It; and as it is folly to neglect the fashion, be certain that I read
some eight or nine thousand of them to be sure of how they were
written and to be safe from generalizing on too frail a basis.
And having read them and discovered first, that it was the custom of
my contemporaries to belaud themselves in this prolegomenaical ritual
(some saying in a few words that they supplied a want, others boasting
in a hundred that they were too grand to do any such thing, but most
of them baritoning their apologies and chanting their excuses till one
knew that their pride was toppling over) - since, I say, it seemed a
necessity to extol one's work, I wrote simply on the lintel of my
diary, _Praise of this Book,_ so as to end the matter at a blow. But
whether there will be praise or blame I really cannot tell, for I am
riding my pen on the snaffle, and it has a mouth of iron.
Now there is another thing book writers do in their Prefaces, which is
to introduce a mass of nincompoops of whom no one ever heard, and to
say 'my thanks are due to such and such' all in a litany, as though
any one cared a farthing for the rats! If I omit this believe me it is
but on account of the multitude and splendour of those who have
attended at the production of this volume. For the stories in it are
copied straight from the best authors of the Renaissance, the music
was written by the masters of the eighteenth century, the Latin is
Erasmus' own; indeed, there is scarcely a word that is mine. I must
also mention the Nine Muses, the Three Graces; Bacchus, the Maenads,
the Panthers, the Fauns; and I owe very hearty thanks to Apollo.
Yet again, I see that writers are for ever anxious of their style,
thinking (not saying) -
'True, I used "and which" on page 47, but Martha Brown the stylist
gave me leave;' or:
'What if I do end a sentence with a preposition? I always follow the
rules of Mr Twist in his "'Tis Thus 'Twas Spoke", Odd's Body an' I do
not!'
Now this is a pusillanimity of theirs (the book writers) that they
think style power, and yet never say as much in their Prefaces. Come,
let me do so ... Where are you? Let me marshal you, my regiments of
words!
Rabelais! Master of all happy men! Are you sleeping there pressed into
desecrated earth under the doss-house of the Rue St Paul, or do you
not rather drink cool wine in some elysian Chinon looking on the
Vienne where it rises in Paradise?
