THE COMPLAINT: OR, Right-Thoughts ON LIFE, DEATH, AND IMMORTALITY. To which is added, A Paraphrafe on Part of the Book of JOB. Sunt lacrymæ rerum, & mentem mortalia tangunt.. VIRG LONDON: Printed for A. MILLAR, over-against Catharine- R. DODSLEY, at Tully's Head, in Pall-Mall, M. DCC.LI. PREFACE. As the occafion of this Poem was real, not fictitious; fo the method pursued in it, was rather impofed, by what fpontaneously arofe in the author's mind, on that occafion, than meditated, or defigned. Which will appear very probable from the nature of it. For it differs from the common mode of Poetry; which is, from long narrations to draw fhort morals: Here, on the contrary, the narrative is short, and the morality arifing from it makes the bulk of the Poem. The reafon of it is, That the facts mentioned did naturally pour these moral reflections on the thought of the gwriter. |