persuaded that I am far from being singular in that opinion.

As for the incurable infidels and liars, I shall range them under the
same article, and would willingly appoint them the same apartment in the
hospital; because there is a much nearer resemblance between them, than
is generally imagined.

Have they not an equal delight in imposing falsities on the public; and
seem they not equally desirous to be thought of more sagacity and
importance than others? Do they not both report what both know to be
false; and both confidently assert what they are conscious is most
liable to contradiction?

The parallel might easily be carried on much further, if the intended
shortness of this essay would admit it. However, I cannot forbear taking
notice, with what immense quantities of incurable liars his Majesty's
kingdoms are overrun; what offence and prejudice they are to the public;
what inconceivable injury to private persons; and what a necessity there
is for an hospital, to relieve the nation from the curse of so many
incurables.

This distemper appears almost in as many different shapes, as there are
persons afflicted with it; and, in every individual, is always beyond
the power of medicine.

Some lie for their interest; such as fishmongers, flatterers, pimps,
lawyers, fortune-hunters, and fortune-tellers; and others lie for their
entertainment, as maids, wives, widows, and all other tea-table
attendants.

Some lie out of vanity, as poets, painters, players, fops, military
officers, and all those who frequent the levees of the great: and others
lie out of ill nature, as old maids, &c.

Some lie out of custom, as lovers, coxcombs, footmen, sailors,
mechanics, merchants, and chambermaids; and others lie out of
complaisance or necessity, as courtiers, chaplains, &c. In short, it
were endless to enumerate them all, but this sketch may be sufficient to
give us some small imperfect idea of their numbers.

As to the remaining incurables, we may reasonably conclude, that they
bear at least an equal proportion to those already mentioned; but with
regard to the incurable whores in this kingdom, I must particularly
observe, that such of them as are public, and make it their profession,
have proper hospitals for their reception already, if we could find
magistrates without passions, or officers without an incurable itch to a
bribe. And such of them as are private, and make it their amusement, I
should be unwilling to disturb,