_Sancho_ replies, _Indeed I have her License for it_. _Carlos_ is somewhat angry at this Gingle, and cries, _what quibling too in your Prosperity_? Adversity it seems is the only time for _punning_. Truly I think so too. For 'tis a sign a Man is much Distress'd when he flies to such an Expedient. However, _Carlos_ needed not to have been so touchy: For He can stoop as low himself upon occasion. We must know then that _Sancho_ had made Himself a Hunch'd Back, to counterfeit the _Conde Alonzo_. The two Colonels being in the same Disguise, were just upon the edg of a Quarrel. After some Preliminaries in Railing, _Sancho_ cries, _Don't provoke me; I am mischeivously bent_.
Carlos replies, _Nay, you are_ Bent _enough in Conscience, but I have a_ Bent Fist _for Boxing_. Here you have a brace of Quibbles started in a Line and a half. And which is worst of all, they come from _Carlos_, from a _Character_ of Sense; And therefore the poet, not the _Soldier_, must answer for them.
I shall now give the _Reader_ a few Instances of the Courtship of the _Stage_, and how decently they treat the Women, and _Quality_ of both _Sexes_. The _Women_ who are secured from Affronts by Custom, and have a Privilege for Respect, are sometimes but roughly saluted by these Men of Address. And to bar the Defence, this Coarseness does not alwaies come from Clowns, and Women-haters; but from _Persons_ of Figure, neither singular, nor ill Bred. And which is still worse, The Satir falls on blindly without Distinction, and strikes at the whole _Sex_.
Enter _Raymond_ a Noble-man in the _Spanish Fryar_.[336]
_O Vertue! Vertue! What art thou become? That men should leave thee for that Toy a woman, Made from the dross and refuse of a Man; Heaven took him sleeping when he made her too, Had Man been waking he had nee'r consented._
I did not know before that a Man's Dross lay in his _Ribs_; I believe sometimes it lies Higher. But the Philosophy, the Religion, and the Ceremony of these Lines, are too tender to be touched. _Creon_ a Prince in _Oedipus_,[337] railes in General at the _Sex_, and at the same time is violently in Love with _Euridice_. This upon the Matter, is just as natural, as 'tis Civil. If any one would understand what the _Curse of all tender hearted Women is, Belmour_ will inform him. What is it then? 'Tis the _Pox_.[338] If this be true, the Women had need lay in a stock of ill Nature betimes. It seems 'tis their only preservative. It guards their Virtue, and their Health, and is all they have to trust to. _Sharper_ another Man of Sense in this _Play_, talks much at the same rate. _Belinda_ would know of him _where he got that excellent Talent of Railing_?