"From the many just sentiments interspersed through the letter before me, and from the whole tendency of it, I should believe you to be a good, though a vain man, if some circumstances in your conduct did not render the inflexibility of your integrity doubtful; and for this vanity a knowledge of human nature enables me to discover such extenuating circumstances, in the very texture of your mind, that I am ready to call it amiable, and separate the public from the private character."
A Vindication of the Rights of Men in a Letter to the Right Honourable Edmund Burke
First edition appears in December of 1790. Second edition, with MW's name on the cover, published December 14. 2 entries in ESTC (1790).<br>
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Reading <u>The Vindications</u>. eds. D. L. Macdonald and Kathleen Scherf. (Toronto: Broadview Press, 2001). [Based on the 2nd ed.] See also edition at the Online Library of Liberty &lt;<a href="http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/991 on 2009-12-02">Link to OLL</a>&gt;.