130 Remarks on the Titles and Pretensions of Reviews. [Sept. 1, 
any thing else I know of; and as the 
Monthly Review was reputed to be the 
work of some of their parsons, it gave 
birth, notwithstanding its merit, to ~ 
‘The British Critic, 1.e. the Welsh Cri- 
tic; this being in opposition tothe Month- 
ly Review, by clergymen of the esta- 
blishment, the authors, from vanity, 
thought it fit to inform the public, that 
they were Wels critics, or in other words, 
those divines of the regular church, 
who emigrated from the Principality, 
to undertake the office of recruiting ser- 
jeants for the church of England. 
Others affirm, that they stole tlie title 
from the British blacking-ball, and other 
noted inventions. There cannot be the 
smallest doubt, but, that the policy and 
measures of that renowned Machiavel 
Archbishop Laud, and the conduct of a 
review upon such principles as confine 
ats circulation to the strictly orthodox, 
must be constantly in the way of making 
mew converts to the church of England, 
and that, if a book of merit be written 
by persons of opposite tenets to the wri- 
ters, the most conscientious clergymen 
and gentlemen of the nicest honour, 
may coolly affirm not untruths, but 
opposite opinions to the evidence of 
facts, &c. &c.; and that without any de- 
ception of the public.—I wish them well 
with Sir I. B. Burgess’s port. Good 
feasting there! 
Then followed the English Review. 
This was taken from the English 
Dictionary, &c. and was intended to 
inform the public, that the authors did 
not meddle with the learned languages, 
which were out of their sphere: but that 
they confined themselves to spelling 
books, and works in the vernacular lan- 
guage, such as the public might believe 
that they did understand. 
The London Review was another ephe- 
meron, and the title meant to say, that 
the authors were cocknies, or that it was 
adapted to the habits and knowledge of 
that double-u-veifying race: the writers 
not meddling with agriculture, gardening, 
horsemanship, or works of that kind, un- 
intelligible within the sound of Bow-bells. 
Next arose the Anti-jacobin Review. 
‘This title at first made me scratch my 
head, it was so riddleish. At last I got 
it. Jack of the bin is only another term 
for Jack of the box, an. ingenious toy 
among the children, where you draw out 
‘a lid and up rises Jack. The title there- 
«fore meant to say, that whenever, the 
democrat Jack of the Bin jumped up, the 
cunning anti Jack of the Bin, got up and 
knocked him down, 
Soon after came the Dnperial Review, 
by a society of gentlemen; surely it ought 
to have been by a society of emperors / 
Bat no, the world would have thought, 
they had got Buonaparte among them, 
and they might have been taken up. 
The fact is however not yet known to 
the public, concerning this appellation. 
Imperials, then, are those packing cases, 
which are fastened to the roof of a tra- 
velling carriage; and the authors being 
trunk-makers, descendants of the old one, 
also a reviewer of play-house celebrity, 
they assumed that title of gentiemen, 
which courtesy deals out so kindly to all 
ranks, I call upon the imperial review- 
ers to prove that they have actually loun- 
ged in Bond-street. 
Next comes the Eclectic Review, hor- 
ribly cacophonous. First philosophers, 
then heretics, says Dr. Mosheim, were 
the said eclectics: now they are review- 
ers; quere, if Philosopho-keretics, as 
many devout and well-meaning elderly 
ladies take most reviewers to be. ‘Their’ 
place is to ecleet the beauties of literature, 
and very amiable and feeling gentlemen 
they are, in this process of eclecting, 
abounding in interjections and apostro- 
phes of delight. There is this singula- 
rity in these reviewers, that though they 
puff, they never puff (and blow besides) 
with great fatigue. 
What the Oxford Review meant, I 
know not; that town, like many others, 
only sending members to parliament ; 
and universities now a days, not meaning 
a place of learning but only U,N, I, 
V,E,R,S,1, T, Y. “We write reviews! 
(says a gentleman commoner) ;—no, no, 
we ride to reviews. What can the nan 
mean by writing reviews?” 
Last comes the leviathan, the Edin- 
burgh Review, properly seasoned it is to 
be hoped with musk, before its arrival 
in town, from that dreadful region, 
whose only privies and vocative cases 
beth carent. To the honour of modern 
Scotland, books, &c. do not now per- 
form quarantine. ‘This review appears 
but once a quarter; the idea being taken 
from the quarter-sessions, which it re- 
sembles in the trial of culprits, and is 
absolutely, in serious truth, for greater 
terror, printed bya Constable! The po- 
lice of literature belongs to them, and it 
is said, that Macmanus, Townshend, and 
various surgeons and butchers, write in 
this review; but their profession unfor- 
tunately precludes the impulse of amiable 
feelings. The Bow-street review is cer- 
tainlya more appropriate title, than tbe 
Edinburgh Review; Scotchmen being 
habitually, 
