credit I was enabled to sell very cheap, yet the heavy stock of books in sheets often disheartened me, so that I more than once resolved to leave off purchasing all such articles where the number was very large. But, somehow or other, a torrent of business suddenly poured in upon me on all sides, so that I very soon forgot my resolution of not making large purchases, and now find my account in firmly adhering to that method; and being universally known for making large purchases, most of the trade in town and country, and also authors of every description, are continually furnishing me with opportunities. In this branch of trade it is next to impossible for me to have any formidable rivals, as it requires an uncommon exertion, as well as very uncommon success, and that for many years together, to rise to any great degree of eminence in that particular line. This success must be attained too without the aid of novelty, which I found to be of very great service to me: and should any person begin on my plan and succeed extremely well, he could never supersede me, as I am still enlarging my business every year, and the more it is extended the cheaper I can afford to sell; so that though I may be pursued, I cannot be overtaken, except I should (as some others have done) be so infatuated and blinded by prosperity, as to think that the public would continue their favours, even though the plan of business were reversed. But as the first king of Bohemia kept his country shoes by him, to remind him from whence he was taken, I have put a motto on the doors of my carriage, constantly to remind me to what I am indebted for my prosperity, viz.

"SMALL PROFITS DO GREAT THINGS."

And I assure you, sir, that reflecting on the means by which I have been enabled to support a carriage adds not a little to the pleasure of riding in it. I believe I may, without being deemed censorious, assert, that there are some who ride in their carriages who can,

not reflect on the means by which they were acquired with an equal degree of satisfaction.

"If splendour charm not, yet avoid the scorn
That treads on lowly stations, think of some
Assiduous booby mounting o'er your head,
And thence with saucy grandeur looking down;
Think of (reflection's stab!) the pitying friend,
With shoulder shrugg'd, and sorry. Think that time
Has golden minutes, if discreetly seiz'd.
Riches and fame are industry's reward.
The nimble runner courses fortune down,

And then he banquets, for she feeds the bold."

DR SNEYD DAVIES TO F. CORNWALLIS.

I am, dear friend, yours.

LETTER XXXVIII.

"Those who would learning's glorious kingdom find,
The dear-bought treasure of the trading miud,
From many dangers must themselves acquit,
And more than Sylla and Carybdis meet.
Oh what an ocean must be voyaged o'er,
To gain a prospect of the shining store!
Resisting rocks oppose th' enquiring soul,
And adverse waves retard it as they roll.
The little knowledge now which man obtains,
From outward objects and from sense he gains;
He like a wretched slave must plod and sweat,
By day must toil, by night that toil repeat;
And yet, at last, what little fruit he gains-
A beggar's harvest glean'd with mighty pains!"

DEAR FRIEND,

POMFRET.

It has been asked, times innumerable, how I acquired any tolerable degree of knowledge, so as to enable me to form any ideas of the merits or demerits of books, or how I became sufficiently acquainted with the prices that books were commonly sold for, so as to

be able to buy and sell, particularly books in the learned and foreign languages. Many have thought that from the beginning I always kept shopmen to furnish me with instructions necessary to carry on my business; but you and all my old friends and acquaintances well know that not to have been the case; as for the first thirteen years after I became a bookseller I never had one shopman who knew anything of the worth of books, or how to write a single page of catalogue properly, much less to compile the whole. I always wrote them myself, so long as my health would permit: indeed I continued the practice for years after my health was much impaired by too constant an application to that and reading; and when I was at last obliged to give up writing them, I for several catalogues stood by and dictated to others; even to the present time I take some little part in their compilation; and as I ever did I still continue to fix the price to every book that is sold in my shop, except such articles as are both bought and sold again while I am out of town. I have now many assistants in my shop, who buy, sell, and in short transact the major part of my business. As to the little knowledge of literature I possess, it was acquired by dint of application. In the beginning I attached myself very closely to the study of divinity and moral philosophy, so that I became tolerably acquainted with all the points controverted between divines; after having read the great champions for Christianity, I next read the works of Toulmin, lord Herbert, Tindal, Chub, Morgan, Collins, Hammond, Woolston, Annet, Mandeville, Shaftesbury, D'Argens, Bolingbroke, Williams, Helvetius, Voltaire, and many other free-thinkers. I have also read most of our English poets, and the best translations of the Greek and Latin classics, and also of the Italian and French poets; nor did I omit to read history, voyages, travels, natural history, biography, &c.

"Survey the globe, each ruder realm explore,
From reason's faintest ray to Newton soar;
What different spheres to human bliss assign'd!
What slow gradations in the scale of mind.
Yet mark in each these mystic wonders wrought,
Oh mark the sleepless energies of thought!"

PLEASURES OF MEMORY.

At one time I had a strong inclination to learn French, but as soon as I was enabled to make out and abridge title-pages, so as to insert them right in my catalogues, I left off for what appeared to me more pleasing as well as more necessary pursuits; reflecting that as I began so late in life, and had probably but a very short period to live, (and I paid some regard to what Helvetius has asserted, viz. that "No man acquires any new ideas after he is forty-five years of age.") I had no time to bestow on the attainment of languages.

""Tis weak in any man to lavish pains,
And rifle and confound his brains."

I therefore contented myself with reading all the translations of the classics, and inserted the originals in my catalogues as well as I could; and when sometimes I happened to put the genitive or dative case instead of the nominative or accusative, my customers kindly considered this as a venial fault, which they readily pardoned, and bought the books notwithstanding.

As I have indefatigably used my best endeavours to acquire knowledge, I never thought I had the smallest reason to be ashamed on account of my deficiency, especially as I never made pretensions to erudition, or affected to possess what I knew I was deficient in. "A bookseller (says Mr Paterson in his Joineriana) is in general a bad judge of everything-but his stupidity shines most conspicuously in that particular branch of knowledge by which he is to get his

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bread." Dr Young's couplet you will therefore think equally applicable to many others as well as myself: "Unlearned men of books assume the care, As eunuchs are the guardians of the fair." LOVE OF FAME.

I had like to have forgot to inform you that I have also read most of our best plays, and am so fond of the theatre, that in the winter season I have often been at Drury lane or Covent garden four or five evenings in a week.

"

There cultivate my mind

With the soft thrillings of the tragic muse,
Divine Melpomene, sweet pity's nurse,
Queen of the stately step, and flowing pall.
Nor let Monimia mourn with streaming eyes,
Her joys incestuous, and polluted love:
Now let soft Juliet in the gaping tomb
Print the last kiss on her true Romeo's lips,
His lips yet reeking from the deadly draught.
Or Jaffier kneel for one forgiving look.
Nor seldom let the Moor on Desdemona
Pour the misguided threats of jealous rage.
By soft degrees the manly torrent steals
From my swoln eyes, and at a brother's woe
My big heart melts in sympathising tears.
What are the splendours of the gaudy court,
Its tinsel trappings, and its pageant pomps?
To me far happier seems the banish'd lord,
Amid Siberia's unrejoicing wilds."

WARTON.

Another great source of amusement as well as knowledge I have met with in reading almost all the best novels; by the best, I mean those written by Cervantes, Fielding, Smollet, Richardson, Miss Burney, Voltaire, Marmontel, Sterne, Le Sage, Goldsmith, Mackenzie, Dr Moore, Green, C. Smith, Gunning, Lee, Reeves, Lennox, Radcliffe, and some others, And I have often thought, with Fielding, that some of those publications have given us a more genuine