M. Cornet used to say, que pour faire des livres, il faloit être ou bien fou ou bien sage, que pour lui, comme il ne se croïoit pas assez sage pour faire un bon livre, ni assez fou pour en faire un méchant, il avoit pris le parti de ne point ecrire.
Pour lui, the Docteur of the Sorbonne: pour moi,—every reader will, in the exercise of that sovereign judgement whereof every reader is possessed, determine for himself whether in composing the present work I am to be deemed bien sage, or bien fou. I know what Mr. Dulman thinks upon this point, and that Mr. Slapdash agrees with him. To the former I shall say nothing; but to the latter, and to Slenderwit, Midge, Wasp, Dandeprat, Brisk and Blueman, I shall let Cordara the Jesuit speak for me.
O quanti, o quanti sono, a cui dispiace
Vedere un uom contento; sol per questo
Lo pungono con stile acre e mordace,
Per questi versi miei chi sa che presto
Qualche zanzara contro me non s'armi,
E non prenda di qui qualche pretesto.
Io certo me l'aspetto, che oltraggiarmi
Talun pretenderà sol perchè pare,
Che di lieti pensier' sappia occuparmi.
Ma canti pur, lo lascerò cantare
E per mostrargli quanto me ne prendo,
Tornerò, se bisogna, a verseggiare.
Leaving the aforesaid litterateurs to construe and apply this, I shall proceed in due course to examine and decide whether Dr. Daniel Dove ought, or ought not to have been an author,—being the first of two questions, propounded in the present chapter, as arising out of the last.
CHAPTER CCXXVI.
THE AUTHOR DIGRESSES A LITTLE, AND TAKES UP A STITCH WHICH WAS DROPPED IN THE EARLIER PART OF THIS OPUS.—NOTICES CONCERNING LITERARY AND DRAMATIC HISTORY, BUT PERTINENT TO THIS PART OF OUR SUBJECT.
Jam paululum digressus a spectantibus,
Doctis loquar, qui non adeo spectare quam
Audire gestiunt, logosque ponderant,
Examinant, dijudicantque pro suo
Candore vel livore; non latum tamen
Culmum (quod aiunt) dum loquar sapientibus
Loco movebor.
MACROPEDIUS.