ou can but use the tomahawk skilfully, your fortune
is certain. '_Sic itur ad astra_.' Read Blackwood's Noctea Ambrosiance.
Take the town by surprise, folly by the ears; 'the glory, jest, and
riddle of the world' is man; use your knowledge of this ancient volume
rightly, and you may soon mount the car of fortune, and drive at random
wherever your fancy dictates. Bear in mind the Greek proverb, '_Mega
biblion, mega kakon_.' In your remarks, select such persons who, from
their elevated situations in society, ought to be above reproof, and
whose vices are, therefore, more worthy of public condemnation:

'------------Ridiculum acri
Fortius ac melius magnas plerumque secat res.'

By this means you will benefit the state, and improve the morals of
society. The most wholesome truths may be told with pleasantry. Satire,
to be severe, needs not to be scurrilous. The approval of the judicious
will always follow the ridicule which is directed against error,
ignorance, and folly."

How long little Index might have continued in this strain I know not, if
I had not ventured to suggest
~11~~
that the course he pointed out was one of great difficulty, and
considerable personal hazard; that to arrive at fortune by such means,
an author must risk the sacrifice of many old connexions, and incur no
inconsiderable dangers; that great caution would be necessary to escape
the fangs of the forensic tribe, and that in voluntarily thrusting his
nose into such a nest of hornets, it would be hardly possible to
escape being severely stung in retaliation. "_Pulchrum est accusari ah
accusandis_," said my friend, the bookseller, "who has suffered more by
the fashionable world than yourself? Have you not dissipated a splendid
patrimony in a series of the most liberal entertainments? Has not your
generous board been graced with the presence of royalty? and the banquet
enriched by the attendant stars of nobility, from the duke to the right
honorable knight commander. And have you not since felt the most cruel
neglect from these your early associates, and much obliged friends, with
no crime but poverty, with no reproach but the want of prudence? Have
you not experienced ingratitude and persecution in every shape that
human baseness could find ingenuity to inflict? And can you hesitate to
avail yourself of the noble revenge in your power, when it combines the
advantages of being morally profitable both to yourself and society?

'-------