Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 8.djvu/401

( 391 ) A SPECIMEN; A SPICE I MEAN.

PREFACE.

HE great and singular advantages of, and the lustre it gives to conversation, are commonly so little known in the world, that scarce one man of learning in fifty, to their shame be it spoken, appears to have the least tincture of it in his discourse. This I can impute to nothing, but that it has not been reduced to a science; and indeed Cicero seemed long ago to wish for it, as we may gather from his second book De Oratore, where he has this remarkable passage: "Suavis autem est et vehementer sæpe utilis jocus et facetiæ cum ambiguitate—in quibus tu longè aliis meâ sententiâ, Cæsar, excellis: quo magis mihi etiam testis esse potes, aut nullam esse artem salis, aut, si qua est, eam nos tu potissimum docebis." "Punning is extremely delightful, and oftentimes very profitable; in which, as far as I can judge, Cæsar, you excel all mankind; for which reason you may inform me, whether there be any Art of Punning; or, if there be, I beseech