Goldsmith and the Public Ledger

Abstract

Three essays, first published in 1760 in the Public Ledger, have been attributed to Goldsmith, though on somewhat scanty evidence. A stylometric study of these, based on samples from authentic Goldsmith material and from four control authors, suggests that one piece is very probably his, while the other two are almost certainly not. Inferences are based on the distances between samples from the three essays and the cluster of 20 samples from Goldsmith.