Gentleman's Magazine: AND Historical Chronicle. From JANUARY to JUNE, 1812. VOLUME LXXXII. (BEING THE FIFTH OF A NEW SERIES.) PART THE FIRST. PRODESSE ET DELECTARE. E PLURIBUS UNUM. By SYLVANUS URBAN, Gent. LONDON: Printed by NICHOLS, SON, and BENTLEY, where LETTERS are particularly requested to be sent, POST-PAID ་ (ii) VERSES In vaine, fare nimph, in vaine you striue, By the same fate that conquer'd me. [From the Oxford Herald.] EDWARD DYER. A celebrated Poet in Queen Elizabeth's Amidst the fayrest mountayne topps, The valleys underneath, A shepparde liude, that dearly loude; Yet had he powre, but her pure thoughts One day, (I neede not name the daye But say, as once a shepparde sayd, Their mone nights haue no morrows, To pasture in the lease, Alone, that is in loue,) Oh heauens! (qouth he,) ar these th'effects Haue women faithless hearts ? Nor long-endur'd laments, I, As I, that enchayn'd my loue desires, euer were true thoughts to her, Shall I, like meads with winter's rayne Be turned into teares, Shall I, of whose true feelinge payne, These greenes the record beares: Oh, Cynthia, thou hast angel's eyes, QD. MR. DIER. INDEX TO PLATES IN VOL. LXXXII. PART 1. Alberbury Church, Salop, 9. Antiquaries, Sociéty of, proposed Arms Autographs, 529. Birmingham, Statue at, to Nelson, 417. Chester le Street Church, 513. Kalendar of Esel, 609. Lee, Kent, Monument at, 529. Ring, antient, 321, 529. St. Alban's, Brasses in St. Michael's at, 321. Slater's Cooking Apparatus, 33. Stoney Stanton Church, co. Leic. 17. Winchester College, Figure at, 114, Witherley Church, co. Leic. 241. Wrentham Hall, Suffolk, 313. PREFACE TO THE FIRST PART OF THE EIGHTY-SECOND VOLUME. Quò magis in dubiis hominem spectare perîclis IT is a remark of the Elder PLINY that one of the principal objects of Nature in the creation of the Cock, was to warn men against the indulgence of indolence, and to rouse them to activity and labour. "Gallos excitandis in opera mortalibus, rumpendoque somno esse à Naturâ genitos, cum sole cubitum euntes, quintâque castrensi vigiliâ ad curam laboremque revocantes, nec solis ortum incautis paventes obrepere.” We also have these periodic warnings, when we are roused to self-examination, and are induced to place ourselves before our Readers, Friends, and Correspondents, with the anxious desire to know whether, for the preceding Six Months, we have discharged our duty to our own credit and their satisfaction. We flatter ourselves that we have: And having, in this interval, brought to their final, and it may be presumed successful, accomplishment, two great and important incidental labours, "The History of Leicestershire," and the "Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century," we experience no diminution of zeal or elasticity; and look before us with the hope that this, our almost only present Literary Labour, will proceed with its accustomed vigour. We are further warned by the solemn language of the philosophic LUCRETIUS, which we have adopted for our motto, to use no other language but that of Truth and Soberness; and this compels us ingenuously to acknowledge that the aspect of things about us is far from being brighter than when we last appeared before 20644 our our Readers in an Address like the present. We then spoke, with the energy of Men and freedom of Britons, of our unalterable attachment to the Religious Establishment of our Country. If it were then in apprehended peril, it is not less so at the present period, whet, our honest zeal is termed Bigotry; our hesitation in admitting those to power, who never yet enjoyed without abusing it, is denominated Illiberality. But we pause, not without adhering with due solemnity to our former protestations, not without invoking our Countrymen to be firm in their principles, unshaken by the general fever of the times, and undaunted by clamour or by menace. Let us turn, not unreluctantly, to a subject about which all parties, all sects, all mankind, are agreed.-Ask of the meanest person that you meet the value of Learning? he will say it is of the greatest. Inquire of those whom you may encounter at the Court, in the City, in the Streets, or in the Markets, whether they are acquainted with Learning? If they say they are, ask them again whether they are desirous to improve their knowledge:-One and all will eagerly and anxiously express their wish to do so.-Here then we rest, and make our honourable stand.-Here we provoke no enmities, irritate no parties, offend no sects, inflame no passions. As we are to all acceptable, so on our part, as long as the cause of Religion and good Morals is preserved inviolate, we receive without prejudice, and countenance without distinction, whatever has a tendency to promote Knowledge and the Sciences in all their various ramifications. To this unreserved and candid declaration, we may be permitted to subjoin the patriotic wish, that the present inauspicious fermentations, of every description, may be speedily and effectually allayed. Nor will it be unbecoming the Spirit of Loyalty, by which we trust we have been invariably distinguished, still further to add the hope, that the new direction and path which the Dæmon of War is now about to take, may lead to the confusion, humiliation, and defeat, of that Individual, who, by the mysterious dispensations of Providence, has, for so long a period, been permitted to erect his conquering Throne upon the misery and anguish of the Nations of the Earth. July 15, 1812. |