I must confess indeed that my countrymen and other southern nations temper the one with the other in a manner as they do their wine with water, often just dashing the latter with a little of the first.

Now here men love to drink their wine pure; nay, sometimes it will not satisfy unless in its very quintessence, as in brandies; though an excess of this betrays want of sobriety, as much as an excess of wit betrays a want of judgment.

But I must conclude, lest I be justly taxed with wanting both.

I will only add, that as every language has its peculiar graces, seldom or never to be acquired by a foreigner, I cannot think I have given my author those of the English in every place; but as none compelled me to write, I fear to ask a pardon which yet the generous temper of this nation makes me hope to obtain.

Albinus, a Roman, who had written in Greek, desired in his preface to be forgiven his faults of language; but Cato asked him in derision whether any had forced him to write in a tongue of which he was not an absolute master.