Heyne's Virgil in four volumes octavo, published by Messrs. Payne and Co., for which Porson, it appears, had undertaken to correct the press. This duty had at first been assumed, as Kidd tells us*, by "a very learned and perspicacious scholar," but, after the third or fourth sheet of the index, with which the printers began, was finished, "the office devolved" upon Porson. In regard to this work he has been accused of great negligence; the author of the "Short Account of Porson" says that Steevens detected four hundred and eighty errors in it; Gilbert Wakefield told Foxt that the same critic had discovered nine hundred; and Steevens himself, if Kidd is not mistaken, was heard to say in an auction-room that he "had reckoned up six hundred errors, more or less." One of the errors was gravibus for gruibus. All these faults were said to have arisen from Porson's perfunctory discharge of his duty. But the truth seems to be that Porson, whether from disgust at the drudgery, or from thinking he might trust the ordinary reader for the press, suffered the correction of the sheets to go altogether out of his hands. According to a writer in the "Museum Criticum," the blame, on Porson's declaration, lay wholly with the booksellers, who, after they had obtained permission to use his name, paid, he said, no attention to his corrections. It was while these rumours of Porson's carelessness were afloat, that Parr threw out the following remarks in his "Answer to Combe's Statement." "Mr. Porson, the republisher of Heyne's Virgil, is a giant in literature, * Tracts, p. lxv. P. 395. † Corresp. with Fox, p. 66. 1793.] PARR'S PRAISE OF PORSON. 117 a prodigy in intellect, a critic whose mighty achievements leave imitation panting at a distance behind them, and whose stupendous powers strike down all the restless and aspiring suggestions of rivalry into silent admiration and passive awe. He that excels in great things, so as not to be himself excelled, shall readily have pardon from me, if he errs in little matters better adapted to little minds. But I should expect to see the indignant shades of Bentley, Hemsterhuis, and Valckenaer rise from their grave, and rescue their illustrious successor from the grasp of his persecutors, if any attempt were made to immolate him on the altars of dulness and avarice for his sins of omission, or his sins of commission, as a corrector of the press. Enough, and more than enough, have I heard of his little oversights, in the hum of those busy inspectors who peep and pry after one class of defects only, in the prattle of finical collectors, and the cavils of unlearned and half-learned gossips. But I know that spots of this kind are lost in the splendour of this great man's excellences. I know that his character towers far above the reach of such puny objectors. I think that his claims to public veneration are too vast to be measured by their short and crooked rules, too massy to be lifted by their feeble efforts, and even too sacred to be touched by their unhallowed hands." * The conclusion of this passage is stupendously grandiose, but there were doubtless a large number of literary pretenders, at that time as there are at all times, who well deserved censure or ridicule for their * Parr's Works, vol. iii. p. 518. attention to one class of errors only, and who might justly be noted as finical and half-learned gossips. All such small-minded critics are ready in every age to assail, with their puny remarks, the fame of any great man, as the Lilliputians shot their tiny arrows at the huge body of Gulliver. Porson had perhaps been negligent, but he was not to be sunk into nothingness because he had not corrected the press with the diligence of a Cruden. If we may believe Beloe, indeed, the mistakes are chiefly confined to the notes, as those in the text do not exceed twenty in all the four volumes.* A brief notice was prefixed, headed "Corrector Lectori," in which Porson stated that he had undertaken, not the duty of editing the work, but merely that of correcting the press; that he had added nothing of his own, except a few conjectures of the learned with which Heyne seemed not to have met; that though he had been anxious that the edition should be as free from errors as possible, he feared that more would be found than his readers or himself would approve; and that a short preface had been received from Heyne, which the printers had carefully laid by, intending to prefix it to the work when completed, but which, when they sought for it, they were nowhere able to find. 66 In January and April 1794, Porson published in the Monthly Review" a critique on Payne Knight's " Analytical Essay on the Greek Alphabet." Knight's book contains much that is fanciful in regard to the gradual formation of the Greek alphabet, and especially with regard to the digamma, of which he allowed himself a * Sexagenarian, vol. i. p. 222. 1794.] CRITIQUE ON PAYNE KNIGHT. 119 more liberal use than any preceding critic had ventured to make. He also proposes a system of metrical quantity, founded chiefly on the practice of Homer, whose works, he says, "are composed of materials so pure and simple, and executed with such precision and regularity, that we can still trace the minutest touches of the master's hand, and ascertain, with almost mathematical certainty, the principles upon which he wrought." On this passage Porson very justly observes that "Homer's poetry, however exalted and embellished by learning and genius, must partake of that rudeness and simplicity which are always incident to the infancy of language and of society;" and intimates that "the champions for Homer, who attribute to him all possible perfection, who find in him not only all other arts and sciences, but also a philosophical grammar, and a philosophical system of metre," attribute to him much more than they can substantiate, except to their own imaginations. The character of the book Porson sums up as follows:-"The author is a man of reading, learning, and inquiry. His taste and knowledge seem to predominate rather in the antiquarian's province, as it is generally called; but, when he traces the history of language and the etymology of words, he gives too much scope to conjecture and imagination. In the execution of his plan he unnecessarily contracts his foundation by building only on the groundwork of Homer; and, while he denies that particular changes of sounds and words can take place except in one certain prescribed mode, he allows too little to the changes, caprices, conveniences, &c., which produce the fluctuations. We have, however, perused his essay generally with entertainment, sometimes with instruc tion and approbation; and Mr. Knight may deserve, at least, this praise, that the errors in his research are sometimes more to the purpose than the successful inquiries of others." The book contains a remark on the faculties and attainments requisite for verbal criticism, which Porson was very glad to quote, as a support to his own pursuits, at the head of his article: "I cannot but think that the judgment of the public, upon the respective merits of the different classes of critics, is peculiarly partial and unjust. "Those among them who assume the office of pointing out the beauties, and detecting the faults, of literary composition, are placed with the orator and the historian in the highest ranks; while those who undertake the more laborious task of washing away the rust and canker of time, and bringing back those forms and colours which are the subject of criticism to their original purity and brightness, are degraded, with the index-maker and antiquary, among the pioneers of literature, whose business it is to clear the way for those who are capable of more splendid and honourable enterprises. "But, nevertheless, if we examine the effects produced by these two classes of critics, we shall find that the first have been of no use whatever, and that the last have rendered the most important services to mankind. All persons of taste and understanding know, from their own feelings, when to approve and disapprove, and therefore stand in no need of instruction from the critic; and as for those who are destitute of such faculties, they can never be taught to use them; for no one can be taught to exert faculties which he does not possess. Every dunce may indeed be taught to repeat the jargon of criticism, which of all jargons is the worst, as it joins the tedious formality of methodical reasoning to the trite frivolity of common-place observation. But, whatever may be the taste and discernment of a reader, or the genius and ability of a writer, neither the one nor the other can appear |