THE BROMPTON PAPERS. 139 



disposed and paternal government. In one of these pieces, the author 

 attempts to awaken sympathy in his audience for the seduction of the 

 daughter of a brazier a mere dealer in skillets and stew-pans ; whilst 

 the seducer is not only a wealthy young man, but of excellent family. 

 I know not how a Russian audience would bear such appeals to their 

 vulgar passions ; but certainly, I would not advise the experiment of a 

 representation, unless the piece were very considerably modified. The 

 scene in which the brazier insults the magistrate if lowered in its tone^ 

 may be retained provided that the offender suffer the infliction of the 

 knout for his abuse. This will shew the audience the necessity of 

 respect towards the officers of government. The flogging scene might 

 conclude the comedy, which would then bear a moral at its end. Mary 

 Thornberry I would sell for a slave; and, to get rid of Frank Rochdale, 

 I would appoint him to a Tartar goverment. The many oaths abound- 

 ing in the pieces, are of a most horrifying character. Did the man ever 

 go to church, .who could perpetrate such immorality? He mentions 

 " heaven" twenty times; and once horrible to relate! he calls a 

 kitchen-wench " an angel in a mob-cap!" When we consider what an 

 angel is, the comparison is awfully criminal. I am aware that different 

 persons have different notions of the forms and essences of angels. 

 There is, I regret to say, much vulgar error abroad on this point. I 

 have long and deeply considered what an angel is,* its nature and dimen- 

 sions ; and I subjoin the result of my painful cogitations. 



I do not conceive an angel to be spherical, like an orange an opinion 

 held by some theologists neither do I think angels angular, as contended 

 for by divers geometricians. That they are of one sex, is, I am con- 

 vinced, most certain. Brahma, Vishna, and Siva, were, however the 

 pundits may sophisticate the matter, females. So is Mali, the Persian 

 angel of the moon. As for the angels of the Hebrews, who took mortal 

 wives, and had families, there must I think be some error in the text. 

 For the make of angels, St. Augustin (a respectable authority) declares 

 them to be slender, probably like a chamberlain's rod. The Jews (I 

 have been studying the Hebrew of late) call angels " flames," "sparks," 

 " images." As I said, I have an opinion of my own. 



An angel, I conceive to be a being altogether cleansed from the stains 

 of sinful unofficial life. If you know a man who, from early youth to 

 the middle prime, has written every kind of vulgar grossness who 

 has left dashes in his prurient verse, to be filled up by the dirtiest ima- 

 gination who has become " fat-witted with drinking of old sack, and 

 unbuttoning after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon" one 

 whose fe hours were cups of sack ; and minutes, capons ; and clocks the 

 tongues of bawds" one who made broad jests for royal lengthy ears, 

 and afterwards was rewarded with a pension for birching the loose mo- 

 rals of his neighbours who, sweetening the corruptions of the dirty 

 humourist in the preservative odour of the conventicle, took under his 

 especial patronage all the hierarchy of heaven, the interests of kings, 

 the souls of the old and juvenile, together with the purity of his mother- 

 tongue if you know such a miracle as this, be sure that is, according 

 to my best belief you know an angel ! 



It is curious that the same notions of the angelic nature are entertained by the 

 licenser as appears by his evidence before the dramatic committee. 



