posterity; and though it may be condemned at present, I can have no
doubt but it will be treated with due reverence some hundred ages hence,
when wisdom and learning shall have gained their proper ascendant over
mankind, and when men shall only read for instruction and improvement of
their minds. As I shall print an hundred thousand copies, some, it may
be hoped, will escape the havoc that is made of moral works, and then
this jewel will shine forth in its genuine lustre. I was in the greater
hurry to consign this work to the press, as I foresee that the art of
printing will ere long be totally lost, like other useful discoveries
well known to the ancients. Such were the art of dissolving rocks with
hot vinegar, of teaching elephants to dance on the slack rope, of making
malleable glass, of writing epic poems that any body would read after
they had been published a month, and the stupendous invention of new
religions, a secret of which illiterate Mahomet was the last person
possessed.

Notwithstanding this my zeal for good letters, and the ardour of my
universal citizenship, (for I declare I design this present for all
nations) there are some small difficulties in the way, that prevent my
conferring this my great benefaction on the world compleatly and all at
once. I am obliged to produce it in small portions, and therefore beg
the prayers of all good and wise men that my life may be prolonged to
me, till I shall be able to publish the whole work, no man else being
capable of executing the charge so well as myself, for reasons that my
modesty will not permit me to specify. In the mean time, as it is the
duty of an editor to acquaint the world with what relates to himself as
well as his author, I think it right to mention the causes that compel
me to publish this work in numbers. The common reason of such proceeding
is to make a book dearer for the ease of the purchasers, it being
supposed that most people had rather give twenty shillings by sixpence a