ook in which he
has expressed himself in terms neither measured nor mealy, he will beg
leave to observe, in the words of a great poet, who lived a profligate
life, it is true, but who died a sincere penitent--thanks, after God, to
good Bishop Burnet--

"All this with indignation I have hurl'd
At the pretending part of this proud world,
Who, swollen with selfish vanity, devise
False freedoms, formal cheats, and holy lies,
Over their fellow fools to tyrannize."

ROCHESTER.

Footnotes

{1} Tipperary.

{2} An obscene oath.

{3} See "Muses' Library," pp. 86, 87. London, 1738.

{4} Genteel with them seems to be synonymous with Gentile and Gentoo; if
so, the manner in which it has been applied for ages ceases to surprise,
for genteel is heathenish. Ideas of barbaric pearl and gold, glittering
armour, plumes, tortures, blood-shedding, and lust, should always be
connected with it. Wace, in his grand Norman poem, calls the Baron
genteel:--

"La furent li gentil Baron," etc.

And he certainly could not have applied the word better than to the
strong Norman thief, armed cap-a-pie, without one particle of truth or
generosity; for a person to be a pink of gentility, that is heathenism,
should have no such feelings; and, indeed, the admirers of gentility
seldom or never associate any such feelings with it. It was from the
Norman, the worst of all robbers and miscreants, who built strong
castles, garrisoned them with devils, and tore out poor wretches' eyes,
as the Saxon Chronicle says, that the English got their detestable word
genteel. What could ever have made the English such admirers of
gentility, it would be difficult to say; for, during three hundred years,
they suffered enough by it. Their genteel Norman landlords were their
scourgers, their torturers, the plunderers of their homes, the
dishonourers of their wives, and the deflourers of their daughters.
Perhaps, after all, fear is at the root of the English veneration for
gentility.

{5} Gentle and gentlemanly may be derived from the same root as genteel;
but nothing can be more distinct from the mere genteel, than the ideas
which enlightened minds associate with these words. Gentle and
gentlemanly mean something kind and genial; genteel, that which is
glittering or gaudy. A person can be a gentleman in rags, but nobody can
be genteel.

{6} The writer has been checked in print by the Scotch with being a
Norfolk man.