Opus ipsum inscriptum est HENRICO BORBONIO, PRINCIPI CONDAEO; et forma libri est in quarto, ut nullo pacto literis includi possit. Ceterum, pro splendidissima et Magnes Britanniae principe, cui merito dicata est, digna editione Psalmorum, ex versione metrica omnium fere poetarum principis JONSTONI maximas tibi grates habet agitque Jacobus. Utinam illustrissimus Bensonus in usum serenissimi principis, atque ingeniorum in altiora surgentium, eadem forma, lisdemque typis exarari juberet divinos illos Ciceronis de Officiis libros, dignos sane, quos diurna nocturnaque manu versaret princeps, a quo aliquando Britannici regni majestas et populi salus pendebunt! Interim tibi, eruditissime vir, atque etiam politissimo D. Caveo, pro muneribus literariis, quae per nobilissimum Lawsonium [1] ad me curastis, magno opere me obstrictum agnosco, cademque, summa cum voluptate, a me perlecta sunt.
Filius meus te plurimum salutat.
Vale, doctissime vir, meisque verbis D. Caveum saluta, atque amare perge,
Tuum,
ABRAHAMUM GRONOVIUM.
Dabam Leidis, A. D. xiv. KAL.
Maias, A. D. MDCCXLVII.
[1] The person here meant was the learned and worthy Dr. Isaac Lawson, late physician to the English army in Flanders; by whom Mr. Gronovius did me the honour to transmit to me two or three acts of the Adamus Exsul of Grotius, transcribed by his son, Mr. James. The truth of this particular consists perfectly well with the knowledge of the Doctor's brother, John Lawson, esq. counsellor at law; who also had the same thing lately confirmed to him by Mr. Gronovius himself in Holland.
POSTSCRIPT.
And now my character is placed above all suspicion of fraud by authentick documents, I will make bold, at last, to pull off the mask, and declare sincerely the true motive that induced me to interpolate a few lines into some of the authors quoted by me in my Essay on Milton, which was this: Knowing the prepossession in favour of Milton, how deeply it was rooted in many, I was willing to make trial, if the partial admirers of that author would admit a translation of his own words to pass for his sense, or exhibit his meaning; which I thought they would not: nor was I mistaken in my conjecture, forasmuch as several gentlemen, seemingly persons of judgment and learning, assured me, they humbly conceived I had not proved my point, and that Milton might have written as he has done, supposing he had never seen these authors, or they had never existed. Such is the force of prejudice! This exactly confirms the judicious observation of the excellent moralist and poet:
Pravo favore labi mortales solent;
Et pro judicio dum stant erroris sui,
Ad poenitendum rebus manifestis agi.