Point í. MISERIES OF AUTHORCRAFT. Readers, Booksellers, Authors, and Critics, a Sample of the Sentimental, the Merry, and the Sorrowful. COURTEOUS reader, when you have overcome the first point of misery, (i. e.) paying the silver-tongued accoucher of literature his modest demand for paper and print, you are generally stopped short in your thirst after knowledge or amusement by another serious impediment in the shape of a long, dull, doleful preface, detailing the miseries of authorship, or made up of panegyric, apology, and fearful solicitation, addressed to their high mightinesses the gentlemen snarlers, vulgo critics of the periodical press, imploring their mercy and the reader's patience. Now we are free to confess, we are too proud to solicit, and too poor to bribe, and must therefore be content to stand or fall purely upon our own humble pretensions. A preface we shall dispense with, unless this chapter may be considered as an apology for one, or accepted as a short note |