riter ill assorted with the critic's
_Fastus_. But about this time Dean Aldrich had set an example to the
students of Christchurch of publishing editions of classical authors.
Such juvenile editorships served as an easy admission into the
fashionable literature of Oxford. Alsop had published the "AEsop;" and
Boyle, among other "young gentlemen," easily obtained the favour of
the dean, "to _desire_ him to undertake an edition of the 'Epistles of
Phalaris.'" Such are the modest terms Boyle employs in his reply to
Bentley, after he had discovered the unlucky choice he had made of an
author.

For this edition of "Phalaris" it was necessary to collate a MS. in
the king's library; and Bentley, about this time, had become the royal
librarian. Boyle did not apply directly to Bentley, but circuitously,
by his bookseller, with whom the doctor was not on terms. Some act of
civility, or a Mercury more "formose," to use one of his latinisms,
was probably expected. The MS. was granted, but the collator was
negligent; in six days Bentley reclaimed it, "four hours" had been
sufficient for the purpose of collation.

When Boyle's "Phalaris" appeared, he made this charge in the preface,
that having ordered the Epistles to be collated with the MS. in the
king's library, the collator was prevented perfecting the collation by
the _singular humanity_ of the library-keeper, who refused any further
use of the MS.; _pro singulari sua humanitate negavit_: an expression
that sharply hit a man marked by the haughtiness of his manners.[297]

Bentley, on this insult, informed Boyle of what had passed. He
expected that Boyle would have civilly cancelled the page; though he
tells us he did not require this, because, "to have insisted on
the cancel, might have been forcing a gentleman to too low a
submission;"--a stroke of delicacy which will surprise some to
discover in the strong character of Bentley. But he was also too
haughty to ask a favour, and too conscious of his superiority to
betray a feeling of injury. Boyle replied, that the bookseller's
account was quite different from the doctor's, who had spoken
slightingly of him. Bentley said no more.

Three years had nearly elapsed, when Bentley, in a new edition of his
friend Wotton's book, published "A Dissertation on the Epistles of the
Ancients;" where, reprehending the false criticism of Sir William
Temple, he asserted that the "Fables of AEsop" and the "Epistles of
Phalaris" were alike spur