rightly used, to make the whole course of life entertaining: _Cantantes
licet usque_ (_minus via laedet_). 'Tis a vast happiness to possess the
pleasures of the head, the only pleasures in which a man is sufficient
to himself, and the only part of him which, to his satisfaction, he can
employ all day long. The Muses are _amicae omnium horarum_; and, like
our gay acquaintance, the best company in the world as long as one
expects no real service from them. I confess there was a time when I was
in love with myself, and my first productions were the children of
Self-Love upon Innocence. I had made an epic poem, and panegyrics on all
the princes in Europe, and thought myself the greatest genius that ever
was. I can't but regret those delightful visions of my childhood, which,
like the fine colours we see when our eyes are shut, are vanished for
ever. Many trials and sad experience have so undeceived me by degrees,
that I am utterly at a loss at what rate to value myself. As for fame, I
shall be glad of any I can get, and not repine at any I miss; and as for
vanity, I have enough to keep me from hanging myself, or even from
wishing those hanged who would take it away. It was this that made me
write. The sense of my faults made me correct.

After the words 'angry to find us so,' p. 3, l. 36, occurred the
following--In the first place I own that I have used my best endeavours
to the finishing these pieces. That I made what advantage I could of the
judgment of authors dead and living; and that I omitted no means in my
power to be informed of my errors by my friends and by my enemies. And
that I expect no favour on account of my youth, business, want of
health, or any such idle excuses. But the true reason they are not yet
more correct is owing to the consideration how short a time they and I
have to live. A man that can expect but sixty years may be ashamed to
employ thirty in measuring syllables and bringing sense and rhyme
together. To spend our youth in pursuit of riches or fame, in hopes to