Читать книгу Ismael; an oriental tale. With other poems - Edward Bulwer Lytton Baron Lytton - Страница 4

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Notwithstanding my friend has said so much and so flattering to myself, in his Preface, yet the diffidence and the anxiety which ever accompany a first attempt, particularly at so early an age, urge me to add a few words, however superfluous they may appear. An apology is indeed, perhaps, always requisite for an intrusion on the public, and I cannot, therefore, refrain from offering one for some of the Poems which are inferior to the rest. They were written when but a child—they were the first faint dawnings of poetic enthusiasm,—and that sense of integrity, which should accompany every action, prevented my now altering them, in any material respect. I expressly state the age at which they were written, and I think it but a duty to the public, that they should actually be written at that age. For the same reason, therefore, and not from any arrogant vanity, I have been particularly careful that no other hand should have polished, or improved them.

For the Battle of Waterloo, much ought to be said in apology, when so many far, far more adequate to the task, than myself, have written upon it; and when so many have failed in the attempt, it seems to argue vanity in the design; but such, I may assert, was far from my mind, at the time of its composition. It was begun in a moment of enthusiasm—it was continued from a deep interest in the undertaking—and it was completed from a dislike, I have always entertained, to leave any thing unfinished. But I was myself very unwilling to commit it to the press, and only did so at the express and flattering desire of some intimate friends, who were, perhaps, too partial to perceive its defects.

To the generosity of the more lenient of the public, do I now confide this first attempt for their favour; and, as they scan over the faults with the eye of Criticism, may the hand of Mercy restrain them from dragging those faults to light.

The solicitude that I feel, would induce me to indulge in a tedious prolixity; but I must remember, that none but myself can be interested in my own feelings, and I will, therefore, no longer detain my readers from the proof.

TO WHOM SHOULD A YOUNG, AND TIMID

COMPETITOR FOR PUBLIC REPUTATION,

DEDICATE HIS ATTEMPTS,

BUT TO

A BRITISH PUBLIC?

TO THAT PUBLIC, WHO HAVE ALWAYS

BEEN THE FOSTERERS OF INDUSTRY, OR GENIUS,

WHO HAVE ALWAYS LOOKED FORWARD FROM

THE IMPERFECTIONS OF YOUTH,

TO THE

FRUITS OF MATURITY.

IT IS TO THAT GENEROUS PUBLIC,

THAT HE NOW COMMITS HIS HOPES AND HIS FEARS.

IT IS TO THAT GENEROUS PUBLIC,

THAT HE NOW OFFERS HIS

JUVENILE EFFORTS,

FOR THEIR APPLAUSE!