hem with a kind of Nonsense
against the Philosophy of Nature, or such a Heap of Wonders told upon
their own Knowledge, as it is not likely one Man should ever have met
with.

I have been led to this Observation by a Company into which I fell
accidentally. The Subject of _Antipathies_ was a proper Field wherein
such false Surprizes might expatiate, and there were those present who
appeared very fond to shew it in its full Extent of traditional History.
Some of them, in a learned manner, offered to our Consideration the
miraculous Powers which the Effluviums of Cheese have over Bodies whose
Pores are dispos'd to receive them in a noxious manner; others gave an
account of such who could indeed bear the sight of Cheese, but not the
Taste; for which they brought a Reason from the Milk of their Nurses.
Others again discours'd, without endeavouring at Reasons, concerning an
unconquerable Aversion which some Stomachs have against a Joint of Meat
when it is whole, and the eager Inclination they have for it, when, by
its being cut up, the Shape which had affected them is altered. From
hence they passed to Eels, then to Parsnips, and so from one Aversion to
another, till we had work'd up our selves to such a pitch of
Complaisance, that when the Dinner was to come in, we enquired the name
of every Dish, and hop'd it would be no Offence to any in Company,
before it was admitted. When we had sat down, this Civility amongst us
turned the Discourse from Eatables to other sorts of Aversions; and the
eternal Cat, which plagues every Conversation of this nature, began then
to engross the Subject. One had sweated at the Sight of it, another had
smelled it out as it lay concealed in a very distant Cupboard; and he
who crowned the whole set of these Stories, reckon'd up the Number of
Times in which it had occasion'd him to swoon away. At last, says he,
that you may all be satisfy'd of my invincible Aversion to a Cat, I
shall give an unanswerable Instance: As I was going through a Street of
_London_, where I had never been till then, I felt a general Damp and
Faintness all over me, which I could not tell how to account for, till I
chanced to cast my Eyes upwards, and found that I was passing under a
Sign-Post on which the Picture of a Cat was hung.

The Extravagance of this Turn in the way of Surprize, gave a stop to the
Talk we had been carrying on: Some were silent because they doubted, and
others because they were conquered in their own W