le in the throat at every word they speak, that can eat no meat
but what is tender enough to suck, that have more hair on their beard
than they have on their head, and go stooping toward the dust they must
shortly return to; whose skin seems already drest into parchment, and
their bones already dried to a skeleton; these shadows of men shall
be wonderful ambitious of living longer, and therefore fence off the
attacks of death with all imaginable sleights and impostures; one shall
new dye his grey hairs, for fear their colour should betray his age;
another shall spruce himself up in a light periwig; a third shall repair
the loss of his teeth with an ivory set; and a fourth perhaps shall fall
deeply in love with a young girl, and accordingly court her with as much
of gaiety and briskness as the liveliest spark in the whole town: and
we cannot but know, that for an old man to marry a young wife without a
portion, to be a cooler to other men's lust, is grown so common, that it
is become the a-la-mode of the times. And what is yet more comical, you
shall have some wrinkled old women, whose very looks are a sufficient
antidote to lechery, that shall be canting out, _Ah, life is a sweet
thing_, and so run a caterwauling, and hire some strong-backed stallions
to recover their almost lost sense of feeling; and to set themselves
off the better, they shall paint and daub their faces, always stand
a tricking up themselves at their looking-glass, go naked-necked,
bare-breasted, be tickled at a smutty jest, dance among the young girls,
write love-letters, and do all the other little knacks of decoying
hot-blooded suitors; and in the meanwhile, however they are laughed at,
they enjoy themselves to the full, live up to their hearts' desire, and
want for nothing that may complete their happiness. As for those that
think them herein so ridiculous, I would have them give an ingenuous
answer to this one query, whether if folly or hanging were left to their
choice, they had not much rather live like fools, than die like dogs?
But what matter is it if these things are resented by the vulgar? Their
ill word is no injury to fools, who are either altogether insensible of
any affront, or at least lay it not much to heart. If they were knocked
on the head, or had their brains dashed out, they would have some cause
to complain; but alas, slander, calumny, and disgrace, are no other way
injurious than as they are interpreted; nor otherwise evil, than