Gauls, and a small part of the Mauritanian forces under Cassius,
have already passed the river; what they will do afterwards, or how
they will succeed against the elephants, it will be some time before
our wonderful writer can be able to learn, either from Mazuris or
the Oxydraci.

Thus do these foolish fellows trifle with us, neither knowing what
is fit to be done, nor if they did, able to execute it, at the same
time determined to say anything that comes into their ridiculous
heads; affecting to be grand and pompous, even in their titles: of
"the Parthian victories so many books;" Parthias, says another, like
Atthis; another more elegantly calls his book the Parthonicica of
Demetrius.

I could mention many more of equal merit with these, but shall now
proceed to make my promise good, and give some instructions how to
write better. I have not produced these examples merely to laugh at
and ridicule these noble histories; but with the view of real
advantages, that he who avoids their errors, may himself learn to
write well--if it be true, as the logicians assert, that of two
opposites, between which there is no medium, the one being taken
away, the other must remain. {49}

Somebody, perhaps, will tell me that the field is now cleansed and
weeded, that the briars and brambles are cut up, the rubbish cleared
off, and the rough path made smooth; that I ought therefore to build
something myself, to show that I not only can pull down the
structures of others, but am able to raise up and invent a work
truly great and excellent, which nobody could find fault with, nor
Momus himself turn into ridicule.