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Table of Contents
  • Audiet Pugnas vitio Parentum / Rara Juventus. Hor: Young men—the few who are left after the crimes of their fathers—will hear of battles. [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Bonae leges ex malis moribus proveniunt: Good laws spring from bad habits [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Malos tueri haud tutum: Save a thief from the gallows and he’ll cut your throat [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Quis enim virtutem amplectitur ipsam Praemia si tollas?: For who embraces virtue herself, if you take away the reward? [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Adjecere bonae paulo plus artis Athenae: Kind Athens Added a Little More Skill [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Mea nec Falernae Temperant Vites, neque Formiani Pocula Colles: Neither Falernian vines nor Formian hills mellow my cups [School and College Latin Exercises]
  • Scheme for the Classes of a Grammar School
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  • Preface to the 1738 Volume of the Gentleman’s Magazine
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  • To the Reader. [Gentleman’s Magazine]
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  • The Jests of Hierocles
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  • Dedication for Robert James's Medicinal Dictionary
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  • Dedication and Preface to An Introduction to the Game of Draughts (1756)
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  • Reflections on the Present State of Literature
  • TO THE PUBLIC
  • Review of John Armstrong, The History of the Island of Minorca (1756)
  • Review of Stephen White, Collateral Bee-Boxes (1756)
  • Review of Thomas Birch, The History of the Royal Society, vols. 1–2 (1756)
  • Review of Arthur Murphy, The Gray’s-Inn Journal, 2 vols. (1756)
  • Review of Joseph Warton, An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope (1756)
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  • Review of Alexander Russell, The Natural History of Aleppo (1756)
  • Review of Four Letters from Newton to Bentley (1756)
  • Review of William Borlase, Observations on the Islands of Scilly (1756)
  • Review of Archibald Bower, Affidavit (1756); John Douglas, Six Letters and Review of Mr. Bower’s Answer (1757); and John Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared (1757)
  • Review of Francis Home, Experiments on Bleaching (1756)
  • Review of Stephen Hales, An Account of a Useful Discovery (1756)
  • Review of Charles Lucas, An Essay on Waters (1756)
  • Review of Robert Keith, A Large New Catalogue of the Bishops (1756)
  • Review of Patrick Browne, The Civil and Natural History of Jamaica (1756)
  • Review of Charles Parkin, An Impartial Account of the Invasion under William Duke of Normandy (1756)
  • Review of A Scheme for Preventing a Further Increase of the National Debt (1756)
  • Review of Conferences and Treaties (1756)
  • Review of Philosophical Transactions (1756)
  • Review of Richard Lovett, The Subtil Medium Prov’d (1756)
  • Review of Benjamin Hoadley and Benjamin Wilson, Observations on a Series of Electrical Experiments (1756)
  • Review of Johann Georg Keyssler, Travels (1756)
  • Review of Elizabeth Harrison, Miscellanies (1756)
  • Review of Jonas Hanway, A Journal of Eight Days Journey (1757)
  • Review of Jonas Hanway, A Journal of Eight Days Journey, Second Edition (1757)
  • Reply to a Letter from Jonas Hanway in the Gazetteer (1757)
  • Review of Samuel Bever, The Cadet (1756)
  • Review of the Test and Con-Test (1756)
  • Review of William Whitehead, Elegies (1757)
  • Review of A Letter to a Gentleman in the Country on the Death of Admiral Byng (1757)
  • Preliminary Discourse in the London Chronicle
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  • "Dedication to John Lindsay, Evangelical History of Our Lord Jesus Christ Harmonized
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  • Of the Duty of a Journalist (1758)
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  • Preface to J. Elmer, Tables of Weights and Prices
  • From The Italian Library Containing an Account of the Lives and Works of the most valuable authors of Italy (1757)
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  • Preface to A Catalogue of the Pictures, Sculptures, Models, Drawings, Prints, &c Exhibited by the Society of Artists of Great-Britain at the Great Room in Spring Gardens Charing Cross May the 17th Anno 1762 Being the Third year of their Exhibition (1762)
  • Review of William Tytler, Historical and Critical Enquiry into the Evidence Produced … Against Mary Queen of Scots
  • Contributions to John Kennedy, A Complete System of Astronomical Chronology, Unfolding the Scriptures
  • Proposals and Advertisement [for Anna Williams, Miscellanies in Prose and Verse] (1762)
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  • Dedication to Jerusalem Delivered (1763)
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  • Dedication to Cyrus: A Tragedy (1768)
  • Review of Oliver Goldsmith, The Traveller
  • Dedication for Thomas Percy, Reliques of Ancient English Poetry
  • 23 Sept. 1765 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 1–4 Oct. 1765. [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 20 Nov. 1765. [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 19 Dec. 1765. [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 24 December 1765 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 3 March 1768 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 8 March 1768 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 14 March 1768 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 23 March 1768 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 23 March 1768 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 13 March 1769 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 1 October 1774 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 4 October 1774 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 13 October 1774 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 4 September 1780 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 4 September 1780 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • 5 Sept. 1780 [Political Writing for Henry Thrale]
  • Dedication for George Adams, A Treatise Describing and Explaining the Construction and Use of New Celestial and Terrestrial Globes
  • Dedication to John Gwynn, London and Westminster Improved
  • Preface to Alexander MacBean, A Dictionary of Ancient Geography
  • Meditation on a Pudding
  • Hereford Infirmary Appeal
  • Dedication for A General History of Music (1776)
  • From A General History of Music, Vol. II (1782)
  • Dedication to An Account of the Musical Performance . . . in Commemoration of Handel (1785)
  • Advertisement for the Spectator
  • Dedication to Zachary Pearce, A Commentary, with Notes, on the Four Evangelists and the Acts of the Apostles
  • Letter of 16 May 1777
  • The Petition of the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Commons of the City of London, in Common Council Assembled, Friday 6 June 1777
  • Letter to Lord Bathurst, the Lord Chancellor, 8 June 1777
  • Letter to William Murray, First Earl of Mansfield, Lord Chief Justice, Wednesday, 11 June 1777
  • Petition of Mrs. Mary Dodd to the Queen
  • Dodd’s Letter to the King, Sunday, 22 June 1777
  • Petition of William Dodd to the King, Monday, 23 June 1777
  • Dodd’s Last Solemn Declaration, Wednesday, 25 June 1777
  • Johnson’s Observations on the Propriety of Pardoning William Dodd, Wednesday, 25 June 1777
  • Introduction and Conclusion to Occasional Papers (1777)
  • Proposal for Printing William Shaw, An Analysis of the Scotch Celtic Language
  • Dedication to Sir Joshua Reynolds, Seven Discourses
  • Preface to Thomas Maurice, Oedipus Tyrannus
  • The Case of Collier v. Flint
  • Translation of Sallust, De Bello Catilinario
  • General Rules of the Essex Head Club
  • On the Character and Duty of an Academick
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Review of Archibald Bower, Affidavit (1756); John Douglas, Six Letters and Review of Mr. Bower’s Answer (1757); and John Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared (1757)
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Samuel Johnson: Johnson on Demand

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Review of Archibald Bower, Affidavit (1756); John Douglas, Six Letters and Review of Mr. Bower’s Answer (1757); and John Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared (1757)1
[Editorial Introduction]
As Geoffrey Holt’s article in ODNB shows, these four books are part of a longer controversy in which Douglas, who had earlier come to SJ’s attention


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when he revealed the forgeries of William Lauder (see p. 361 above) showed that Bower was a plagiarist, a liar, and a cheat. Bower posed as a Roman Catholic convert to Protestantism when issuing proposals for his History of the Popes (1747), a work dedicated to George II and eventually filling seven volumes (1748–66). In 1754, when the third volume came out, Rev. Alban Butler demonstrated that much of Bower’s work in the first two volumes was plagiarized and that he had discovered a packet of incriminating letters to a Jesuit priest showing that he was a fraud. When Bower argued that the letters were forged, Douglas entered the case. In SJ’s circle, Garrick and Birch had been friendly with Bower, but became convinced of the fraud and notified Lord Lyttelton, one of Bower’s powerful supporters. The publisher of the Literary Magazine, William Faden, was also involved (see p. 325, n. 2 below). Bower’s Affidavit in Answer to the False Accusation Brought Against Him by Papists (1756) provoked Douglas’s Six Letters from A——d B——r to Father Sheldon, provincial of the Jesuits in England; illustrating with several remarkable facts tending to ascertain the authenticity of the said letters and the true character of the writer (1756). In response to Douglas, Bower wrote Mr. Bower’s Answer to a Scurrilous Pamphlet, Intituled, Six Letters from A——d B——r to Father Sheldon (1757). On the same day (6 January) Douglas published Bower and Tillemont Compared: or, The First Volume of the pretended original and Protestant History of the Popes, shewn to be chiefly a traslation [sic] from a Popish one; with Some farther Particulars, relating to the True Character and Conduct of the Translator.
[Reviews]
The controversy about the character of Mr. Archibald Bower author of the History of the Popes has appeared of so much importance, that even in this time of war and dispute it has shared, or more than shared the attention of the public, we shall therefore give a faithful abstract of the charge and the defence, and if any further proof shall be hereafter offered on either side, shall exhibit it likewise in our future pamphlets.
In the year 1747, Mr. Bower published proposals for a history of the Popes, in the title of which he gives himself many titles to which his claim has been publicly questioned, and not yet proved; among others that of counsellor, which, in the stile of foreign courts, implies judge of the inquisition at Macerata, is apparently false, no Jesuit being ever an inquisitor.1
To give his history credit, he declares, that he was employed in the Vatican to write in defence of the Pope’s supremacy,


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but that the further he advanced in the work, the more he was convinced that the supremacy of the Pope was not to be defended, and that he then abjured in his heart the religion of Rome.2
It is asserted that after this mental abjuration he was still so well contented with popery that he took his last vows among the Jesuits, and in the account which multitudes are said to have heard from him, he has been accustomed to ascribe his conversion to the sight of the cruelties practiced by the inquisition at Macerata.
Little doubt, however, was made by the public of the reality of our historian’s conversion, till in 1750, Mr. Barron a dissenting teacher published the following narrative, as taken from Mr. Bower’s own mouth. . . .3
This account Mr. B——r publicly disowned in two advertisments, in the first of which he declares it “in almost every particular absolutely false,” in the second “very imperfect and false in many circumstances,” promising when he had compleated his second volume to publish his own story. This promise, however, he has never performed. Mr. Barron charged him with denying at one time what he asserted at another.
Mr. Bower had been near twenty years in England, when he published his proposals, in which he declares that from the time when he discovered the falshood of the Pope’s claim to supremacy, he resolved as soon as he could come into a country where truth might be uttered without danger, to write an history to undeceive the “many Protestants” who are not sufficiently guarded against the papal emissaries. Yet now there is reason to suspect that for many years after this conversion


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and resolution, Mr. Bower continued to correspond with the Jesuits, and to act in all respects as a Papist.
Sir Henry Bedingfield of Norfolk, produced last February six letters, said to be written by Mr. Bower to father Sheldon, the provincial of the Jesuits, who entered upon his office in 1745, and at the end of the year having a warrant issued against him, took the name of Elliot Brown, to whom these letters are directed.
Copies of the Letters in Question, delivered to Mr. Bower by Mr. Havers, attested by a Notary.4
If these letters are genuine, there is no doubt, but that this man who on the 25th of March, 1747, commenced so zealous a champion for the reformation, was on the 14th of March, 1747, a very zealous Papist, and a Jesuit unreservedly submissive to his superiors.
These letters have been compared with other pieces written by him, and the handwriting appears the same. Mr. Bower, however, has denied them upon oath. This is said to prove nothing, and indeed cannot prove much when the question concerning which the oath is taken, is only whether the deponent is a man to be credited.
Whether from the facts mentioned in them they can be proved to be counterfeit is then to be examined. Mr. Bower fixes this part of his defence upon the mention of the woman and the child, and has indeed urged this objection with great force.
As to the woman and the child, it is, like the rest, a most impudent fiction. Mr. Bower calls on the Authors of these letters to produce the one or the other, or any person that ever knewa the one or the other. A woman of fortune, of family, seduced, injured in her person and fortune, she and her


Page 324

innocent child unjustly turned off, afterwards taken again, must have some name, some friends, some relations, some acquaintance, some residence.—They have diligently been sought for, and have no where been found.—The reason is plain—they never existed but in the forged and fictitious letters in question, and the wicked hearts of the authors.5
To this it is answered, that the letters had been published as the letters of an honest man; to have proved them false would be to prove them spurious, but that it can be no matter of wonder that the letters of a liar should contain lies.
It is not however to be concealed, that Sir Henry Bedingfield seems to act in a manner not quite conformable to that ingenuity and openness, which a question in which a moral character is involved requires. He for some time refused upon many pretences to exhibit the originals, “they were” at one time “not in his possession”; at another “they were in the hands of his lawyer, who was out of town,” or “in a Bureau of which he had lost the key,” and at last he has not told how these letters came into his hands, and what he personally knows of this dark transaction.6
In the pamphlet by which Mr. Bower is attacked, though written in general with great strength and perspicuity, there is sometimes mention of a distinguished “Clergyman, a noble lord that wears a ribbon, of a lady of quality of the first distinction,”7 and such other nameless evidences as can very little corroborate an assertion. Surely, in a case like this, it is better either to tell all or nothing, either to name or not to mention. Mr. Bower has likewise injur’d his own cause, by a postscript to his affidavits, in which he imputes this attack on his character to a “Protestant Papist,” and to the desire of the Romanists to obstruct his continuation of the history of the popes.8
The transaction referred to in the letters is this. After


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having lived in England from the year 1726 in a course of libertinism, he was at last desirous of being readmitted among the Jesuits, he offered to put a sum of money into their hands, in consideration of an annuity, and accordingly between the 21st of August 1741, and the 6th of August 1743, he paid into the hands of Father Sherburn one thousand three hundred and fifty pounds, for which an annuity was to be paid him of 94 l. 10 s. secured by a bond, and commencing August 27, 1743.—He was then about the end of the year 1744 re-admitted into the order. After this it is supposed, that he had some reasons to wish himself released from his vows, and he contrived this story of the woman and her child to get back the money, but as appears with no success; he therefore about the year 1747 published his proposals, and on the 20th of June the same year the Jesuits paid him his money.
In evidence of this whole transaction are produced receipts given by Mr. Bower, for his annuity to father Hill, who transacted such affairs for the Jesuits, and entries in the books of Mr. Wright, a banker, who paid the annuity by Hill’s order to Mr. Bower.9
His re-admission into his order was attested by father Carteret the person who re-admitted him, and his conversion to popery is further attested by Mrs. Hoyles, “widow of Mr. Hoyles, a printer now living in Great Wild-street, Lincoln’s Inn-Fields . . . .”1
This relation is corroborated by the testimony of Mr. Faden, a man, whose character will not suffer him to be considered as an exceptionable witness. . . .2


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The evidence against him is concluded by a letter from Rome. . . .3
Thus we have laid before the public a summary of the charge against Mr. Bower, with the evidence on which it is founded, which those who shall consult the masterly pamphlet from which this extract was made, will find that we had no desire to aggravate; we hope Mr. Bower has some answer to make more cogent than his own testimony, but would remind him that silence is better, at least more modest than a weak plea.
Mr. Bower’s Account of the Inquisition at Macerata, and of his escape from Italy. (Taken from his own Mouth.)4
. . . This is the account given by the antagonist of Mr. Bower, as taken from Mr. Bower’s own mouth. Mr. Bower has at last published an account of his escape, in an Answer to a Scurrilous Pamphlet, &c. The narrative which he has printed is conformable enough, in the first part, to that which he is said to have given in conversation, the slight disagreements between them being, as Mr. Bower himself allows, only failures of memory, and geographical mistakes.
In the forgoing narrative the rewards offered by the inquisition are 300£. for his person alive, and 600£. for his head; in Mr. Bower’s, more probably, 800 crowns for his person, and 600 crowns for his head.5 In his own account there is no


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mention of his design to “travel on horseback through the Adriatic.”6 He tells nothing of the alarm spread through the canton of Bern.
The chief variation between the two relations begins where Mr. Bower quitted the boat at Strasburgh, the account which we have inserted having more omissions, and insertions, than could easily have happened by chance or forgetfulness. We shall therefore insert his own words.7
After the relation of his escape, Mr. Bower proceeds to deliver the series of his life from his arrival in England, of which we have given a very contracted epitome.
Mr. Bower, according to his own relation, came to England in July or August 1726, from that time begins the history of his Protestantism.
“I continued,” says he,8 “some time a Papist and a Jesuit, I had rejected the pope’s supremacy, but the other points of the controversy I had yet to study. I applied to Dr. Aspinwal,9 who had been likewise a Jesuit, and was by him introduced to Dr. Clark,1 with whom and with Dr. Bekley2 I had many conferences, and in about four months withdrew from the communion of Rome, and from that time have never been present at any office of the Popish religion.
“I was for six years a Protestant without any settled denomination, I then conformed to the Church of England.
“Dr. Aspinwal introduced me early to his acquaintance, and among others to Mr. Dalton of Cleveland-row now living.3 At the recommendation of Dr. Aspinwal and Dr. Clark, I was


Page 328

taken by Lord Aylmer to assist him in his studies.4 Lord Aylmer made enquiries without my knowledge, by his friends in Italy, after my character, and was so well satisfied, that by his means I became acquainted with all his relation, and among others with his niece, afterwards Mrs. Littleton.5
“In 1730, while I was yet with Lord Aylmer, I wrote the Historia Literaria, in which there will be found many passages sufficient to evince that the author was a Protestant.6
“In 1735, I undertook part of the Universal History, and continued employed in it to 1744;7 during which time I passed a year with Mr. Thomson of Cooley in Berkshire, as tutor to his son, and afterwards undertook, at lord Aylmer’s desire, the education of his two sons, of whom one is now living, a prebendary of Bristol.
“In 1747, and the following year, I corrected the whole Universal History in order to a new impression, and Mr. Millar would have engaged me to write the whole Modern History,8 but I declined the offer, that I might apply myself wholly to the History of the Popes.”
Having thus given the general history of his life. Mr. Bower proceeds to examine the particular facts alledged against him.
It has been objected that he calls himself “Counsellor of the Inquisition,” the meaning and even the existence of this title is doubted, and a “Jesuit Inquisitor” is said not to be known or admitted in Italy.9


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Mr. Bower answers, that in every court of Inquisition there are twelve counsellors; four divines, four canonists, four civilians; there is indeed no “Jesuit Inquisitor,” nor did he claim that title, he was not an Inquisitor, but “Counsellor of the Inquisition.” The letter indeed from Montecuccoli, the Inquisitor, and others from Douay and Rome, which would have proved this, are all destroyed, and those to whom they were shewn all dead. But Mr. Aylmer has often heard Lord Aylmer speak of that letter.1
He is said to have contradicted in the public papers the account of his escape, given by himself in conversation, and it is affirmed that a lady in Cumberland has a narrative taken from his own mouth, which agrees in all essential parts with that which he disavowed when published by Mr. Barron.2
To this it is answered, that finding Mr. Barron’s account full of mistakes Mr. Bower first charged it as “false in almost every circumstance,” and afterwards when he was cooler, as “false in many circumstances,” as where it is said that he embarked on the Rhine at Bern, instead of Basil; that he found himself described in the Swiss contons, instead of the pope’s dominions; that advertisements for apprehending him were fixed on the gates at Calais; that immediately on his arrival at Dover he received a letter from the Inquisitor general, which he did not receive till six months after, and then only for Montecuccoli the Inquisitor at Macerata.3
He affirms, “that he has a transcript of the narrative of the Cumberland Lady, and that none of these absurdities can be found in it.”4
Mr. Hill was sent by the Archbishop of Canterbury to know of Mr. Bower why he contradictedb Mr. Barron’s account,


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and came away with the “lowest opinion” of Mr. Bower’s “sincerity.”
Mr. Bower answers, “that he would have told Mr. Hill his reasons; but that he would not hear them, and said, ‘that does not concern me.’ That narrative was taken by William Duncombe, Esq;5 from the mouth of a ‘considerable person,’ to whom Mr. Bower told it, and that, tho’ he charges the faults only to want of memory, yet he still maintains that it is very faulty.”6
It is objected, “that Mr. Bower attempted at Macerata to debauch a nun of the family of Buonacorsi, that Bower being the lady’s spiritual father, the affair belonged to the inquisition, and was brought before them; that according to the account of Mr. Lunardi, Bower denounced himself, and advised her to do the same, but the inquisition proceeding to take further information, his superiors removed him to Perugia, where he was informed that a capiatur7 was issued out, and fled.”8
He replies, “that not being the lady’s confessor in ordinary, he could not be her spiritual father; that he only supplied for a fortnight the office of confessor to the nunnery; that lady Buonacorsi being a nun, he probably heard her confession, though he knew not when; for the Italian nuns confess in a dark room, with a grate and a curtain within it between them and the confessor, and seldom tell their names. That after some time he visited the nun Buonacorsi, having seen her with the abbess, but not often, and without any scandal.
“That the affair did not belong to the inquisition, unless some very particular circumstances had concurred; and that it is absurd that he should advise the lady to denounce herself, since her crime was not cognizable by the inquisition; that the secresy of the inquisitorial procedure makes any notice of a capiatur impossible; and that the whole account pretended to


Page 331

be received from Italy, and attested by these eminent Jesuits, is full of absurdities.” He adds “that he has advised young gentlemen who consulted him about their travels, to stop at Macerata which shewd no fear of these reports.”9
Mr. Bower then attempts to prove his right to the titles which he has assumed, and which his popish adversary had denied.
He declares, “that he never pretended to have brought any peculiar materials from the Vatican, and that the charge of spinning out his history for gain is groundless, since he no longer anticipates his pay by asking a subscription.”1
It is charged upon Mr. Bower, that according to his own declaration, he began to write at Rome “a history of the popes,” but that endeavouring to maintain their supremacy, he found it chimerical, and became a proselyte to the opinion that he had undertaken to confute, that from this time he was a Protestant in his heart, and yet after this he made his last tour among the Jesuits, and sat in the court of the inquisition.
Mr. Bower answers,
that being employed to defend the pope’s supremacy, he found it indefensible, and as soon as he could quitted the work; but that the supremacy is no article of faith or condition of communion; that he was not a Protestant by denying it any more than the Jansenists of France, and that he might make his last vows without any inconsistency.
Mr. Bower in a country where truth might be uttered without danger, and where nothing hindered him to make a public profession of his opinion, still kept up such an intimacy with the Jesuits as gives just reason for suspecting him as a disguised Papist.2
Mr. Bower answers, “That in five months after his arrival


Page 332

in England, he withdrew from the church of Rome, and as soon as he wrote at all, wrote against it. That he continued his acquaintance with the Jesuits as gentlemen and scholars to whom he had obligations, and that he never concealed this acquaintance from his Protestant friends. That the monks and secular clergy were more to be dreaded by him than the Jesuits, and that they attempted to carry him off by water at Greenwich in 1728, when he was saved by the Lord Aylmer, who often told the story.”3
He now comes to the six letters of which he still denies the authenticity, and promises in his next pamphlet to detect them of forgery; he then spends a few pages in denying some of the stories told of his connections with Papists, or levity of behaviour. At a house in Covent-Garden he owns he was once seen, but declares he entered it only to bring out a young man, and reconcile him to his father.4
It is affirmed, “that Mr. Bower told a ‘worthy divine’ that he and Mr. Barton curate of St. Ann’s who had likewise been a popish priest, attended Dr. Aspinwal in his last illness.”- And it is asserted in another place, that Dr. Aspinwal “died a faithful son of the church of Rome, that the fact was notorious at that time, and that Mrs. Aspinwal made no secret of her husband’s dying sentiments, and being a good Protestant would not admit a priest to administer extreme unction to the Doctor who desired it.”
Mr. Bower answers, “That he did not attend Dr. Aspinwal in his last illness, and that the divine mentioned has declared that Mr. Bower never gave any such account to him, nor he to any other.” And two very solemn attestations are produc’d, one of Mrs. Sydal relict of the late bishop of Gloucester, the intimate friend of Mrs. Aspinwal, who died with her hand in Mrs. Sydal’s: and the other of Mrs. Deschamps who lived with Mrs. Aspinwal as her companion for thirty years from before her marriage to her death, which proves so far as negatives can be proved, that Mrs. Aspinwal never thought that the


Page 333

Dr. died a Papist: “And Mrs. Deschamps offers to make oath, that the Doctor never desired extreme unction, and that no priest ever offered it, nor any Papist visited the Doctor in his last sickness.”
Upon this Mr. Bower calls upon his Adversaries publickly to retract what they have so publickly and positively asserted.5
It is alledged, “that Mr. Bower was ejected from the order of the Jesuits, that he negociated for several years about, being re-admitted without success; but that he succeeded at last by bribing them with all he was worth, and was readmitted in a formal manner about the end of the year 1744.”
Mr. Bower answers, that “by the last vows a man is tied to his order, and his order to him, so that they cannot throw him off, but must receive him whenever he will return, he appeals to the Jesuits whether they would not always have received him, and allow him first to give away all that he has.
“That he placed his money in the hands of Mr. Hill, a Jesuit, he confesses; but declares, that he had first offered it to Protestants, that his Protestant friends knew of the contract, that he took a bond, and received seven per cent. interest, which he could get no where else; that repenting of having bought an annuity he desired his money back, and that it was repaid by Mr. Hill, deducting only what interest had been received above four per cent.” This bond he urges, and urges speciously as a proof that he had no design to return to the order, in which property has no place, and where therefore the bond would be null at the moment of his re-admission, and that he could very little oblige the Jesuits by putting money in their hands at seven per cent. “Lord Aylmer,” he says, “charged him on that occasion with having acted INDISCREETLY, as a great commander in the navy can now attest.”6
This is the long expected defence of Mr. Bower which I have endeavoured not to weaken by contracting it. He has


Page 334

defended himself not unskilfully if he be innocent; if he be guilty he has pleaded his cause with great ability. The proofs of the spuriousness of the letters are yet to come, and of them I shall only observe that proofs must be very strong that will counterbalance similitude of hand. To write a name so as to deceive is easy, to write a line is possible; to write a letter, and even six letters, in an imitated hand with success, I believe no man will undertake: Similitude of hand, if there be a sufficient quantity of writing to be compared, is a physical testimony, perhaps irrefragably cogent.
In the defence which we have just perused Mr. Bower allows that Father Carteret declared that “he had reconciled him to the Church,” and seems to endeavour to evade that assertion by fixing it on his adversary’s mistaken opinion, that he was reconciled to the order.7
While I was engaged in the foregoing extract Mr. Faden has again declared to me that Mr. Bower converted Mrs. Hoyles to popery; that in the years 1734 and 35, during which Mr. Faden lodged in her house, Mr. Bower frequently visited her, and was received and considered as a Papist.
Here is an accusation confirmed by every kind of evidence. It is known that Mrs. Hoyles and her husband were converted to popery; it is known that about that time Mr. Bower frequently visited her, and her conversion is here imputed to him, and imputed to him by a Protestant.
Editorial Notes
1 Eddy, nos. 11–12 and 31–32; LM, I.[134–41] (the pages are mistakenly numbered 126–33) and 442–53.
1 Cf. Alban Butler, Remarks on the Two First Volumes of the Late Lives of the Popes (1754): “a Jesuit Inquisitor in Italy . . . is . . . a Thing never known, and repugnant to the Laws and Customs of that country” (p. 8).
2 History of the Popes, I.i–ii; Bower speaks specifically here of “abjuring” only the supremacy of the pope; his abjuration of Roman Catholicism, however, is implicit or, at least, inferable from what he says about the importance of this tenet to his faith.
3 Richard Barron, A Faithful Account of Mr. Archibald Bower’s Motives for leaving his Office of Secretary to the Court of Inquisition (1750). We omit SJ’s quotation of Douglas’s paraphrase of Barron’s rendition of Bower’s account of his escape from papal agents after his defection from his position as a member of the “council of inquisition” (Douglas, Six Letters, pp. 4–7; LM, I.127 [135]).
4 This heading is from Bower’s Affidavit (p. 21). SJ then quotes Letters I–VI from this work (pp. 21–30), which are presented in a different order than in Douglas (Six Letters, pp. 16–24). The letters, which Bower claims are forged, concern Bower’s attempt to pay off a woman with whom he has had an affair and fathered a child. The letters also include affirmations of his Roman Catholic faith. After quoting the letters, SJ returns to paraphrasing the controversy.
a knew Bower] had LM
5 Bower, Affidavit, pp. 36–37.
6 This paragraph includes paraphrase of Bower, Affidavit, pp. 20–21.
7 “A noble Lord who wears a red ribbon,” Six Letters, p. 65, n. a. “Lady of the first distinction,” p. 42, n. m. In using the word “clergyman,” SJ imperfectly remembers a reference to a “reverend Divine” (p. 81).
8 Bower, Affidavit, p. 49.
9 Six Letters, pp. 67–72.
1 SJ here quotes Six Letters, pp. 74–78. The testimony accuses Bower of lying about his religious convictions, pretending to be a Knight of Malta, and underhanded financial dealings.
2 Faden is identified in Six Letters as “printer in Wine-Office Court, Fleet-Street, and a Protestant” (p. 80). ODNB identifies him as William Faden (1711–83), formerly Macfaden, who “abbreviated his family name at the time of the Jacobite rising of 1745.” He was the printer of the Rambler and of the Universal Chronicle, the venue for publication of SJ’s Idler. He was, most importantly, the publisher and printer of volume I of the Literary Magazine. On his deathbed, SJ remembered borrowing a guinea of him thirty years earlier and sent repayment to his son (Life, IV.443–44; Plomer, pp. 87–88; Eddy, pp. 107–8). SJ quotes Faden’s testimony (Six Letters, pp. 80–81), affirming that Bower was a Jesuit and converted Mr. and Mrs. Hoyles, whom he visited “hundreds of times.” Later in his review he cites a personal conversation with Faden (p. 334 below).
3 SJ quotes the letter dated 1 May 1756; from Six Letters, pp. 85–87. The letter affirms that Bower was a Jesuit, that he seduced a high-born nun named Buonacursi, and that he escaped the Pope’s warrant for arrest “disguised in a clown’s dress.”
4 This is the heading for the continuation of the review (LM, I.442); it is taken from a separate section of Douglas’s Bower and Tillemont Compared, which comes with its own half-title and epigraph. SJ quotes this section verbatim (LM, I.442–49; Douglas, pp. 91–106): it includes lurid descriptions of torture at Macerata followed by a tense story of escape, concluding with Bower’s arrival in England in 1732.
5 Bower, Answer, p. 21 (“800 crowns, about two hundred pounds English money”).
6 Bower, Answer, p. 48; cf. Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared, p. 97.
7 Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared, pp. 103–4; Bower, Answer, p. 26. SJ then (LM, I.449–50) quotes Bower, Answer, pp. 26–30, verbatim, omitting one long paragraph (pp. 27–28).
8 Despite the typographical indications of direct quotation, this and the following paragraphs paraphrase Bower, Answer, pp. 30–41.
9 Edward Aspinwall (1678–1732), prebendary of Westminster.
1 Samuel Clarke (1675–1729), whom SJ admired, despite his near Arianism (see Life, IV.416, n. 2).
2 George Berkeley (1685–1753), who is identified by Bower only as “the late Bishop of Cloyne then of Londonderry” (p. 31).
3 John Dalton (1709–63). He wrote the adaptation of Milton’s Comus that was performed for the benefit of Milton’s granddaughter and for which SJ wrote the prologue (see p. 198 above).
4 Henry Aylmer (d. 1754).
5 Lucy Aylmer (1717/18–47) married George Lyttelton (1709–73), whose Life is the last in SJ’s Lives of the Poets (see Yale, XXIII.1472).
6 Historia Literaria, or, An exact and early account of the most valuable books published in the several parts of Europe, published monthly (1730–34).
7 An Universal History, from the Earliest Account of Time to the Present, 7 vols. (1736–44). These folios covered the “ancient history,” to which Bower contributed the history of the Romans, a significant portion of the whole. Cf. SJ’s letter to GM, to which he appended a list of contributors to the Universal History (December 1784; LIV.891–92).
8 Proposals for Publishing the Modern Part of the Universal History (1758) was for the first eight volumes octavo; the work reached forty-four volumes (1759–66). Andrew Millar (1705–68) was one of the publishers; he was also one of the publishers of SJ’s Dictionary.
9 See p. 321, n. 1 above.
1 SJ paraphrases Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 7 and 46–47; Mr. [Rev.] Aylmer was a son of Henry, Lord Aylmer (d. 1754).
2 Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared, p. 85.
3 This paragraph, including the passages marked as quotation, paraphrases Douglas, Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 43–49.
4 Douglas, Mr. Bower’s Answer, p. 50.
b contradicted emend.] contracted LM
5 William Duncombe (1690–1769), dramatist and miscellaneous writer; SJ praised him as “a pleasing man” (Life, III.314) and in his Life of Hughes for his “blameless elegance” (Yale, XXII.686).
6 Paraphrase of Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 50–52.
7 Capiatur: a warrant for arrest.
8 Paraphrase of Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 53–54.
9 This and the previous paragraph paraphrase Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 55–60.
1 This and the previous paragraph abridge Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 64–70.
2 These two paragraphs abridge Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 71–74.
3 This paragraph abridges Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 75–79.
4 This paragraph touches on parts of Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 79–99.
5 The preceding three paragraphs abridge Mr. Bower’s Answer, pp. 99–100 and 114–26.
6 The preceding three paragraphs abridge material in Mr. Bower’s Answer on pp. 100–112.
7 SJ’s analysis of Mr. Bower’s Answer, p. 105.
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Document Details
Document TitleReview of Archibald Bower, Affidavit (1756); John Douglas, Six Letters and Review of Mr. Bower’s Answer (1757); and John Douglas, Bower and Tillemont Compared (1757)
AuthorJohnson, Samuel
Creation DateN/A
Publ. DateN/A
Alt. TitleN/A
Contrib. AuthorJohnson, Samuel
ClassificationSubject: Plagiarism; Subject: Forgery; Subject: Catholicism; Subject: Conversion; Genre: Book Review
PrinterN/A
PublisherJ. Richardson
Publ. PlaceLondon
VolumeSamuel Johnson: Johnson on Demand
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