duce extermination by _surfeit_. One favour, alone, I crave--give me
_abuse_ enough; let no squeamish pretences of respect for my bookseller,
or disguised qualms of apprehension for your own sacred persons, deter
the _natural_ inclination of your hearts. The slightest deviation
from your _usual course_ to independent writers--or one step towards
commendation from your _gang_, might induce the public to believe I
had _abandoned my character_, and become one of your _honourable
fraternity_-the very _suspicion of which_ would (to me) produce
irretrievable ruin. _Your masters_, the _trading brotherhood_, will (as
usual) direct you in the course you should pursue; whether to approve or
condemn, as their _'peculiar interests_ may dictate. Most _sapient_ sirs
of the secret _bandit'_ of the screen, inquisitors of literature, raise
all your _arms_ and _heels_, your _daggers, masks_, and _hatchets_, to
revenge the daring of an _open foe_, who thus boldly defies your _base_
and _selfish views_; for, basking at his ease in the sunshine of public
patronage, he feels that his heart is rendered invulnerable to your_
poisoned shafts_. Read, and you shall find I have not been parsimonious
of the means to grant you _food_ and _pleasure_: errors there are, no
doubt, and plenty of them, grammatical and typographical, all of which
I might have corrected by an _errata_ at the end of my volume; but I
disdain the wish to rob you of your office, and have therefore left them
just where I made them, without a single note to mark them out; for if
all the _thistles were rooted up_, what would become of the _asses?_ or
of those

"Who pin their easy faith on critic's sleeve,
And, knowing nothing, ev'ry thing believe?"

Fully satisfied that swarms of _literary blow flies_ will pounce upon
the errors with delight, and, buzzing with the ecstasy of infernal joy,
endeavour to hum their readers into a belief of the profundity of their
critic erudition;--I shall nevertheless, with Churchill, laughingly
exclaim--"Perish my muse"

"If e'er her labours weaken to refine
The generous roughness of a nervous line."

Bernard Blackmantle.

CONTENTS. Page
INTRODUCTION 3

PREFACE, IN IMITATION OF THE FIRST SATIRE OF
PERSIUS 5

REFLECTIONS, ADDRESSED TO TH