[ 6o ] 



' Immoderate taxes are ever unfriendly to trade, 

 and heavy charges and ekorbitant expences are not 

 Ipfs fo to fcience and the arts. Ingenuity, even 

 mere prctenfions to ingenuity, are often taxed as 

 high as any article of commerce. Subfcriptions 

 for thoufands and tens of thoufands are propofed 

 and tendered to the publick, with as much eafe, un- 

 concern, and firmnefs of features now, a*- the moft 

 hardy veteran would have dared to have offered for- 

 merly for fives and for fifties. But this is an age in 

 which credulity is become epidemical, and the al- 

 chemy and empirifm of Ben Johnson^s days are faft 

 gaining ground under another denomination, and in 

 a different form. Should a comick genius arife of 

 equal humour and parts, he might now find as ample 

 a field of impoflure to range in as ever difgraced that 

 poet*s times. The furefl and mofl effedlual means 

 of promoting and extending knowledge for the ge- 

 neral benefit of the publick, is to render it attainable 

 on the eafieft and leafl expenfive means pofTible. 



I hope no proprietor of any machine now in ufe 

 will conceive, that any thing is here meant inimical 

 to his intereft. It is the writer's fincere wifh, that 

 matters might be fo ordered, as to render the inte- 

 reft of the proprietors compatible with that of the 

 publick in general. Should the drill hufbandry b^ 



generally 



