ΤΟ STEPHEN POYNTZ DENNING, ESQ. DULWICH. DEAR DENNING, HAVING now completed my Notes to REYNOLDS'S DISCOURSES, I have great pleasure in dedicating to you the fruits of my labour. I am aware that I might have found many with more sounding titles, and also some who would have appreciated the work with equal favour; but I am sure that I could have found none more deserving, on account of a long and faithful friendship. In bringing these admirable Discourses before the public in a new shape, it has been my care to disturb as little as possible the majesty of the stream from its source to its absorption in the great bosom of Nature; I have merely made a few openings in the banks, for the purpose of letting out some of its waters into clear shallows in which the younger fry may recreate and strengthen themselves. Nor, in my anxiety for the student, has the general reader been overlooked, as it is only by making the subject known, that we can ever hope for patronage to the higher branches of the Art. The example of Burke and the daily intercourse with Dr. Johnson, could not fail to infuse into these Discourses a considerable portion of eloquence and morality: to have attempted in my Notes anything of the first Α |