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When an Idea is provided with a single expression which
is at once universal in it's reception {constant} unchanging
in it's import, what can be more absurd than to substitute
for it upon every occasion a tedious paraphrase which
has not the merit of superior precision to x for the x
it gives to the apprehension, x the burthen it imposes on
the memory?
Sec 15. G.2.C.28.{1. the consequence of x [all this]
in so much more than is necessary, is that there is not enough:
and if any one chuses to make a farthing look
like a Shilling, which is full as easy to do as to make
it like a sixpence nothing is there here to hinder him.
Like a General who with the same Army, the greater extent of frontier
he has to defend, the weaker he is.
Arm Reg. 1771. fr.136. 14th August.
An Edict was published at Paris imposing an additional Tax of 20 Sols on the Head of every Hog or Sow brought into
that City for the consumption of the Inhabitants.
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"As the Hogs are not killed in Paris, but brought to Town
"by Cartloads without their garbage,& ready for Sale, one
"of the Undertakers for supplying the Town was driving 6
"loaden Carts into Paris but had the Precaution first to cut
"off the Heads, which he had left at home. When he arrived
"at the Barrier, the Clerks demanded this new duty: he presented
"them the Edict, which specifies the heads only: he bid
"them search, & if they found one single head, he consented
"they should seize the whole. The Clerk laughed at the joke, —
"but insisted that the Hogs should not be brought in untill
"the Edict was put in execution. & the new Tax paid. The
"Undertaker sent for an Attorney, & deposited the Duty, which
"the Attorney protested against, in order to prevent their disposing
of the money, until such time as the Laws should pronounce
"concerning the validity or invalidity of the Edict."
I know not that I ever saw any article of those which are
the thickest stuffed with these anxious tautologies, to the
efficacy of which the necessity of those any tautologies if admitted
would not be fatal: because let a set of there excessaries synonyms have been
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inserted so many times more than they ought to have been,
it scarce ever happens but that it might be shewn where that— they have been omitted where there is an equal demand for them [they have been omitted]
The misfortune is, that this Scheme of supererogation when
once taken up cannot afterwards be departed from but at the expence always of consistency, & oftentimes of concord:
[like a habit of Drunkenness in some constitutions, which
once begun it is dangerous to continue, but fatal to leave off.}
For some little time words shall have been piled upon words, the changes shall have been rung upon the
Numbers of Genders, the Pronouns the Pronominal Adjectives
of the words of specification, the words of no meaning and the words
where meaning has been [presupposed] anticipated the changes with
have been rung I say upon all with tolerable regularity then
when by & by {the correspondent fibres of the Brain either the hand or the head growing tired [failing thro' fatigue] one is
dropt, and another is dropt, till the sentence ca,e limping
on at the conclusion with half it's compliment, first undertaken
to be furnished.
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A Statute of this cast (and almost all are of this cast) shews
like the performance of some raw musician, who more ambitious
of the praise of execution, than of the merit of correctness
+ sets out with a valocity which fatigue and awkardness
[force him soon to slacken] are perpetually forcing him at
intervals to slacken.
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Identifier: | JB/070/075/001"JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 70. |
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070 |
of laws in general |
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075 |
composition stat. singly as a discourse - verbosity mischiefs of - produces defects |
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001 |
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copy/fair copy sheet |
1 |
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recto |
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[[watermarks::gr [crown motif] [britannia with shield motif]]] |
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23190 |
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