I have not yet seen Bishop Newton's life. I will not give three guineas for what I would not give threepence, his Works; his Life,(479) I Conclude, will be borrowed by all the magazines, and there I shall see it.
I know nothing of Acciliator—I have forgotten some of my good Latin, and luckily never knew any bad; having always detested monkish barbarism. I have just finished Mr. Pennant's new volume, parts of which amused me; though I knew every syllable, that was worth knowing before, for there is not a word of novelty; and it is tiresome his giving such long extracts out of Dugdale and other common books, and telling one long stories about all the most celebrated characters in the English history, besides panegyrics on all who showed him their houses: but the prints are charming; though I cannot conceive why he gave one of the Countess of Cumberland, who never did any thing worth memory, but recording the very night on which she conceived.
"The Fair Circassian" was written by a Mr. Pratt, who has published several works under the name of Courtney Melmoth.(480) The play might have been written by Cumberland, it is bad enough. I did read the latter's coxcombical Anecdotes,(481) but saw nothing on myself, except mention of my Painters. Pray what is the passage you mean on me or Vertue? Do not write on purpose to answer this, it is not worth while.
(478) This picture of the marriage of Elizabeth of York with Henry the Seventh was painted by Mabuse, and is described in Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting.-E.
(479) Shortly after the death of Bishop Newton, his Works were published, with an autobiographical Memoir, in two volumes quarto. The prelate, speaking, in this Memoir, of Johnson's Lives of the Poets, having observed, that "candour was much hurt and offended at the malevolence that predominated in every part," the Doctor, in a conversation with Dr. Adams, master of Pembroke College, Oxford, thus retaliated on his townsman:—"Tom knew he should be dead before what he said of me would appear: he durst not have printed it while he was alive." Dr. Adams: "I believe his Dissertations on the Prophecies' is his great work." Johnson: "Why, Sir, it is Tom's great work; but how far it is great, or how much of it is Tom's, are other questions. I fancy a considerable part of it was borrowed." Dr. Adams: "He was a very successful man." Johnson: "I don't think so, Sir. He did not get very high. He was late in getting what he did get, and he did not get it by the best means. I believe he was a gross flatterer."-Life, vol. viii. p. 286.-E.
(480) Mr. Pratt was the author of "Gleanings in England," "Gleanings through Wales, Holland, and Westphalia," and many other works which enjoyed a temporary popularity, but are now forgotten. Of Mr. Pratt, the following amusing anecdote is related by Mr. Gifford, in the Maviad:—"This gentleman lately put in practice a very notable scheme. Having scribbled himself fairly out of notice, he found it expedient to retire to the Continent for a few months, to provoke the inquiries of Mr. Lane's indefatigable readers. Mark the ingratitude of the creatures! No inquiries were made, and Mr. Pratt was forgotten before he had crossed the channel. Ibi omnis efFusus labor—but what!
The mouse that is content with one poor hole,
Can never be a mouse of any soul:
baffled in this expedient, he had recourse to another, and, while we were dreaming of nothing less, came before us in the following paragraph:—"A few days since, died at Basle in Switzerland, the ingenious Mr. Pratt: his loss will be severely felt by the literary world, as he joined to the accomplishments of the gentleman the erudition of the scholar." This was inserted in the London papers for several days successively; the country papers too yelled out like syllables of dolour; at length, while our eyes were yet wet for the irreparable loss we had sustained, came a second paragraph as follows: "As no event of late has caused a more general sorrow than the supposed death of the ingenious Mr. Pratt, we are happy to have it in our power to assure hiss numerous admirers, that he is as well as they can wish and (what they will be delighted to hear) busied is preparing his Travels for the press."-E.
(481) "Anecdotes of Eminent Painters, in Spain during the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, with Cursory Remarks upon the present State of Arts in that Kingdom."
Letter 248 To John Nichols, Esq.
Berkeley Square, June 19, 1782. (page 315)