_Selden etant sans Contredit le plus docte des Anglois moderns._ 'Tis said by a _Frenchman_ and a _Papist_; but as much as _Selden_ was an Oracle, and a Glory to our Country, Archbishop _Laud_ his Brethren would have thrust his learned Head into a Pillory, if they could have come at him. I don't know whether it was for his History of _Tythes_ or not; but that would have been hard after he had been so fully answer'd by Doctors of both Universities; who, however, were not, _Les plus Doctes des Anglois moderns_. Judicious Antiquaries ever were, and ever will be in Esteem. Those that meddle with Things solid and useful. None of the Pretenders to this Sort of Knowledge, are more despicable than such as deal in old Terms and Phrases, who generally affect a Contempt for those that are in present Use as weak and effeminate. The Emperor _Augustus_ could not bear these Men, any more than _Punster_'s whom he heartily despis'd. The Spectator, Nº 470. has with much Pleasantry animadverted on those Criticks in Readings, and has brought in the _Cotton Library_, _Aldus_, _Scaliger_, _Scioppius_, _Salmasius_, the elder _Stephens_, and a Heap of old Manuscripts, to clear up the Difficulties in certain Lyrick Verses, about _a Shape_, _an Eye_, _Wit_, _Charms_, Corinna _and_ Belvedera. As scrupulous and as curious as these _Antiquaries_ would be thought to be, one might fill Volumes with Examples of the most notorious Mistakes and Blunders in the Writings of the most learned among them; which are not taken notice of to lessen the Credit they have worthily acquir'd, but to shew the Infirmity of humane Nature, which will always be attended with Errours, and never arrive at Perfection as we have elsewhere observ'd after _Horace_: --------_Non ego Paucis_, &c.