It is evident that we ought to account him the best grammarian, who has the most completely executed the worthiest design.

But no worthy design can need a false apology; and it is worse than idle to prevaricate.

That is but a spurious modesty, which prompts a man to disclaim in one way what he assumes in an other--or to underrate the duties of his office, that he may boast of having "done all that could reasonably be expected." Whoever professes to have improved the science of English grammar, must claim to know more of the matter than the generality of English grammarians; and he who begins with saying, that "little can be expected" from the office he assumes, must be wrongfully contradicted, when he is held to have done much.

Neither the ordinary power of speech, nor even the ability to write respectably on common topics, makes a man a critic among critics, or enables him to judge of literary merit.

And if, by virtue of these qualifications alone, a man will become a grammarian or a connoisseur, he can hold the rank only by courtesy--a courtesy which is content to degrade the character, that his inferior pretensions may be accepted and honoured under the name.
24.