"Sincerum est nisi vas, quodcunque infundis acescit."
I understand this line as referring to the notorious fact, that some liquors turn sour if the air gets to them from without. "Sincerum vas" is a sound or air-tight vessel. In another place (Sat., lib. i. 3.), Horace employs the same figure, where he says that we "call evil good, and good evil," figuring the sentiment thus:
"At nos virtutes ipsas invertimus, atque
Sincerum cupimus vas incrustare"—
meaning, of course, that we bring the vessel into suspicion, by treating it as if it were flawed. Dryden, no doubt, knew the radical meaning of sincere when he wrote the lines cited by Johnson:
"He try'd a tough well-chosen spear;
Th' inviolable body stood sincere."
C. Mansfield Ingleby.
Birmingham.
The Saltpetre Man (Vol. viii., p. 225.).—In addition to the curious particulars of this office, I send you an extract from Abp. Laud's Diary: