ity of
the Soul, of the Mystery of Godliness, or of Ecclesiastical Policie, and
then had treated you with Indiscerpibility and Essential Spissitude
(words, which though I am no competent Judge of, for want of Languages,
yet I fancy strongly ought to mean just nothing) with a company of
Apocryphal midnight Tales cull'd out of the choicest Insignificant
Authors; If I had only proved in Folio that Apollonius was a naughty
knave, or had presented you with two or three of the worst principles
transcrib'd out of the peremptory and ill-natur'd (though prettily
ingenious) Doctor of Malmsbury undigested and ill-manag'd by a silly,
saucy, ignorant, impertinent, ill educated Chaplain I were then indeed
sufficiently in fault; but having inscrib'd Comedy on the beginning of
my Book, you may guess pretty near what penny-worths you are like to
have, and ware your money and your time accordingly. I would not yet be
understood to lessen the dignity of Playes, for surely they deserve a
place among the middle if not the better sort of Books; for I have heard
the most of that which bears the name of Learning, and which has abused
such quantities of Ink and Paper, and continually employs so many
ignorant, unhappy souls for ten, twelve, twenty years in the University
(who yet poor wretches think they are doing something all the while) as
Logick etc. and several other things (that shall be nameless lest I
misspell them) are much more absolutely nothing than the errantest Play
that e'er was writ. Take notice, Reader, I do not assert this purely
upon my own knowledge, but I think I have known it very fully prov'd,
both sides being fairly heard, and even some ingenious opposers of it
most abominably baffl'd in the Argument: Some of which I have got so
perfectly by rote, that if this were a proper place for it, I am apt to
think myself could almost make it clear; and as I would not undervalue
Poetry, so neither am I altogether of their judgement who believe no
wisdom in the world beyond it. I have often heard indeed (and read) how
much the World was anciently oblig'd to it for most of that which they
call'd Science, which my want of letters makes me less assured of than
others happily may be: but I have heard some wise men say that no
considerable part of useful knowledge was this way communicated, and on
the other way, that it hath serv'd to propogate so many idle
superstitions, as all the benefits it hath or can be guilty of, can
never make suff