A catalogue of the ... library ... of ... Richard Gough ... : Which will be sold ... on ... April 5, 1810 / [Richard Gough].

  • Richard Gough
Date:
[1810]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A catalogue of the ... library ... of ... Richard Gough ... : Which will be sold ... on ... April 5, 1810 / [Richard Gough]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    from without. And perhaps the greatest ineonveni- enee arising from this disposition was the want of opportunities to serve his friends. But he saw enough of the general temper of mankind, to convince him that favours should not be too often asked; and that as to be too much under obligation is the worst of Bondage, so to confer obligations is the truest Liberty. The account thus far given of Mr. Gough, almost literally from his own pen, unmixed with extraneous observations, it may now be allowable to enlarge. One of the most prominent features in his character was an insatiable thirst for Literature; and particu- larly that branch of it in which he so eminently ex-, celled, the study of our National Antiquities. Young as he was at the time of his Fathers death, in iyf)] ; not having then attained his Ib’th year; an only son, with the certainty of inheriting a plentiful fortune; his attention was principally turned to the improvement of his mind, and the foundation of a noble Library. Jlence the pleasurable diversions of the age to him had little charms. The well-stored shop of honest Tom Payne at the Mews Gate, or the auction-rooms of the two Sams, Baker and Paterson, had beauties far tran- scending the alluring scenes of fashionable dissipation. At Cambridge his studies were regular and severe; diverted only by occasional visits to the Metropolis; or by the delightful excursions which for twenty years he made to various parts of the kingdom, one of which, abd that not the least pleasant to himself, was to Pleshy in Essex in 17^2; and of which, after an in- terval of more than 40 years, he published an excel- lent History, in the Preface to which he says. Having collected the history of this renowned lit- tle spot from all the materials within my reach, I leave the fartljer investigation of its antient glory to those whom a nearer residence to it gives an oj)portunity of more frequently examining. If I haVe failed in any essential part of my description, when I flatter myself I have done qiore towards bringing Pleshy into view than any before me have done, or are tiisinterested enough to aUeinpt in future —