ABSTRACT
I take the liberty of mentioning this to your Lordship, to clear my self of that Aspersion which some of my own Sex have been unkind enough to throw upon me, that ‘I seem to endeavour to divert more than improve the Minds of my Readers’. Now, as I take it, the Aim of every Person, who pretends to write (tho’ in the most insignificant and ludicrous way) ought to tend at least to a good Moral Use; I shou’d be sorry to have my Intentions judg’d to be the very reverse of what they are in Reality. How far I have been able to succeed in my Desires of infusing those Cautions, too necessary to a Number, I will not pretend to determine: but where I have had the Misfortune to fail, must impute it either to the obstinacy of those I wou’d persuade, or to my own Deficiency in that very Thing which they are pleased to say I too much abound in-a true Description of Nature.
