The editor thought that in many cases the selections should not be published without notes, for epigrams have often some obscurity in them and their whole charm is lost unless the light that would illuminate it is at hand. The notes to the selections from Martial are pretty largely taken from Farnaby. Elsewhere the editor has supplied notes sparingly, at those points where the reader might be stuck. He has also changed the titles of a good many pieces, especially where the original involved the name of some fictitious or base person. The purpose of a title is to recall the whole piece to memory or to facilitate finding it in an index. Why, then, title an epigram _To Gargilianus_ or _Cecilianus_, which gives no idea of what the epigram is about? The editor, therefore, has substituted titles which express as well as possible the force of the poem, a difficult task especially when the meaning is compact, as only one who has tried it knows. But that out of the brevity of this book the reader may get that ability in judgement, which above all should be cultivated, the editor thought it worth while to prefix to the anthology an exposition of the norms of judgement used in selecting the epigrams. He drew these norms not merely from his own wit or from the authorities of Antiquity, but from the conversation of learned men experienced in civilized life. Hence the reader will find here their judgements, not the editor's, and will, if he is unbiased, perceive how just and accurate they are. The preface is then followed by the essay. The principles of the essay, as Nicole asserted above in the preface, are not peculiarly his own but those of the group with which he was associated. They are the principles, for example, of the _Port-Royal logic_: particularly 1), "one of the most important rules of true rhetoric," "_that there is nothing beautiful except that which is true_; which would take away from discourse a multitude of vain ornaments and false thoughts;" and 2) the doctrine that "the figurative style commonly expresses, with the things, the emotions which we experience in conceiving or speaking of them," and hence in the light of the adjustment of feeling to the situation "we may judge the use which ought to be made of it, and what are the subjects to which it is adapted."[8] The purpose of the book is to serve morality and to promote judgement.[9] To this end the editor provides a check list of the better epigrams, and affixes an asterisk to designate the best.[10] Seventeen pieces are given the highest rating: thirteen of Martial's (1.8, 1.21, 1.33, 2.5, 3.44, 3.46, 4.56, 4.69, 5.10, 5.13, 8.69, 10.53, and 12.13); the re-written epigram ascribed to Seneca and discussed in the notes to the essay (note 32); Claudian on Archimedes' sphere;[11] Boethius, _De cons. phil._ 1.m.4; and one modern poem, Buchanan's dedication of the _Paraphrase of the psalms_ to Mary, Queen of Scots.[12]