As we have already observed, D’Israeli has informed us that Milton imitated the verse of the Duchess; and, after reading the above extract from one of her books on philosophy, people devoid of legal knowledge may possibly be inclined to think that certain other scribes have imitated her prose, namely lawyers in drawing up deeds and wills.
At the end of one of her books, entitled Philosophical Opinions, the Duchess wrote:—
Of all my works this work which I have writ,
My best beloved and greatest favourite,
I look upon it with a pleasing eye,
I take pleasure in its sweet company.
Probably few authors, after re-reading the manuscripts, correcting the proofs, and again correcting the revised proofs of their books, ever find “sweet company” in them again. In most cases the only printed things they read in connexion with them, in the future, are reviews. Nor do these invariably prove “sweet company”.
The Duchess wrote books on all sorts of subjects. Not the least curious are her Orations of Divers Sorts Accommodated to Divers Places, a work which, strange to say, went through two editions. It contains orations suited, or professing to be suited, for weddings, funerals, and battlefields, loyal speeches and seditious speeches, speeches in favour of taxation and speeches against taxation, and after-dinner speeches both for “a quarter-drunk gentleman” and for “a half-drunken gentleman”. The Duchess writes the heaviest stuff of all when she tries to be funny. She is even heavier as a Wit than as a Philosopher.