Remarks on Dr. Johnson's Life, and Critical Observations on the Works of Mr Gray.

84pp. 8vo. Large uncut copy, stitched as issued; outer pages & fore-edges dusted, some sl. chipping to edges. Erratum corrected in a contemporary hand. ESTC T46762. First edition. Johnson's dismissive criticisms of Gray's Odes were published ten years after the poet's death, pronouncing them 'glittering accumulations of ungraceful ornaments: they strike, rather than please; the images are magnified by affectation; the language laboured into harshness'. Tindal attempts to redress the balance, writing that 'it hath been of late fashionable to decry precedent, and to combat its influence on government and laws: human authority hath not been treated with more respect in religious controversy; proceedings which perhaps do not meet the entire approbation of Dr Johnson. the author of these remarks hath ventured forth, not in defiance of that deservedly great name, but in defence of another, to which the decisions of the critic are in general thought injurious, and by some not well founded'. p.5. …