Thomas Pope Blount's remarkable _Censura Celebrium Authorum_ (1690).
That popular bibliographical dictionary of criticism (reprinted 1694,
1710 and 1718) is only remembered now for its omission of Shakespeare,
Spenser, Jonson and Milton from its list of "celebrated authors."
Neither that volume nor the same author's _De Re Poetica_ (1694) finds a
proper place in a list of periodicals. They should be grouped with such
works as Phillips' _Theatrum Poetarum_ (1675) and Langbaine's _Account
of the English Dramatic Poets_ (1691) among the more deliberate attempts
at literary criticism.

Between 1692-94 appeared the _Gentleman's Journal; or, the Monthly
Miscellany. Consisting of News, History, Philosophy, Poetry, Music,
Translations, etc._ This noteworthy paper, edited by Peter Anthony
Motteux while he was translating Rabelais, included among its
contributors Aphra Behn, Oldmixon, Dennis, D'Urfey and others. In many
ways it anticipated the plan of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ (1731), which
has usually been accorded the honor of priority among English literary
magazines. The _History of the Works of the Learned; or, an Impartial
Account of Books lately printed in all Parts of Europe_ was begun in
1699 and succumbed after the publication of its thirteenth volume
(1711). Among its editors was George Ridpath, who was afterwards
immortalized in Pope's _Dunciad_. The careers of the _Monthly
Miscellany_ (1707-09) and _Censura Temporum_ (1709-10) were brief. About
the same time an extensive series of periodicals was begun by a Huguenot
refugee, Michael De la Roche, who fled to England after the revocation
of the Edict of Nantes and became an Episcopalian. After several years
of hack-work for the booksellers, he published (1710) the first numbers
of his _Memoirs of Literature, containing a Weekly Account of the State
of Learning at Home and Abroad_, which he continued until 1714 and for a
few months in 1717. In the latter year he began at Amsterdam his