P.S.—Is there any china left in the Great Duke's collection, made by Duke Francis the First himself? Perhaps it was lately sold with what was called the refuse of the wardrobe, whence I hear some charming things were purchased, particularly the Medallions of the Medici, by Benvenuto Cellini. That sale and the "History" are enough to make the old Electress[1] shudder in her coffin.
[Footnote 1: The Electress Palatine Dowager was sister of John Gaston, the last Grand Duke of the House of Medici; after her husband's death she returned to Florence and died there.]
THE LANGUAGE PROPER FOR INSCRIPTIONS IN ENGLAND—FALL OF LORD NORTH'S MINISTRY—BRYANT.
TO THE REV. WILLIAM COLE.
April 13, 1782.
Your partiality to me, my good Sir, is much overseen, if you think me fit to correct your Latin. Alas! I have not skimmed ten pages of Latin these dozen years. I have dealt in nothing but English, French, and a little Italian; and do not think, if my life depended on it, I could write four lines of pure Latin. I have had occasion once or twice to speak that language, and soon found that all my verbs were Italian with Roman terminations. I would not on any account draw you into a scrape, by depending on my skill in what I have half forgotten. But you are in the metropolis of Latium. If you distrust your own knowledge, which I do not, especially from the specimen you have sent me, surely you must have good critics at your elbow to consult.
In truth, I do not love Roman inscriptions in lieu of our own language,[1] though, if anywhere, proper in an University; neither can I approve writing what the Romans themselves would not understand. What does it avail to give a Latin tail to a Guildhall? Though the words are used by moderns, would major convey to Cicero the idea of a mayor? Architectus, I believe, is the right word; but I doubt whether veteris jam perantiquae is classic for a dilapidated building—but do not depend on me; consult some better judges.
[Footnote 1: Walpole certainly here shows himself superior in judgement to Johnson, who, when Burke, Reynolds, and others, in a "round-robin," requested that the epitaph on Goldsmith, which was entrusted to him to draw up, should be in English instead of Latin, refused, with the absurd expression that "he would never be guilty of defacing Westminster Abbey with an English inscription.">[
Though I am glad of the late revolution,[1] a word for which I have great reverence, I shall certainly not dispute with you thereon. I abhor exultation. If the change produces peace, I shall make a bonfire in my heart. Personal interest I have none; you and I shall certainly never profit by the politics to which we are attached. The "Archaeologic Epistle" I admire exceedingly, though I am sorry it attacks Mr. Bryant,[2] whom I love and respect. The Dean is so absurd an oaf, that he deserves to be ridiculed. Is anything more hyperbolic than his preferences of Rowley to Homer, Shakspeare, and Milton? Whether Rowley or Chatterton was the author, are the poems in any degree comparable to those authors? is not a ridiculous author an object of ridicule? I do not even guess at your meaning in your conclusive paragraph on that subject: Dictionary-writer I suppose alludes to Johnson; but surely you do not equal the compiler of a dictionary to a genuine poet? Is a brickmaker on a level with Mr. Essex? Nor can I hold that exquisite wit and satire are Billingsgate; if they were, Milles and Johnson would be able to write an answer to the "Epistle." I do as little guess whom you mean that got a pension by Toryism: if Johnson too, he got a pension for having abused pensioners, and yet took one himself, which was contemptible enough. Still less know I who preferred opposition to principles, which is not a very common case; whoever it was, as Pope says,
The way he took was strangely round about.