CRITICAL AND MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS. BY AN OCTOGENARIAN. "Nihil habeo quod accusem senectutem."--CICERO DE SENECTUTE, Cap. v. VOL. I. CORK: PRINTED BY G. NASH, 16, PRINCE'S STREET. 1850. NOT PUBLISHED. ΤΟ Marianne, Wife of Thomas Gallwey, Esq. AND Sarah Aune, Wife of Edward John Collins, Esq. MY BELOVED CHILDREN, Not only as, to the most cherished objects of my affections, but, as to you solely have I to acknowledge any aid in the composition of these volumes, do I dedicate them to you. By you were several of their contained subjects suggested to me. By you were the occasional inaccuracies that escaped me at once rectified; and by YOU was every sheet from the pen or press revised. By You again, whenever disposed to yield to the torpid influence of years, have I been roused to renewed exertion, while, to your tender care of my health and comforts, I owe, under Providence, in plenitude of enjoyment, many years of domestic happiness, enhanced and completed by seeing it conferred on yourselves by those to whom you have that of being united. Accept then this expression, through, I trust, an enduring channel, of a fond Father's obligations, which have been to him the most grateful proof his children could give of their sense of his attention to their education, and its suited direction, in principle, act, and feeling, to the knowledge and discharge of their duties to God and Society. That you should entitle yourselves to the blessings of Heaven in their choicest dispensation, has ever been my most fervent prayer, and shall be the last supplication of, what, in pleasurable repetition, I sign myself, my dearest children Your fond Father, JAMES ROCHE. |