_But this sort of Books is most to be blamed, because for the greater part, as I said before, their =chief Design= is to put fleshly Lust into long stories, and sometimes not without very unhandsome mixtures, tending onely to the service of brutish Concupiscence, the nourishment of dishonorable affections, and by exciting in the Readers muddy fancies, to indispose them for their attendance upon God by their better part. For some such reason, I suppose, the great =Sidney= before his death charg’d his friend Sir =Fulk Grevill=, who had the onely Copy of his =Arcadia=, that he should never permit it to be made publick._ _The =other= pieces, which fill up the =intervalls= of the story, and grace it with pleasing varieties, are commonly frivolous devices of wit in some contemptible matter, and serve but to some such slight purpose, as doth the writing of =Verses= in the form of an =Egge= or =Hatchet=, where the measures of words and sense are constrain’d to suite with the odde proportions of such figures. These are fine rarities of no use, the intertexture of the =by-accidents= being as triviall as the =principall Design=._ _’Tis true, some of these Authors written in divers Languages, are applauded for the =Elegancy= of each particular =Tongue=, and are here and there interspers’d with good =Sentences=: but they are so deeply =infected= with =noisome words=, =immodest Tales= and =Discourses=, which do fatally corrupt the manners of Youth, that I cannot but assent to the Opinion of many wise men, who judge them, for all that, well worthy of the fire. Neither do I think it improper to use the words, which the old =Sages= of =Troy= silently mutter’d, when they perceived the dangers which attended the beauty of =Helen=, which the young men extoll’d as equall to that of the heavenly Goddesses._ Αλλὰ γαρ ὧς τοίηπερ ἐοῦς᾽ ἐν νηυσὶ νεέσθω μηδ᾽ ἡμῖν τεκέεσσί τ᾽ ὀπίσσω πῆμα λίποιτο, _i.e._ But though She’s such, let her return, and make An end of what we suffer for her sake. _I could easily name them, but that Labour is needless to such as know books: and to those which do not, I ought not, by making a Catalogue, to give notice of such as I could wish burnt. If they were, they would not be greatly miss’d, as to that propriety of speech unto which they lay claim, and for which they are magnified by their Readers; because the best Languages used in the world, may as well be learn’d from Authors that are as Elegant as Chaste._