A LETTER, &c. a SIR, Short time since a friend of yours, and one of A the most distinguished poets of the present day, informed me that there had appeared, in the Morning Chronicle, an extract from your Specimens of British Poets, entitled, “ CAMPBELL's Answer “ to Bowles." I have since read, with much pleasure, the work from which the extract was taken; and I beg to return you my thanks, for the kind manner with which my name is introduced, though you profess to differ from me, and state at large the grounds of that difference, on a point of criticism. The criticism of mine, which you have discussed, is that which appears in the last volume of the last edition of Pope's Works, entitled, “ On 6 the Poetical Character of Pope.” B As the opinion pronounced by the editor of the Morning Chronicle will probably be the opinion of all who read, without much reflection, not my criticism, but your representation of it; I am bound, in justice to myself, to state the grounds of my proposition clearly; to meet the arguments you have brought against it, manfully but respectfully; and to make the public (at least that part of the public which may be interested in such a discussion) a judge between us! I feel it the more incumbent on me to do this, knowing the deserved popularity of your name, and the impression which your representation of my arguments must make on the public; though I must confess, it does appear to me that you could , I do not think that any thing, Sir, you have advanced, at all shakes the propositions I have laid down; and, moreover, I do not doubt I shall be able to prove that you have misconceived my meaning ; ill supported your own arguments ; confounded what I had distinguished; and even 'given me grounds to think you had replied to propositions which you never read, or, at least, of which you could have read only the first sentence, omitting that which was integrally and essentially connected with it. In an article in the Edinburgh Review, the same mis-statement was made, and the same course |