And readers better to engage,
Tells a flat lie in every page.
However, as we should never refuse ourselves an innocent pleasure, for fear others should think ill of us, I followed the guide who did me the honor to be my conductor.
Abbé with taste and genius fraught,
With us the sacred shrine you sought;
You, who with sage enlightened mind,
At once both knowing and refined,
Have, by example, shown the way
Which we may take, nor fear to stray,
When in pursuit of taste we go,
That God which wits so seldom know.
In our journey we had many difficulties to encounter. We first of all met with Messrs. Baldus, Scioppius, Lecicocrassus, Scriblerius, and a crowd of commentators, who made it their business to restore passages, and compile volumes upon a word which they did not understand.
Dacier, Salmasius the profound,
With learned lumber stored I found;
Their faces wan, their fire quite spent,
With pouring o'er Greek authors bent.
Soon as the squalid troop I spied,
I raised my voice, and to them cried,
"To Taste's famed Temple do you bend?"
"No, sir, we no such thing intend.
What others have with care expressed,
With accuracy we digest,
On others' thoughts we spend our ink,
But we for our part never think."
