"though so many dozen volumes have been written on it.'

Dr.

Dibdin's Introduction to the Imitation of Jesus Christ, translated from the Latin Original, ascribed to THOMAS A KEMPIS, Lond. 1828. 8vo. p. lix.

Dr. Dibdin investigates the subject with great reading, judgment, moderation, impartiality, and success, and in p. lxxxiii, writes:-"Let us now see,-supposing the pretensions of Gerson and Gersen to be equipoised in the scales of evidence, whether from intrinsic evidence, this be not the work of a writer about the year 1300; and whether that writer be not a Benedictine? This cannot perhaps be better effected than by considering, 1. the language, as to words, and as to sentiments and observations; 2. circumstances, directly or incidentally mentioned; 3. probable monastic order of the author,-from the two previous branches of evidence combined." I consider that the arguments advanced are sufficient to establish the point, at which Dr. Dihdin aims; and it is by following a similar train of reasoning with the like impartiality that I have decided against the claims of SIR PHILIP FRANCIS and CHARLES LLOYD to the authorship of JUNIUS's Letters. The great matter in these cases is to be content with reasonable circumstantial evidence, when evidence, direct, positive, and clear, cannot be obtained; and therefore it is important to refer to similar controversies for the purpose of shewing either that they have been determined, among learned men, on exactly the same principles as those, for which we contend in the case under consideration, or that they cannot be settled by such arguments as are brought forward in some quarters with too much confidence.

Е Н.В.

V.

DR. PARR'S Critique on GILBERT WAKEFIELD'S Edition of HORACE, extracted from the BRITISH CRITIC for Jan. 1795. p. 58. Febr. p. 148. April p. 344.

Q. Horatii Flacci quæ supersunt, recensuit et Notis instruxit, Gilbertus Wakefield, A. B. Coll. Jes. Cant. nuper Socius. 2 vols. 8vo. Kearsley, sm. p. 10s. 6d. large, 188.

Widely as the conductors of the British Critic differ from Mr. Wakefield on subjects of theology and of politics, they are ever ready to pay a tribute of commendation to his learning and unwearied diligence. They cannot indeed look without respect on the abilities and exertions of a scholar, who at one time is employed on critical illustration of the Sacred Writings, at another endeavours to support the authority of revelation against its antagonists, and at a third exhibits proofs of his erudition and taste, as an editor of the most distinguished writers in Greek, in Roman, and in English literature.

In the edition of Horace now before us, we meet with a concise address to the reader, in which Mr. W. informs us, that at the request of his bookseller he has endeavoured to give the text of Gesner, occasionally altered by himself; and that in conformity to a plan, which required brevity, he has left many errors unnoticed, and has in

troduced only such emendations, as appeared to him highly probable, whether they were his own, or had been proposed by other critics. He intimates a design of publishing other Greek and Latin Poets, in the same commodious form, and with the same elegance of type, if the Horace should meet with the approbation of learned men. And he tells us that Virgil is the next author he means to commit to the press.

To this address succeeds a short Life of Horace, which the reader may find in Baxter's edition; and which is ascribed to Suetonius.

The first vol. contains the Odes, Epodes, and Carmen Sæculare, the second, the Satires, Epistles, and the book de Arte Poetica.

The notes subjoined to the first volume, are contained in ten pages, and those, which are in the second volume, fill only nine. They chiefly relate to changes in the punctuation, suggested by Mr. W. himself, or by other critics, but in some instances we find words, as well as the pointing altered. With his usual candour, the editor ascribes every conjecture to its proper author, and in some instances we perceive that his own sagacity has led him to make the same emendations, which Heinsius, Markland, Bentley, and others, have proposed before him.

In the first book of the Odes, we have eight changes of punctuation, and three of the text. Ode the first, line 29, Mr. W. follows Bishop Hare in reading te doctarum, for me. Ode 3, 6. he separates Finibus Atticis from reddas in the next line, and joins it with "quæ tibi creditum Debes Virgilium," &c.

In verse 16, he thus prints,

Major tollere, seu ponere vult freta.

And we shall give his note

"Ita se habent ordo loci et constructio, quo non arbiter major tollere freta, vel' ponere, 'si' vult:"

Though in Horace adjectives are often followed by the infinitive mood, we cannot accede to Mr. Wakefield's interpretation of this passage. Seu is equivalent to sive, not to si, and in the first division is often omitted: e. g. Cantamus vacui, sive quid urimur, &c.

See Lambin's note, Ode 6, 19. and Ode 3, 16.Lib. 1.

Ode 7, 26. he puts a colon at ibimus, and throws "O socii comitesque" into the next sentence.

Ode 15, 16. he joins nequicquam to divides in the preceding verse, and puts a colon. "Ordo est," says he in his interpretation of the next sentence, "vitabis' quidem' hostes, serus tamen' crines pulvere collines." Without intending to condemn Mr. W.'s conjecture, we adhere to the common reading. We suppose that Laertiadem, (line 21) is an error of the press for Laertiaden, though in Baxter we find Laertiadem; a reading, which can hardly be approved by so accurate a scholar as Mr. W. In the same Ode, Mr. W. introduces a new interpretation of the following lines,

et Sthenelus sciens

Pugnæ, sive opus est, imperitare equis
Non auriga piger.

For the punctuation he acknowledges himself obliged to his friend, Mr. Jones, and the construction he explains in these words: "Sthenelus sciens pugnæ; 'vel si, opus est, auriga non piger imperitare equis." Again we have the misfortune to differ from Mr. W.

Sive cannot be

confounded with si, vel cannot be understood, and on

the whole, the common reading, in point both of perspicuity and exactness, is preferable to that, which Mr. Jones supplied, and which Mr. W. has adopted.

66

Ode 31, 1. 18. Mr. W. reads et, where Baxter with the old scholiast reads at, and Cunningham ac, before precor integra cum mente." He puts a colon after mente, where a semicolon is found in Baxter, a comma in the Delphin, and in Cunningham and Bentley there is no stop at all: we follow Bentley and Cunningham.

Ode 35. 1. 6. he refers to his punctuation published in $74 of the Silva Critica, where the comma is put at Dominam, and æquoris is joined, (we conceive improperly,) in construction with pelagus: in line 17, he reads with the old scholiast and others, Serva, instead of Sava before necessitas.

Ode 37, 1. 24.

Classe cita reparavit oras,

Mr. W. for reparavit would read repedavit, where Bentley had proposed penetravit, and L. Bos, "Classe cita ire paravit oras." Whatever difficulties may belong to this passage, we are firmly of opinion that they are not removed by the conjecture of Mr. W. Repedare is an old word, which we meet in the following line of Lucilius.

Sanctum ego a Metello Romam repedabam munere.

Nonius explains repedare by Pede iterare. Francis Dousa alters sanctum, into sane tum ego; and in the note he would read, repedato, conversoque ordine isto, for repudiato, &c. &c. in l. 8. B. 2d. of A. Gellius. To the forgoing passage, ex incerto Satirarum libro, we will add from the 26 of the Satires of Lucilius another instance,

redisse,

Ac repedasse, ut Romæ vitet gladiatoribus,