Quidquid in hac caufa mihi fufceptum eft, Quirites, id omne me reipublica THE SECOND EDITION. London: PRINTED FOR F. C. AND J. RIVINGTON No. 62, ST. PAUL'S CHURCH-YARD; PREFACE. AN attentive obferver of mankind must so frequently have been disappointed, by writers who take public affairs in hand, as to be likely to receive this performance with an expectation of its affording him, fome new proof of weaknefs and vanity. It must often have occurred to fuch a perfon, that men in the obfcurest fituations, and of the moft confined capacity, will be fmitten with a paffion for fetting the World, or the Church to rights; and conceive themselves capable of fuch an undertaking, while it is notorious, perhaps, that their own immediate province, though of small dimenfions, is in the greatest disorder. The book now before the reader, was written under fuch an impreffion of this prepofteroufnefs, as to lead the writer often to examine himfelf; and to take care, that he was not impofed on by his own heart, or the forward fpirit of the times, to go out of his proper line. And though he is not fure, that after all he is not deceived into an attempt for |