then Saturn’s belt! which the translator says
in his notes, Is not round the planet’s waist,
like the shingles; but is a globe of crystal that encloses
the whole orb, as You may have seen an enamelled watch
in a case of glass. If you do not perceive what
infinitely pretty things may be said, either in poetry
or romance. on a brittle heaven of crystal, and what
furbelowed rainbows they must have in that country,
you are neither the Ovid nor natural philosopher I
take you for. Pray send me an eclogue directly
upon this plan—and I give you leave to
adopt my idea of Saturnian Celias having their every
thing quadrupled—which would form a much
more entertaining rhapsody than Swift’s thought
of magnifying or diminishing the species in his Gulliver.
How much more execution a fine woman would do with
two pair of piercers! or four! and how much longer
the honeymoon would last, if both the sexes have (as
no doubt they have) four times the passions, and four
times the means of gratifying them!—I have
opened new worlds to you—You must be four
times the poet you are, and then you will be above
Milton, and equal to Shakspeare, the only two mortals
I am acquainted with who ventured beyond the visible
diurnal sphere, and preserved their intellects.
Dryden himself would have talked nonsense, and, I
fear, indecency, on my plan; but you are too good
a divine, I am sure, to treat my quadruple love but
platonically. In Saturn, notwithstanding their
glass-case, they are supposed to be very cold; but
platonic love of itself produces frigid conceits enough,
and you need not augment the dose.—But
I will not dictate, The Subject is new; and you, who
have so much imagination, will shoot far beyond me.
Fontenelle would have made something of the idea,
even in prose; but Algarotti would dishearten any
body from attempting to meddle with the system of
the universe a second time in a genteel dialogue.(470)
Good night! I am going to bed.—Mercy
on me! if I should dream of Celia with four times
the usual attractions!
(469) By Poinsinet de Sivry, in twelve Volumes quarto.-E.
(470) A translation of Count Algarotti’s “Newtonianismo
per Le Dame,” by Mrs. Elizabeth Carter, under
the title of “Sir Isaac Newton’S Philosophy
explained for the Use of the Ladies; in six Dialogues
of Light and Colours,” appeared in 1739.-E.
I doubt you are again in error, my good Sir, about
the letter I in the Gentleman’s Magazine against
the Rowleians, unless Mr. Malone sent it to you; for
he is the author, and not Mr. Steevens, from whom
I imagine you received it.(471) There is a report
that some part of Chatterton’s forgery is to
be produced by an accomplice; but this I do not answer
for, nor know the circumstances. I have scarce
seen a person who is not persuaded that the forging
of the poems was Chatterton’s own, though he
might have found some old stuff to work upon, which
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