E X P L A N A T O R Y R E M A R K S
O N T H E
P R E F A C E
T O
S Y D N E Y P A R K I N S O N ,:S J O U R N A L
O F A
V O Y A G E T O T H E S O U T H - S E A S .
B Y J O H N F O T H E R G I L L, M. D. F R. S.
T O an ingenuous mind, however innocent, it is a humiliating cir-
cumftance to be accufed : even a confcioufnefs of integrity, both in adt
and intention, cannot always efface the remembrance of unmerited, unjuft
imputations.
I feel myfclf no otherways affedted by the accufations I am going to refute ;
and if I have borne them longer than my friends thought I ihould have done
I neither was indifferent, nor incapable of refuting them.
I muil here acquaint the reader, that the preface to Sydney Parkinfon’s
Journal was not written by the perfon who figns it. That he fupplied the materials,
I have no doubt ; he was indeed “ unqualified to addrefs the publick”_
" an unlettered man”— and was he capable of anfwering for himfelf I might fay
more. He had the fortune however to find out a perfon, whofe talents and
difpofition were exadfcly fuitable to fuch a work, and who has, indeed, “ varniihed
“ his materials” admirably. I know the nominal author was incapable, of writing
a line of it— nay, thofe letters put down as his own have been corredled;
otherwife, a much larger field of Italicks might have appeared than are fo
invidiouily pointed'Out-in a letter, which does the writer’s heart great credit '
with every friend to truth and humanity. It is of confequence to the parties
accufed, that the reader ihQuld know this circumftance, and that whilff he is
S perufing