Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 16.djvu/347



HE Bishop of St. Asaph's famous Preface having been so much buffeted of late between advocates and opposers, I had a curiosity to inspect some of his other works. I sent to the booksellers in Dock Lane, and Little Britain, who returned me several of the sermons which belonged to that preface; among others, I took notice of that upon the death of the duke of Gloucester, which had a little preface of its own, and was omitted, upon mature deliberation, when those sermons were gathered up into a volume; though, considering the bulk, it could hardly be spared. It was a great masterpiece of art in this admirable author, to write such a sermon, as, by help of a preface, would pass for a tory discourse in one reign, and by omitting that preface, would denominate him a whig in another: thus, by changing the position, the picture represents either the pope or the devil, the cardinal or the fool. I confess, it was malicious in me, and what few others would have done, to rescue those sermons out of their dust and oblivion; without which, if the author had so pleased, they might have passed for new preached, as well as new printed: neither would the former preface have risen up in judgment to confound the latter. But, Rh