290. One speaking of an agreeable young fellow, said, He had wit enough to call his good nature in question, and yet good nature enough to make his wit suspected.
291. A person seeing a tolerably pretty fellow, who, by the help of a tailor and sempstress had transformed himself into a beau, said, What pity it is to see one, whom nature has made no fool, so industrious to pass for an ass. Rather, said another, one should pity those whom nature abuses than those who abuse nature; besides, the town would be robbed of one-half of its diversion, if it should become a crime to laugh at a fool.
292. At the masquerade in the Hay-Market, one appearing in the habit of a bishop, another, for the jest’s sake, bowed his knee to ask a blessing. The former laying his hand on his head, very demurely said, Prithee rise, there’s nothing in’t indeed, friend.
293. Of all coxcombs, the most intolerable in conversation is your fighting fool, and your opiniated wit; the one is always talking to show his parts, and the other always quarrelling to show his valour.
294. One said of a fantastical fellow, that he was the folio of himself, bound up in his own calf’s leather, and gilt about the edges.
295. A decayed gentleman coming to one who had been a servant, to borrow money of him, received a very scurvy answer, concluding in the following words: Pray, sir, what do you trouble me for? I’ve no money to lend. I’m sure you lie, said the gentleman, for if you were not rich, you durst not be so saucy.
296. The Roman Catholics make a sacrament of matrimony, and, in consequence of that notion, pretend that it confers grace. The Protestant divines do not carry matters so high, but say, This ought to be understood in a qualified sense; and that marriage so far confers grace, as that, generally speaking, it brings repentance, which everybody knows is one step towards grace.
297. An extravagant young gentleman, to whom the title of lord, and a good estate, was just fallen, being a little harassed by duns, bid his steward tell them, That whilst he was a private gentleman he had leisure to run in debt, but being now advanced to a higher rank, he was too busy to pay them.
298. A gentleman complaining of a misfortune, said it was all along with that drunken sot his man, who could not keep himself sober. With your worship, said the fellow, I know very few drunken sots that do keep themselves sober.
299. A certain Irishman making strong love to a lady of great fortune, told her, He could not sleep for dreaming of her.