D E D I C A T O R Y E P I S T L E.

...they spend their time, or even the chief part of it, in the speculation of these things, while that which is greatest and most necessary is handed over to neglect and ruinous oblivion. When Divine grace began to free me, in whatever way, from this sea of a thousand rocks, I hung up this votive tablet original: "Tabellam." A reference to the ancient custom where sailors who survived a shipwreck would hang a "tabula votiva" (votive plaque) in a temple to thank the deity who saved them. Poiret uses his book as this symbolic tablet.—saved from the shipwreck, or at least from the peril of shipwreck—for my Liberator. In this work, I have attempted to designate, as far as I was permitted, what is right, what is off the path or devious, and what of good or evil is to be found in such ways. I do this for the caution of those who are of a freer disposition and who aspire toward truer things, being slaves to no man's opinions original: "nullarum ullius cogitationum mancipia." This reflects the early Enlightenment ideal of intellectual independence from scholastic or ecclesiastical authority..

If I should be of benefit to some, there will be cause to give thanks to the Author of all good God.. If not, it shall suffice for me to have candidly intended something of good, and to have taken that occasion to testify publicly that I cherish a Prince who is a lover of solid and fruitful Truth, while I truly profess myself to be,

Most Illustrious Prince,