_
As I am a considerable Proficient in this Sort of Learning; and
as at this time of the Year, Copies of Almanacks for the next Year
usually come to the Press, long before they are wanted: And as I have
laid out many a Six-pence among your Customers, the Profit whereof
has in a great Measure redounded to you: So I may reasonably hope to
be look'd on as a good Customer, and claim a favourable Place in your
Paper.
I have a large Volume in Manuscript by me, on the Important
Subject of _Almanack-making_, which I may in time communicate to the
Publick; but at present I am willing to oblige them, with only a
Taste of my Skill, which (if I have any Title to the Art of
Prognostication) will certainly make them long for the whole.
My present Design, is to give to you and the Publick, _a short
Essay_, upon the Talents requisite in _an Almanack-Writer_, by which
it will plainly appear, how much the Community is indebted to Men of
such _great and uncommon Parts and Sagacity_.
An _Almanack-Writer_, Sir, should be born one like a Poet; for
as I read among the Works of the learned, _Poeta nascitur non fit_;
so it is a Maxim with me, that _Almanackorum scriptor nascitur not
fit_. Gifts of Nature, Sir, compleated by Rules of Art, are
indispensably Necessary to make a great Man this way, as well as any
other.
The first Thing requisite in an _Almanack-Writer_, is, _That he
should be descended of a great Family, and bear a Coat of Arms_, this
gives Lustre and Authority to what a Man writes, and makes the common
People to believe, that _certainly this is a great Man_.
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