BEing abundantly perswaded, that the Latin tongue may as readily be attained, as the French and other Languages are with us; or at least to a great deal more perfection, both for speaking and writing, than commonly it is, and that also according to our old way of Teaching, did we use such means to faci­litate it as they do in other Countries; I have seriously attended that Method, and (as God hath given opportu­nity) contrived sundry helps, whereby I thought I might (probably) ease my own pains, and ready my Scholars at their Books.

And whereas I have hitherto forborn to mention the particular use of those already published, (because I have still in mind, after some other requisites provid­ed, to make a full Discovery of the Art of Teach­ing, proceeding orderly from the very A B C to the height of what is attainable to at a Grammar School:) to satisfie their desires, who continually importune me to say something here (by way of Preface) touching the course I take, and the benefit I find in teaching this and other School-Books thus translated by me, I shall now freely impart my School Method, so far as concerneth those Books, and so fully as is requisite by writing. And hereby, I presume, I shall neither exasperate others, nor do prejudice to my self.

For I know very well, that the proportioning [Page] of things taught to the Learners just capacity, and the ordering of present documents, in relation to the past and future, so as to help the memory to retain the one, and prepare the understanding for receiving the other; still carrying on his affections to covet more, is a meer slight, and yet a Master­piece in our Profession: Which indeed it is very diffi­cult to discourse on, if not impossible to discover. Be­cause (as I conceive) this Ars infundendi is continu­ally attended with so many Circumstances, and requires such prudential considerations, as none can possibly ob­serve and think on, but those that are very circumspect and assiduous in a long continued Practice. Scire quid deceat, est caput artis, quod nullâ arte doce­tur, is very true in School teaching.

When a Child therefore is, 1. So well acquainted with his entrance into the Latin Tongue, as that he can tell you (according to his rudiments, or Grounds of Grammar) what part of Speech any word is, what are its Accents, and with what it agrees, or by what it is governed according to Rule. 2. When he can decline any Noun, and form any Verb, and render the Rule of the Genders of the one, and of the Praetertense and Supines of the other, out of Propria quae maribus, Quae Genus, and As in Prae­senti. 3. When by the daily use of his Vocabulary, and Phrases, he hath a good stock of proper words, and neat expressions, so as plausibly to deliver himself up­on any familiar occasion. 4. When he hath been exer­cised a while in construing, parsing, altering, and imi­tating the Collections out of the lowest School-Authors, [Page] and can do it Grammatically, though not altogether so exquisitely, as may be expected and at­tained to by after practice. 5. When he can read ei­ther English or Latin pretty distinctly, and can frame to write truly and legibly, and to keep his books fair: Then let him take an easie progress in the same Lan­guage by the help of his Latin Grammar, and the Authors already provided him; after this Method.

1. Let him, together with his Sententiae Pueriles, procure himself a little Paper book of the same bigness, and handsomly ruled; in which let him every Mon­day, Tuesday, and Wednesday in the forenoon (after he hath read two or three Verses in the Latin Testa­ment, and repeated his Grammar part.) 1. Write down half a Page of the Sentences both English and Latin according to the Printed Copy, and get them by Heart, as he writeth them, which will cause him to be more intent upon the matter, and to write more tru­ly and leisurely. 2. Let him repeat so many of them as he is well able (without tiring his memory) by heart, out of his own written Copy, and construe them likewise memoriter, sometimes out of English into Latin, and sometimes out of Latin into English. 3. Let him parse as many Sentences as the time and your lei­sure will permit you to hear; and be sure he decline those Nouns, and form those Verbs through, which seem more difficult, and inform him touching what Rule you know he is not so well acquainted withal in his Grammar, or which he doth not so well under­stand, and let him turn to it. For this purpose he should always bring his Grammar with him, when he [Page] cometh to say his Lesson. 4. Shew him how to imitate or vary one of those Sentences, and then cause him to write it down, taking special heed to the placing of his Latin words in the Latin order. Ex. gr. When he hath said Grammatically, i. e. as our words stand in English.

Let him change some accidents of the words thus,

Afterwards let him imitate it, by altering some of the words, and keeping the construction in the Latin order, thus;

Then help them to understand and remember it, by shewing them how to return an answer in the same case that the Question is made in, as.

Q. Quibus opitulaberis? R. Amicis.

Q. Whom will you help? A. My friends.

And in the same Mood and Tense.

Q. Amicis tuis quid debes facere? R. Opitulari.

Q. What oughtest thou to do to thy friends? A. To help them.

On Mondays and Wednesdays in the afternoons (after the Vocabula' s repeated) let a Boy 1. Tran­scribe out of Cato into a paper Book provided for that purpose, two or three Distichs Latin and English; and as he writes them, let him get them by heart, and after­wards rehearse them so, according to his written copy: [Page] 2. Let him construe them word by word memoriter (and to help him in so doing, let him make use of Cato Grammatically construed) and parse them ac­cording to the grammatical order. 3. Let him op­pose every Lesson by way of Question and Answer both English and Latin, which he should thus write down in two columes in a little Book, ex. gr. out of the first Distioh.

And then 4. Let him give you the sense of the Distich thus;

God, who is a Spirit, is chiefly to be worshipped of us, and that with a pure mind.

Deus, qui est Spiritus, à nobis precipuè & pu­râ mente colendus est.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays in the afternoons let Children learn to talk with one another accord­ing to the expressions they meet with in Pueriles Confabulatiunculae, and Corderius' s School-Colloquies thus: 1. Let them construe a Colloquy, or more verbatim. 2. Cause them to analyse exactly (at the least) one, of every part of Speech in it, and to deeline a Noun, and conjugate or form a Verb thorow­out. 3. Let them take a Clause or a whole Sentence, and alter it quite to another meaning by other words [Page] placed in the same order that those are in the Book, 4. Let them try who can say the most part of a Col­loquy by heart, and see how well they can imitate it. 5. Let them frame a Colloquy of their own in En­glish, and turn it into Latin, marking according to the figures of their Books, the page or Colloquy and line, where the words and Phrases, or Sentences they make use on, are to be found, especially if they be such as they seldom meet withal.

But however, Let them have a paper Book, wherein the Grammar Rules are written, after the manner of common-place heads, and ever as they find examples in these Authors answering their Rules, let them write them down under them. Let them likewise have a book for Phrases, Alphabetically contrived, wherein they may write down such elegancies as are worthy the pre­sent noting, and of which they may come to make use of at another time. The benefits that accrew to Children by thus canvasing these lesser Authors, are extraor­dinary; For, 1. It bettereth them in reading either English or Latin. 2. It teacheth them Orthography, and fair writing. 3. It makes them rightly to un­derstand what they Learn, and easily to remember it, by presenting every thing to the Phantasie as well by the eye as by the ear, and imprinting them fast upon the memory by an earnest intention and reiteration. 4. It not only helps them to construe surely, and with confi­dence, and 5. To parse readily any word in their les­son (which are things meerly Grammatical;) but also 6. Instructeth them in the Moral part of Learning, both how to behave themselves, and to speak as those [Page] of better breeding. For it maketh the matter, words, and Phrases in every lesson their own, and stores them with Copy and Variety of both, to use upon any occa­sion. And this is it which Mr. Brinsley truly calls the very picking out of the kernel, and the life of every Lecture.

Now for the translating of these books, to the end they might be thus improved to the Childrens greater advantage, I conceived there was to me a necessity so to do, if I meant at all to use them, as (I observe) the generality of School-Masters have done both here and beyond the Seas for many years, and some Ages together.

1. In regard the parties to whom they are com­monly taught are but little ones, of about seven or eight years old, who are not so well able to apprehend terms of Art, and digest Rules; as to imitate, re­member, and repeat the forms of Speech in any Lan­guage; whereof; when they have gained some know­ledge, the Rules may be better instilled into them by informing them in a Practical way, why they said thus and thus, and directing them withal, how to say the like, when they are put to it.

2. A Book altogether Latin is (as I may term it) a meer Barbarian to our Children, that are ig­norant in the tongue, and therefore know not one word in the Book what it meaneth, further than it is told them. Hence cometh it to pass, that when the Master, or (as in many Schools) a boy takes upon him to in­terpret a place in an Author, and to tell Children verbatim what it meaneth (though never so distinct­ly [Page] and twice or thrice over) the work of Construing proves so elaborate, that they can receive but a very little at one Lesson, whereas the more one hears or reads of any language, and the oftner he meets with the words and phrases in it (so he do but well under­stand what they mean) the more apt he is to remem­ber them, and the sooner and the surelier to attain the Tongue. Moreover a Book only Latin, presents in it many things to be considered at once (and the most of them beyond a Boys apprehension) before one can un­derstand it; viz. the proper and then the tropical sig­nification of the words, and which of many is to be used in each particular place. 2. How the words are to be transprosed from the Rhetorical to a Grammer order. 3. How every Elegancy and Phrase is to be rendred according to the natural Idiom. 4. How the Sentence or Speech doth hang together in our language, so as to express the same sense that it bears in Latin: For the pondering of all which, a young Learner had need to be helped by having the languages set down as they answer one another, that thereby he may be able to compare them both together, and express the one by the other, giving to each its due propriety.

3. Because the profession of a Latin School-master is to teach the Latin tongue, and not the Grammer only (which is but an introduction to it) and experience tells us that no language is more readily got than by familiar discourse in it, and ability therein is no way sooner gained than by compa­ring the tongue we learn with that we know, and ask­ing how they call this, or how they say that in another [Page] language, which we are able to express in our own.

4. The having of these first Books meerly Latin, seemed a main cause why Children made so little pro­gress in them, and with so little benefit or pleasure. For commonly they peruse not above six or seven leaves in some one of those Authors, not regarding them further, than to construe or parse their present Lesson, which they seldom do as they ought, because they do not well understand them, whereas by having them in English and Latin together, they will run their Books two or three times through, and readily perform any task their Masters shall impose upon them.

5. Whereas many that had tasted the sweat of their own labours, and were free in imparting it to o­thers, had formerly translated certain School-Books (by which many hundreds that have industriously us­ed them to help themselves, and others, in the Latin, have received much benefit.) I observe the present rarity of such Books had made them excessive dear, and therefore conceived it requisite to make them more common; and that both the English an Latin might be had under one, I have set them down constantly together.

6. This, I conceive, is the surest (if not the only) way to avoid. Anglicisms, and other Barbarisms which are incident to Children in making Latin, For where a Rule many times cannot be had to direct them, nor their Dictionaries be able to supply them with words and phrases, their Authors may. And it is undoubtedly better for a Child to learn to speak well at the first, than after he hath got an habit of Bald, [Page] duncical Latin (as they call it) by attending only the Rules, to be first made to unsay it, and then to express it better, as his Author hath done.

7. I might alledge further, that these manner of Translations may prove beneficial, though not so ne­cessary altogether, to many at riper years, as well as to little boys, viz. 1. To the weaker sort of Country School Masters, that have no supply of Books, who may hence gain the true construction of a place which seems doubtful, obscure, or erroneous. 2. To young Students, who come not perfectly grounded to the Uni­versities, as it is meet, who by using Books translated may attain a Copy of proper Language, without trust­ing too much to Dictionaries, which do oft-times fail, if not deceive them. 3. To those that have lost their Latin Tongue, and would recover it by their own industry. And lastly to them, that after a lit­tle insight into it, having no other means to increase it but by these Books, which do serve, upon my knowledge, to many instead of private Teachers, and are affectual, with a little direction now and then, when the Learner finds himself at a loss.

Touching the manner of Translating, I observe Ma­ny Men, many Minds, and therefore there are many Methods or ways taken by many. Some set down the English only, as Mr. Brinsley; some the English and Latin together, and that word by word, as Mr. Hain; or clause by clause, as Dr. Web; or speech after speech, as Mr. Bernard. For my part, I have observed that course which I found most agreeable to my Scholars apprehensions, which I see also taken by the French, [Page] Dutch, and other School masters in foreign parts, who do certainly sooner gain the Latin Tongue by ad­mitting these helps, than we that abandon them in England. I have endeavoured to frame my English stile to the Latin, so, as at once to reach the Authors true meaning, and to condescend to the capacity of a young Learner. As for rendring of words Gramma­tically, I have sometimes done it, where other words would have seemed to carry the child too far aside. Sometimes I have purposely set down the sense of the Latin, as we express it in English discourse, that a child may thereby be enforced more diligently to search out his way of Construing. And I find that children which have been exercised in Vocabularies and Grammar-Rudiments, will in a very short time be able to construe Grammatically of themselves, be­cause the sense, and Grammar order, and knowledge of the words before hand, direct them very readily to what they would say, and they quickly recal their own er­rours. I have therefore taken the most care to make our English answer the Latin in its propriety of Words and phrases. For, To render the Latin word for word, would seem too harsh in our English tongue, which would sometimes scarce be understood to be English, and children are short of Judgment, how to give the right significations of Words: especially where the matter is not familiar unto them, which I conceive to be the main reason why so many have rejected these more ancient and first School-Books, especially of late years, and since our Children are put to Latin so early. Where places admit of a [Page] double sense I have followed that which in the judge­ment of Commentators upon that place, seemeth the most natural, and where they admit sometimes of a double Text, I have made the Construction also double. The elegances that occur more remarkable, I have caused to appear by the change of the Letter in the print, and the Sentences are pointed at with this mark ☞ I have commonly rendred you for thou, or thee, be­cause our children are generally now taught to say so (especially in common discourse) for manners sake. For quid me tuissas? is every bodies reply now a dayes, to whom do we say thou, except he be much our inferiour, though Erasmus was very angry with all such in his time as would not indure to be thou'd.

Some School Masters there are, very eminent for their excellent abilities, and long experience (and such whose Persons I acknowledg my self much bound to re­verence (that because of some suspected inconveniences) are utterly averse to all manner of Translations of School Books. Now I intreat these more seriously (and in friendly manner as I study to write this) to consider, whether more benefit hath not commonly redounded to Schools where Translations have been used, than where they are totally excluded? I mean so as to make the Scholars learn more chearfully, and the Masters to teach more comfortably.

1. Seeing it is manifestly apparent, that since Mr. Hayn put out the Construing Book, the Grammer hath been sooner and more profitably learn'd by the generality of Children under ten, than ever it was before, by here and there a youth near twenty years [Page] old. And tho the most School masters at its first com­ing up, exclaim'd against it, and with all strictness forbid it to come within their Schools, yet the help it did to children at home and underhand, towards the performance of their tasks, and the ease that Masters found in having their children prepared aforehand for their Lessons, hath so far convinced men, and prevail­ed, that a million (I believe) of those Books have been sold; and that which we call Lillies Grammer is now seldom bought without a Construing Book, to explain its meaning.

2. We see it evidently, that the Greek tongue hath been more generally studied, and more easily attained, and that to a great deal more perfection than former­ly, both at Universities, and elsewhere, since all those Orators, Poets, Histories, Fathers, (and what not) have been translated into Latin.

3. The Practice of some Masters that make use of Interliniaries for themselves, whereby they learn the Eastern Languages (not to speak of their Construing the French or Spanish Bibles by the help of an English one) may excuse their Scholars; and convince them, that Translations may as well be allowed to Children as Men. If they say Boyes must work it out by their own selves, I may reply, that they have neither that strength of judgment, nor aptness to devise wayes (whereby to help themselves at a loss) that men have and therefore should not be left (as commonly they are) to shift for themselves more than Men would be.

4. I think it as profitable for a Child, having had his Lesson once construed to him (or not at all) to learn [Page] how to construe perfectly by a book, as by his Masters often telling him, who (perhaps) sometimes chides him because he doth no better remember. And the poor boy therefore, to fasten it the better in his memory by the sense, makes use of his own weak shifts, to scrib­ble the word (which he conceives, but is not yet sure) his Master told him, in the margine of his book. I am sure it is more encouragement to the Scholar to know where to help himself, and less trouble to the Master that he can do as well without him: Not to say, that it con­duceth something to the fairer keeping of their books. What need I care what way my Scholar con his lesson, so he can say it truly? The easiest way for himself to learn, is the acceptablest way for me to teach him by; and the most profitable doubtless to us both, if it be constantly followed to the gaining of an habit.

Now whereas it is objected, that Translations in a School, are means to beget and maintain, 1. Idleness in the Master; and 2. Truantliness in Scholars; I answer,

1. I observe them that commonly make this objecti­on, to be conversant rather in teaching Scholars that are towards maturity, both of age and learning, than in entring little Ones into a tongue, whereof they know nothing, however therefore with them there be no need of such mean Subsidiaries as these, yet with others there may.

2. This objection is but a groundless suspition of theirs that have never made use of them; which till they do, they can never certainly say what convenien­ces, or inconveniences attend them. In the mean [Page] time their Opinions are no infallible proofs, and I will not take upon me to refute them; being not desirous to impose upon any man, either in matter of judgment or practice.

3. But this I can confidently say (now near upon 20 years experience in this Calling, as well publickly as privately) 1. That a Master, whose own eyes ought to be his constant and best Monitors among his Scholars, shall not want imployment, were his work made never so easie to his hand, to see that Children do orderly be­have themselves, and diligently perform their tasks within their limited times. 2. Though Translations do make the Master's work in teaching a great deal more easie, because Children, with a little of his direction, may be able by their help to construe and parse their Lessons; yet doth it not therefore follow, that by them he hath nothing left him to do: for it is some work to hear, and instruct, and examine his Scholars, in re­peating their tasks (though they be never so well pre­pared, and ready in saying;) and if, because they can say readily, he dispatch them the sooner, he may take the opportunity to shew them how to observe, imitate, or make use of the passages in their lessons; and by thus doing, he shall improve their knowledge, both for beha­viour and language. And indeed, this is the end of all our learning, that we may know and do our duty both to God, our selves, & other men, and perswade those men with whom we converse to do so too.

4. Those Helps are so far from making Children any way to truant it that they exceedingly increase in them a desire to their Books, and make them continu­ally (in School time at the least) to busie themselves [Page] about them. For, 1. They take away those dulling dis­heartnings, that do usualy befal Children (when they are put to get a Lesson, the meaning whereof they do not well understand: who, when others forbear to tell them, and their own contrivances to help them­selves fail, do presently despair of what they are about, and look no further after it. 2. The writing, imitating examining, and doing other things for the improve­ment of their lessons, will afford them little time to be idle; whereas when Boys have no more to do but that every days work of construing and parsing, they spend little or no time in looking after it, but either betake themselves to some busie chat, or foolish pastime, or (which is worse) sit sottishly idle in the School or slip out at the door, and there they do emanare, tarry forth (which is properly to truant it) if they do not withal commit some egregious misdemeanour or other. 3. One may imagine that a lothness rather to undergo the bur­den of reading so many exercises as Children can rea­dily perform by help of these Translations, and a little direction of the Master now and then, should incline many Masters to neglect them, than any fear of having too little to do in a Calling so every way cumbersome and full of toil. But for the trouble of reading Exercises a discreet Master can devise better ways, how to help himself in it than I can at this time stand to prescribe.

5. Let who will object further what they please to imagine against it, so long as we see this course (which I use in private, and do now commend to the publick) of teaching language by language, as well as by Grammar rules, is that which they take for the most part in all places beyond the Seas, and by [Page] which they out strip us in Latin. And no wise man will be angry to see English Boys have as easie Helps for the Latin, as these commonly have in foreign parts: seeing our Language hath very little nearness to the Latin whereas others of most use and eminency with us, (i. e. the French, Spanish, and Italian) seem wholly to be bred out of that tongue now corrupted.

6. My intentions are not to fill the Schools (as some are merrily said to have done the world) with Transla­tions; but only by the helps of some few selected ones to bring on the younger sort of School boys, in Gram­matical Exercitations, and getting Language, till they be able to help themselves in the purest Latin Authors. And this, I conceive, they will readily do, after they have run over (besides the Books already mentioned) Aesop's Fables, Terence, and a competent number of select Epistles: all which I have now in hand, and endeavour (as God affords me opportunity) to fi­nish, according to my agreement with the Company of Stationers.

It would be tedious to my self, and Reader, to con­tinue a discourse touching the Author of this Book of Distichs, as 1. To dispute whether Cato major or Ca­to minor, or Valerius Cato the Grammarian, might not have been Authors of it. Or 2. To enquire the reasons, why some have fathered it upon Seneca, some upon Chrysostome, and others upon Ausonius. Or 3. To determine which of these three was its ancientest and justest title, viz. Ethica Catonis, Tullius de Prae­ceptis Catonis (whereby some have thought Tully compos'd it,) or Libellus elegantissimus qui inscribi­tur Cato. Or 4. To censure with Erasmus and Scaliger [Page] that this Book was called Cato, because it hath in it Sentences worthy of Cato, or is able to make one that observes them, a wise & well behaved man, as Cato was.

I shall only say, that this Book hath been every where approved on, and taught in Schools and all Countries for these many Ages together, insomuch, as Planudes turn­ed the Distichs into Greek, Erasmus made Scholia's, and others before him had written Commentaries up­on them. Corderius for his own ease and Scholars be­nefit construed them in French, and some (about 70 years since) converted his construction into English. Sir Rich. Baker, J. P. and sundry others, have rendred them in English verse: So that I shall neither seem to intro­duce a new Author, or to bring any uncouth device into our Schools, if for the sweetning of this Poet, and that children may more easily digest it, I take the like course that others of greater worth have done before me.

Those arguments (I confess) which Mr. Mulcaster and some others have used against this Book, (and this chiefly, that it was too serious for little Ones that mind nothing beyond their toys,) did much sway me to for­bear the use of it in my School, till both by turning it into an easie English verse (as near as might be to the Latin) and construing it verbatim in an Interlinea­ry way, I had rendred it more suitable to their appre­hensions. And now they sometimes delight both me and themselves, in striving who can repeat the most Distichs both English and Latin by heart, after they have writ them fair (as I have said) in Paper Books. Corderius in one of his Colloquies brings in some of his Scholars thus exercising themselves and vying memo­ries. What I have hitherto done, or intend (by Gods bles­sing) [Page] further, in facilitating the way of teaching, was occasioned by my own private endeavours to bring on Children in a chearful and continued exercise of read­ing, writing and speaking the Latin tongue, as well as English, and to acquaint them all along (according to the pitch of their capacity) with the Rules of Grammar, letting them see how far both languages agreed in that Art, and wherein they differed. And this I dare thus publickly aver upon tryal, that whereas (especially since I have got those Helps printed) I am constant to my Rule, (Which of late I have observed to de injoyned by Chr. Helvicus) never to whip a Boy for his Book, or (as my Tutor once advised me) not to punish a Child for his intellectuals, though I seldom let volun­tary misdemeanours in point of manners go unpunished (especially where I meet with a stubborn Spirit,) I rare­ly have a Child come to me that doth not studiously at­tend his learning, and after a while make shew of profit.

And again, whereas I had formerly framed my Me­thod so, as I usualy saved one year in seven of what I knew others commonly spent; I have sensibly of late gained upon my self, so as to gain one of three, of what I have spent heretofore. Nay further, where I have to do with those of riper years, whose abilities and occasi­ons require more expedition, and less attendance, I do constantly undertake in six Months to make them intel­ligibly to peruse any ordinary Latin Author, and to give the Grammatical reasons for what they read: and I bless God, I fail'd in performance with none that have carefully attended their appointed hours, which is once in two days to receive directions, and imploy their spare time accordingly. The main thing to be re­quired [Page] either from Children, or men of years, is a wil­ling mind to be taught, and an attentive ear. Parents therefore might do very well, when they bring their sons to the School, either to engage for their quiet demeanor there, or to leave the Master to his power to command it, or (at least) to forbear such expressions of indulgency as may incourage them to rudeness beyond controul.

I have wondered to hear that some of our Profession should blame others, for going about by these means to prostitute learning, and to make the way of knowledge too common a thing, which in my judgment is impossible. For, let the way be never so easie, all will not desire. to go it, and if one should begin never so early, and proceed never so fast, in a way of learning, it would be with him as it is with other Travellers, who when they have once come whether the Earth and Skie seemed in their eyes to meet, they find the Heavens as high as formerly it was above them, and that meeting (as some rudely call it) of the Earth and Element, to be still as far as they can ken before their face: And the wisest man a live will ingeniously confess (as wiser men than he, per­haps, have done before him) that all the little which he knoweth, is nothing in comparison to that infiniteness of things whereof he is ignorant. Besides, were the Art of School teaching never so common, there are Chil­dren enough (but especially in London) to be taught and it is work for more than one man to reduce our corrupted nature to good order. For my part, I have often wisht, that all Parents were able to teach their own children; for then they would either ease School-masters by setting their work more forward, as some­times they do their servants, or more liberally re­ward [Page] their pains, that diligently, and faithfully per­form their trust, in a thing of such concernment, and wherein themselves have no judgment.

I know it is with Books, as with dishes at a Table, where every one tasteth what he best liketh, and some prefer meer Kick-shaws before solid meats. I ever li­ked that free law of hospitality, viz. Every Man what he pleaseth; and therefore amongst others I only present my dish, and press it upon no mans sto­mach. And forasmuch as I neither oppose nor pre­scribe to others, I hope none will trouble themselves to oppose, or detract from me, but either candidly censure what I thus freely communicate, or commit their mis­doings to the common test.

It is God I serve in what I do, and my Country that I desire to benefit; and as I repose my self secure­ly upon God, in assurance of his protection, so I hope none of my Countrymen will envy or malign my under­takings. But if any man do so, I account Gods ami­able countenance, and the incouragement I receive from men of known integrity, and learning, to have far more force to bear up my spirits, than their cavils can be to deject them. And now, whether I seem to have said too much, or too little of this subject, I forbear more than to say,

Reader, though perhaps this may not please thee, it may profit some of thine; and therefore scorn not the tender, from him that hath often profest himself, and now subscribes, that he is thus