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If in the courſe of my Orations, I ſhould omit any thing unintelligible or culpable, I muſt here in my Introductory lecture moſt humbly beg not to be impugned while on my roſtrum, as this manner of procedure might tend to introduce confusion and would perhaps put me to a fatal and irrecoverable ſtand; And in lieu of this preliminary requeſt, I shall become bound to ſatisfy and amend to my power all ſuch miſtakes, by being for the future more explicit or more upon my guard.
To conclude then, Gentlemen, I ſhall make it my principal ſtudy to acquit myſelf ſo, as to merit in ſome degree your approbation; by interlarding the comic with the ſerious, and blending them ſo together as to make an agreeable tertiam quid, which will pertake partly of both, and at the ſame time differ widely from either. And I remember Cato, that excellent and antient Roman Moralist, ſaith in his diſtichs.
"Mirth with thy labour ſometimes put in ure,
"That better thou mayeſt thy labour endure
Claudero hath tried ſeveral employments, and to uſe the words of the noted and reverend Mago Pico, in his account of himſelf.
"God, not a beaſt, but me did make a man,
"And not a Turk, but a true Chriſtian;
"His providence made me a School-maſter,
"None of the meaneſt ſort I dare averr.
I have undergone ſeveral viciſſitudes of fortune, but that blind goddeſs hath hitherto brow beat and eluded my embraces.
I was once a Huſſar in the army, and had then the vanity of expecting to arrive at the dignity of Captain, but those pleaſing and arrogaut hopes ſoon evaniſhed, and in place of bettering my fortune, I was reduced to the moſt abject circumſtances, and forced to wander up and down like a vagabond, in queſt of my former employment.
