truth and justice of this remonstrance. If there be not
a stop put to this evil art, all the modes of address, and the elegant
embellishments of life, which arise out of the noble passion of love,
will of necessity decay. Who would be at the trouble of rhetoric, or
study the _bon mien_, when his introduction is so much easier obtained
by a sudden reverence in a downcast look at the meeting the eye of a
fair lady, and beginning again to ogle her as soon as she glances
another way? I remember very well, when I was last at an opera, I could
perceive the eyes of the whole audience cast into particular cross
angles one upon another, without any manner of regard to the stage,
though King Latinus was himself present when I made that observation. It
was then very pleasant to look into the hearts of the whole company; for
the balls of sight are so formed, that one man's eyes are spectacles to
another to read his heart with. The most ordinary beholder can take
notice of any violent agitation in the mind, any pleasing transport, or
any inward grief, in the person he looks at; but one of these oglers can
see a studied indifference, a concealed love, or a smothered resentment,
in the very glances that are made to hide those dispositions of thought.
The naturalists tell us, that the rattlesnake will fix himself under a
tree where he sees a squirrel playing; and when he has once got the
exchange of a glance from the pretty wanton, will give it such a sudden
stroke on its imagination, that though it may play from bough to bough,
and strive to avert its eyes from it for some time, yet it comes nearer
and nearer by little intervals of looking another way, till it drops
into the jaws of the animal, which it knew gazed at it for no other
reason but to ruin it. I did not believe this piece of philosophy till
that night I was just now speaking of; but I then saw the same thing
pass between an ogler and a coquette. Mirtillo, the most learned of the
former, had for some time discontinued to visit Flavia, no less eminent
among the latter. They industriously avoided all places where they might
probably meet, but chance brought them together to the playhouse, and
seated them in a direct line over against each other, she in a front
box, he in the pit next the stage. As soon as Flavia had received the
looks of the whole crowd below her with that air of insensibility which
is necessary at the first entrance, she began to look round her and saw
the va