AN ACCOUNT OF HIS STUDIES

AND NUMEROUS WORKS,
IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER;

A SERIES OF HIS EPISTOLARY CORRESPONDENCE

AND CONVERSATIONS WITH MANY EMINENT PERSONS;

Α Ν D

VARIOUS ORIGINAL PIECES OF HIS COMPOSITION,

NE V ER BEFORE

PUBLISHED.

THE WHOLE EXHIBITING A VIEW OF LITERATURE AND LITERARY MEN
IN GREAT BRITAIN, FOR NEAR HALF A CENTURY,

DURING WHICH HE FLOURISHED.

D E DI C Α Τ Ι ο Ν.

Τ Ο

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

MY DEAR SIR,

EVER

VERY liberal motive that can actuate an Authour

in the dedication of his labours, concurs in directing me to you, as the person to whom the following work should be inscribed.

If there be a pleasure in celebrating the distinguished merit of a contemporary, mixed with a certain degree of vanity not altogether inexcusable, in appearing fully sensible of it, where can I find one in complimenting whom I can with more general approbation gratify those feelings? Your excellence, not only in the Art over which you have long presided with

unrivalled

unrivalled fame, but also in Philosophy and elegant Literature, is well known to the present, and will continue to be the admiration of future ages. Your equal and placid temper, your variety of converfation, your true politeness, by which you are so amiable in private fociety, and that enlarged hospitality which has long made your house a common centre of union for the great, the accomplished, the learned, and the ingenious; all these qualities I can, in perfect confidence of not being accused of flattery, ascribe

to you.

If a man may indulge an honest pride, in having it known to the world, that he has been thought worthy of particular attention by a person of the first eminence in the age in which he lived, whose company has been universally courted, I am justified in availing myself of the usual privilege of a Dedication, when I mention that there has been a long and uninterrupted friendship between us

If gratitude should be acknowledged for favours received, I have this opportunity, my dear Sir, most fincerely to thank you for the many happy hours which