As to your Un-Waller-like Treatment of the Ladies, I must tell you that I had put on Shield and Buckler to step forth their redoubted Knight, but Bouillon vowed fhe was able to encounter so puny a Paynim heríelf, and you may therefore prepare to meet her Lance. LETTER [70] I LETTER XVII. ST. EVREMOND to WALLER. SEND you the inclosed without the least Com paffion for you: You have deserved a more fevere Chastisement, and you will be too much honoured in falling by so distinguished a Hand. Advenit qui veftra dies muliebribus armis Patrum Manibus boc referes, telo cecidiffe CAMILLA! Madam DE BOUILLON to Mr. WALLER. I HAVE the Pleasure of being obliged to Mr. Waller for a more agreeable Opinion both of myfelf and of my whole Sex, than I have ever before dared to entertain. St. Euremond, either to gratify his own Spleen, or to excite mine, fhewed me a Letter, which, but for certain Circumftances, I could never have believed to be written by the gallant Mr. W The unmer ciful Cenfures in that invidious Letter, thrown indifcriminately indifcriminately on the whole Female World, awakened, I must confefs, my keenest Resentment. What! faid I, are we then fuch weak, fuch infignificant Creatures, born for no Purpofe but the lowest of all Purposes? The Disdain I this Moment feel at my Soul, tells me that the Charge is not lefs groundless than malicious. For no nobler Purpose than But you shall find, Waller, that I can be cool; and that a Woman has Fortitude enough to repel an injurious Attack with Calmness. If Nature intended us for nothing more than the Prefervation of her favourite Boys, why did she give us any other Powers than fuch as were neceffary merely for that End? But you will fay, she has not given us any other - You difpute with us even the Privilege of Reason-O Blindness of Prejudice! Vain and arrogant Partiality! What is Reafon but the Power of diftinguishing Right from Wrong, the Capacity of drawing juft Conclufions from known Principles? And will you dare to deny that we have this Power? Let the noble Inftances of Rectitude, Virtue, and Intrepidity; let the fhining Powers of Mind, the Fire of Genius, the Delicacy of Tafte, the Vivacity of Penetration, and the Clearness of Understanding, that have dif tinguished Numbers of illuftrious Women, make you you think of your Cenfure with filent Blushes! Shall I mention the feveral Characters which at once occur to my Memory? No, Sir! I will not pay fo ill a Compliment to yours. But if, after all, you should have Charity enough to allow us this fame Faculty of Reason, it must not be without Limitations Limitations almoft as difgraceful as the total Exclufion of it!" The Reafon of a Woman is a flexible Principle, whofe Office is never to direct her "Inclinations, but to defend them when pur"fued." I wish, with all my Heart, Waller, that this were lefs the Condition of Human Reafon in general; but that it is more particularly fo with the Female World, I believe no candid Obferver of Characters will allow. Are many of us remarkable for Abfurdities, for Levities, Inconfiftencies, and infignificant Purfuits? Let it be fuppofed But have not you, too, your Wrong-heads, your infipid Triflers, your fickle and frivolous Characters? Though a Woman fhould make use of her Reafon to defend her Follies, is me therefore more despicable, or more ridiculous than he whose Condu&t is equally exceptionable, but who has not Modesty or Ingenuity fufficient to apologife for it? Are we destitute of Virtue? You will not dare to fay it And are you not Philofopher enough to know, know, that Virtue is the Effect of Reafon? If Virtue be the Effect of Reafon, and if Women are not deftitute of Virtue, neither can they be deftitute of Reafon; of Reafon in its utmoft Perfe&ion; for it is that alone which is productive of Virtue? But we are vain and variable!" Thanks to that unbounded Adulation of yours, and that fickle Difpofition to which we owe both these Qualities! It is to your Diffimulation, or your Servility, or both, that we are indebted for the greatest Part of our Vanity: and you know too well your Paffion for Variety, to be ignorant of the Motives why we are given to Change. It is this Neceffity we find of assuming different Appearances, and of varying our Conduct in Compliance with your Tafte, that has furnished you with your curioufly careless Observation, that" our Sentiments are lightly taken up, and fuperficially impreft." We can think, Sir, with as much Depth, as much Firmness and Solidity, as any MASCULINE MIND-But what a fuperficial Observer must you be, who could not at once fee into the Reasons you give us for this Variety of Sentiment, as well as of Condu&t? Be ingenuous, Waller! be frank, and conftant ; D |