VI 
PREFACE. 
Cenfure is aimed point-blank, it amounts to no more 
than plain Billingfgate , or, as the French have it, 
Criailler , on ecrire en grondant. I wifhl were able 
to difeern the Profundity of his Wit, in faying, 
among many other Things, “ England has not 
hitherto bred one Painter (a), that here Hunt- 
ing feems to be the Paflion of all Ages and Sexes (, b ) > 
his Animadverfions upon which he has happily con- 
cluded with a fublime Tale of a Pod-boy ; and that 
it was Lazinefs that made Shakefpear write feverai 
Tragedies in Profe (c). Now, to anfwer thefe 
Affertions in the Stile of the Abbe, the natural Re- 
ply would be, point-blank, Cc Ce ri eft pds vrai ” But 
we will not fo far imitate him j no, let us ufe him 
with more Politenefs, and rather recommend to him, 
when he next intends to write Letters, to ftudy thofe 
of an Englifh Author (d) fird, which want neither 
* Delicacy , Truth , nor T)eftgnh where the Satire is 
keen, yet pleafing, and not dufFd with tame crawling 
Narratives. 
X. 
Judgment is mod likely to be genuine, where it 
is engaged in the Difcovery rather of Beauties than 
Faults 5 and is but barely honed, when it is capable 
of feeing fome Beauties as well as Faults. A cur- 
fory Spectator, in running thro' a Kingdom, is not 
to condemn or ridicule the Cudoms he finds, only 
becaufe 
(a) Vol. I. Lett. 23. ( b ) Lett. 46. 
(d) Mr. Littleton's Perfian Letters, 
(0 Lett. 31. 
