my misconduct has been more the refult of thoughtleffness and imprudence, than of a depraved difpofition. And this being the case, I doubt not but my actions will be viewed by the world in a less unfavourable light than they have hitherto been.

As Shakespeare fays in the motto I have prefixed to my "Apology," "that the web of our life is "of a mingled yarn, good and ill together;" that "our virtues would be proud if our faults whipt "them not; and our crimes would despair, if they "were not cherished by our virtues ;" I hope this confideration will weigh in my favour with the liberal and unprejudiced. And though I may not ftand totally acquitted; though my faults may overbalance my virtues; I truft it will foften the feverity of the public cenfure, and restore me, in fome measure to their good opinion.

Should the relation of my errors and their confequences prove a document to my own fex; warn them to fhun the paths I have pursued; and inspire them with a greater degree of prudence and reflection than I have been poffeffed of; I fhall have employed my time to fome good purpose.-The certain effects of an inattention to a prudential fyftem, are poverty, diftrefs, anxiety, and every attendant evil, as I have moft feverely experienced.

May

May the world (particularly my readers) have the fame indulgence and compaffion for me, which I have unremittingly fhown to others! And may Sterne's recording Angel drop the tear of pity, and obliterate my faults!

G. A. B.

H 3

THE following letter was advertised for publi

cation in the month of October 1767; but Mr. Calcraft, by an unwarantable and unmanly exertion of power, (as related in my "Apology") obliged me to fupprefs it. Upon reading it over, in order to lay it before the public, I find that the refentment by which I was agitated, at the time I wrote it, made me exprefs myself in terms fuited to the injuries I had recently received, and which to an unprejudiced mind, may appear too much tinctured with paffion. This would induce me to let it lie in a state of oblivion, as it has done for many years, were not its publication abfolutely needful to elucidate the foregoing letters.

Most of the facts, it is true, have been there introduced, as they could not have been omitted without breaking the chain of the narrative; yet as they are given in the following pages more explicitly, and tend particularly to an investigation of the ill treatment I received from Mr. Calcraft,

the propriety of annexing the Letter, will, I flatter myfelf, be apparent.

To many it may seem illiberal to let it appear after his death; but when it is confidered, that the publication is fo effentially necessary for the vindication of my own conduct, and to clear me of many cruel afperfions which have been propogated to my difcredit, I hope it will not, upon due reflection, be deemed fo.

In the ftate it was intended at firft to be published, many of the letters I had received from him, were interspersed, for the purpose of refreshing his memory. But as that is no longer needful, and they would by no means prove entertaining, as might be judged from that given in the "Apology," I have expunged them. I have alfo greatly curtailed the Letter itself, leaving out the most exceptionable parts. And as a poem, which was given me upon the occafion, has fince made its appearance, it will be unneceffary to annex that.

Irritated by repeated injuries, and actuated by refentment at the time I wrote them, the following fheets were originally compofed, with an impetuofity that might render them incorrect, and deficient in that regularity which may be neceffary to make them fit for publick infpection; and for this, I truft, a proper allowance will be made,

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