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ILLUSTRATED FROM HIS LETTERS, WITH OCCASIONAL
NOTES AND NARRATIVES.

BY JOHN, LORD SHEFFIELD.

COMPLETE IN ONE VOLUME:

NEW YORK:

BUCKLAND & SUMNER,
No. 79 JOHN STREET.

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Bennet & Warner, Printers, No. 142 Nassau street.

1846

KF 12871

HARVARD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

THE melancholy duty of examining the papers of my deceased friend devolved upon me at a time when I was depressed by severe afflictions.

In that state of mind, I hesitated to undertake the task of selecting and preparing his manuscripts for the press. The warmth of my early and long attachment to Mr Gibbon made me conscious of a partiality, which it was not proper to indulge, especially in revising many of his juvenile and unfinished compositions. I had to guard, not only against a sentiment like my own, which I found extensively diffused, but also against the eagerness occasioned by a very general curiosity to see in print every literary relic, however imperfect, of so distinguished a writer.

Being aware how disgracefully authors of eminence have been often treated, by an indiscreet posthumous publication of fragments and careless effusions; when I had selected those papers which to myself appeared the

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