e, and he repeats-- However, he
acknowledges that there is one fine poem in the German language, that
poem is the "Oberon;" a poem, by the bye, ignored by the Germans--a
speaking fact--and of course, by the Anglo-Germanists. The Germans! he
has been amongst them, and amongst many other nations, and confesses that
his opinion of the Germans, as men, is a very low one. Germany, it is
true, has produced one very great man, the monk who fought the Pope, and
nearly knocked him down; but this man his countrymen--a telling
fact--affect to despise, and, of course, the Anglo-Germanists: the father
of Anglo-Germanism was very fond of inveighing against Luther.

The madness, or rather foolery, of the English for foreign customs,
dresses, and languages, is not an affair of to-day, or yesterday--it is
of very ancient date, and was very properly exposed nearly three
centuries ago by one Andrew Borde, who under the picture of a "Naked man,
with a pair of shears in one hand, and a roll of cloth in the other," {3}
inserted the following lines along with others:--

"I am an Englishman, and naked I stand here,
Musing in my mind what garment I shall weare;
For now I will weare this, and now I will weare that,
Now I will weare, I cannot tell what.
All new fashions be pleasant to mee,
I will have them, whether I thrive or thee;
What do I care if all the world me fail?
I will have a garment reach to my taile;
Then am I a minion, for I wear the new guise.
The next yeare after I hope to be wise,
Not only in wearing my gorgeous array,
For I will go to learning a whole summer's day;
I will learn Latine, Hebrew, Greek, and French,
And I will learn Dutch, sitting on my bench.
I had no peere if to myself I were true,
Because I am not so, divers times do I rue.
Yet I lacke nothing, I have all things at will
If I were wise and would hold myself still,
And meddle with no matters but to me pertaining,
But ever to be true to God and my king.
But I have such matters rowling in my pate,
That I will and do--I cannot tell what," etc.

CHAPTER IV--On Gentility Nonsense--Illustrations of Gentility.

What is gentility? People in different stations in England--entertain
different ideas of what is genteel, {4} but it must be something
gorgeous, glittering, or tawdry, to be considered genteel by any of them.
The beau-ideal of the English aristocracy, of course with some
exceptions