Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 2.djvu/95

Rh time be very unwilling to offend your modesty; but chiefly, I should celebrate your liberality towards men of great parts and small fortunes, and give you broad hints, that I mean myself. And I was just going on, in the usual method, to peruse a hundred or two of dedications, and transcribe an abstract to be applied to your lordship; but I was diverted by a certain accident: for, upon the covers of these papers, I casually observed written in large letters the two following words, DETUR DIGNISSIMO; which, for aught I knew, might contain some important meaning. But it unluckily fell out, that none of the authors I employ understood Latin; (though I have them often in pay to translate out of that language) I was therefore compelled to have recourse to the curate of our parish, who englished it thus, Let it be given to the worthiest: and his comment was, that the author meant his work should be dedicated to the sublimest genius of the age for wit, learning, judgment, eloquence, and wisdom. I called at a poet's chamber (who works for my shop) in an alley hard by, showed him the translation, and desired his opinion, who it was that the author could mean: he told me, after some consideration, that vanity was a thing he abhorred; but, by the description, he thought himself to be the person aimed at; and at the same time, he very kindly offered his own assistance gratis towards penning a dedication to himself. I desired him however to give a second guess; why then, said he, it must be I, or my lord Somers. From thence I went to several other wits of my acquaintance, with no small hazard and weariness to my person, from a prodigious number of dark, winding stairs; but found them all in the same