moral lessons he ever taught, his life formed the most pointed. Fearlessness and honesty were his watchwords from his early career of art, after being released from the silversmith's apprenticeship in 1720 until the day of his death in 1764, when he retired from mundane existence full of years and honours. As Ireland declares him to have asserted, his drawings were meant for the crowd rather than for the critics; and with that intention his book was commenced, the original design being to comprise in one volume "a moral and analytical description of seventy-eight prints;" but as the work advanced, such an amount of anecdote and illustrative comment suggested itself, that he was compelled to adopt the three-volume form which is here followed, with the further addition to which we have alluded, of such a full description and reproduction as the original compiler, from accident or design, omitted. These will be found in the third volume, and include many of the most important and meritorious works of the great artist. It has been found advisable to change the ornamental and sometimes indistinct lettering of the original plates, and to adopt a consistent and uniform style of titles. At the same time the elaborate catalogue compiled by Ireland is preserved, since it is still highly valuable as a chronological list of every effort of Hogarth's hand, although it would be folly to attempt a reproduction of every variation it contains. The system pursued by Ireland and Nichols is followed, and the Publishers venture to congratulate themselves on submitting to the notice of the artistic and literary world, as well as to the public generally, the best and cheapest edition of Hogarth's complete works ever brought forward. [Illustration: (end of chapter floral icon)] INTRODUCTION. Mr. Hogarth frequently asserted that no man was so ill qualified to form a true judgment of pictures as the professed connoisseur; whose taste being originally formed upon imitations, and confined to the manners of Masters, had seldom any reference to Nature. Under this conviction, his subjects were selected for the crowd rather than the critic;[1] and explained in that universal language common to the world, rather than in the _lingua technica_ of the arts, which is sacred to the scientific. Without presuming to support his hypothesis, I have endeavoured to follow his example. My original design was to have comprised in one volume a moral and analytical description of seventy-eight prints; but as the work advanced, such variety of anecdote and long train of _et cetera_ clung to the narrative, that these limits were found too narrow. With the explanation of fifteen additional plates, the letterpress has expanded to near seven hundred pages.