Ce ee 
430 Mifcellaneous Remarks. 
time elapfed fince its difeovery. It were 
greatly to be wifhed, now that military 
waxeties are happily filent, that all phz/ofo- 
phic nations had a Cometary Gazette Extra- 
ordinary. For want of this, I, as an in- 
dividual, would take it asa particular fa- 
vour if you would obligeme by fach com- 
munications, whenever they reach. Co- 
mets are often loft for want of this early 
notice. Yours, &c. CHboTrEn, 
—=a 
Tb the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, 
OU will, perhaps, find a corner at 
the end of your volume for the fol- 
lowing mifcellaneous remarks, &c. fome of 
which, no doubt, required an earlier com- 
munication. 
The Tranflation of De Sales’s intereft- 
ing Sketch of the Progrefs of Literature, 
given in vol. VIII. appears, in many re- 
fpects, to have been too haftily made, or 
it would not have been fo pregnant with 
miftakes, which the Engliffi reader would 
be inclined to afcribe to the author :—for 
example, in p. 706, col. 2, where men- 
tion is made of Antonio’s Bibliotheca Hif- 
panica, (falfely printed Hi/pana,) there is 
a paragraph abfolutely unintelligible; and 
it frould feem as if fomething had been 
omitted between the words Hygmus and 
Augufius, or perhaps after the word mmy- 
thaiogy. In p. 707, col. 1, }. 37, read 
Lycofthenes. In the fame column mention 
is made of the fademy of Eticnne 5 but 
who had ever before heard of fuch an aca- 
demy ? The fact 1s, that Charles Etienne, 
or Stephens, the printer, publifhed the 
Geographical, Hiftorical, and Poetical 
DiStionary referred to, not in 1720, for 
the firft time, as carelefsly ftated, but 
about 1550°; which was amplified and re- 
publifhed by Nicholas Lloyd, in 1670, 
wot in 1760, and feveral times afterwards. 
his work feems to have been undeferv- 
edly forgotten. Surely thefe errors are 
not to be placed tothe account of a Mem. 
ber of the National'Inftitute ! 
Vol. VIII. p. 790. Shakefpeare’s imi- 
tation of Seneca, if it really be one, proves 
nothing as to his learning, for there was 
an L£ugli/b tranflation of that author in 
1581. 
Vol. XIII. p. 9, col. 2. It is an error 
to fuppofe that Shakefpeare invented the 
word juj?, for it was ufed before he was 
born. L : 
Vol. XIV. p. 335. The bird here call- 
ed the zize-killer, is very well known in 
this country under the names of the fhrike, 
fhree!, butcher-bird, murdering-birc, 
wierangle or wariangle, and nine-murder, 
[Jan. 1, 
See Tyrwhitt’s Chauc. Cant. Tales, IV. 
272. Pennant’s Brit. Zocl. I. 213, and 
the Monthly Magazine, IX. 472. 
Vol. XIV. p. 377. Hannibal will find 
the work on Carthage, by Hendreich, after 
which he enquires, in the Britifh Mufeun, 
in a better edition, viz. Amft. 1705, 8°. 
More relating to the marine-chart men- 
tioned in p. 263, 302, may be found in 
Pinkerton’s Geography, II. 522, which, 
it is to be hoped, will have been feen by 
Morelli, hefore the publication of his in~ 
tended work. 2; ;* 
oth Dec. 1802. 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, ‘ 
Have ‘read with pleafure a- letter m 
your laft Magazine, figned Orthophilus, 
in which are many juft and difcriminating 
remarks, tending to recommend the virtue 
of candour, a virtue, which, I am forry 
to fay, is not one the fpirit of the times 
feems particularly difpofed to cherifh. I 
perfectly agree with the ingenious auther, 
in reprobating the ufe of loofe, undefined, 
and opprobrious appellations, but I own 
it does not appear to me, that thofe he 
has fpecified do fairly come under fuch a 
cenfuree To begin with the term redel. 
Its etymological fenfe the writer has 
fhewn to be even fhort of the meaning to 
which fo much -odium is attached, as it 
rather implies a generous refiftance to 
an infulting conqueror, than oppofition 
to lawful rule. Whence then does the 
odium arife? Certainly from the nature 
cf things; from the idea, and not the 
name. ‘The mere appellation conveys no 
reproach; but the character muft necefla- 
rily, in a regulated community, be, more 
or lefs, branded with ‘opprobrium. To 
rebel may be defined, atting againft the 
eftablifhed authority under which we live. 
Itis to fart, like a wandering planet from 
its {phere, out of the order of civil fociety ; 
to violate the rules by which others hold 
themfelves bound ; to oppofe, by lawlefs 
force, the force which is fanétioned by 
law ; to bring difcord and blood where 
unity and peace ought to reign. All this 
may be right ; it may be even heroic ; but 
it is alfo right, that the prefumption 
fhould be againft fuch a conduct. ¢* Suc- 
cefs turns rebellion into revolution ;”” very 
true; but till it bas fo changed its nature, 
it isnot revolution, but rebellion ; and its 
nature is changed, becaufe, wheh the re- 
volution is completed, another authority, 
another order of things, becomes eftablith- 
ed, which then, in its turn, has on its fide 
the fences of law, and order and pyblic 
opinion 
