Richard Blackmore
says, with as much good Sense as Virtue,
It is a mighty Dishonour and Shame to employ excellent Faculties and abundance of Wit, to humour and please Men in their Vices and Follies. The great Enemy of Mankind, notwithstanding his Wit and Angelick Faculties, is the most odious Being in the whole Creation
.
goes on soon after to say very generously, That he undertook the writing of his Poem
to rescue the Muses out of the Hands of Ravishers
, to restore them to their sweet and chaste Mansions, and to engage them in an
Employment suitable to their Dignity