The chief desire of him that comments an authour, is to shew how much other commentators have corrupted and obscured him.
The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of controversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise again to reception in remoter times.

Thus the human mind is kept in motion without progress.

Thus sometimes truth and criour, and sometimes contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal invasion.

The tide of seeming knowledge which is poured over one generation, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the sudden meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot their beams into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden withdraw their lustre, and leave mortals again to grope their way.
These elevations and depressions of renown, and the contradictions to which all improvers of knowledge must for ever be exposed, since they are not escaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may surely be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank themselves but as the satellites of their authours.

How canst thou beg for life, says _Achilles_ to his captive, when thou knowest that thou art now to suffer only what must another day be suffered by _Achilles ?_ Dr._Warburton_ had a name sufficient to confer celebrity on those who could exalt themselves into antagonists, and his notes have raised a clamour too loud to be distinct.