Were it not too grave, all that I would urge on this subject is, that men are bewildered when they consider themselves in any other view than that of strangers, who are in a place where it is no great matter whether they can, or unreasonable to expect they should, have everything about them as well as at their own home. This way of thinking is, perhaps, the only one that can put this being into a proper posture for the ease of society. It is certain, this would reduce all faults into those which proceed from malice or dishonesty: it would quite change our manner of beholding one another, and nothing that was not below a man's nature would be below his character. The arts of this life would be proper advances towards the next; and a very good man would be a very fine gentleman. As it now is, human life is inverted, and we have not learned half the knowledge of this world before we are dropping into another. Thus, instead of the raptures and contemplations which naturally attend a well-spent life from the approach of eternity, even we old fellows are afraid of the ridicule of those who are born since us, and ashamed not to understand, as well as peevish to resign, the mode, the fashion, the ladies, the fiddles, the balls, and what not. Dick Reptile, who does not want humour, is very pleasant at our club when he sees an old fellow touchy at being laughed at for anything that is not in the mode, and bawls in his ear, "Prithee don't mind him; tell him thou art mortal."
FOOTNOTES:
[175] See No. 95.
[176] Possibly Colonel Ambrose Edgworth, a great dandy, whom Swift calls "that prince of puppies" ("Journal to Stella," Oct. 17, 1710).
[No. 247. [Steele.]
By Jenny Distaff, Half-Sister to Mr. Bickerstaff.
From Saturday, Nov. 4, to Tuesday, Nov. 7, 1710.
Ædepol, næ nos sumus ... æque omnes invisæ viris,
Propter paucas; quæ omnes faciunt dignæ ut videamur malo.
Ter., Hecyra, act ii. sc. 3.
From my own Apartment, Nov. 6.
My brother, having written the above piece of Latin, desired me to take care of the rest of the ensuing paper. Towards this he bid me answer the following letter, and said, nothing I could write properly on the subject of it would be disagreeable to the motto. It is the cause of my sex, and I therefore enter upon it with great alacrity. The epistle is literally thus: