Thou wilt be pleased to consider that
this fellow, as we have already informed thee, had neither the birth
nor education of a gentleman, nor was a proper person to be enrolled
among the number of such. If, therefore, his baseness can justly
reflect on any besides himself, it must be only on those who gave
him his commission.
BOOK X
IN WHICH THE HISTORY GOES FORWARD ABOUT TWELVE HOURS
Chapter 1
Containing instructions very necessary to be perused by modern
critics
Reader, it is impossible we should know what sort of person thou
wilt be; for, perhaps, thou may'st be as learned in human nature as
Shakespear himself was, and, perhaps, thou may'st be no wiser than
some of his editors. Now, lest this latter should be the case, we
think proper, before we go any farther together, to give thee a few
wholesome admonitions; that thou may'st not as grossly misunderstand
and misrepresent us, as some of the said editors have misunderstood
and misrepresented their author.
First, then, we warn thee not too hastily to condemn any of the
incidents in this our history as impertinent and foreign to our main
design, because thou dost not immediately conceive in what manner such
incident may conduce to that design. This work may, indeed, be
considered as a great creation of our own; and for a little reptile of
a critic to presume to find fault with any of its parts, without
knowing the manner in which the whole is connected, and before he
comes to the final catastrophe, is a most presumptuous absurdity.
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