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T O T H E

READER.

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FT ER what ^Frontispiece and Porch of thisWooden Edifice presents you., I jhall ' need nofarther to repeat the Occasion of this followingDiscourse : I am only to acquaint you, Thatas it was delivered to the Royal Society by anunworthy Member thereof in Obedience to theirCommands ; byyfhe same it is now re-publilh’dwithout any farther TrofpcB : And the Reader is to know,that if these dry Sticks afford him any Sap, it is one of the least andmeanest of those' Pieces which ate every TJay produced by that IllustriousAssembly, and which enrich their Collections, as so many Monumentsof theff accurate Experiments, and publick Endeavours, in order tothe dProdutUon of real and useful Theories, the Tropagation and Im-provement of Natural Science, and the Honour of their Institution. Ifto this there be any Thing subjoined here, which may a while bespeakthe T alienee of the Reader, it is only for the Encouragement of anIndustry, and worthy Labour, much in our Hays neglected, as haplyreputed a Consideration of too fordid and vulgar a Nature for NoblePersons and Gentlemen to busy themselves withal, andwhooftner findout Occasions to Fell-down and Hefiroy their Woods and Plantations,than either to Repair or Improve them. ^

BUT we are not without Hopes of taking off these Prejudices,and of reconciling them to a Subject and an Industry which has beenconsecrated {as I may fay ) by as good, and as great Ter sons, x as anythe World has produced ; and whose Names we find mingled amongfiKings and Philosophers, grave Senators and Patriots of their Country sFor such of Old were Solomon, Cyrus, and Num a* Idicivms,' fqrnamedStolo, Cato, and Cincinnatus; the Piso’s, Fabii, Cicero, the Plinies, andthousands more whom I might enumerate , that disdained not, to cul*tivate these Rusticities even with their own Hands, and td\esteem itno snail Accession to dignify their Titles, and adorn thein Purple

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