[_On a fly-leaf._] "This book is ascribed by Wood to Dr. Tho'm. Powell, canon of St. David's, who was, says he, 'an able philosopher, a curious critic, and well versed in various languages.' See an abstract of this scarce book in Oldys's _British librarian_, p. 42."
"N.B.--The above is the hand-writing of the Rev'd. M'r. Granger, author of the _biographical history._--I bought it of Mr. Prince, at Oxford, who purchased his books." [John Brand.]
I have now only to consign the learned Powell to future biographers, and to recommend the volume as one which deserves a place in every choice collection of English books.
D***N**R. (p. 38.), gives, as an instance of misquotation, a passage from Pope, as it appeared in the _Times_, and adds a correction of it. As my _memory_ suggested a version different from both that of the _Times_, and the correction of your correspondent, I turned to Pope (Bowles edition, 1806), and found the passage there, precisely as it is given from the _Times_. Has your correspondent any authority for his reading? No various reading of the lines is given by Bowles.
While on the subject of Pope, I will make a note (as I have not seen it noticed by his commentators), that the well-known line,
is literally from Charron (_De la Sagesse_, I. i. ch. 1.)--
"La vraye science et le vray etude de l'homme c'est l'homme."
[We may add, that in the Aldine edition of Pope, which was produced under the editorial superintendence of the Rev. A. Dyce, the lines are given as quoted from the _Times_, and without any various reading. See vol. ii. p. 55.]
"Like angels visits, few and far between,"
has been clearly shown by a correspondent in another paper, to be all but copied from Blair:--
----"like an ill-used ghost Not to return;--or if it did, its visits _Like those of angels, short and far between._"
But the same phrase, though put differently, occurs in a religious poem of Norris of Bemerton, who died in 1711:--
"But those who soonest take their flight, Are the most exquisite and strong, _Like angels visits, short_ and bright, Mortality's too weak to bear them long."
_Extract from Parish Register of North Runcton, Norfolk_.
Sir,--As a pendant to the extracts from the register of East Peckham, Kent, in your third number, I send the following, which I copied some time ago from one of the register books of the parish of North Runcton, Norfolk, and which may prove interesting to some of your readers.