rom the lord chamberlain.

This expedient, which I hope will be carefully concealed from the
vulgar, must infallibly answer the great end proposed by it, and set the
power of the court not only above the insults of the poets, but, in a
short time, above the necessity of providing against them. The licenser,
having his authority thus extended, will, in time, enjoy the title and
the salary without the trouble of exercising his power, and the nation
will rest, at length, in ignorance and peace.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This admirable piece of irony was first printed in the year 1739. A
comparison of its sarcastic strokes with the serious arguments of
lord Chesterfield's speech in the house of lords against the bill
for licensing the stage, will be both amusing and instructive.--Ed.

[2] Lyttelton and Pitt.

[3] Britain

[4] Titles of pamphlets published at this juncture. The former by lord
Lyttelton. See his works, vol i.

PREFACE TO THE GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE,

1738.

The usual design of addresses of this sort is to implore the candour of
the publick: we have always had the more pleasing province of returning
thanks, and making our acknowledgments for the kind acceptance which our
monthly collections have met with.

This, it seems, did not sufficiently appear from the numerous sale and
repeated impressions of our books, which have, at once, exceeded our
merit and our expectation; but have been still more plainly attested by
the clamours, rage, and calumnies of our competitors, of whom we have
seldom taken any notice, not only because it is cruelty to insult the
depressed, and folly to engage with desperation, but because we consider
all their outcries, menaces, and boasts, as nothing more than
advertisements in our favour, being evidently drawn up with the
bitterness of baffled malice and disappointed hope; and almost
discovering, in plain terms, that the unhappy authors have seventy
thousand London Magazines mouldering in their warehouses, returned from
all parts of the kingdom, unsold, unread, and disregarded.

Our obligations for the encouragement we have so long continued to
receive, are so much the greater, as no artifices have been omitted to
supplant us. Our adversaries cannot be denied the praise of industry;
how far they can be celebrated for an honest industry, we leave to the
decision of the publick, and even of their brethren, the booksellers,
not including those whose advertisements