hing into my Book, which the Ladies may not read without
blushing. And if you see not my _Hero_ persecuted with Love by
Women, it is not because he was not amiable, and that he could not
be loved, but because it would clash with Civility in the persons of
Ladies, and with true resemblance in that of men, who rarely shew
themselves cruel unto them, nor in doing it could have any good
grace: Finally, whether things ought to be so, or whether I have
judged of my _Hero_ by mine own weakness, I would not expose his
fidelity to that dangerous triall, but have been contented to make
no _Hilas_, nor yet an _Hipolitus_ of him.

But whilest I speak of Civility, it is fit I should tell you (for
fear I be accused of falling therein) that if you see throughout all
my Work, whenas _Soliman_ is spoken unto, Thy Highness, Thy
Majestie, and that in conclusion he is treated with Thee, and not
with You, it is not for want of Respect, but contrarily it is to
have the more, and to observe the custom of those people, who speak
after that sort to their Sovereigns. And if the Authority of the
living may be of as much force, as that of the dead, you shall find
examples of it in the most famous _Othomans_, and you shall see that
their Authors have not been afraid to employ in their own Tongue a
manner of speaking, which they have drawn from the Greek and Latin;
and then too I have made it appear clearlie, that I have not done it
without design; for unless it be whenas the Turks speak to the
Sultan, or he to his Inferiours, I have never made use of it, and
either of them doth use it to each other.

Now for fear it may be objected unto me, that I have approached some
incidents nearer than the Historie hath shewed them to be, great
_Virgil_ shall be my Warrant, who in his Divine _AEneids_ hath made
_Dido_ appear four Ages after her own; wherefore I have believed I
might do of some moneths, what he hath done of so many Years, and
that I was not to be afraid of erring, as long as I followed so good
a guide. I know not likewise whether some may not take it ill, that
my _Hero_ and _Heronia_ are not Kings; but besides that the Generous
do put no difference between wearing of Crowns, and meriting them,
and that my _Justiniano_ is of a Race which hath held the Empire of
the Orient, the example of _Athenagoras_, me-thinks, ought to stop
their mouths, seeing _Theogines_ and _Charida_ are but simple
Citizens.

Finally, Reader, such Censors may set their