то SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. I DEAR SIR, Can have no expectations, in an address of this kind, either to add to your reputation, or to establish my own. You can gain nothing from my admiration, as I am ignorant of that art in which you are said to excel; and I may lofe much by the feverity of your judgment, as few have a jufter taste in poetry than you. Setting intereft therefore afide, to which I never paid much attention, I must be indulged at present in following my affections. The only Dedication I ever made was to my Brother, becaufe I loved him better than most other men. He is fince dead. Permit me to inscribe this poem to you. How far you may be pleased with the versification and mere mechanical parts of this attempt, I do not pretend to enquire; but I know you will object (and, indeed, f veral of our best and wifest friends concur in the opinion) that the depopulation it deplores is no where to be seen, and the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's own imagination. To this I can scarce make any other anfwer, than that I fincerely believe what I have written; that I have taken all poffible pains, in my coun. try excurfions for these four or five years past, to be certain of what I alledge; and that all my views and enquiries have led me to believe thofe miferies real, which I here attempt to display. But this is not the place to enter into an enquiry, whether the country bed epopulating or not: the difcuffion would take up much room; and I should prove myself, at beft, an indifferent politician, to tire the reader with a long preface, when I want his unfatigued attention to a long poem. In regreting the depopulation of the country, I inveigh against the increase of our luxuries; and here also I expect the shout of modern politicians against me. For twenty or thirty years paft, it has been the fashion to confider luxury as one of the greatest national advantages; and all the wisdom of antiquity, in that particular, as erStill, however, I muft remain a profeffed ancient on that head, and continue to think thofe luxuries prejudicial to ftates, by which fo many vices are introduced, roneous. and |