PREFACE to

Xviii

the Bas-reliefs and Statues in his Gallery he commends , andby his elegant Description of many wonderful Pieces ofArt, (or rather Cicero’.?, for it is colleBed from his De-scriptions of them in his Pleadings against Verres) he makesus feel what is due to the ingenious Arts; and tothose who generously colleB and preserve their bes Pro-duBidns , in order to recommend, animate, astist andpromote good Taste and laudable Emulation to excel inArts, which sometimes have been employed to very nobleand truly useful Purposes; ever may ; and always shinemo ft when they are so : I mean , by perpetuating the Me-mory os great Men and great ABionSy to excite and sup-port truly Praife-worthy Ambition to rival such gloriousExatnples : And in Subordination to that principal End,by transmitting to Pofterity true Representations of cer-tain more remarkable Customs and Usages among theAncients civil and religious, to give SatissaBion to a Cu-riosty that naturally springs up in great Minds; andwhich if it does not become their chief Employment, butholds only the Place of an ingenious Amusement is no ig-noble or unworthy Passion. The very Amusements of Manought to be manly <2;%/ingenious, andsar removedfromVice*.

The justly celebrated Earl os Shaftsbury’j Observationson the Augustan Age> and the CharaBers of Augustus,Marcus Agrippa and Mæcenas, are so agreeable to thePiBureSy the Abbe Vertot has drawn of them ; that Icould not choose but join them together. And no whereJmidf i S thereto be sonud such a just Idea or CbaraBer os Ho-race and his Writings as that which his Lordship has given

us ,

* Milton, il Penseroso.