e Body present who will take Care of their respective Interests, that
nothing may be written or published to the Prejudice or Infringement of
their just Rights and Privileges.

I last Night sat very late in company with this select Body of Friends,
who entertain'd me with several Remarks which they and others had made
upon these my Speculations, as also with the various Success which they
had met with among their several Ranks and Degrees of Readers. WILL.
HONEYCOMB told me, in the softest Manner he could, That there were some
Ladies (but for your Comfort, says WILL., they are not those of the most
Wit) that were offended at the Liberties I had taken with the Opera and
the Puppet-Show: That some of them were likewise very much surpriz'd,
that I should think such serious Points as the Dress and Equipage of
Persons of Quality, proper Subjects for Raillery.

He was going on, when Sir ANDREW FREEPORT took him up short, and told
him, That the Papers he hinted at had done great Good in the City, and
that all their Wives and Daughters were the better for them: And further
added, That the whole City thought themselves very much obliged to me
for declaring my generous Intentions to scourge Vice and Folly as they
appear in a Multitude, without condescending to be a Publisher of
particular Intrigues and Cuckoldoms. In short, says Sir ANDREW, if you
avoid that foolish beaten Road of falling upon Aldermen and Citizens,
and employ your Pen upon the Vanity and Luxury of Courts, your Paper
must needs be of general Use.

Upon this my Friend the TEMPLAR told Sir ANDREW, That he wondered to
hear a Man of his Sense talk after that Manner; that the City had always
been the Province for Satyr; and that the Wits of King _Charles's_ Time
jested upon nothing else during his whole Reign. He then shewed, by the
Examples of _Horace, Juvenal, Boileau_, and the best Writers of every
Age, that the Follies of the Stage and Court had never been accounted
too sacred for Ridicule, how great so-ever the Persons might be that
patronized them. But after all, says he, I think your Raillery has made
too great an Excursion, in attacking several Persons of the Inns of
Court; and I do not believe you can shew me any Precedent for your
Behaviour in that Particular.

My good Friend Sir ROGER DE COVERL[E]Y, who had said nothing all this
while, began his Speech with a Pish! and told us. That he wondered to
see so many Men of Sense so very serious upon Fooleries.