JHQ2. gleanings of literature, 107 



GLEANINGS OF LITERATURE. 



Sir, To the Editor of the Bee. 



Although the authors of the theory of Moral Sentiments, 

 and the Rambler, have contributed to bring into discredit 

 every kind of miscellaneous and periodical publication. 

 I remain perfectly convinced of their utility, on account of 

 their tendency to diffuse knowledge among the middling and 

 poorer ranks of society, and to attract the notice of id- 

 lers and triflers. I have therefore from the beginning been 

 a friend to your undertaking, which, without descending to 

 foment the frivolity and lubricity of the times, applies it- 

 self judiciously to that love of novelty and variety, which 

 distinguifhes cur modern v/orld from the plodding world 

 of our fathers. 



With a view to contribute somewhat to the pasture of 

 the Bee, 1 have thought that it might not be amiis to set 

 an example of forming an article in your miscellany, com- 

 posed of pertinent selections from the epistolary correspon- 

 dence of persons of learning and taste, which have not 

 been publiflied ; thereby preserving m.any curious, useful 

 and agreeable particulars, which might otherwise be final- 

 ly lost, either from the inadequacy of the whole pieces 

 in which they are contained, to appear before the public, 

 or the difficulty of rendering them in that ihape profitable 

 either to the editor or to the reader. 



Many important facts, many vivacious and agreeable re- 

 marks, many beautiful and prolific thoughts,, are to be found 

 scattered amid the rubbiih of trivial correspondence j and 

 one cannot but wifti that they fhould be picked up and' 

 preserved. 



■ Every person of literary eminence, indeed almost every 

 person of taste, sentiment, and social inclination, must, in 



