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to describe and to celebrate: but I may be allowed to observe, that one of the few additions inserted in this collection will be particularly welcome to every reader of sensibility, as an eulogy on that attractive quality so gracefully visible in all the writings of Cowper.

Permit me to close this imperfect tribute of my respect, by saying, it is my deep sense of those important services, for which the afflicted Poet was indebted to the kindness of LORD SPENCER, that impels me to the liberty I am now taking, of thus publicly declaring myself,

Your Lordship's

Highly obliged and

Very faithful servant,

JOHN JOHNSON,

PREFACE.

It is incumbent on me to apprize the Reader, that by far the greater part of the Poems, to which I have now the honour to introduce him, have been already published by Mr. Hayley. That endeared friend of the deceased Poet having enriched his copious and faithful Life of Him with a large collection of his minor Pieces, soon after his death, and having since given to the world a distinct Edition of his Translations from the Latin and Italian verses of Milton, every thing seemed accomplished that the merits and memory of a Poet so justly popular as Cowper, appeared to require. But of late years a fresh and detached Collection of all his Poems being wished for by his friends, I was flattered by their request, that I would present them to the public as the Editor of his third poetical volume.

Having accepted this honourable invitation, my first care was to assemble as many of the editions of the two former Volumes as I could possibly meet with, that nothing might be admitted into their projected companion, which the public

already possessed in them. With one slight exception I believe I secured that desirable point. My next employment was to make such a copious but careful selection from the unpublished Poetry. of Cowper, which I happily possessed, and which I had only imparted to a few friends, as while it gratified his admirers, might in no instance detract from his poetical reputation. I should tremble for the hazard to which my partiality to the compositions of my beloved Relation exposed me in discharging this part of my office, if I did not hope to find in the reader a fondness of the same kind; and if I were not assured that a careless or slovenly habit, in the production of his verses, has never been imputed to the Author of the Task.

The materials of the Volume being thus provided, the ascertaining their dates was my remaining concern. In a few instances, I found them affixed to the Poems by their author; a few more I collected from intimations in his Letters: but in several the difficulty of discovering them pressed upon myself. This was especially the case with the very interesting additional Poem addressed by Cowper to an unknown Lady on reading " the Prayer for Indifference." Of the existence of these verses I had not even heard, till I was called on to superintend the Volume, in which they make their first public appearance. I am inclined to believe that during the ten years of my domestic

intercourse with the poet, they had never occurred to his recollection. He appears to have imparted them only to his highly valued and affectionate relative, the Reverend Martin Madan, brother of the late Bishop of Peterborough, from whose Common-place Book they were transcribed by his daughter, and kindly communicated to me. There being nothing in Mr. Madan's copy of these verses, from which their date could be inferred, it was only by a minute comparison of the poem itself with the various local and mental circumstances, which his Life exhibits, that I was enabled to discover the year of their production. The labour attending this and other instances of research, in which I have been obliged to engage for the purpose of ascertaining the dates of several minor poems, will be best understood by those who are practically acquainted with similar investigations. After all, there are some of which no diligence of mine could develope the exact time; but with the greater number I trust their proper order of succession has been carefully secured to them.

From this brief account of the Volume before the reader, I pass on to the Memoir of its Author. Had I not already embarked in a preparation of the Poems, when I was requested to prefix a sketch of the poet's life, an unaffected distrust of my ability to achieve it would have precluded me

from making such an attempt; but a peculiar interest in these relics of Cowper having been wrought into my feelings, while I was arranging them for the Press, I was unwilling to shrink from a proposed task, by which I might hope to contribute, in some degree, to the expanding renown of my revered relation. I therefore ventured to advance on the only path in the wide field of Biography, in which my humble steps could accompany Cowper, namely that, in which I could simply

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"retrace

(As in a map the voyager his course)

"The windings of his way thro' many years.”

Into this path it might seem presumptuous in me to invite those whom my kind and constant friend Mr. Hayley has made intimately acquainted with Cowper by his extensive and just Biography; but to such readers as happen not to have perused his more copious Work, I may venture to recommend the following " Map of Cowper's Life," as possessing one of its prime characteristics, namely Fidelity of Delineation.

BEDFORD, April 1815.

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