The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Present State of Wit (1711), by John Gay

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Title: The Present State of Wit (1711)
In A Letter To A Friend In The Country

Author: John Gay

Release Date: January 27, 2005 [EBook #14800]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRESENT STATE OF WIT (1711) ***

Produced by David Starner, Linda Cantoni, and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.

Series One:

_Essays on Wit_

No. 3

John Gay, _The Present State of Wit_ (1711)

With an Introduction by

Donald F. Bond

and

a Bibliographical Note

and

Excerpts from

_The English Theophrastus: or the Manners of the Age_ (1702)

With an Introduction by

W. Earl Britton

The Augustan Reprint Society

May, 1947

_Price_: 75c

GENERAL EDITORS: _Richard C. Boys_, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor;
_Edward N. Hooker_, _H.T. Swedenberg, Jr._, University of California,
Los Angeles 24, California.

Membership in the Augustan Reprint Society entitles the subscriber to
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Address subscriptions and communications to the Augustan Reprint
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EDITORIAL ADVISORS: _Louis I. Bredvold_, University of Michigan; _James
L. Clifford_, Columbia University; _Benjamin Boyce_, University of
Nebraska; _Cleanth Brooks_, Louisiana State University; _Arthur
Friedman_, University of Chicago; _James R. Sutherland_, Queen Mary
College, University of London; _Emmett L. Avery_, State College of
Washington; _Samuel Monk_, Southwestern University.

Lithoprinted from Author's Typescript

EDWARDS BROTHERS, INC.

_Lithoprinters_

ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN

1947

THE

Present State

OF

WIT,

IN A

LETTER

TO A

Friend in the Country.

_LONDON_ Printed in the Year, MDCCXI

(Price 3 d.)

INTRODUCTION

Gay's concern in his survey of _The Present State of Wit_ is with the
productions of wit which were circulating among the coffee-houses of
1711, specifically the large numbers of periodical essays which were
perhaps the most distinctive kind of "wit" pro