PREFACE. A FEW words feem at prefent to be neceffary, on the general fubject of REVIEWS. A new kind of publication has of late arifen, bearing the fame name, but in its nature, very different. Such we mean, as the Edinburgh Review, and others, fince publifhed, in imitation or emulation of that work *. We wish not, in the leaft, to cenfure these publications. We allow them all to have displayed, in turn, diftinguished abilities; and to have been often useful, entertaining, and instructive to the public. We feel no furprife at the attraction which they have poffeffed. Our object is only to diftinguish, and to fhow that, however these books may deserve patronage, they are not in fact Reviews, as to their principal defign and contents. Whoever knows the influence of names will allow, that to point out this distinction, if it be real, is no fuperfluous effort on our parts, but an act of just and neceffary felf-defence. We obferved, on a former occafion, that Reviews ought to be, fo far as is practicable, complete hiftories of contemporary literature. In repeating which, we mean not to affert that fo much is ftrictly implied * It is whimsical enough that they all fo exactly copy the form and appearance of that work as to be liable to be mistaken for it, quithout reading. in the name, but that fuch has generally been the defign and attempt of perfons who wrote Reviews in this country; and that fuch a record, under whatever name, is in itself defirable, will not we think be denied. Such it has been our uniform attempt to render the BRITISH CRITIC; and to make it in that respect still more useful, we firft ftruck out the plan of these half-yearly prefaces, in which we briefly recapitulate the works which beft deferve attention; adding references to our larger criticifms, for the more detailed account of each. This plan has given fatisfaction, and has in fome inftances been imitated. Many books after all, as happens to every fuch Review, we are confcious of having paft by or overlooked; but it has feldom been by defign; and the accidents that have occafioned fuch omiffions may be as eafily imagined as repeated. Sometimes the illness or even death of a coadjutor; fometimes difapprobation of what was offered to us; and fometimes, because we have fairly had doubts refpecting the fubject of the work. Once or twice we have paffed by a book, in confideration of the peculiar circumftances of the author, whom cenfure might have injured, and to whom we could not give approbation. Whatever caufe produces long delay, is likely, in a periodical work, to produce entire omiffion; fince new objects are continually arifing, with more urgent demands, and more intereft attached to them in the eye of the public, than belongs to fuch as are less re cent. We are far from uniting in opinion with thofe who think that a Review fhould be a felection; and that there is little ufe in noticing bad or trifling works. The vanity and prefumption of foolish writers ought to be repreffed, for the fake of the writers themfelves, as well as for the fake of the public: and the mischievous are too indulgently treated if they are only paffed over in filence. Much more than the coft of a Review may be faved to many perfons, by being told what they ought not to buy; and the extreme ignorance of fome pretenders to authorship, is even a curious circumftance in the hiftory of the human mind; as may very often be seen in our Monthly Catalogue, particularly under the head of Poetry. If then a fervice of this nature be effential to the public; if it be defirable that a complete hiftory of the publications of any period fhould be at all attainable, we fay, without fear of contradiction, that these objects cannot be effected by any one or even all of thofe publications which notice only eight or ten books in a quarter of a year. The average number of works mentioned, more or lefs explicitly, in each monthly publication of the BRITISH CRITIC, is about thirty-five, which gives, in the whole year, the number of four hundred and twenty; and even this amount is usually, as we have candidly stated, deficient. What progrefs then can critics make who notice only forty, at the moft, in the fame period, and feveral of thofe perhaps not connected with British literature? We defire not to contend about a name, or we might contend, that, in a REVIEW, books ought to be reviewed, whereas, in the publications here alluded to, the title of a book (or even of feveral together) ferves frequently as a mere introduction to an original differtation, of great extent, in which the contents, the merits, or demerits of the introducing work are not even mentioned or alluded to. This then is evidently not a critique but a new pamphlet on the fame fubject, and requiring to be reviewed as much as that or thofe which gave occafion to it. But waving this, as bearing chiefly upon the name of Review, we haften to conclude this introduction. * What cannot be done by means of any one Review, even on the old plan, may be effected by a comparison of three or four, fince very few books are omitted by all of those who undertake. to notice all. What, it may be asked, is our defign? Is it to diminish the fale of the works herein described? Far otherwise. We read them ourselves, and were they confidered as books, not journals, would review, and often recommend them. They are in truth collections of effays or differtations, fometimes critical, but more frequently political; generally very able, often learned, and fometimes calculated to be highly ufeful. Yet though, we could not perhaps always do what they have done, and fometimes certainly would not if we could, yet moft clearly what we profefs and perform, with whatever fuccefs, the production of a regular record of British literature, THEY do not even attempt, and therefore fhould not be confidered as occupying the fame ground. Let it not then be faid that there are at prefent fo many REVIEWS; when in fact there are none, according to the original acceptation of the word, excepting those which proceed upon the old plan. We plead not for preference. Let the public prefer, if they be really preferable, differtations on a very few works, to a general account of many. But let things at least be rightly understood; and let those who with for a Review, that they may know what paffes in the literary world, be aware how little progrefs they can make, in that object, with the best conducted felections. The Preface, which we are now about to begin, will contain more literary facts than feveral volumes of quarterly effays, however ingenious, able, or amufing. DIVINITY. It has happened fometimes, that we have forborne to fpeak of a work in the preface, because the account of it was hitherto incomplete in our volume. There |