Await his nod, the silken slaves of pleasure,
Or fetter'd in their fears.--

Thus is that decent submission to our superiours, and that proper awe of
authority which we are taught in courts, termed base fear and the
servility of the soul. Thus are those gaieties and enjoyments, those
elegant amusements and lulling pleasures, which the followers of a court
are blessed with, as the just rewards of their attendance and
submission, degraded to lust, grossness, and debauchery. The author
ought to be told, that courts are not to be mentioned with so little
ceremony, and that though gallantries and amours are admitted there, it
is almost treason to suppose them infected with debauchery or lust.

It is observable, that, when this hateful writer has conceived any
thought of an uncommon malignity, a thought which tends, in a more
particular manner, to excite the love of liberty, animate the heat of
patriotism, or degrade the majesty of kings, he takes care to put it in
the mouth of his hero, that it may be more forcibly impressed upon his
reader. Thus Gustavus, speaking of his tatters, cries out,

--Yes, my Arvida,
Beyond the sweeping of the proudest train
That shades a monarch's heel, I prize these weeds;
For they are sacred to my country's freedom.

Here this abandoned son of liberty makes a full discovery of his
execrable principles, the tatters of Gustavus, the usual dress of the
assertors of these doctrines, are of more divinity, because they are
sacred to freedom, than the sumptuous and magnificent robes of regality
itself. Such sentiments are truly detestable, nor could any thing be an
aggravation of the author's guilt, except his ludicrous manner of
mentioning a monarch.

The heel of a monarch, or even the print of his heel, is a thing too
venerable and sacred to be treated with such levity, and placed in
contrast with rags and poverty. He, that will speak contemptuously of
the heel of a monarch, will, whenever he can with security, speak
contemptuously of his head.

These are the most glaring passages which have occurred, in the perusal
of the first pages; my indignation will not suffer me to proceed
farther, and I think much better of the licenser, than to believe he
went so far.

In the few remarks which I have set down, the reader will easily
observe, that I have strained no expression beyond its natural import,
and have divested myself of all heat, partiality, and prejudice.

So