kes it!
Fancy,--but we must not fancy such a scene at all, which would be an
outrage on public decency. Should we be any better than our neighbors?
No, certainly. And as we can't be virtuous, let us be decent. Figleaves
are a very decent, becoming wear, and have been now in fashion for four
thousand years. And so, my dear, history is written on fig-leaves. Would
you have anything further? O fie!

Yes, four thousand years ago that famous tree was planted. At their
very first lie, our first parents made for it, and there it is still the
great Humbug Plant, stretching its wide arms, and sheltering beneath its
leaves, as broad and green as ever, all the generations of men. Thus,
my dear, coquettes of your fascinating sex cover their persons with
figgery, fantastically arranged, and call their masquerading, modesty.
Cowards fig themselves out fiercely as "salvage men," and make us
believe that they are warriors. Fools look very solemnly out from the
dusk of the leaves, and we fancy in the gloom that they are sages. And
many a man sets a great wreath about his pate and struts abroad a
hero, whose claims we would all of us laugh at, could we but remove the
ornament and see his numskull bare.

And such--(excuse my sermonizing)--such is the constitution of mankind,
that men have, as it were, entered into a compact among themselves to
pursue the fig-leaf system a l'outrance, and to cry down all who
oppose it. Humbug they will have. Humbugs themselves, they will respect
humbugs. Their daily victuals of life must be seasoned with humbug.
Certain things are there in the world that they will not allow to be
called by their right names, and will insist upon our admiring, whether
we will or no. Woe be to the man who would enter too far into the
recesses of that magnificent temple where our Goddess is enshrined, peep
through the vast embroidered curtains indiscreetly, penetrate the secret
of secrets, and expose the Gammon of Gammons! And as you must not peer
too curiously within, so neither must you remain scornfully without.
Humbug-worshippers, let us come into our great temple regularly and
decently: take our seats, and settle our clothes decently; open our
books, and go through the service with decent gravity; listen, and be
decently affected by the expositions of the decent priest of the place;
and if by chance some straggling vagabond, loitering in the sunshine out
of doors, dares to laugh or to sing, and disturb the sanctified du