I have reason to believe that certain of my contemporaries have made use of an art I some time ago professed, of being often designedly dull;[128] and for that reason shall not exert myself when I see them lazy. He that has so much to struggle with as the man who pretends to censure others, must keep up his fire for an onset, and may be allowed to carry his arms a little carelessly upon an ordinary march. This paper therefore shall be taken up by my correspondents, two of which have sent me the two following plain, but sensible and honest letters, upon subjects no less important than those of education and devotion:
"Sir,[129]
"I am an old man, retired from all acquaintance with the town, but what I have from your papers (not the worst entertainment of my solitude); yet being still a well-wisher to my country and the commonwealth of learning (a qua, confiteor, nullam ætatis meæ partem abhorruisse), and hoping the plain phrase in writing that was current in my younger days would have lasted for my time, I was startled at the picture of modern politeness transmitted by your ingenious correspondent, and grieved to see our sterling English language fallen into the hands of clippers and coiners. That mutilated epistle, consisting of hipps, reps, and such-like enormous curtailings, was a mortifying spectacle, but with the reserve of comfort to find this, and other abuses of our mother-tongue, so pathetically complained of, and to the proper person for redressing them, the Censor of Great Britain.
"He had before represented the deplorable ignorance that for several years past has reigned amongst our English writers, the great depravity of our taste, and continual corruption of our style: but, sir, before you give yourself the trouble of prescribing remedies for these distempers (which you own will require the greatest care and application), give me leave (having long had my eye upon these mischiefs, and thoughts exercised about them) to mention what I humbly conceive to be the cause of them, and in your friend Horace's words, "Quo fonte derivata clades In patriam populumque fluxit."[130]
"I take our corrupt ways of writing to proceed from the mistakes and wrong measures in our common methods of education, which I always looked upon as one of our national grievances, and a singularity that renders us no less than our situation,
——Penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos.[131]
This puts me upon consulting the most celebrated critics on that subject, to compare our practice with their precepts, and find where it was that we came short or went wide.