EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.
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him. It was his happiness to pass the greater part of his life in an intimacy with men of the prigfatest abilities, whose names will be revered by posterity ; by most of whom he was loved as much for the virtues of his heart, as he was admired on account of his writings."
After a life spent in the exercise of every social duty, he fell a martyr to the gout, at the house of bis friend, Mr. Spence,* at Durham, and was interred in the abbey church-yard, where his tomb is thus inscribed :
If yon have any mpect
for unconunoQ Indostry and Merit,
regard this place,
In which are depoaited the Remalna erf
2tr. RoBiaT Dooslzy :
who. as an Anthor, raised himself
modi above what coold have been expected
from one In his rank of life,
and without a learned education ;
and irho, as a Man, was scarce
exceeded by any in Integrity of Heart,
and Puity of Manners and Conversation.
He left this Ufe for a better, Septal, I7t4,
in the Cist year of liis age.
Robert Dodsleyhad quitted business in 1759; but his brother James, who had been his partner, continued the business, and persevered in acquiring wealth by the most honourable literary con- nexions until his death, in 1797.
1764. During the exile of Mr. Wilkes, there ieems to have been a constant correspondence between him and Mr. Almon, the bookseller, of London. He was residing at Paris, when lord Hertford, the ambassador, gave a grand dinner to all the subjects of Great Britain, omitting only Mr. Wilkes. He sent Almon an account of this
- onduct, and also a ludicrous paragraph relative
- o the rev. Mr. Trail, a Scotchman, importing,
Jiat though lord Hertfort was our ambassador, ind David Hume his secretary, yet the rev. Mr. Frail administered to the English subjects in pirituals. This paragraph was printed in the London Evening Pott. The earl of Maichmont Doved the house of lords against Mr, Meres, the irinter, and the house fined him £100 for it Several other printers were afterwards fined every ession for some years, £100 each time they irinted a lord's name. Lord Marchmont began his business. It might, and it ought to have leen a question in the house of commons,whether he house of lords had a right to levy money in bis manner ? But there are very few real friends
• In a malignant epistte from Cmil, the bookseller, to ope, in 1737, Mr. Spence is Introduced as an eariy patron roodaley :
Tia Idnd indeed a Ufery Mute to aid. Who scribbles (arces to augment bis trade : Where Yoa and Spence and Olover drive the nail. The devil's in it U the plot should faU.
he Rev. Joseph Spence, M.A. was fellow of New college, •xford. In 1743 he was made professor of modern history, nd presented to the rectory of Oreat Horwood, in uckinghamsbire, and in 1754 prebcodary of Durham. He Tote An Eaaap on Pove'a Odpuep, and a work entitled olj/metU, or an enquiry concerning the agreement be- veen the works of the Roman poets and the remains of le ancient artists, being an attempt to Ulustzate them om each other. Tills ornament of polite literature was nf oitimatcly drowned, in a canal in his garden at Byfleet , I Sorry, Augnet 28, l7(Se.
to the liberty of the press. Men sometimes talk of it as an inestimable privilege; but their friendship lasts no longer than the occasion. A man had better make his son a tinker, than a printer or bookseller. The laws of tin he can understand, but the law of libels is unwritten, uncertain, and undefinable. It is one thing to day, and another to-morrow. No man can tell what it is.[1] It is sometimes what the king or queen pleases; sometimes what the minister pleases; and sometimes what the attorney-general pleases.—Memoirs of John Almon, Bookseller, of Piccadilly, London.
1764, Sept. 20. Died, Charles Hitch, Esq., a bookseller of considerable eminence in Paternoster-row, and in the commission of the peace for the county of Essex; was master of the stationers' company, in 1758. He was buried at Eastham. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Mr. Arthur Bettesworth, bookseller. She died in 1777.
1765, Jan. 23. Mr. Williams, bookseller, in Fleet-street, sentenced by the court of king's bench to pay a fine of £100, to be imprisoned six montns in that court, to stand once in the pillory in Old Palace-yard, and to give security m the sum of £1,000 for his good behaviour for seven years, for publishing the North Briton," No. 45, in sheets. Mr. Kearsley, for republishing the same in volumes, was discharged on his own recognizances. Mr. Kearsley had a promise made to him by the earls of Halifax and Egremont, that if he would give up the author he should not be prosecuted. On the 14th of February, Mr. Williams was taken in a hackney coach. No. 45, from the king's bench prison, to stand, pursuant to the above sentence, in the pillory, in New Palace-yard, Westminster. Opposite to the pillory were erected four ladders, with cords running from one ladder to another, on which were hung a jack-boot, an axe, and a bonnet; the last with a label, Scotch bonnet: the boot and bonnet after remaining some time, were burnt, the top of the boot having been previously chopped off. A gentleman with a purple purse, ornamented with ribbons of an orange colour, began a collection in favour of Mr. Williams, by putting a guinea in himself, by which means Mr. Williams obtained above £200; one gentleman gave fifty guineas. Mr. Williams held a sprig of laurel all the time. The same coach carried him back, and the master of it refused to take any hire.
1765. Died, Mr. Edward Dodd, bookseller, in Paternoster-row.
1765. Nicholas Hasselbocht, a pupil of Sauer of Germantown, introduced the art of printing into the city of Baltimore, of Baltimore county, in Maryland, North America. He was well supplied with types for printing, both in the German and English languages; and is said to have meditated the publication of a German version of the bible; a design which, however,
was never carried into execution.
- ↑ Anything, which any man, at any time, for any reason, chooses to be offended with, is a libel.—Bentham.
