With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part
of this discourse: in the second part, as at a second sitting, though
I alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again,
and change the dead colouring of the whole. In general, I will only
say, that I have written nothing which savours of immorality or
profaneness; at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such
intention. If there happen to be found an irreverent expression, or
a thought too wanton, they are crept into my verses through my
inadvertency; if the searchers find any in the cargo, let them be
staved or forfeited, like contrabanded goods; at least, let their
authors be answerable for them, as being but imported merchandise, and
not of my own manufacture. On the other side, I have endeavoured to
choose such fables, both ancient and modern, as contain in each of
them some instructive moral, which I could prove by induction, but the
way is tedious; and they leap foremost into sight, without the reader's
trouble of looking after them. I wish I could affirm, with a safe
conscience, that I had taken the same care in all my former writings;
for it must be owned, that supposing verses are never so beautiful or
pleasing, yet if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good
manners, they are at best what Horace says of good numbers without
good sense:
_Versus inopes rerum, nugaeque canorae.
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