Title:  The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 584 Vol. 20, No. 584. (Supplement to Vol. 20)

Author:  Various

Release Date:  November 22, 2004 [EBook #14124]

Language:  English

Character set encoding:  ASCII

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THE MIRROR OF LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.

Vol. 20, No. 584. (Supplement to Vol. 20)

* * * * *

THE

MIRROR

OF

Literature, amusement,

AND

Instruction: 

CONTAINING

Original essays;

Historical narratives; biographical memoirs; sketches of society;
topographical descriptions; novels and tales; anecdotes;

SELECT EXTRACTS

FROM

New and expensive works;

Poetry, original and selected;

The spirit of the public journals;

Discoveries in the arts and sciences;

Useful domestic hints;

&C. &C. &C.

Vol.  XX.

London: 

1832

* * * * *

PREFACE.

The completion of the Twentieth Volume of this Miscellany presents us with another cause for self-gratulation, and thankful acknowledgement to the reading public.  This continued and unimpaired success amidst a myriad of new-born aspirants, is the best proof of our maintenance of public esteem; and so long as our efforts are guided by the same singleness of purpose that first directed them we shall hope for a continuance of such favour.  A multitude of contemporaries “whet each other;” “thinking nurseth thinking;” and, in like manner, reading nurseth reading, and awakens a spirit of inquiry, untiring and exhaustless, among all concerned in pursuit and wholesome gratification.

In a retrospect of the hundreds of competitors who have started for the prize of public patronage since our outset, we shall not, perhaps, be accused of vanity in placing to our own account the first appropriation of such means as may have contributed to the partial success of our contemporaries.  We owe them nothing but good will; for we rather regard things poetically than politically, and we are anxious to inform and amuse the reader—­not to perplex, by constantly reminding him of his uncheery lot in life.