'[letter to Hector MacNeil - H.M.] 'it appears to me, that even in your slighter pieces, this illusion [hiding judgment under imagination] is kept up; while, in your more finished producions, it is preserved in an uncommon degree. This, my feelings tell me; and to them, in this instance, judgment delegates her authority. Had I, previously to publication, known of your intention of paying a compliment to Lord N., I should certainly have remonstrated. I confess I was revolted by the idea of your virtuous muse binding her laurels round the brow of one of the most profligate and worthless of the human race; but that single passage excepted, I found so much pleasure in the perusal of the whole, that I would not have taken a thousand pounds to have gone critically over every if and and, purposely to pick out some faults'.