t love Roman inscriptions in lieu of our own
language,[1] though, if anywhere, proper in an University; neither can I
approve writing what the Romans themselves would not understand. What
does it avail to give a Latin tail to a Guildhall? Though the words are
used by moderns, would _major_ convey to Cicero the idea of a _mayor_?
_Architectus_, I believe, is the right word; but I doubt whether
_veteris jam perantiquae_ is classic for a dilapidated building--but do
not depend on me; consult some better judges.

[Footnote 1: Walpole certainly here shows himself superior in judgement
to Johnson, who, when Burke, Reynolds, and others, in a "round-robin,"
requested that the epitaph on Goldsmith, which was entrusted to him to
draw up, should be in English instead of Latin, refused, with the absurd
expression that "he would never be guilty of defacing Westminster Abbey
with an English inscription."]

Though I am glad of the late _revolution_,[1] a word for which I have
great reverence, I shall certainly not dispute with you thereon. I abhor
exultation. If the change produces peace, I shall make a bonfire in my
heart. Personal interest I have none; you and I shall certainly never
profit by the politics to which we are attached. The "Archaeologic
Epistle" I admire exceedingly, though I am sorry it attacks Mr.
Bryant,[2] whom I love and respect. The Dean is so absurd an oaf, that
he deserves to be ridiculed. Is anything more hyperbolic than his
preferences of Rowley to Homer, Shakspeare, and Milton? Whether Rowley
or Chatterton was the author, are the poems in any degree comparable to
those authors? is not a ridiculous author an object of ridicule? I do
not even guess at your meaning in your conclusive paragraph on that
subject: Dictionary-writer I suppose alludes to Johnson; but surely you
do not equal the compiler of a dictionary to a genuine poet? Is a
brickmaker on a level with Mr. Essex? Nor can I hold that exquisite wit
and satire are Billingsgate; if they were, Milles and Johnson would be
able to write an answer to the "Epistle." I do as little guess whom you
mean that got a pension by Toryism: if Johnson too, he got a pension for
having abused pensioners, and yet took one himself, which was
contemptible enough. Still less know I who preferred opposition to
principles, which is not a very common case; whoever it was, as Pope
says,

The way he took was strangely round about.

[Footnote 1: In March Lord North resigned