PRIVILEGES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE; TOGETHER WITH Additional Observations ON ITS HISTORY, ANTIQUITIES, LITERATURE, AND BIOGRAPHY. BY GEORGE DYER, AUTHOR OF THE HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSITY AND COLLEGES OF CAMBRIDGE, IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. London: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN AND CO., PATERNOSTER ROW; PAYNE AND £378.42 C ED 98 p ADVERTISEMENT. THE Editor feels sensibly the perplexities in which the present Work has involved him, and the objections to which the publication of it is exposed. Against the latter he endeavours to provide in the proper place; and to the former he must be contented to submit. Still there are two or three particulars, which he begs leave to take notice of here. Of the general imperfections of the volumes he cannot be ignorant, nor of the dislikes which particular persons will have towards parts of it. Thusthe proper place for the Latin Dissertation to be read is at the beginning of the first volume; and the only reason for placing it in the second was to preserve some appearance of uniformity in the size of the volumes. Now a long Dissertation, and in Latin, at the beginning, will be a sufficient reason, with some persons, to lay it immediately aside. It is a bar at the very entrance. It will be deemed to savour of pedantry, if not of that species of vanity, which borders on impertinence. Even those disposed to peruse it, the presumption is, will come prepared rather to criticise, in parts, the Latinity, than to wade through the whole long course of Latinized argumentation. The writer admits, that there is apparent room for much censure on this head, has given the reasons for his conduct, and endeavoured to remove objections in the Address 654941 to his Subscribers; and he repeats here, that he stept, as it were, insensibly into this way of proceeding: all he intended, at first, was a Dedication, which he thought, in conformity with the greater part of the Privileges, would appear better in the Latin language than in the English, and that some things could be better said in that tongue, than in our own. But he has little reason to make pretensions, or to invite criticism. Since he left school and college, he has had few occasions of attempting Latin composition till of late years; and he is aware, that such as are critically acquainted with the niceties and elegancies of the Roman language, will find, in such a lengthened production, ample space for their animadversions. As to the length of this Dissertation---the truth is, that the writer ventured to speak on a few points, which some might think he had better not have touched upon at all. This, too, he felt himself, so far as prudence was concerned: but having gone a certain length, he found it necessary to proceed; for there are certain cases, in which nothing is said or done without amplification. Declarations or propositions, and more particularly on delicate, disputed points, may, without a proper statement of facts, and a due mixture of arguments, appear like baseless assertions, or impudent dogmas. When the mind, too, breaks loose in quest of ideas, which (though familiar to it once) it may have lost, you cannot answer for its return it is apt to lose all sense of distance; and writers, unfatigued by their own discursions, are apt to forget, that their readers may not possess the same degree of perseverance. Here, also, the writer perceives many repetitions, more, indeed, than he was aware of: for the English part of the volumes having been worked off a considerable time, and the sheets not being before him when he composed the Latin Dissertation, he finds he has brought together again several things, which being strongly impressed on his mind, followed in the natural order of his ideas; but having been spoken of in part elsewhere, they may be justly censured as repetitions. With respect to the Latin Dissertation, to be still more particular, it may be thought by some, that the term, Generalis Dissertatio, and the manner of handling it, contradict what the writer states above, and in his Address to his Subscribers, to have been his original intention in writing it, viz. to make a short address, in the form of a Dedication: but the truth is, nothing more was intended, than to give a summary view of the contents of the volumes, with his reasons for publishing them. Such a summary, as it lies in the mind, is a sort of bird's eye view, and may seem to occupy but little space there; but when put on paper, it falls, as it were, into perspective, and may run out to unforeseen length, and uncalculated varieties. It was done by piecemeal. The title was of subitaneous recollection; and those articles which run out to the greatest length, in the event, did not enter into the original design. These are the best reasons, which he can give, as an apology for the plan itself, and in explanation of its |