author's preface. Ixxix 



as they rail in Verse ; and the most Scoundrel Rimers find 

 also their Account in their Songs and Lampoons. If my 

 Voyage was written in Hebrew, I am very well assur'd it 

 wou'd at least succeed as well as that of Rabhi Benjamin^ 

 And if it was only in Latin interlarded with Greeh, a la 

 Montfaxiconm} with a word or two of Arcibich to relish it a 

 little, I should without doubt have at least Admirers, if I 

 wanted Readers. For who with impunity, and even with 

 Success, would publish a hundred useless sorts of insipid 

 Literature, a hundred Copies of things that have been said 

 again and again by others, a hundred Lyes and Invectives ? 

 if they had not been in Latin, or in Verse, they wou'd never 

 liave gone off as they did. 



There's a certain Eeverend Father^ of our Acquaintance 

 whose Book is full of Faults, of things ill Chosen, of shock- 

 ing Eepetitions, of Trifles, of Pedantick Insolence, of 

 Injurious and ill-grounded Contradictions ; but then 'tis all 

 in Latin. This Learned Doctor endeavours to give the 

 World a Pielation of his Voyage, in imitation of Father 

 Mahillon,^ whose Scholar he is ; and whose Novelty consisting 



1 Rabbi Benjamin, the son of Jonas of Tuclela. Travels tlirongh 

 Europe, Asia, from Spain to China, 1160-73. From the Latin of 

 Montanus ; vide Purchas' Pilgi-imes, vol. ii. 



2 Dom. Bernard de Montfaucon, a distinguished savant and Greek 

 scholar, who after taking part in two campaigns under Turenne became 

 a monk of Saint-Benoit at Toulouse in 1675. He died, aged 87 years, 

 in 1741. 



3 According to Bernard this author was Casimir Freschot, the 

 anonymous author oi Remarqnes Historiques et Critiques, etc., hnt the 

 context further on appears to refer to Mabillon or Montfaucon. 



* Jean Mabillon was a learned writer and Benedictine monk of the 

 Congregation of St. Maur, born in 1632, a few years senior therefore 

 to Leguat. Mabillon visited the principal Libraries of Italy in 1G85 

 with Michel Germain, and brought back 3,000 volumes and manu- 

 scripts for the King's Library. He published an account of his 

 travels, and published the Muvieum Italicum and many works of deep 

 research. He died, aged 75 years, in 1707. (Weiss, Biographie 

 Universelle.) 



