Page images
PDF
EPUB

ADVERTISEMENT.

T

O promote the Sale of this Piece, Mr. DODSLEY was for dedicating it to fome reigning Toaft; but it was thought more for his Intereft to fend it into the World, with the Motto infcribed on the Golden Apple adjudged to Venus; for then a Thousand Goddeffes might feize it as their

own,

DEDI

DEDICATION.

DETVR PVLCHRIORI

TO THE

GREATEST BEAUTY.

DE FORMITY

I

A N

ESSA Y.

T is offenfive for a Man to. fpeak: much of himself; and few can do it with fo good a

Grace as Montaigne. I wish I could; or that I could be half fo [] entertaining or instructive. My Subject, however, will be my Apology; and I am fure it will draw no Envy upon me. Bodily Deformity is visible to every Eye; but the Effects of it are known to very few; intimately known to none, but those who feel them; and they generally are not inclined to reveal them. As therefore I am furnished with the neceflary Materials, I will treat this uncommon Subject at large; and to view it in a philofophical Light is a Speculation which may be useful to Perfons fo oddly (I will not fay unhappily) diftinguifhed; and per haps not unentertaining to others.

[a] The Marquis of Halifax, in a Letter to Charles Cotton, Efq; who tranflated Montaigne's Effays, fays, it is the Book in the World, with which he is beft enter tained; and that Montaigne did not write for Praife, but to give the World a true Picture of himself and of Mankind.

I do not pretend to be fo ingenious as Montaigne; but it is in my Power to be as ingenuous. I may, with the fame [b] Naïvité remove the Veil from my mental as well as perfonal Imperfections; and expofe them naked to the World. And when I have thus anatomized myself, I hope my Heart will be found found and untainted, and my Intentions honeft and fincere.

[c] Longinus fays, that Cecilius wrote of the Sublime in a low Way: on the contrary, Mr. [d] Pope calls Longinus" the great Sublime he draws." Let it be my Ambition to imitate Longinus in Style and Sentiment; and like Cecilius, to make these appear a Contrast to my Subject; to write of Deformity with Beauty; and by a finished Piece to atone for an ill-turned Perfon.

[ocr errors]

If any Reader imagines, that [e] a Print of me in the Frontispiece of this Work would give him a clearer Idea of the Subject; I have no Objection, provided he will be at the Expence of engraving. But, for want of it, let him know, that I am fcarce fiye Feet high; that my Back was bent in my Mother's Womb; and that in Perfon I refemble Efop, the Prince of Orange, Marthal Luxemburg,

[b] Vertu Naïve, an Expreffion of Montaigne; and which Fontenelle puts into his Mouth in his Dialogue

with Socrates.

[] In the Beginning of his Treatife on the Sublime. [d] In his Effay on Criticism.

[e] It was a difobliging Stroke to a Lady; but it was faid of Mademoiselle de Gournai, that, to vindicate her Honour from Reflexion, the need only prefix her Picture to her Book. General Dictionary, under the Word (Gournai.)

Lord

Lord Treasurer Salisbury, Scarron, and Mr. Pope; not to mention Therfites and Richard the Third; whom I do not claim as Members of our Society: [f] the first being a Child of the Poet's Fancy; the last mifreprefented by Hiftorians, who thought they must draw the Devil in a bad Shape. But I will not (on this Occasion) accept of Richard's Statue from the Hand of any Hiftorian, or even of Shakespear himself; but only from that of his [g] own Biographer, who tells us (and he ought to know) that Richard was a handfome Man.

As I have the greatest Reason to thank God, that I was born in this Island, and enjoy the Bleffings of his Majefty's Reign; let me not be unthankful, that I was not born in Sparta! where I had no fooner feen the Light, but I fhould have been deprived of it; and have been thrown as a useless Thing [b], into a Cavern by Mount Taygetus! Inhuman Lycurgus! thus to destroy your own Species! Surrounded by the Innocents, whom you have murdered, may I not haunt you among the Shades below for this Barbarity? That it was ill Policy, the glorious Lift of Names, which I have produced, is a Proof; your own Agefilaus

[f] Tam mala Therfiten prohibebat forma latere,
Quam pulchra Nireus confpiciendus erat.

Ov. Ep. ex Ponto xiii. ver. 4. [g] George Buck, Efq. who, in his History of Richard the Third, endeavours to reprefent him as a Prince of much better Shape (both of Body and Mind) than he had been generally efteemed. And Bishop Nicholson calls Buck a more candid Compofer of Annals than Sir Thomas More. See his Hiftorical Library.

[] See Plutarch in the Life of Lycurgus.

confutes

« PreviousContinue »