The Project Gutenberg EBook of Vice in its Proper Shape, by Anonymous

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Title: Vice in its Proper Shape
Or, The Wonderful and Melancholy Transformation of Several
Naughty Masters and Misses Into Those Contemptible Animals
Which They Most Resemble In Disposition.

Author: Anonymous

Release Date: August 20, 2008 [EBook #26379]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: FRONTISPIECE.]

VICE
IN ITS
PROPER SHAPE;
OR, THE
Wonderful and Melancholy
TRANSFORMATION
OF SEVERAL
NAUGHTY MASTERS AND MISSES
INTO THOSE
Contemptible ANIMALS which they most
resemble in Disposition.

Printed for the Benefit of all GOOD BOYS
and GIRLS.

THE FIRST _WORCESTER_ EDITION.

PRINTED at WORCESTER, _Massachusetts_,
BY ISAIAH THOMAS,
Sold at his BOOKSTORE, and by THOMAS
and ANDREWS in BOSTON.

MDCCLXXXIX.

INTRODUCTION.

It was the opinion of the wise _Pythagoras_, and of some other
philosophers, that the souls of men, women, and children, after their
death, are sent into other human bodies, and sometimes into those of
beasts and birds, or even insects; and that they hereby change their
residence either to their advantage or disadvantage, according to their
good or ill behaviour in their preceding state of existence. This
singular opinion still prevails in some part of the Eastindies; and
that to such a degree that they make it criminal to put any animal to
death: "For how do you know, say they, but in killing a sheep, a bird,
or a fish, you murder your father, or your brother, or some other
deceased friend or relation, whose soul may inhabit the body of the
animal you so wantonly destroy?" An officer in the service of the
Eastindia Company, and a particular friend of mine, had like to have
lost his life by not paying a proper deference to this whimsical
notion; for being some time in that part of the country, and happening