rend Mr. Douglas, which he drew up for him: but
scarcely had Lauder exhibited this sign of contrition, when he addressed
an apology to the archbishop of Canterbury, soliciting his patronage for
an edition of the very poets whose works he had so misapplied, and
concluding his address in the following spirit: "As for the
interpolations for which I am so highly blamed, when passion is
subsided, and the minds of men can patiently attend to truth, I promise
amply to replace them with passages equivalent in value, that are
genuine, that the public may be convinced that it was rather passion and
resentment, than a penury of evidence, the twentieth part of which has
not yet been produced, that obliged me to make use of them." This did
not satiate his malice: in 1752, he published the first volume of the
proposed edition of the Latin poets, and in 1753, a second, accompanied
with notes, both Latin and English, in a style of acrimonious
scurrility, indicative almost of insanity. In 1754, he brought forward a
pamphlet, entitled, King Charles vindicated from the charge of
plagiarism, brought against him by Milton, and Milton himself convicted
of forgery and gross imposition on the public. 8vo. In this work he
exhausts every epithet of abuse, and utterly disclaims every statement
made in his apology. It was reviewed, probably by Johnson, in the Gent.
Mag. 1754, p. 97.--Ed.

TO THE REVEREND MR. DOUGLAS.

Sir,

Candour and tenderness are, in any relation, and on all occasions,
eminently amiable; but when they are found in an adversary, and found so
prevalent as to overpower that zeal which his cause excites, and that
heat which naturally increases in the prosecution of argument, and which
may be, in a great measure, justified by the love of truth, they
certainly appear with particular advantages; and it is impossible not to
envy those who possess the friendship of him, whom it is, even, some
degree of good fortune to have known as an enemy.

I will not so far dissemble my weakness, or my fault, as not to confess
that my wish was to have passed undetected; but, since it has been my
fortune to fail in my original design, to have the supposititious
passages, which I have inserted in my quotations, made known to the
world, and the shade which began to gather on the splendour of Milton
totally dispersed, I cannot but count it an alleviation of my pain, that
I have been defeated by a man who knows how to use advantages, with so
m