assembly of men and women were allowed to meet at midnight in masks
within the verge of the Court; with many improbabilities of the like
nature. We must therefore, in these and the like cases, suppose
that these remote hints and allusions aimed at some certain follies
which were then in vogue, and which at present we have not any
notion of. We may guess by several passages in the speculations,
that there were writers who endeavoured to detract from the works of
this author; but as nothing of this nature is come down to us, we
cannot guess at any objections that could be made to his paper. If
we consider his style with that indulgence which we must show to old
English writers, or if we look into the variety of his subjects,
with those several critical dissertations, moral reflections, -

* * *

The following part of the paragraph is so much to my advantage, and
beyond anything I can pretend to, that I hope my reader will excuse
me for not inserting it.



THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.



Est brevitate opus, ut currat sententia,
HOR., Sat. i. 10, 9.

Let brevity despatch the rapid thought.