Coin. When an Idea is provided with a single expression which is

at once universal in it's reception & constant &

unchanging in it's import, what can be more absurd than to

substitute for it upon every occasion a tedious paraphrase which has

not the merit of superior precision to atone for the strain it gives to the

apprehension, & the burthen it imposes on the memory?

Sec 15. G.2.C.28. S1. the consequence of putting [all this] in so much more

than is necessary, is that there is not enough: and if any one

chuses to make a farthing look like a Shilling, which is full as

easy to do as to make it like a sixpence nothing is there here to hinder

him.

Like a General who with the same Army, the

greater extent of frontier he has to defend, the weaker he

is.

Arm Reg. 1771. p.136. 14 th August.

An Edict was published at Paris imposing an additional Tax of 20 Sols on the

Head of every Hog or Sow brought into that City for the consumption of the Inhabitants.

"As the Hogs are not killed in Paris, but brought to Town "by

Cartloads without their garbage, & ready for Sale, one "of the

Undertakers for supplying the Town was driving 6 "loaden Carts into Paris

but had the Precaution first to cut "off the Heads, which he had left at

home. When he arrived "at the Barrier, the Clerks demanded this new duty:

he presented "them the Edict, which specifies the heads only: he bid

"them search, & if they found one single head, he consented "they

should seize the whole. The Clerk laughed at the joke, — "but

insisted that the Hogs should not be brought in untill "the Edict was put

in execution, & the new Tax paid. The "Undertaker sent for an

Attorney, & deposited the Duty, which "the Attorney protested

against, in order to prevent their disposing of the money, until such time

as the Law should pronounce "concerning the validity or invalidity of the

Edict." I know not that I ever saw any article of those which are the

thickest stuffed with these anxious tautologies, to the efficacy of which

the necessity of those very tautologies if admitted would not be fatal:

because let a set of these synonyms have been

inserted

COMPOSIT. Stat. Singly as a discourse. Verbosity Mischiefs [BR] ][][][of

— produces defects.

inserted so many times more than they ought to have been, it scarce ever

happens but that it might be shewn

that — they have been omitted where there is an

equal demand for them [they have been omitted]>

nor is a sentence ever finished by the departing from this plan in

instances less the stands self convicted of tautology in assuming it by his

own confession. The misfortune is, that this Scheme of

supererogation when once taken up cannot afterwards be departed from but

at the expence always of consistency, & oftentimes of

concord: [like a habit of Drunkenness in some constitutions, which

once begun it is dangerous to continue, but fatal to leave off.] For some

little time words shall have been piled upon words, the changes shall

have been rung upon the Numbers & Genders, the Pronouns the

Pronominal Adjectives of the words of specification, the words of no

meaning and the words whose meaning has been [prescripted] anticipated the

change will have been rung I say upon all with tolerable regularity

then when by & by [the correspondent fibres of the Brain either

the hand or the head growing tired [failing thro' fatigue] one is

dropt, and another is dropt, till the sentence came

limping on at the conclusion with half it's compliment, first

undertaken to be furnished. Tone of ill supported amplitude

Musician A Statute of this cast (and almost all are of this cast)

shews like the performance of some raw musician, who more

ambitious of the praise of execution, than of the merit of correctness

firmness of tone improvement sets out with a valocity

which fatigue and awkardness [force him soon to slacken] are

perpetually forcing him at intervals to slacken.