340 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, > . 
WAS in hopes, when I faw my * Re- 
_ ply to the anonymous Obfervations on 
my Letter to the Editor of the Edinburgh 
Review” fairly out of the hands of the 
piinter, that [had done with the contro- 
verfy into which I have been fo unhappily 
plunged ; and that I might now be at 
liberty to apply myfelf, without further 
interruption, to the cultivation of my fci- 
ence. But a new and unprecedented in- 
ftance of perfecution calls for a new mode 
of appeal ; and though I am far from 
wifhing that your refpectable Milcellany 
fhould be made a vehicle of mere perfonal 
conteft and recrimination; yet as, in 
every Civilized fociety, for every fpecies of 
injury, there fhould be fome means of re- 
dreis—or, if a&tual redrefs cannot be had, 
at leat fome organ through which the injur- 
ed may complain; I rely upon that libera- 
lity which literary men have, from you, fo 
frequently experienced, for an opportu-- 
nity of laying before the public the follow. 
ing ftatement of circtmftances ucder 
which the proprietors of the Edinburgh 
newipapers have been influenced to refule 
my advertifements. 
Many months ago, in the third number 
of the Edinburgh Keview, an attack was 
- made upon my 20ral charadier, ima pre- 
tended criticifm ofa volume of Poems and 
Memoirs, which had never been fubmit- 
ted to the cuffemary procefs of publication. 
In this pretended 1eview, afier loading 
me with every fceurrility, as a perfon 
wiole only talent confifted in ** mere for- 
wardnefs and audacity ;°° after comparing 
me to ** thofe females who delight the pub- © 
jic by their beauty in the ftreets,’’-and 
fiating as fa&, upen the authority of the 
‘< Memoir,’’ a variety of circumftances di- 
rectly the reverfe of thofe which the Me- 
moir contains, the Editor, (for it is now 
fully and completely afcertained that the 
article was written by the Editor himielf,) 
proceeds to infert, with the quetative dif- 
tinfiion of inverted commas, as if it had 
been copied from my book, 2 complete 
fentence of bombaftic and fophifticated 
feli-commendation, 29 two words of 
avhich are in any part of that book to be 
fuund iacompanytogether. Ifthereview 
had been written with any ability, I 
fhould urdoubtedly have found myfelf 
calied upon to defend myfelf immediately 
azainft fo g-ofs an atiack: but the ar- 
ticle in quefiion, and the two others into 
which I happened to look, exhibited fuch 
imperfe& acquaintance, net only with the 
principles of criticiim, but with the fim- 
Letter from Mr. Thelwall, 
[May 1, 
pleft elements of grammar and: conftrue- 
tion, that Teafily periuaded myfelf that 
fuch calumny might be negleéted without 
injury ; ard that the only anfwer to which 
it was entitled, was to fulfil my infention 
(which had been already announced,) of 
vifiting Edinburgh at the clofeof the year, 
and give the gead people of that city an 
Opportunity. of judging for tnemfelves, 
whether I were in reality the kind o! be- 
ing my calumniators had reprefented.— 
My vifit, however, foon occaiioned me to 
difcover, that, how deficient feever my 
enemies might be in talent and in gram- 
mar, there were other particulars in which 
they were fufficiently formidable : - that 
the Edinburgh reviewers were in reality a 
confederacy of the mo/t turbulent and pre- 
fuming young men of that very profeilion 
(the faculty of advocates,) who, time im- 
memorial, had enjoyed the prerogative of 
distating to the city of Edimburgh in 
matters of tafté acd public amulement ; 
a prerogative which, upon the preieni oc- 
cafion, they were by ne means difpoted to, 
relinquifh. They tried every expedient, 
tieretore, to prejudice the public mind 
againft me, and openly planted themfelves 
in the lecture-room, with a party of theix 
confcderates, to interrupt ‘me with the - 
moft degrading infults, aad laugh down a 
courle of lettureg which had already re- 
ceived the fanction and approbation of the 
fcientific part of ths community through- 
outall the towns and populous neighbour, 
hoods of the worchern hal of Engiand ; 
and which has fince been honoured with 
unprecedentid countenance in the liberal 
and enlightened city of Glafgow, and 
with the refpe€tful attention of the literary 
few in the other towns of Scotland that [ 
have vifited. This circumftance produced 
my ‘* Letter to Mr. Jefirey,”’ (the editor - 
of the Review,) in the compofition of 
which I was impeded ‘* by the hourly in- 
terruptions, infults, and indignities, with 
which the wicked indultry of unmanly. 
enemies contrived to aflail me.’ ‘ Hav. 
ing, by the treachery.ef my agent,’ got 
poifefiion of the firft part of my manu- 
{cript, and being ** fuficiently apprized of 
the narure of my intended publication, 
they contrived, by thé terrors of their legal 
profefiion, to chafe me from printer tg 
prinier, and from bookfeller to bookieller, 
with threats of indictment and profecu- 
tion,” (Profecutton and indiiment! far 
detefing ibe falfe quotations and ungram- 
matical ignorance of reviewers 11.1) « till 
I attualiy vegan to defpair -of all poffibi- 
lity of either printing or publifhing’ in 
Euinburgh.” At lait, however, my pam- 
: f pilet 
