Excerpt from The British Plutarch, or Biographical Entertainer: Being a Select Collection of the Lives of the Most Eminent Men of Great Britain and Ireland; From the Reign of Henry VIII to George II Both Inclusive Among the few collections of na tional lives that have hitherto been publilhed in this kingdom, the Bio graphiabritannica undoubtedly {lands foremofi, we had almoft faid alone, in merit; but containing fix volumes in fo'lio, which colt upwards of ten pounds, its lize and price have con fined it to a particular clafs of readers, and rendered it much fitter for the library than the clofet add too, that its'method (being digel'ted in the manner ofa dictionary, and giv ing a great deal more in notes, than uninterrupted narrative) hath left it rather as a ufeful and faithful regif'ter, to be applied to for occafional infor mation, than a book for ordinary pe rufal. Indeed, though forne of the lives to be found in'it afford all that entertainment which we' make one of the principal objects of our own attention, there are, from the nature of its plan, fuch a multitude of others, which give little more than the name, and birth-place of the per fon treated of, that the former can hardl be confidered as a compenfa tion r the drynefs and fierility of the latter, in any fenfe, but fuch as we have above mentioned: and in this latter clafs we comprehend all thofe finaller Biographical vocabula ries, called dictionaries, which yield no manner of entertainment, but are compiled like parifh regif'ters, and give juf't as fatisfaftory an account of the lives of illuftrious men, as the Dutch almanacks do of the reigning kings and princes of Europe. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.