tion. Though the Name and Tenour of the Work is borrowed, it may, perhaps, be allowed some Claim to local and characteristic Originality. The most serious Subject attached to our Nature is, indeed, presented with a Degree of familiar Pleasantry which is not common to it:-But, in this Particular, the Example of the Painters who first suggested and propagated the Idea has been followed, and no other Vivacity has been displayed in these Pages, than has been found on the Walls of Edifices dedicated to Religion; and was thus represented in the Cloisters of St. Paul's, before the sacrilegious Pride of the Protector Somerset caused the Dilapidation of that Appendage to the Metropolitan Church of the Kingdom. But I am not afraid of being accused by reflecting Minds, of having introduced an unbecoming Levity into the following Pages: for that Writer may surely claim the Approbation of the grave and the good, who familiarises the Mind with Death, by connecting it, in any way, with the various Situations and Circumstances of Life.

THE AUTHOR

TIME & DEATH their Thoughts impart On Works of Learning & of Art.

TIME AND DEATH

AN INTRODUCTORY DIALOGUE

DEATH

'FATHER TIME! 'tis well we are met:

I am dispos'd to fume and fret,
To see that mortals have the power
Thus to prolong Life's fleeting hour;
To see them thus display the art
That blunts my unavailing dart ;
And, though the fatal arrow's sped,
To make men live when they are dead :
While you with placid eye look on,
Nor blame the mischief that is done:
Nay, suffer the records to last
When many an age is gone and past.
You, in your motions, are so slow,
With such a measur'd step you go,

VOL. I.-A