Let me have good proof of your greediness to devour my labours, and I will dish up such a meal for you in my next volume, as shall go nigh to produce extermination by _surfeit_. One favour, alone, I crave--give me _abuse_ enough; let no squeamish pretences of respect for my bookseller, or disguised qualms of apprehension for your own sacred persons, deter the _natural_ inclination of your hearts. The slightest deviation from your _usual course_ to independent writers--or one step towards commendation from your _gang_, might induce the public to believe I had _abandoned my character_, and become one of your _honourable fraternity_-the very _suspicion of which_ would (to me) produce irretrievable ruin. _Your masters_, the _trading brotherhood_, will (as usual) direct you in the course you should pursue; whether to approve or condemn, as their _'peculiar interests_ may dictate. Most _sapient_ sirs of the secret _bandit'_ of the screen, inquisitors of literature, raise all your _arms_ and _heels_, your _daggers, masks_, and _hatchets_, to revenge the daring of an _open foe_, who thus boldly defies your _base_ and _selfish views_; for, basking at his ease in the sunshine of public patronage, he feels that his heart is rendered invulnerable to your_ poisoned shafts_. Read, and you shall find I have not been parsimonious of the means to grant you _food_ and _pleasure_: errors there are, no doubt, and plenty of them, grammatical and typographical, all of which I might have corrected by an _errata_ at the end of my volume; but I disdain the wish to rob you of your office, and have therefore left them just where I made them, without a single note to mark them out; for if all the _thistles were rooted up_, what would become of the _asses?_ or of those "Who pin their easy faith on critic's sleeve, And, knowing nothing, ev'ry thing believe?" Fully satisfied that swarms of _literary blow flies_ will pounce upon the errors with delight, and, buzzing with the ecstasy of infernal joy, endeavour to hum their readers into a belief of the profundity of their critic erudition;--I shall nevertheless, with Churchill, laughingly exclaim--"Perish my muse" "If e'er her labours weaken to refine The generous roughness of a nervous line." Bernard Blackmantle. CONTENTS. Page INTRODUCTION 3 PREFACE, IN IMITATION OF THE FIRST SATIRE OF PERSIUS 5 REFLECTIONS, ADDRESSED TO THOSE WHO CAN THINK. Reflections of an Author--Weighty Reasons for writing-- Magister Artis Ingeniique Largitor Venter--Choice of Subject considered--Advice of Index, the Bookseller--Of the Nature of Prefaces--How to commence a new Work 7 A FEW THOUGHTS ON MYSELF 14