These postulata being admitted, it will follow in due course of reasoning, that those beings, which the world calls improperly suits of clothes, are in reality the most refined species of animals; or to proceed higher, that they are rational creatures, or men. For, is it not manifest, that they live, and move, and talk, and perform all other offices of human life? are not beauty, and wit, and mien, and breeding, their inseparable proprieties? in short, we see nothing but them, hear nothing but them. Is it not they, who walk the streets, fill up parlia ment, coffee-, play-, bawdy-houses? It is true, indeed, that these animals, which are vulgarly called suits of clothes, or dresses, do according to certain compositions receive different appellations, If one of them be trimmed up with a gold chain, and a red gown, and a white rod, and a great horse, it is called a lord-mayor: if certain ermines and furs be placed in a certain position, we style them a judge; and so an apt conjunction of lawn and black sattin we entitle a bishop.

Others of these professors, though agreeing in the main system, were yet more refined upon certain branches of it; and held, that man was an animal compounded of two dresses, the natural and celestial suit, which were the body and the soul: that the soul was the outward, and the body the inward clothing; that the latter was ex traduce; but the former of daily creation and circumfusion. This last they proved by Scripture, because, in them we live, and move, and have our being; as likewise by philosophy, because they are all in all, and all in every part. Besides, said they, separate these two, and you will find the body to be only a senseless unsavour, carcase. By all which it is manifest, that the outward dress must needs be the soul.

To this system of religion, were tagged several subaltern doctrines, which were entertained with

1

great vogue; as particularly, the faculties of the mind were deduced by the learned among them in this manner: embroidery, was sheer wit; gold fringe, was agreeable conversation; gold lace, was repartee; a huge long periwig, was humour; and a coat full of powder, was very good raillery: all which required abundance of finesse and delicatesse ta manage with advantage, as well as a strict observance after times and fashions.

I have, with much pains and reading, collected out of ancient authors this short summary of a body of philosophy and divinity, which seems to have been composed by a vein and race of thinking, very different from any other systems either ancient or modern. And it was not merely to entertain or satisfy the reader's curiosity, but rather to give him light into several circumstances of the following story; that, knowing the state of dispositions and opinions in an age so remote, he may better comprehend those great events, which were the issue of them. I ad. vise therefore the courteous reader to peruse with a world of application, again and again, whatever I have written upon this matter. And so leaving these broken ends, I carefully gather up the chief thread of my story, and proceed,

These opinions therefore were so universal, as well at the practices of them, among the refined part of court and town, that our three brother-adventurers, as their circumstances then stood, were strangely at a loss. For, on the one side, the three ladies they addressed themselves to, whom we have named already, were ever at the very top of the fashion, and abhorred all that were below it but the breadth of a hair. On the other side, their father's will was very precise, and it was the main precept in it, with the greatest penalties annexed, not to add to, or diminish from their coats one thread, without a positive command in the will. Now the coats their father

had left them, were, it is true, of very good cloth, and besides, so neatly sown, you would swear they were all of a piece; but at the same time very plain, and with little or no ornament: and it happened, that before they were a month in town, great shoulder-knots came up*: straight all the world was shoulder-knots; no approaching the ladies ruelles without the quota of shoulder-knots†. "That fellow," cries one, "has no soul; where is his shoulder-knot? Our three brethren soon discovered their want by sad experience, meeting in their walks with forty mortifications and indignities. If they went to the play-house, the door-keeper showed them into the twelve-penny gallery. If they called a boat, says a waterman, "I am first sculler." If they stepped to the Rose to take a bottle, the drawer would cry, "Friend, we sell no ale." If they went to visit a lady, a footman met them at the door, with, "Pray send up your message." In this unhappy case they went immediately to consult their father's will, read it over and over, but not a word

*The first part of the Tale is the history of Peter; thereby popery is exposed: every body knows the papists have made great additions to christianity, that indeed is the great exception which the church of England makes against them; accordingly Peter begins his pranks with adding a shoulder-knot to his coat. W. WOTTON.

His description of the cloth, of which the coat was made, has a farther meaning than the words may seem to import ; "The "coats their father had left them, were of very good cloth, and "besides, so neatly sown, you would swear they were all of a "piece; hut at the same time very plain, with little or no or"nament." This is the distinguishing character of the christian religion: christiana religio absoluta & simplex, was Ammianus Marcellinus's description of it, who was himself a heathen. W. WOTTON.

By this is understood the first introducing of pageantry and unnecessary ornaments in the church; such as were neither for convenience nor edification; as a shoulder-knot, in which there is neither symmetry nor use. H.

of the shoulder-knot: what should they do? what temper should they find? obedience was absolutely necessary, and yet shoulder-knots appeared extremely requisite. After much thought, one of the brothers, who happened to be more book-learned than the other two, said, he had found an expedient. It is true, said he, there is nothing here in this will, totidem verbis, making mention of shoulder-knots; but I dare conjecture, we may find them inclusive, or, totidem syllabis. This distinction was immediately approved by all; and so they fell again to examine; but their evil star had so directed the matter, that the first syllable was not to be found in the whole writings. Upon which disappointment, he, who found the former evasion, took heart, and said, Brothers, there are yet hopes; for though we cannot find them totidem verbis, nor totidem syllabis, I dare engage we shall make them out tertio modo, or totidem literis. This discovery was also highly commended, upon which they fell once more to the scrutiny, and soon picked out S,H,O,U,L,D,E,R; when the same planet, enemy to their repose, had wonderfully contrived, that a K was not to be found. Here was a weighty difficulty! but the distinguishing brother, for whom we shall hereafter find a name, now his hand was in, proved by a very good argument, that K was a modern illegitimate letter, unknown to the learned ages, nor any where to be found in ancient manuscripts. It is true, said he, the word Calendæ hath in Q. V. C. * been sometimes written with a K, but erroneously; for in the best copies it has been ever spelt with a C. And by consequence it was a gross mistake in our language to spell knot with a K; but that from henceforward, he would take care it should be written with a C. Upon this all farther difficulty vanished; shoulder-knots were made * Quibusdam veteribus codicibus; some ancient manuscripts. H.

clearly out to be jure paterno; and our three gentlemen swaggered with as large and as flaunting ones as the best. But, as human happiness is of a very short duration, so in those days were human fashions, upon which it intirely depends. Shoulder-knots had their time, and we must now imagine them in their decline; for a certain lord came just from Paris with fifty yards of gold-lace upon his coat, exactly trimmed after the court-fashion of that month. In two days all mankind appeared closed up in bars of gold-lace*: whoever durst peep abroad without his compliment of gold-lace, was as scandalous as a- and as ill received among the women what should our three knights do in this momentous affair? they had sufficiently strained a point already in the affair of shoulder-knots: upon recourse to the will, nothing appeared there, but altum silentium. That of the shoulder-knots was a loose, flying, circumstantial point; but this of gold-lace seemed too considerable an alteration without better warrant ; it did aliquo modo essentia adhærere, and therefore required a positive precept. But about this time it fell out, that the learned brother aforesaid had read Aristotelis dialectica, and especially that wonderful piece de interpretatione, which has the faculty of teaching its readers to find out a meaning in every thing but itself; like commentators on the revelations, who proceed prophets without understanding a syllable of the text. Brothers," said he, "you are to be informed, that of wills duo sunt genera, nuncupatory and scriptory; that in the scriptory will here before us, there is no precept or mention about gold-lace, conceditur: but, si idem affirmetur

* I cannot tell whether the author means any new innovation by this word, or whether it be only to introduce the new me. thods of forcing and perverting Scripture. H.

: + By this is meant Tradition, allowed by the papists to have equal authority with the Scripture or rather greater. H.