the main defign can be brought to maturity. To this end, at a grand committee fome days ago this important difcovery was made by a certain curious and refined obferver: that feamen have a cuftom, when they meet a whale, to fling him out an empty tub by way of amusement, to divert him from laying violent hands upon the ship. This parable was immediately mythologised: the whale was interpreted to be Hobbes's Leviathan,which toffes and plays with all schemes of religion and government, whereof a great many are hollow, and dry, and empty, and noify, and wooden, and given to rotation: this is the leviathan, from whence the terrible wits of our age are faid to borrow their weapons. The bip in danger

eafily understood to be its old antitypę the commonwealth. But how to analyse the tub, was a matter of difficulty: when, after long enquiry and debate, the literal meaning was preferved; and it was decreed, that in order to prevent thefe leviar thans from toffing and fporting with the commonwealth, which of itself is too apt to fluctuate, they should be diverted from that

game

game by a Tale of a Tub. And, my genius being conceived to lie not unhappily that way, I had the honour done me to be engaged in the performance.

This is the fole defign in publishing the following treatife, which I hope will ferve for an interim of fome months to employ those unquiet spirits, 'till the perfecting of that great work; into the fecret of which, it is reasonable the courteous reader fhould have fome little light.

It is intended, that a large academy be erected, capable of containing nine thoufand feven hundred forty and three perfons: which by modeft computation is reckoned to be pretty near the current number of wits in this ifland. These are to be difpofed into the several schools of this academy, and there pursue those studies to which their genius moft inclines them. The undertaker himself will publish his propofals with all convenient fpeed, to which I fhall refer the curious reader for a more particular account, mentioning at present only a few of the principal schools: there is, firft, a large pæderaftic fchool, with French and Italian mafters. There is, alfo,

the

the spelling school, a very spacious building: the fchool of looking-glaffes: the fchool of fwearing: the fchool of critics: the school of falivation: the school of hobby-horses : the school of poetry: the school of tops: the fchool of Spleen: the school of gaming: with many others, too tedious to recount. No perfon to be admitted member into any of these schools without an atteftation under two fufficient perfons hands, certifying him to be a wit.

But, to return: I am fufficiently inftructed in the principal duty of a preface, if my genius were capable of arriving at it. Thrice have I forced my imagination to make the tour of my invention, and thrice it has returned empty; the lat→ ter having been wholly drained by the following treatise. Not fo my more fuccefs+ ful brethren the moderns, who will by no means let flip a preface or dedication, without fome notable diftinguishing stroke to furprise the reader at the entry, and kindle a wonderful expectation of what is to

This I think the author fhould have omitted, it being of the very fame nature with the school of bobby-borfes, if one

may venture to cenfure one, who is fo fevere a cenfurer of others, perhaps with too little diftinction.

enfue.

enfue. Such was that of a moft ingenious poet, who, folliciting his brain for fomething new, compared himself to the hangman, and his patron to the patient : this was infigne, recens, indictum ore alio. When I went through that neceffary and noble' course of study, I had the happinefs to obferve many fuch egregious touches, which I fhall not injure the authors by transplanting: because I have remarked, that nothing is so very tender as a modern piece of wit, and which is apt to fuffer fo much in the carriage. Some things are extreamly witty to-day, or fasting, or in this place, or at eight a clock, or o ver a bottle, os fpoke by Mr. Whatd'y'call'm, or in a fummer's morning: any of the which, by the smallest tranfpofal or misap¬ plication, is utterly annihilate. Thus, wit has its walks and purlieus, out of which it may not ftray the breadth of an hair, upon peril of being loft. The maderns have artfully fixed this mercury, and reduced it to the circumftances of time, place, and perfon. Such a jeft there is,

• Her. Something extraor- upon before. dipary, new, and never hit

Reading prefaces, &c.

that

that will not pass out of Covent-Garden; and fuch a one, that is no where intelligible but at Hyde-Park corner. Now, though it sometimes tenderly affects me to confider, that all the towardly paffages I' shall deliver in the following treatise, will grow quite out of date and relish with the firft fhifting of the prefent fcene, yet I muft needs fubfcribe to the justice of this proceeding? because, I cannot imagine why we should be at expence to furnish wit for fucceeding ages, when the former have made no fort of provifion for ours: wherein I speak the fentiment of the very neweft, and confequently the most orthodox refiners, as well as my own.

How

ever, being extreamly follicitous, that every accomplished perfon, who has got into the tafte of wit calculated for this present month of August, 1697, fhould defcend to the very bottom of all the fublime thoughout this treatise; I hold fit to lay down this general maxim: whatever reader defires to have a thorough comprehenfion of an author's thoughts, cannot take a better method, than by putting himself into the circumstances and poftures

of