Being considered in the same moral light, this book will be useful to the present age, by the instances it gives of corrections by which different offences against the peace of mankind have been requited; the consequence of which will be the preventing of such offences. Slanderous wits, for example, to mention only offenders of that class, writers of satires, epigrams, and lampoons, dealers in bon-mots, inventors of anecdotes, by reading the instances of disciplines by which such ingenious pastimes have, on different occasions, been repaid, will naturally be led to recollect, that all possible flagellations (to use the expression of the Alguazil introduced in a certain chapter of Gil Blas) have not been yet inflicted; and sudden considerations like this, which this book will not fail to suggest to them, will be extremely apt to check them the instant they are preparing to make their excursions on the reputation of their neighbours; and by that means the good name of many an innocent person will be preserved. To the persons themselves who actually suffer from the injustice or wantonness of others, this performance will be of great service. Those, for instance, who smart under the lash of some insolent satirist, those who are disappointed in their expectations, those whose secrets have been betrayed, nay, even ladies, treacherously forsaken by those who had given them so many assurances of fidelity and eternal constancy, will find their misfortunes alleviated by reading the different instances and facts related in this book: they will take comfort from the thought, that what has already happened may happen again; and cheer themselves with the hope, that flagellations will sooner or later be the lot of those persons who cause their uneasiness. Being considered in a philosophical light, this work will be useful to the present age, in the same manner as we have said it would be to posterity. The present generation, at least in this island, will find in it proofs both of the reality of the singular practices which once prevailed in their own country, and are still in full force in many others, and of the important light in which they have been considered by mankind. They will meet with accounts of bishops, cardinals, popes, and princes, who have warmly commended or blamed such practices; and will not be displeased to be moreover acquainted with the debates of the learned on the same subject, and with the honest, though opposite, endeavours, of a Cerebrosus and a Damian, a Gretzer and a Gerson.