| Citation |
MG-A(G.748.009
4 May 1748:41 (158)
Mr. Green, I really would not have troubled you with any
answer to the letter in No. 153 of your Gazette, sign'd
Philo-Kalus, had I not been afraid that some people would
have thought I had writ it myself; that writer having (I
believe undesignedly) paid me a very high compliment, by
alledging that verses, entirely my own, are stolen from Mr.
Pope. I take this opportunity, therefore, to let you know,
that a certain reverend gentleman, noted for his gravity, as
I am well inform'd, in a public company, threatened to
expose the verses, much in the same manner as is performed
in the aforesaid elegant epistle.
Seeing then his reverence has endeavoured to point me out
(with much good manners) as a plagiary, he cannot take it
amiss to be pointed out himself as an original--author: For
this subject; which, for aught I know, may be sung to the
tune of the hundred and nineteenth psalm. The poetical
epistle, I am told, was read to a congregation after divine
service, and condemn'd by the parson for the sake of an ill
placed compliment, following verses he likewise thought a
proper entertainment after devotion, I submit the music
proper for them to the clerk; and I hope Stentor will not
spare his lungs upon the occasion, tho' Hudibrass says,
They may be either said or sung.
I know very well that the Satyr would alarm all the dunces
in the province; and if some one or other of them had not
shewn their resentment, I should have thought it had not
touch'd them so nearly as was intended. But I would not
have them imagine that I design to answer any more of them,
otherwise than by a contemptuous silence. I am, &c. Philo-
Musaeus.
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