BIOGRAPHICAL, CRITICAL, AND HISTORICAL, ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE RAMBLER, ADVENTURER, & IDLER, AND OF THE VARIOUS PERIODICAL PAPERS WHICH, In Imitation of the Writings of Steele and Addison, HAVE BEEN PUBLISHED Between the Close of the eighth volume of the Spectator, and the commencement of the year 1809. BY NATHAN DRAKE, M. D. AUTHOR OF LITERARY HOURS, AND OF ESSAYS ON THE TATLER, SPECTATOR, AND GUARDIAN. Evolvendi penitus auctores qui de virtute præcipiunt, ut -vita cum scientia divinarum rerum sit humanarumque conjuncta. QUINTILIANUS. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. PRINTED BY J. SEELEY, BUCKINGHAM, FOR W. SUTTABY, STATIONERS COURT, LONDON. 1809. CONTENTS. ESSAY 1. Observations on the Taste which had been generated by Steele and Addison for Periodical Composi- tion. Enumeration of the Perio- dical Papers which were written during the publication of the Tat- ler, Spectator, and Guardian.... ESSAY 2. Observations on the Periodical Pa- PREFACE. THE plan of these volumes being, in several respects, different from that which was adopted for the Essays on the Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian, I have thought it necessary to place before the reader, in this Preface, a connected view of its construction. . It is divided, as in the former work, into five Parts, and these parts into Essays; but, for the purpose of compression, the Dissertations on Style, Humour, Ethics, &c. instead of being |