_From hence it comes to pass that Matters of Fact are handed down to Posterity with so little Certainty, that nothing is to be depended upon; from hence the uncertain Account of Things and Actions in the remoter Ages of the World, the confounding the Genealogies as well as Atchievements of_ Belus, Nimrod, _and_ Nimrus, _and their Successors, the Histories and Originals of_ Saturn, Jupiter, _and the rest of the Celestial Rabble, who Mankind would have been asham'd to have call'd_ Gods, _had they had the true Account of their dissolute, exorbitant, and inhumane Lives_. _From Men we may descend to Action: and this prodigious Looseness of the Pen has confounded History and Fable from the beginning of both. Thus the great Flood in_ Deucalion'_s_ Time _is made to pass for the Universal Deluge: the Ingenuity of_ Dedalus, _who by a Clue of Thread got out of the_ Egyptian _Maze, which was thought impossible, is grown into a Fable of making himself a pair of Wings, and flying through the Air:--the great Drought and violent Heat of Summer, thought to be the Time when the Great Famine was in_ Samaria, _fabl'd by the Poets and Historians into the Story of_ Phaeton _borrowing the Chariot of the Sun, and giving the Horses their Heads, they run so near the Earth as burnt up all the nearest Parts, and scorch'd the Inhabitants, so that they have been black in those Parts ever since._ _These, and such like ridiculous Stuff, have been the Effects of the Pageantry of Historians in former Ages: and I might descend nearer home, to the Legends of Fabulous History which have swallow'd up the Actions of our ancient Predecessors, King_ Arthur, _the Gyant_ Gogmagog, _and the_ Britain, _the Stories of St._ George _and the_ Dragon, Guy _Earl of_ Warwick, Bevis _of_ Southampton, _and the like_. _I'll account for better Conduct in the ensuing History: and tho' some Things here related shall have equal Wonder due to them, Posterity shall not have equal Occasion to distrust the Verity of the Relation._ _I confess here is room for abundance of Romance, because the Subject may be safer extended than in any other case, no Story being capable to be crowded with such Circumstances, but Infinite Power, which is all along concern'd with us in every Relation, is suppos'd capable of making true._ _Yet we shall no where so Trespass upon Fact, as to oblige Infinite Power to the shewing more Miracles than it intended._ _It must be allow'd, That when Nature was put into so much Confusion, and the Surface of the Earth and Sea felt such extraordinary a Disorder, innumerable Accidents would fall out that till the like Occasion happen may never more be seen, and unless a like Occasion had happen'd could never before be heard of: wherefore the particular Circumstances being so wonderful, serve but to remember Posterity of the more wonderful Extreme, which was the immediate Cause._