dumps, and always holding forth with a diſmal face and a canting tone.
- ——ridiculum acri
- Fortius & melius magnas plerumque ſecat res.
Upon the whole, after the cooleſt review of this undertaking, and the various reflections which I have been making upon it, for theſe five years paſt, I can ſee nothing in it, to repent of, but the want of ſufficient abilities to treat a ſubject of ſuch general importance in the manner which it deſerves. But I hope the reader will excuſe ſome imperfections, when he conſiders the nature of my ſtinted Education, that I was allowed to continue but three years at Oxford, and was not wenty four years of age, when I compleated this undertaking.
Give me leave, for a concluſion, to indulge the natural vanity of an author, by applying to my own performance the ſelf-exaltation of the celebrated Horace; which may ſeem the more excuſable in me, ſince the gratification of this human foible is the only Reward, which I am ever like to receive for all my zeal and all my labours!
- Exegi monumentum ære perennius,
- Regalique ſitu pyramidum altius,
- Quod non imber edax, non Aquilo impotens
- Poſſit diruere, aut innumerabilis
- Annorum ſeries, & fuga temporum.
- Non omnis moriar.
