threshold, it is to invite him in with country cordiality.

To say truth, I had no sooner finished reading this little book in

proof, than I was seized upon by a distressing apprehension. It

occurred to me that I might not only be the first to read these

pages, but the last as well; that I might have pioneered this very

smiling tract of country all in vain, and find not a soul to follow

in my steps. The more I thought, the more I disliked the notion;

until the distaste grew into a sort of panic terror, and I rushed

into this Preface, which is no more than an advertisement for

readers.

What am I to say for my book? Caleb and Joshua brought back from

Palestine a formidable bunch of grapes; alas! my book produces

naught so nourishing; and for the matter of that, we live in an age

when people prefer a definition to any quantity of fruit.

I wonder, would a negative be found enticing? for, from the

negative point of view, I flatter myself this volume has a certain

stamp. Although it runs to considerably upwards of two hundred

pages, it contains not a single reference to the imbecility of

God's universe, nor so much as a single hint that I could have made

a better one myself.--I really do not know where my head can have

been. I seem to have forgotten all that makes it glorious to be

man.--'Tis an omission that renders the book philosophically

unimportant; but I am in hopes the eccentricity may please in

frivolous circles.

To the friend who accompanied me I owe many thanks already, indeed

I wish I owed him nothing else; but at this moment I feel towards

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