Fowler John or Mr Bowman (1 results)

Condition: Fine. viii, 18, [2]pp., 8vo. Vignette of the obverse and reverse of a Queen Anne gold guinea on title, with an advertisement leaf at end. Modern, but not recent, sheep-backed cloth, spine gilt-lettered. "The Second Edition Corrected," genuinely revised and not a reissue of the first edition the same year. Dedicated "To the Master of the Mint in the Tower" and noting that the author "Could have made a better Copy of Verses on a Thousand, and it is in your Power if you please, to try the Experiment of my Genius." William Lee, in Daniel Defoe: His Life and Recently Discovered Writings (1869, Vol. II, pp. 273-274) assigns the review of this poem in the September 1720 number of Mercurius Politicus to Daniel Defoe, who comments that the poet . . . goes very naturally, Line by Line, from one Moral to another; which is constantly either enlivened with a Simile, or illustrated with an Antithesis. So that, for the space of the first Hundred Lines, there are almost as many morals, fitted to all degrees and stations of life, and full of as many lively Strokes of Ingenuity, as there are Lines. The rest of the Piece has its equal Excellencies; and, if the author has his deserts, he ought never to see a Last Guinea but upon the Title Page of his Poem. Foxon L52; six copies in ESTC.…