THE WHIG-EXAMINER. N° 1. Thursday, September 14, 1710. Nefcia mens hominum fati fortifque futuræ, T HE defign of this work is to cenfure the writings of others, and to give all perfons a rehearing, who have fuffered under any unjuft fentence of the Examiner. As that Author has hitherto proceeded, his paper would have been more properly intitled the Executioner: At leaft his Examination is like that which is made by the rack and wheel. I have always admired a critic that has discovered the beauties of an author, and never knew one who made it his business to lafh the faults of other writers, that was not guilty of greater himself; as the hangman is generally a worfe malefactor, than the criminal that fuffers by his hand. To prove what I fay, there needs no more than to read the annotations which this Author has made on Dr. Garth's Poem, with the preface in the front, and a riddle at the end of them: To begin with the firft: Did ever any advocate for a party open with fuch an unfortunate affertion? The collective body of the Whigs have already engroffed our riches :' 02 That That is, in plain English, the Whigs are poffeffed of all the riches in the nation. Is not this giving up all he has been contending for these fix weeks? Is there any thing more reasonable, than thofe who have all the riches of the nation in their poffeffion, or if he likes his own phrafe better, as indeed I think it is stronger, that those who have already engroffed our riches, fhould have the management of our public treasure, and the direction of our fleets and armies? But let us proceed: • Their reprefentative the Kit-Cat have pretended to make a monopoly of our fenfe.' Well, but what does all this end in? If the Author means any thing it is this, That to prevent fuch a monopoly of fenfe, he is refolved to deal in it himself by retail, and fell a pennyworth of it every week. In what follows, there is fuch a fhocking familiarity both in his ralleries and civilities, that one cannot long be in doubt who is the Author. The remaining part of the preface has fo much of the pedant, and fo little of the converfation of men in it, that I fhall pafs it over, and haften to the riddles, which are as fol Ow. S PHINX was a monster, that would eat Unless his ready wit difclos'd The fubtile riddles fhe propos'd. Oedipus was refolv'd to go, And try what ftrength of parts could do. Which has four feet at morning bright? Upo Upon all four: As years accrue, With sturdy steps he walks on two: For his third leg adopts the ftick. Now in your turn, 'tis juft, methinks, Who has four legs, then two, then three; The first part of this little myftical poem is an old riddle, which we could have told the meaning of, had not the Author given himself the trouble of explaining it: But as for the expofition of the fecond, he leaves us altogether in the dark. The riddle runs thus: What creature is it that walks upon four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs at night? This he folves, as our forefathers have done for these two thoufand years; and not according to Rabelais, who gives another reason why a man is faid to be a creature with three legs at night. Then follows the fecond riddle: What creature, fays he, is it that firft ufes four legs, then two legs, then three legs; then lofes one leg, then gets two legs, and at laft runs away upon four legs? Were I difpofed to be fplenetic, I fhould ask if there was any thing in the new garland of riddles fo wild, fo childish, or fo flat But though I dare not go so far as that, I fhall take upon me to fay, that the Author has ftolen his hint out of the garland, from a riddle which I was better acquainted with than the Nile when I was but twelve years old. It runs thus, riddle my riddle my ree, what is this? Two legs fat upon three legs, and held one leg in her hand in came four legs, and fnatched away one leg up started two legs, and flung three legs at four legs, and brought one leg back again. This enigma, joined with the foregoing two, rings all the changes that 0.3 can can be made upon four legs. That I may deal more ingenucully with my reader than the above-mentioned egatift has cone, I thall prefent him with a key to my riddle; which upon application he will find exactly fited to the words of it. One leg is a leg of mutton, two legs is a fervant-maid, three legs is a joint-tocl, which in the Sphinx's country was called a tripod; as four legs is a dog, who in all nations and ages has been reckoned a quadruped. We have now the expofition of cur firit and third riddles upon legs; let us here, if you' pleafe, endeavour to find out the meaning of our fecond, which is thus in the Author's words: What ftranger creature yet is he That has four legs, then two, then three; And runs away at laft on four? This riddle, as the poet tells us, was proposed by Oedipus to the Sphinx, after he had given his folution to that which the Sphinx, had proposed to him. This Oedipus, you must understand, though the people did not believe it, was fon to a King of Thebes, and bore a particular grudge to the Treaturer of that kingdom; which made him fo bitter upon H. L. in this enigma. What ftranger creature yet is he, That has four legs, then two, then three? By which he intimates, that this great man at Thebes being weak by nature,' as he admirably expreffes it, could not walk as foon as he was born, but, like other children, fell upon all four when he attempted it; that he afterwards went upon two legs, like other men; and that in his more advanced age, he got a white staff in Queen Focafta's court, which the Author calls his third leg. Now it fo happened that the treasurer fell, and by that means broke his third leg, which is intimated by the next words, • Then lofes one → Thus far I think we have travelled through the riddle with good fuccefs, What |