that I think it might not improperly have been made on the other side of _Parnassus_, unless matters are strangely mended since I left you. We _Apollo_, by the Grace of _Jupiter_, Emperor of _Parnassus_, King of Poetry, Sovereign Prince of Letters, Duke of the _Muses_, Marquis of Light, and Earl of the Four Seasons, _&c._ to all our Trusty and well Beloved Explorers of Nature, and Cherishers of Learning, Greeting. _Whereas we are inform’d to our ineffable displeasure, grief, sorrow and concern, that many fewds, jars, quarrels, animosities, and heart-burns are ever and anon kindled, stirr’d up, and fomented among the elder brothers of_ Helicon, _as well as the multitude of vain pretenders to bayes and immortality, in so much, that your bickerings, clamours, noise and disturbances, are of intolerable inconveniency to the good and just; and an unhappy suspension of the serenity of their minds, as well as so many perturbations and infractions of the peace of our uncle king_ Pluto’_s dominions: wherefore it is our royal will and pleasure, that these notorious misdemeanours be forthwith remedied; promising upon our royal word, that justice shall be duly executed to every body; and all men of real merit and worth, lovers of wisdom and learning, of what nation or sort soever, shall in their respective classes of virtue and excellence, be registred in the glorious volumes of fame, to be kept eternally in the_ Delphic _library: In pursuance whereof, we do hereby earnestly require and injoin our beloved sisters the Muses, to hold a court of claims in the principality of_ Delos, _where we shall give our royal attendance so often as the fatigues of our laborious course will permit us, to examine all capacities, claims, titles, and pretensions whatever: and to avoid all lets, troubles, hinderances, molestations, and interruptions that possibly we can: we do farthermore hereby strictly prohibit and forbid, upon pain of our highest displeasure, and a hundred years interdiction from the laurel-grove, all sonneteers, songsters, satyrists, panegyrists, madrigallers, and such like impediments of_ Parnassus, _to make any pretensions whatever to reputation and immortality; till such time as the more laborious and industrious investigators of nature are regulated and dispatch’d_. Given at our High Court of _Helicon_, this 47th Century, from our Conquest of _Python_.