I cannot indeed controvert the lawfulness of free-thinking, because it has been universally allowed that thought is free. But, however, although it may afford a large field of matter, yet, in my poor opinion, it seems to contain very little of wit or humour; because it has not been ancient enough among us to furnish established authentic expressions, I mean such as must receive a sanction from the polite world, before their authority can be allowed; neither was the art of blasphemy or free-thinking invented by the court, or by persons of great quality, who, properly speaking, were patrons rather than inventors of it; but first brought in by the fanatic faction toward the end of their power, and after the restoration carried to Whitehall by the converted rumpers, with very good reason, because they knew that King Charles the Second, from a wrong education, occasioned by the troubles of his father, had time enough to observe, that fanatic enthusiasm directly led to atheism, which agreed with the dissolute inclinations of his youth; and perhaps these principles were further cultivated in him by the French Hugonots, who have been often charged with spreading them among us; however, I cannot see where the necessity lies of introducing new and foreign topics for conversation, while we have so plentiful a stock of our own growth.

I have likewise, for some reasons of equal weight, been very sparing in double entendres; because they often put ladies upon affected constraints, and affected ignorance. In short, they break, or very much entangle, the thread of discourse; neither am I master of any rules to settle the disconcerted countenances of the females in such a juncture; I can therefore only allow innų

endoes of this kind to be delivered in whispers, and only to young ladies under twenty, who being in honour obliged to blush, it may produce a new subject for discourse.

Perhaps the critics may accuse me of a defect in my following system of Polite Conversation; that there is one great ornament of discourse, whereof I have not produced a single example; which indeed I purposely omitted, for some reasons that I shall immediately offer; and, if those reasons will not satisfy the male part of my gentle readers, the defect may be applied in some manner by an appendix to the second edition; which appendix shall be printed by itself, and sold for sixpence, stitched, and with a marble cover, that my readers may have no occasion to complain of being defrauded.

The defect I mean is, my not having inserted into the body of my book all the oaths now most in fashion for embellishing discourse, especially since it could give no offence to the clergy, who are seldom or never admitted to these polite assemblies. And it must be allowed, that oaths well chosen are not only very useful expletives to matter, but great ornaments of style.

What I shall here offer in my own defence upon this important article, will, I hope, be some extenuation of my fault.

First, I reasoned with myself, that a just collection of oaths, repeated as often as the fashion requires, must have enlarged this volume at least to double the bulk, whereby it would not only double the charge, but likewise make the volume less commodious for pocket carriage.

Secondly, I have been assured by some judicious friends, that themselves have known certain ladies to take offence (whether seriously or not) at too

great a profusion of cursing and swearing, even when that kind of ornament was not improperly introduced, which, I confess, did startle me not a little, having never observed the like in the compass of my own several acquaintance, at least for twenty years past. However, I was forced to submit to wiser judgments than my own.

Thirdly, as this most useful treatise is calculated for all future times, I considered, in this maturity of my age, how great a variety of oaths I have heard since I began to study the world, and to know men and manners. And here I found it to be true, what I have read in an ancient poet:

For, now-a-days, men change their oaths
As often as they change their clothes.

In short, oaths are the children of fashion; they are in some sense almost annuals, like what I observed before of cant words; and I myself can remember about forty different sets. The old stock oaths, I am confident, do not amount to above forty-five, or fifty at most; but the way of mingling and compounding them is almost as various as that of the alphabet.

Sir JOHN PERROT was the first man of quality, whom I find upon record to have sworn by God's wounds. * He lived in the reign of queen Eliza

* Sir John Perrot was lord-deputy of Ireland, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. On his return from that charge, he fell under the displeasure of the queen, chiefly by the predominating influence of his enemy, Sir Christopher Hatton. Being a man of a violent and passionate temper, he had made use of some irreverent expressions towards the queen, for which, an unconscientious jury found him guilty of high treason. The following are some of these explosions, garnished, as usual, by his favourite oath :

66 Upon receiving her majesty's letter to prefer Mr Errington to

beth, and was supposed to be a natural son of Henry the Eighth, who might also probably have been his instructor. This oath indeed still continues, and is a stock oath to this day; so do se

*

the office of clerk of the exchequer, Sir John Perrot used these undutiful speeches: "This fiddling woman troubles me out of measure. God's wounds, he shall not have the office; I will give it to Sir Thomas Williams.' Further, he was accused, that, when his secretary was writing to the queen, and used the dutiful expression, he would be sacrificed for her,' Sir John scratched it out, saying,' he had little cause to be sacrificed for her.' Moreover, when, on the Spanish threat of invasion, his secretary said, he hoped God would bless them for her majesty's sake, he answered, 'God's wounds, and why for her sake?never the more for her sake.' But the highest and most unpardonable of these irreverent expressions was used to one Garland, who brought to Perrot a letter from the queen, at the terms of which this puta tive son of Henry VIII. conceived such displeasure as to exclaim, 'God's wounds, this it is to serve a base bastard, piss kitchen woman; if I had served any prince in Christendom, I had not been so dealt withal."-SOMERS's Tracts, ed. 1809, vol. I. p. 269,

note 1.

* Sir John Perrot's hasty and choleric temper confirms this tradition, which is mentioned by Naunton. "The queen, on the news of his condemnation, swore by her wonted oath, that the jury were all knaves; and they delivered it with assurance, that, on his returne to the towne after his trial, he said, with oathes and with fury to the lieutenant, Sir Owen Hopton, What, will the queene suffer her brother to be offered up a sacrifice to my skipping adversaries?' Which being made knowne to the queene, and somewhat enforced, she refused to sign it, and swore he should not die, for he was an honest and faithfull man; and surely, though not altogether to set our rest and faith upon tradition and old reports, as that Sir Thomas Perrot, his father, was a gentleman of the privy chamber, and in the court married to a lady of great honour, which are presumptions in some implications; but, if we goe a little further, and compare his pictures, his qualities, gesture and voyce, with that of the king, which memory retains yet amongst us, they will plead strongly that he was a surreptitious child of the blood royal."-NAUNTON's Fragmenta Regalid, apud SOMERS's Tracts, ed. 1809, vol. I. p. 269.

veral others that have kept their natural simplicity; but infinitely the greater number has been so frequently changed and dislocated, that if the inventors were now alive, they could hardly understand them.

Upon these considerations I began to apprehend, that if I should insert all the oaths that are now current, my book would be out of vogue with the first change of fashion, and grow as useless as an old dictionary; whereas the case is quite otherwise with my collection of polite discourse; which, as I before observed, has descended by tradition for at least a hundred years, without any change in the phraseology. I therefore. determined with myself to leave out the whole system of swearing, because both the male and female oaths are all perfectly well known and distinguished; new ones are easily learnt, and, with a moderate share of discretion, may be properly applied on every fit occasion. However, I must here, upon this article of swearing, most earnestly recommend to my male readers, that they would please a little to study variety. For it is the opinion of our most refined swearers, that the same oath or curse cannot, consistently with true politeness, be repeated above nine times in the same company, by the same person, and at one sitting.

I am far from desiring, or expecting, that all the polite and ingenious speeches contained in this work should, in the general conversation between ladies and gentlemen, come in so quick and so close as I have here delivered them. By no means on the contrary, they ought to be husbanded better, and spread much thinner. Nor do I make the least question, but that, by a discreet and thrifty management, they may serve