“I WILL drop this piece of morality, with a charge to the fair reader, that whenever she discovers satire, ridiculing or recriminating the follies or crimes of mankind, that she look into her own heart, and compare the strictures on the conduct of others with her own feelings.”
LETTER XII.
Mrs. Holmes to Myra.
In Continuation.
MY good father-in-law being so strenuous in proving the eligibility of reading satire, had spurn out, what he called his new idea, to such a metaphysical nicety, that he unhappily diminished the number of his hearers; for Mrs. Bourn, to whom he directed his discourse, had taken down a book and was reading to herself, and Miss was diverting herself with the cuts in Gay’s Fables.
A CONSIDERABLE silence ensued, which Worthy first broke, by asking Mrs. Bourn what book she had in her hand. Everyone’s attention was alarmed at this important enquiry. Mrs. Bourn, with little difficulty, found the title page, and began to read. “A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy, by Mr. Yorick.”
“I DO not like the title,” said Miss Bourn.
“WHY, my dear!” apostrophized the mother, “you are mistaken—it is a very famous book.”
“WHY, my dear!” retorted the daughter, “It is sentimental—I abominate everything that is sentimental—it is so unfashionable too.”
“I NEVER knew before,” said Mr. Holmes, “that wit was subject to caprice of fashion.”