128 



heart and mind which produced them, and the exemplary life 

 by which he illustrated them. Some of his writings were not 

 the less perused from having been burnt publicly, by order of 

 the ministry in 1712. These were the preface to his Sermons 

 on the Deaths of Mary, of the Duke of Gloucester, of William, 

 and on the accession of Queen Anne. This mode of censuring 

 an author is, perhaps, of all others the most ill-advised, for as 

 Dr. Johnson has well expressed it " fire is a conclusive but 

 not convincing argument ; it will certainly destroy any book, 

 but it refutes none" ; and if it is intended by the conflagration 

 to warn persons from perusing it, Goethe gives his testimony of 

 the contrary tendency. Having seen a book publicly commit- 

 ted to the flames, he says *' We never rested until we had pro- 

 cured a copy of it, and we were not the only persons who 

 longed for the forbidden fruit. Had the author tried to disco- 

 ver a good method of promoting the circulation of his work, he 

 could not have lit upon a better expedient."* Fleetwood 

 requires our notice from being the author of. 



Curiosities of Nature and Art in Husbandry and Gardening. 

 London. 1707. 8vo. 



His works were published in a collected form in one volume, 

 folio. 1737.— 



His Sermons on the Relative Duties were published in 1716. 

 With his Portrait. 8vo. 



JOHN MORTIMER, was a Merchant on Tower Hill, 

 London, in 1693. He was fond of Agricultural pursuits, and in 

 that year became possessed of an Estate in Essex, Filiols, or, as 

 it is now called, Toppingo Hall, He was descended from a 

 branch, settled in Somersetshire, of the ancient family of Mor- 

 timer. He had three wives, and his second Son, Cromwell 



• Memoir?, v. i. p. 99. 



