at if any of my Readers
think I am to blame in Publishing my own Commendations, they will allow
I should have deserved their Censure as much, had I suppressed the
Humour in which they are convey'd to me.

_SIR,_

'I am often in a private Assembly of Wits of both Sexes, where we
generally descant upon your Speculations, or upon the Subjects on
which you have treated. We were last _Tuesday_ talking of those two
Volumes which you have lately published. Some were commending one of
your Papers, and some another; and there was scarce a single Person in
the Company that had not a favourite Speculation. Upon this a Man of
Wit and Learning told us, he thought it would not be amiss if we paid
the _Spectator_ the same Compliment that is often made in our publick
Prints to Sir _William Read_, Dr. _Grant_, Mr. _Moor_ the Apothecary;
[1] and other eminent Physicians, where it is usual for the Patients
to publish the Cures which have been made upon them, and the several
Distempers under which they laboured. The Proposal took, and the Lady
where we visited having the two last Volumes in large Paper
interleav'd for her own private use, ordered them to be brought down,
and laid in the Window, whither every one in the Company retired, and
writ down a particular Advertisement in the Style and Phrase of the
like ingenious Compositions which we frequently meet with at the end
of our News-Papers. When we had finish'd our Work, we read them with a
great deal of Mirth at the Fire-side, and agreed, _Nemine
contradicente_, to get them transcrib'd, and sent to the _Spectator_.
The Gentleman who made the Proposal enter'd the following
Advertisement before the Title-Page, after which the rest succeeded in
order.

_Remedium efficax et universum_; or, An effectual Remedy adapted to
all Capacities; shewing how any Person may Cure himself of
Ill-Nature, Pride, Party-Spleen, or any other Distemper incident to
the human System, with an easie way to know when the Infection is
upon him. This Panacea is as innocent as Bread, agreeable to the
Taste, and requires no Confinement. It has not its Equal in the
Universe, as Abundance of the Nobility and Gentry throughout the
Kingdom have experienced.

N. B. 'No Family ought to be without it.

_Over the two_ Spectators _on Jealousy, being the two first in the
third Volume._

I _William Crazy_, aged Threescore and se