This is the Attempt; how far I have succeeded, must be let to the
judicious and curious Reader to determine. Thus much I thought
necessary to say concerning former Translations, in order to justify
my own Undertaking, which will not acquire an intrinsic Merit from the
Censures, that I have pass'd upon others. No: The Faults of others
cannot extenuate our own; and that Stamp, which every Work carries
along with it, can only determine of what Kind it really
is.
The Reader will expect that I shou'd here say a Word or two
concerning the _Notes_ which follow the _Characters_. Some Authors or
Commentators (call them which you will) out of a vain Ostentation of
Literature, lay hold of the slightest of Opportunities to expose all
their Learning to the World, without ever knowing when they have said
enough: Insomuch, that in most Commentaries upon antient Authors, one
may sooner meet with a System of Antiquities, than with Solutions of
the real Difficulties of the Text. Consider'd barely as a Translator,
I lay under no immediate Necessity of writing _Notes_, but then as
I was highly concern'd, even in that Capacity, to lay before the
_English_ Reader, what I took to be the true Sense of the _Greek_,
and as I farther propos'd to preserve that particular _Humour_ of the
Original, which depends on those Manners and Customs which are alluded
to, I found, my self necessitated to add some _Notes_; but yet I have
endeavoured to shun that Fault, which I have already censur'd, by
saying no more, but what was immediately necessary, to illustrate
the Text, to vindicate a received Sense, or to propose a new one.
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