Encyclopedias and Scientific Dictionaries. 267 



tionary of Arts and Sciences, in three volumes folio, 

 by the Rev. Henry Temple Croker, and others. 

 This work, though, in many respects, worthy of 

 public patronage, attracted but little attention, 

 and gained but a small share of reputation. 



About the year 1773 was published, in Edin- 

 burgh, the Encyclopedia Britatinica, in three 

 volumes quarto, of which the principal editor was 

 Mr. Colin Mac Farquhar, assisted by a num- 

 ber of the learned men around him. A second 

 edition of the same work was completed in 1783, 

 enlarged to ten volumes quarto, executed chiefly 

 by the same persons who had compiled the former 

 edition. A third impression, still under the same 

 title, was undertaken in 1789, with the aid of a 

 number of new literary labourers, and completed 

 in 1797, in eighteen quarto volumes. This work 

 deserves to be highly commended on various ac- 

 counts. The friendly aspect which it bears, in gene- 

 ral, towards religion and good morals, is entitled to 

 much approbation. And though, on some subjects, 

 it is far from containing the same depth and extent 

 of scientific research with the French Encyclo^ 

 pedie, yet it presents a rich variety of knowledge, 

 and, in the general usefulness of its tendency, far 

 exceeds that celebrated performance. 



From the last edition of the Encyclopedia Bri- 

 iannica, an American impression has been given 

 by Mr. Thomas Dobson, a respectable printer and 

 bookseller of Philadelphia, who, with a degree of 

 zeal and enterprize then altogether unrivalled in 

 the United States, soon after the commencement of 

 the publication in Britain, announced his intention 

 of giving it to the American public through the 

 medium of his own press. His plan has been ex- 

 ecuted in a manner equally honourable to himself 

 and his patrons; and his edition, on account of 

 many valuable additions and corrections, deserves 



