BEING
A General Satyr on the Vices and Follies of the Age.
The Second Edition.
LONDON, Printed for S. Briscoe, at the Bell Savage, Ludgate-Hill, and the Sun against John’s Coffee-House Swithin’s-Alley, Cornhill, 1722
THE
PREFACE.
As Prefaces now are become common to every Production of the Press, I am resolv’d to be in the Fashion likewise, to let my Reader understand that I am not an Ascetick, or one of those devout Pilgrims, who will travel on Foot to see the holy Sepulchre, the Chapel of Loretto, or some strange Relique; but a comical merry Traveller that would take a Perigrination, on Horseback or by Water, beyond the Devil’s Arse i’th’ Peak, to see the Religion, Customs, and Manners of foreign People, as well as knowing those of my own Country; contrary to the Sentiments of Claudian, who mentions it as a Happiness, for Birth, Life, and Burial, to be all in one Parish.
Some Pilgrims may brag of their having seen a Vial full of the Virgin Mary’s Milk; another Vial full of Mary Magdalen’s repenting Tears; the Pummel of the Sword with which the Ear of Malchus, the high Priest’s Servant, was cut off; the Bill of the Cock which crow’d after Saint Peter had deny’d his Master, set in Silver; an Ell Flemish of the Cord with which Judas hang’d himself; a Linnen Apron worn by our Saviour’s hæmorrhoidal Patient; a Piece of the seemless Garment, for which the Jewish Soldiers cast Lots; one of Saint John the Baptist’s Eye-Teeth, set in Gold; Saint Paul’s Cloak, which he left at Troas, never the worse for wearing; and talk also of their often meeting with the wandering Jew in their Travels; these, I say, were Curiosities I valu’d not seeing; but in all Places wherever I came, I made general Observations on the Folly and Vices of the Inhabitants, thereby to correct my own Manners, which, indeed, is a very fine Thing, in either Man or Beast.