Character Writings of the 17th Century eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 591 pages of information about Character Writings of the 17th Century.

Character Writings of the 17th Century eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 591 pages of information about Character Writings of the 17th Century.
conduct.  He is a eunuch-bashaw, that has charge of the women and governs all their public affairs, because he is not able to do them any considerable private services.  One of his prime qualifications is to convey their persons in and out of coaches, as tenderly as a cook sets his custards in an oven and draws them out again, without the least discomposure or offence to their inward or outward woman; that is, their persons and dresses.  The greatest care he uses in his conversation with ladies is to order his peruke methodically, and keep off his hat with equal respect both to it and their ladyships, that neither may have cause to take any just offence, but continue him in their good graces.  When he squires a lady he takes her by the handle of her person, the elbow, and steers it with all possible caution, lest his own foot should, upon a tack, for want of due circumspection, unhappily fall foul on the long train she carries at her stern.  This makes him walk upon his toes and tread as lightly as if he were leading her a dance.  He never tries any experiment solitary with her, but always in consort, and then he acts the woman’s part and she the man’s, talks loud and laughs, while he sits demurely silent, and simpers or bows, and cries, “Anon, Madam, excellently good!” &c. &c.  He is a kind of hermaphrodite, for his body is of one sex and his mind of another, which makes him take no delight in the conversation or actions of men, because they do so by his, but apply himself to women, to whom the sympathy and likeness of his own temper and wit naturally inclines him, where he finds an agreeable reception for want of a better; for they, like our Indian planters, value their wealth by the number of their slaves.  All his business in the morning is to dress himself, and in the afternoon to show his workmanship to the ladies, who after serious consideration approve or disallow of his judgment and abilities accordingly, and he as freely delivers his opinion of theirs.  The glass is the only author he studies, by which his actions and gestures are all put on like his clothes, and by that he practices how to deliver what he has prepared to say to the dames, after he has laid a train to bring it in.

AN HYPOCRITE

Is a saint that goes by clockwork, a machine made by the devil’s geometry, which he winds and nicks to go as he pleases.  He is the devil’s finger-watch, that never goes true, but too fast or too slow as he sets him.  His religion goes with wires, and he serves the devil for an idol to seduce the simple to worship and believe in him.  He puts down the true saint with his copper-lace devotion, as ladies that use art paint fairer than the life.  He is a great bustler in reformation, which is always most proper to his talent, especially if it be tumultuous; for pockets are nowhere so easily and safely picked as in jostling crowds.  And as change and alterations are most agreeable to those who are tied to nothing,

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Character Writings of the 17th Century from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.