the two kinds of romance, the ancient and the
modern. In the former all was imagination and improbability: in the latter,
nature is always intended to be, and sometimes has been, copied with success.
Invention has not been wanting; but the great resources of fancy have been
dammed up, by a strict adherence to common life. But if in the latter species
Nature has cramped imagination, she did but take her revenge, having been
totally excluded from old romances. The actions, sentiments, conversations, of
the heroes and heroines of ancient days were as unnatural as the machines
employed to put them in motion.
    The author of the following pages thought it possible to reconcile the two
kinds. Desirous of leaving the powers of fancy at liberty to expatiate through
the boundless realms of invention, and thence of creating more interesting
situations, he wished to conduct the mortal agents in his drama according to the
rules of probability; in short, to make them think, speak and act, as it might
be supposed mere men and women would do in extraordinary positions. He had
observed, that in all inspired writings, the personages under the dispensation
of miracles, and witnesses to the most stupendous phenomena, never lose sight of
their human character: whereas in the productions of romantic story, an
improbable event never fails to be attended by an absurd dialogue. The actors
seem to lose their senses the moment the laws of nature have lost their tone. As
the public have applauded the attempt, the author must not say he was entirely
unequal to the task he had undertaken: yet if the new route he has struck out
shall have paved a road for men of brighter talents, he shall own with pleasure
and modesty, that he was sensible the plan was capable of receiving greater
embellishments than his imagination or conduct of the passions could bestow on
it.
    With regard to the deportment of the domestics, on which I have touched in
the former preface, I will beg leave to add a few words. The simplicity of their
behaviour, almost tending to excite smiles, which at first seem not consonant to
the serious cast of the work, appeared to me not only not improper, but was
marked designedly in that manner. My rule was nature. However grave, important,
or even melancholy, the sensations of princes and heroes may be, they do not
stamp the same affections on their domestics: at least the latter do not, or
should not be made to express their passions in the same dignified tone. In my
humble opinion, the contrast between the sublime of the one, and the naïveté of