212 THE IMPROVEMENT OE TOE MIND. reasons for another paragraph, and scarcely ever submits to cor- rection ; and this utterly discourages the freedom that a true friend would take, in pointing out our mistakes. Such writers who are so full of themselves, may go on to admire their own incorrect performances, and expose their works and their follies to the world without pity*. Horace, in his Art of Poetry, talks admirably well on this subject : Quintilio si quid recitares, eorrige, sodes, Hoc, aiebat, et hoc ; meliús to posse negares, Ris terque expertum frustra ; delere jubebat, Et male tornatos incudi reddereversus. Si defendere delictum, gum vertere, malles ; Nulla ultra verbum, aut operam insurnebat inanem, Quinsine rivali teque et tuasolos ameres. Let good Quintilius all your lines revise, And lie will freely say, mend this and this ; ' Sir, 1 have often try'd, and try'd again, I'm sure I can't do better, 'tis in vain ;" Then blot out ev'ryword, or try once more, And file these ill-turn'd verseso'er and o'er : But if youseem in love wßh your own thought, Moreeager to defend, than mend, your fault, He says no more,; but lets the fop go on, And, rival -free, admire, his lovely own. CREECit. If you have not the advantage of friends to survey your writings, then read them over yourself, and all the way consider what will be the sentence and judgment of all the various cha- racters of mankind upon them : think what one of your own party would say, or what would be the sense of an adversary ; imagine what a curious or a malicious man, what a captious or an envious critic, what a vulgar or a learned reader would object, either to the matter, the manner, or the style : and be sure and think with yourself, what you yourself could say against your owuwriting, if you were of a different opinion, or a stranger to the writer : and by these means you will obtain some hints, whereby to correct and improve your own work and to guard it better against the censures of the public, as well as to render it more useful to that part of mankind for whom you chiefly design it. CHAP. VIII. Of writing and reading Controversies. SECT. I. Of writing Controversies. WHEN a person of good sense writes on any controverted Subject, he will generally bring the strongest arguments that are To cut off such chicanery, it may perhaps be the most expedient for a per- son consulted, on such au occasion, to note down on a distinct paper, with pro, per r,ferences the advised alterations, referring it to the author, to make such use of them as he, cot due deliberation, shall think fit.
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