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ciety for coffee and tobacco, in order to enable them "the more effectually to defame him in coffeehouses.

"Refolved, That towards the further leffening the "character of the faid Pope, fome perfons be deputed "to abufe him at ladies tea-tables, and that in confide"ration our authors are not well dreffed enough, Mr "Cy and Mr Ke-1 be deputed for that service. Refolved, That a ballad be made against Mr Pope, " and that Mr Oldmixon *, Mr Gildon †, and Mrs Cent"livre I, do prepare and bring in the fame.

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"Refolved, That, above all, fome effectual ways and "means be found to increase the joint ftock of the repu"tation of this fociety, which at present is exceeding "low, and to give their works the greater currency; whether by raifing the denomination of the faid works "by counterfeit title-pages, or mixing a greater quantity of the fine metal of other authors with the alloy of this fociety.

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"Refolved, That no member of this fociety for the "future mix ftout in his ale in a morning, and that Mr - remove from the Hercules and Still.

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Refolved, That all our members (except the cook's "wife) be provided with a fufficient quantity of the vivifying drops, or Byfield's fal volatile.

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Refolved, That Sir Richard Blackmore || be appoint"ed to endue this fociety with a large quantity of regu

* Oldmixon was all his life a party-writer for hire: and after having falfified Daniel's Chronicle in many places, he charged three eminent perfons with falfifying Lord Clarendon's hiftory, which was difproved by Dr Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester, the only furvivor of them. Hawkef.

Gildon, a writer of criticifms and libels, who abufed Mr Pope in feveral pamphlets and books printed by Curll. Hawkef.

Mrs Sufanna Centlivre, wife of Mr Centlivre, yeoman of the mouth to his Majefty, wrote a fong before the was seven years old, and many plays: fhe wrote alfo a ballad against Mr Pope's Homer, before he began it. Hatukef.

Sir Richard Blackmore, in his Effays, vol. 2. p. 270. accused Mr Pope in very high and fober terms, of profaneness and immeality, on the mere report of Curll, that he was author of a travestie on the firft Pfalm. Hawkef.

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"lar and exalted ferments, in order to enliven their cold "fentiments (being his true receipt to make wits *."

These refolutions being taken, the affembly was ready to break up, but they took fo near a part in Mr Curll's afflictions, that none of them could leave him without giving him fome advice to reinftate him in his health.

Mr Gildon was of opinion, that in order to drive a Pope out of his belly, he should get the mummy of fome deceafed Moderator of the general affembly in Scotland to be taken inwardly as an effectual antidote against Antichrift; but Mr Oldmixon did conceive, that the liver of the perfon who administered the poison, boiled in broth, would be a more certain cure.

While the company were expecting the thanks of Mr Curll for thefe demonftrations of their zeal, a whole pile of Sir Richard's Efays on a fudden feil on his head; the shock of which in an inflant brought back his delirium. ' He immediately rofe up, overturned the clofe-ftool, and beth-t the Eays (which may probably occafion a fecond edition), then without putting up his breeches, in a most furious tone he thus broke out to his books, which his diftempered imagination reprefented to him as alive, coming down from their fhelves, fluttering their leaves, and flapping their covers at him.

Now G-d damn all folios, quartos, ectavos, and duodecimos! ungrateful varlets that you are, who have fo long taken up my houfe without paying for your lodging! Are you not the beggarly brood of fumbling journeymen! born in garrets among lice and cobwebs, nurfed up on gray peas, bullocks liver, and porters ale?

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the first light you faw, the farthing candle I paid for? Did you not come before your time into dirty feets of brown paper? And have not I clothed youin double royal, lodged you handfomely on decent jhelves, laced your backs with gold, equipped you with fplendid titles, and fent you into the world with the names of perfons of quality? Muft I be always plagued with you ? Why flutter ye your leaves and flap your covers at me ? Damn ye all, ye awolves in forceps cloathing; rags ye

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avere, and to rags ye shall return. Why hold you forth your texts to me, ye paltry Sermons? Why cry ye, at every word to me, ye bawdy poems? To my shop at Tunbridge ye fhall go, by G, and thence be drawn like the rest of your predeceffors, bit by bit, to the paf Lage-hcufe; for in this prefent emotion of my bowels, how do I compaffionate thofe who have great need, and nothi ng to wipe their breech with?

Having faid this, and at the fame time recollecting that his own was yet unwiped, he abated of his fury, and with great gravity applied to that function the unfinished theets of the conduct of the Earl of Nottingham.

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A ftrange but true RELATION how Mr EDMUND CURLL, of Fleet-ftreet, stationer, out of an extraordinary defire of lucre, went into 'Change-alley, and was converted from the Chriftian religion by certain eminent Jews; and how he was circumcifed, and initiated into their mysteries.

A Varice (as Sir Richard, in the third page of his

Effays, hath elegantly obferved) is an inordinate impulfe of the foul towards the amafing or heaping together a fuperfluity of wealth, without the least regard of applying it to its proper uses.

And how the mind of man is poffeffed with this vice, may be seen every day both in the city and fuburbs thereof. It has been always efteemed by Plato, Puffendorff, and Socrates, as the darling vice of old age: but now our young men are turned ufurers and ftockjobbers; and, instead of lufting after the real wives and daughters of our rich citizens, they covet nothing but their money and eftates. Strange change of vice! when the concupifcence of youth is converted into the cove-toufnefs of age, and thofe appetites are now become VENAL, which fhould be VENEREAL.

In the first place, let us fhew you how many of the ancient worthies and heroes of antiquity have been undone and ruined by this deadly fin of avarice.

I fhall take the liberty to begin with Brutus, that noble Roman. Does not Etian inform us, that he received fifty broad pieces for the affaffination of that renowned Emperor Julius Cæfar, who fell a facrifice to the Jews, as Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey did to the Papists?

Did not Themiftocles let in the Goths and Vandals into Carthage for a fum of money, where they barbaroufly put out the other eye of the famous Hannibal? as Herodotus hath it in his ninth book upon the Roman medals.

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Even the great Cato (as the late Mr Addison hath. very well obferved), though otherwife a gentleman of good fenfe, was not unfullied by this pecuniary contagion; for he fold Athens to Artaxerxes Longimanus for a hundred rix-dollars, which in our money will amount to two talents and thirty feftertii, according to Mr. Demoivre's calculation. See Hefiod in his ferventh chapter of Feafs and Festivals.

Actuated by the fame diabolical fpirit of gain, Sylla the Roman Conful fhot Alcibiades the Senator with a piftol, and robbed him of feveral bank-bills and 'chequernotes to an immenfe value; for which he came to an untimely end, and was denied Christian burial. Hence comes the proverb, Incidat in Syllam.

To come near to our own times, and give you one modern inftance, though well known, and often quoted. by hiftorians, viz. Echard, Dionyfius Halicarnaffeus, Virgil, Horace, and others: It is that, I mean, of the fainous Godfrey of Bulloigne, one of the great heroes of the holy war, who robbed Celopatra Queen of Egypt of a diamond necklace, ear-rings, and a Tompion's gold. watch (which was given her by Mark Anthony); all: thefe things were found in Godfrey's breeches pocket, when he was killed at the ficge of Damafcus.

Who then can wonder, after fo many great and illu-ftrious examples, that Mr Edmund Curll the stationer fhould renounce the Chriftian religion for the Mammon of unrighteoufnefs, and barter his precious faith for the filthy profpect of lucre in the prefent fluctuation of flocks?

It having been obferved to Mr Curll, by fome of hisingenious authors, (who I fear are not over-charged with any religion), what immenfe fums the Jews had got by bubbles &c. he immediately turned his mind from the bufinefs, in which he was educated, but thrived little,

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* Bubble was a name given to all the extravagant projects, for which fubfcriptions were raifed, and negotiated at vast premiums in 'Change-alley, in the year 1920. A name, which alluded to their production by the ferment of the South-fea, and not to their splen-dor, emptiness, and inutility: for it did not become a name of reproach in this cafe, till time completed the metaphor and the bubble. broke, Howkef,

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