amplest connivance. I wish our Friend Mr. Murray * would publish some sermons to Bishops; he will find excellent materials in Milton's Prose Writings for a volume. Better employed as I am †, and must be, I could almost wish for leisure to indulge my indignation. But it is some comfort to me to know that it is full as strong in other breasts here, who have more leisure and greater abilities to express it. But I am in earnest when I request you to propose to Mr. Murray to think seriously of this: by so doing he will serve his friends and himself equally at this time: if he can trust his MSS. here, we will contrive to make it as perfect in its kind as may be, and as beneficial to him. I must leave it on you to write in my name, and in your own to Mr. Gardner, on this subject with a view to get such Letters as he thinks may best serve us, from the people of Berwick to their Members. Dr. Kippis has, I know, written to him on the same score; but two are better than one, and I have made this one so long that you must give me leave to make it serve you all, and to turn over the rest upon you; though slow as I am in a work to which no one man is equal, and obliged to add yet more night to day than I was wont to do when you knew me, I cheerfully give the utmost I can of my time and travel, which I can here turn to good account, to further this business. I beg my respects to Messrs. Davison and Richardson, whom I leave you to inform of this affair: I could wish you could apprize likewise Mr. Blackie of it, and any other whose advice or interest you judge to be of consequence to us. I know your activity in a good cause, and generous spirits need no spur. I leave it, therefore, with your own judgment and heart. Dr. Priestley left me as I begun to write to you, and said he would be back in an hour; I expect him every minute. I have not forgot to represent to him the cases of sundry of my friends, and the state of the interest in general in Northumberland. I am sorry to find the fund is in a condition that can admit of new beneficiences, and that must be recovered by a temporary diminution of the little pittances it at present allows you.

"I beg my compliments to Mr. and Mrs. Crawford; and am, dear Sir,

"Yours affectionately,

JOHN CALDer."

The Rev. James Murray, a Dissenting Minister at Newcastle, and author of an impudent but humorous work, published anonymously in 1768 (of which see the Monthly Review, vol. XXXIX. p. 100.), but afterwards boastingly avowed. He was also the author of "Lectures to Lords Spiritual, or Advice to the Bishops concerning religious Articles, Tythes, and Church Power; with a Discourse on Ridicule, 1774;" "A Sermon on the General Fast-day, Feb. 21, 1781." Of his "Lectures to Lords Spiritual," re-published in 1781, see the Monthly Review, vol. LIII. p. 471. + In preparing for a new Edition of Chalmers's " Cyclopedia," the history of which see in the Fourth volume of the Illustrations, p. 801.

427

Of this unrivaled Commentator on Shakspeare a brief Memoir has been given in the " Literary Anecdotes," vol. II. p. 680; and frequent mention is made of him in other parts of these volumes*. Of his true character it is difficult to form a just estimate.

Possessing naturally an extremely robust bodily frame, and endowed with intellectual power of equal strength, there was scarcely any thing within the range of human possibility which he could not have atchieved. His retentive memory had in early life been abundantly stored with classical literature; and to the end of his life he could quote from the strains of the Greek and Roman Poets as readily as he could from Shakspeare, Dryden, or Pope. He wrote rapidly; but his hand-writing was perfect, and his style correct. But woe to the hopeless wight who chanced to give him the slightest offence; as nothing could exceed the severity of his satire. Yet, in his general habits, he was polite in the extreme; and his attachment to some of his friends was most exemplary; to Dr. Farmer particularly, to Isaac Reed, and Mr. Tyrwhitt.

Frugal, and even abstemious in his own solitary meal, he was liberal to the distressed; and in his literary communications he was unremittingly attentive and obliging.

He was always an early riser; and, unless prevented by extraordinary bad weather, rarely failed walking to London and back again. His usual custom was to call on Isaac Reed in Staple-Inn at or before seven o'clock in the morning; and then, after a short conference with his intelligent Friend, he paraded to John Nichols, in Red Lion-passage;

* See the passages referred to in vol. VII. pp. 397, 681. + Who acknowledges much obligation to him for various literary communications, particularly when publishing the Biographical Anecdotes of Hogarth; yet who more than once experienced his unaccountable caprices.

then hastened to the shop of Mudge and Dutton, the celebrated watch-makers, to regulate his watch; and to his steady and judicious friend Thomas Longman, in search of new publications, and literary news. This was in general his ultima Thule.

In returning, he constantly visited his much respected Friend Henry Baldwin; and then generally passed some time in converse with the Paragon of Literature, Dr. Samuel Johnson; rarely omitting to call at the well-stored shop of Ben White; the political storehouse of George Kearsley *, or the literary conversational lounge at Archibald Hamilton's. Thence occasionally at one, two, or more of the following noted Bibliopoles: Cadell, Peter Elmsly, Tom Davies, Tom Payne, Debrett, or Stockdale. Regularly finishing in Bond-street either with Robson or Faulder, he hastened to an early dinner at his pleasant residence on Hampstead Heath.

His fertile pen was frequently employed in the "Critical Review," sometimes in the "Morning," and occasionally in the "General Evening Post +;" but the "St. James's Chronicle," of which he was one of the early Proprietors, was the principal arena of his various literary squibs. Of these it may suffice to mention his cruel and unwarrantable attacks on Sir John Hawkins's "History of Music" which for a long time much injured the sale of that valuable publication, to the very serious injury of honest Tom Payne," one of the worthiest Booksellers that this country could ever boast.

The "Gentleman's Magazine" too was occasionally the deposit of his satirical effusions; in which the benevolent Dean Milles was severely handled for his credulity in Rowley's Poems §.

His malevolent attack on Arthur Murphy is well known; and that he received from that spirited

* Where he indulged his satirical vein by hints to Peter Pindar. † See hereafter, p. 433.

See some specimens in pp. 437, 438, 443. § Ib. pp. 437, 438.