scie MISCELLANEOUS THOUGHTS. in Latin, and the Jews wash their hands always before eating ? It was the usage of ancient ages, and the custom of their fathers. Why did the ladies of Great - Britain wear ruffs and fardingales a century and a half ago ? and why do the men of fashion now - a-days keep two knots of hair dangling on their shoulders, with one long curl behind ? Does nature find so much convenience, or spy so much decency in it? Neither of the two ; but still there is supposed to be reason enough for any of these oddities, since it is the present mode. The mode will soon reconcile fancy to the most awkward appearances, and the most incommodious practices : But if nature, reason and convenience, make never so loud remonstrances, they must all stand aside and submit, while some old customs and some new fashions pronounce their absolute decrees concerning a thousand things, and determine without appeal. Yet if reason, or religion, might have leave to put in a word, methinks there are some ancient fashions which should never have been antiquated, as well as there are some new ones which should never have been suffered to arise. It was a fashion among our grandfathers, to cite a worthy or elegant sentence from some author of established fame, and that in their conversation, as well as their writings : They would choose to express their sentiments in the bright and beautiful lan- guage of some ancient poet or philosopher, which gave new life and strength to the period : But for these fifty years past you gain the naine of a pedant, if you affront the modish world with a wise and pious saying borrowed from one of the ancients in their own language. I will grant indeed, that it was a piece of pride, vanity and impertinence, in some who lived in the last century, to interline all their discourses and almost every page -of their books, with perpetual scraps of Greek and Latin ; and it became yet more ridiculous in sermons and in treatises which were written only for the use of the English world, wbo knew nothing but their mother- tongue; but must so useful and entertaining a practice be banished for ever, because it has been abused, and carried to extremes ? Suppose I have a fine and noble sentiment in my thoughts, which I learned from Seneca or Cicero, must I be bound to deliver it in my own ruder language, rather than let those ingenious ancients speak it in their own phrase; supposing always that the company in which I speak, understand the Ro- man tongue ? Is it such a crime to let Juvenal or Horace say an agreeable and pertinent thing for me, when I thereby confess that I cannot say any thing myself so pertinent and so agreeable ? And why may not a David or a Solomon, as well as a Virgil, a Milton, or an Addison, raise and dignify a period now and then with their noble, and just, and elegant lines, and enliven a
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