This Letter complains of the cruelty of the assertion, that Sir William Draper had, for promotion to himself, sold the companions of his victory at Manilla; offers proofs to shew, that he had not; breaks out into some angry, but feeble abuse of JUNIUS; summons him to declare his name; and menaces, against him a soldier's vengeance, if he should ever become personally known to Sir William. It is written, not inelegantly, but without much art; without strength of reasoning, or force of invective. SIR, 14. September, 1769. HAVING accidentally seen a republication of your Letters, wherein you have been pleased to assert, that I had sold the companions of my success; I am again obliged to declare the said assertion to be a most infamous and malicious falsehood; and I again call upon you to stand forth, avow yourself, and prove the charge. If you can make it out to the satisfaction of any one man in the kingdom, I will be content to be thought the worst man in it; if you do not, what must the nation think of you? Party has nothing to do in this affair: you have made a personal attack upon my honour, defamed me by a most vile calumny, which might possibly have sunk into oblivion, had not such uncommon pains been taken to renew and perpetuate this scandal, chiefly because it has been told in good language, for I give you full credit for your elegant diction, well-turned periods, and Attic wit; but wit is oftentimes false, though Attic wit.] This is an egregious misnomer. No two things of the same species, can be more remarkably unlike to each other, than the it may appear brilliant; which is exactly the case of your whole performance. But, Sir, I am obliged in the most serious manner to accuse you of being guilty of falsities. You have said the thing that is not. To support your story, you have recourse to the following irresistible argument: "You sold the companions of your victory, because when the 16th regiment was given to you, you was silent. The conclusion is inevitable." I believe, that such deep and acute reasoning could only come from such an extraordinary writer as JUNIUS. But, unfortunately for you, the premises, as well as the conclusion, are absolutely false. Many applications have been made to the ministry wit of JUNIUS, and that which both the ancients and well-informed moderns have distinguished by the appellation of Attic wit. If I mistake not, we possess the most genuine examples of the true Attic wit in the conversations of Socrates, related by Xenophon, and in the imitations of the Comedies of Menander by Terence. A delicate propriety, that commits no rudeness, pollutes itself with no grossness, hazards none of those experiments in which the distinction between true and false wit seem to become uncertain; a coldness and ease that seem to aim at nothing striking; a simplicity that wears the air of expressing the first thoughts that can arise to an inartificial mind, in the most natural, unstudied language; an archness that, under all this disguise, misses no occasion of presenting the happiest combinations of ideas, which, though never before associated, yet refuse not to meet together; faultless purity of phrase, propriety in the use of words, correctness of syntax; and an absence of every thing, whether in style or in thought, that might strike the ear as affected or unfamiliar; are the characteristic qualities of Attic wit. Very different are the qualities of the wit of JUNIUS. Addison, Cumberland, La Fontaine-were it not for his occasional grossness-the playful Gresset, and sometimes the elder George Coleman, have succeeded better in that which is called Attic wit, than almost any others of the moderns. on the subject of the Manilla Ransom, since the time of my being Colonel of that regiment. As I have for some years quitted London, I was obliged to have recourse to the Honourable Colonel Monson and Sir Samuel Cornish to negotiate for me; in the last autumn, I personally delivered a memorial to the Earl of Shelburne, at his seat in Wiltshire. As you have told us of your importance, that you are a person of rank and fortune, and above a common bribe, you may in all probability be not unknown to his lordship, who can satisfy you of the truth of what I say. But I shall now take the liberty, Sir, to seize your battery, and turn it against yourself. If your puerile and tinsel logic could carry the least weight or conviction with it, how must you stand affected by the inevitable conclusion, as you are pleased to term it? According to JUNIUS, silence is guilt. In many of the public papers, you have been called, in the most direct and offensive terms, a liar and a coward. When did you reply to these foul accusations? You have been quite silent, quite chop-fallen: therefore, because you was silent, the nation has a right to pronounce you to be both a liar and a coward, from your own argument. But, Sir, I will give you fair-play; will afford you an opportunity to wipe off the first appellation, by desiring the proofs of your charge against me. Produce them! To wipe off the last, Colonel Monson and Sir Samuel Cornish, &c.] These were the other officers who had commanded, together with Sir William Draper, in the expedition against Manilla. produce yourself. People cannot bear any longer your Lion's skin, and the despicable imposture of the old Roman name which you have affected. For the future, assume the name of some modern* bravo and dark assassin let your appellation have some affinity to your practice. But if I must perish, JUNIUS, let me perish in the face of day; be for once a generous and open enemy. I allow, that Gothic appeals to cold iron, are no better proofs of a man's honesty and veracity, than hot iron and burning ploughshares are of female chastity: but a soldier's honour is as delicate as a woman's; it must not be suspected; you have dared to throw more than a suspicion upon People cannot bear any longer your Lion's skin, &c.] This is exceedingly like to the eloquence of a school-boy. For the future, assume the name, &c.] Sir William Draper is unfortunate in throwing out a contemptuous phrase of censure against the character of BRUTUS. He confounds the idea of JUNIUS BRUTUS, the author only of the expulsion of the Tarquins, with that of MARCUS BRUTUS, one of the conspirators against Julius Cesar. For such a blunder, a pretender to classical learning is not to be easily pardoned. Besides, according to the principles of public morality and expediency, which then generally prevailed, the assassination of Cæsar was, at least to Brutus, a virtue, not a crime. Yet, on the other hand, by those principles of rectitude and political expediency, which have have been since clearly established by all the force of moral demonstration, it is a crime, and one of the most heinous too, that can be committed against society, to ab even a tyrant to the heart. It bespeaks error or wickedness in JUNIUS, even to put the question, as he here does in a note. Was Brutus an ancient bravo and dark assassin? or, does Sir W. D. think it criminal to stab a tyrant to the heart? I allow, that Gothic appeals, &c.] The trifling of the collegian, forgetting nature and vigorous reason, but hunting solicitously after Aigurative ornaments. |