re bought by the late possessor, they will find it diminished at
least three parts in four; if they would compare it with the demands of
other booksellers, they must first find the same books in their hands,
and they will be, perhaps, at last reduced to confess, that they mean,
by a high price, only a price higher than they are inclined to give.

I have, at least, a right to hope, that no gentleman will receive an
account of the price from the booksellers, of whom it may easily be
imagined that they will be willing, since they cannot depreciate the
books, to exaggerate the price: and I will boldly promise those who have
been influenced by malevolent reports, that, if they will be pleased, at
the day of sale, to examine the prices with their own eyes, they will
find them lower than they have been represented.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This scheme was never executed; the fifth volume, the only one
subsequently published, was a mere shop catalogue.

A VIEW OF THE CONTROVERSY BETWEEN
MONS. CROUSAZ AND MR. WARBURTON,
ON THE SUBJECT OF
MR. POPE'S ESSAY ON MAN,

In a Letter to the Editor of the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. xiii. 1743.

Mr. Urban,

It would not be found useless in the learned world, if in written
controversies as in oral disputations, a moderator could be selected,
who might, in some degree, superintend the debate, restrain all needless
excursions, repress all personal reflections, and, at last, recapitulate
the arguments on each side; and who, though he should not assume the
province of deciding the question, might at least exhibit it in its true
state.

This reflection arose in my mind upon the consideration of Mr. Crousaz's
commentary on the Essay on Man, and Mr. Warburton's answer to it. The
importance of the subject, the reputation and abilities of the
controvertists, and, perhaps, the ardour with which each has endeavoured
to support his cause, have made an attempt of this kind necessary for
the information of the greatest number of Mr. Pope's readers.

Among the duties of a moderator, I have mentioned that of recalling the
disputants to the subject, and cutting off the excrescences of a debate,
which Mr. Crousaz will not suffer to be long unemployed, and the
repression of personal invectives which have not been very carefully
avoided on either part, and are less excusable, because it has not been
proved, that, either the poet, or his commentator, wrote with any other
design than that of promot