num is a good rule for all writers, but chiefly for writers of characters; becaufe it may happen to those, who vent praise or cenfure too precipitately, as it did to an eminent English poet, who celebrated a young nobleman for erecting Dryden's monument upon a promife, which his lordfhip forgot, till it was done by another. In regard to two perfons only we wish our raillery, though ever so tender, or refentment, though ever so juft, had not been indulged. We speak of Sir John Vanbrugh, who was a man of wit, and of honour; and of Mr. Addifon, whofe name deferves all refpect from every lover of learning. We cannot deny (and perhaps most writers of our kind have been in the fame circumstances) that in feveral parts of our lives, and according to the difpofitions we were in, we have written fome things, which we may wish never to have thought on. Some fallies of levity ought to be imputed to youth, (fuppofed in charity, as it was in truth, to be the time in which we wrote them;) others to the gaiety of our minds at certain junctures common to all men. The publishing of these, which we cannot difown, and without our confent, is, I think, a greater injury, than that of afcribing to us the moft ftupid productions, which we can wholly deny. This has been usually practifed in other countries after a man's decease; which in a great measure account for that manifeft inequality found in the works of the best authors; the collectors only confidering, that fo many more sheets raise the price of the book; and the greater fame a writer is in poffeffion of, the more of such trash he may bear to have tacked to him. Thus it is apparently the editor's intereft to infert, what the author's judgment had rejected; and care is always taken to intersperse these additions in fuch a manner, that scarce any book of confequence can be bought, without purchasing fomething unworthy of the author along with it. But in our own country it is ftill worse : Those very book fellers, who have fupported themselves upon an author's fame while he lived, have done their utmost after his death to leffen it by fuch practices: Even a man's a man's last will is not fecure from being 'exposed in print; whereby his most particular regards, and even his dying tenderneffes are laid open. It has been humorously faid, that fome have fifhed the very jakes for papers left there by men of wit: But it is no jeft to affirm, that the cabinets of the fick, and the closets of the dead, have been broke open and ranfacked to publish our private letters, and divulge to all mankind the most secret sentiments and intercourfe of friendship. Nay, these fellows are arrived to that height of impudence, that when an author has publickly difowned a fpurious Piece, they have disputed his own name with him in printed advertisements; which has been practised to Mr. Congreve and Mr. Prior. We are therefore compelled, in refpect to truth, to fubmit to a very great hardship; to own fuch pieces, as in our stricter judgments we would have fuppreffed for ever: We are obliged to confess, that this whole collection, in a manner, confifts of what we not only thought unlikely to reach the future, but unworthy even of the present age; not our studies, but our b 4 follies; follies; not our works, but our idleneffes. Some comfort however it is, that all of them are innocent, and most of them, flight as they are, had yet a moral tendency; either to foften the virulence of parties against each other; or to laugh out of countenance foine vice or folly of the time; or to difcredit the impofitions of quacks and falfe pretenders to fcience; or to humble arrogance of the ill-natured and envious; in a word, to leffen the vanity, and promote the good humour of mankind. the Such as they are, we must in truth confefs, they are ours, and others fhould in juftice believe, they are all that are ours. If any think elfe has been printed, in which we really had any hand, it is either intolerably imperfect, or loaded with fpurious additions; fometimes even with infertions of mens names, which we never meant, and for whom we have an efteem and refpect. Even the fe pieces, in which we are leaft injured, have never before been printed from the true copies, or with any tolerable degree of correctness. We declare, that this collection contains every piece, which in the idleft humour we have writ ten; ten; not only fuch, as came under our review or correction; but many others, which however unfinished, are not now in our power to fupprefs. Whatsoever was in our own poffeffion at the publishing hereof, or of which no copy was gone abroad, we have actually deftroyed, to prevent all poffibility of the like treatment, These volumes likewife will contain all the papers, wherein we have cafually had any share; particularly those written in conjunction with our friends, Dr. Arbuthnot and Mr. Gay; and lastly, all of this fort compofed fingly by either of thofe hands. The reader is therefore defired to do the fame juftice to thefe our friends, as to us; and to be affured that all the things, called our miscellanies (except the works of Alexander Pope, published by B. Lintot, in quarto, and folio in 17173 thofe of Mr.Gay by F. Tonfon, in quarto, in 1720; and as many of thefe mifcellanies as have been formerly printed by Benj. Tooke) are absolutely fpurious, and without our confent imposed upon the publick. Twickenham, JONATH. SWIFT, THE |