examined, were adapted with admirable art to their several functions, they did not question but those, whose uses they could not determine, were contrived with the same wisdom, for respective