at last Madonella, a lady who had writ a fine book concerning the recluse life, and was the projectrix of the foundation. She approaches into the hall and Rake, knowing the dignity of his own mien and aspect, goes deputy from his company. She begins, "Sir, I am obliged to follow the servant, who was sent out to know what affair could make strangers press upon a solitude which we, who are to inhabit this place, have devoted to heaven and our own thoughts?""Madam," replies Rake, with an air of great distance, mixed with a certain indifference, by which he could dissemble dissimulation, "your great intention has made more noise in the world. than you design it should; and we travellers, who have seen many foreign institutions of this kind, have a curiosity to see, in its first rudiments, the seat of primitive piety; for such it must be called by future ages, to the eternal honour of the founders: I have read Madonella's excellent and seraphic discourse on this subject." The lady immediately answered, "If what I have said could have contributed to raise any thoughts in you that may make for the advancement of intellectual and divine conversation, I should think myself extremely happy." He immediately fell back with the profoundest veneration; then advancing, "Are you then that admired lady? If I may approach lips which have uttered things so sacred-" He salutes her. His friends followed his example. The devoted within stood in amazement where this would end, to see Madonella receive their address and their company. But Rake goes on.-"We would not transgress rules; but if we may take the liberty to see the place you have thought fit to choose for ever, we would go into such parts of the gardens, as is consistent with the severities you have imposed on yourselves." To be short, Madonella permitted Rake to lead her into the assembly of nuns, followed by his friends, and each took his fair one by the hand, after due explanation, to walk round the gardens. The conversation turned upon the lilies, the flowers, the arbours, and the growing vegetables; and Rake had the solemn impudence, when the whole company stood round him, to say, that "he sincerely wished men might rise out of the earth like plants; and that our minds were not of necessity to be sullied with carnivorous appetites for the generation, as well as support, of our species." This was spoken with so easy and fixed an assurance, that Madonella answered, "Sir, under the notion of a pious thought, you deceive yourself in wishing an institution foreign to that of Providence. These desires were implanted in us for reverend purposes, in preserving the race of men, and giving opportunites for making our chastity more heroic." The conference was continued in this celestial strain, and carried on so well by the managers on both sides, that it created a second and a third interview; and, without entering into farther particulars, there was hardly one of them but was a mother or father that day twelvemonth. Any unnatural part is long taking up, and as long laying aside; therefore Mr. Sturdy may assure himself, Platonica will fly for ever from a forward behaviour; but if he approaches her according to this model, she will fall in with the necessities of mortal life, and condescend to look with pity upon an unhappy man, imprisoned in so much body, and urged by such violent desires. "SIR, THE TATLER, No. XXXV. THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 1709. "To ISAAC BICKERSTAFF, Esq. "Not long since, you were pleased to give us a chimerical account of the famous family of the Staffs, from whence I suppose you would insinuate, that it is the most ancient and numerous house in all Europe. But, I positively deny that it is either, and wonder much at your audacious proceedings in this manner, since it is well known, that our most illustrious, most renowned, and most celebrated, Roman family of Ix, has enjoyed the precedency to all others from the reign of good old Saturn. I could say much to the defamation and disgrace of your family; as, that your relations Distaff and Broomstaff were both inconsiderable, mean persons, one spinning, the other sweeping the streets, for their daily bread. But I forbear to vent my spleen on objects so much beneath my indignation. I shall only give the world a catalogue of my ancestors, and leave them to determine which hath hitherto had, and which for the future ought to have, the preference. "First then comes the most famous and popular lady Meretrix, parent of the fertile family of Bellatrix, Lotrix, Netrix, Nutrix, Obstetrix, Famulatrix, Coctrix, Ornatrix, Sarcinatrix, Fextrix, Balneatrix, Portatrix, Saltatrix, Divinatrix, Conjectrix, Comtrix, Debitrix, Creditrix, Donatrix, Ambulatrix, Mercatrix, Adsectrix, Assectatrix, Palpatrix, Præceptrix, Pistrix. I am yours, "ELIZ. POTATRIX." THE TATLER, No. LIX. THURSDAY, AUGUST 25, 1709. Will's Coffeehouse, August 24. THE author of the ensuing letter, by his name and the quotations he makes from the ancients, seems a sort of spy from the old world, whom we moderns ought to be careful of offending; therefore I must be free, and own it a fair hit where he takes me, rather than disoblige him.* "Sir, having a peculiar humour of desiring to be somewhat the better or wiser for what I read, I am always uneasy when, in any profound writer, for I read no others, I happen to meet with what I cannot understand. When this falls out, it is a great grievance to me that I am not able to consult the author himself about his meaning, for commentators are a sect that has little share in my esteem: your elaborate writings have, among many others, this advantage, that their author is still alive, and ready, as his extensive charity makes us expect, to explain whatever may be found in them too sublime for vulgar understandings. This, sir, makes me presume to ask you, how the Hampstead hero's character could be perfectly new when the last letters came away, and yet Sir John Suckling so well * Swift, under the character of Obadiah Greenhat, ridicules Steele for a seeming inconsistency in a former paper. Steele in return gives an excellent account of Swift's talents for irony, Which he was born to introduce, acquainted with it sixty years ago?* I hope, sir, you will not take this amiss: I can assure you, I have a profound respect for you, which makes me write this, with the same disposition with which Longinus bids us read Homer and Plato. When in reading, says he, any of those celebrated authors, we meet with a passage to which we cannot well reconcile our reasons, we ought firmly to believe, that were those great wits present to answer for themselves, we should to our wonder be convinced, that we only are guilty of the mistakes we before attributed to them. If you think fit to remove the scruple that now torments me, it will be an encouragement to me to settle a frequent correspondence with you; several things falling in my way which would not, perhaps, be altogether foreign to your purpose, and whereon your thoughts would be very acceptable to your most humble servant, "OBADIAH GREENHAT." I own this is clean, and Mr. Greenhat has convinced me that I have writ nonsense, yet am I not at all offended at him. * "Letters from Hampstead say, there is a coxcomb arrived there, of a kind which is utterly new. The fellow has courage, which he takes himself to be obliged to give proofs of every hour he lives. He is ever fighting with the men, and contradicting the women. A lady, who sent to me, superscribed him with this description out of Suckling : I am a man of war and might, And know this much, that I can fight, No man under heaven I fear, Devoutly. New oaths I can exactly swear; And forty healths my brain will bear Most Stoutly." |