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original Beauties, the native Attendants upon Youth and a good Constitution, made to droop and flag, while Paleness and Leanness come into the Face, Heaviness into the Heart, and Dulness into the Head? How is the shining sparkling of the Eye eclipsed, the Understanding lost, the Memory decay'd, and the Genius partaking of the Contagion, entirely altered?
The Glory of a young Man is his Strength, says Solomon, Prov. xx. 29. and one of his first Advices after that Expression, is, give not thy Strength unto Women, it is true, Solomon there means to a strange Woman, that is to say, a Whore. But with some abatement for the Person only, and for the Circumstances spoken to here, the Thing is (otherwise) the same, and the Excesses are in their Degree, tho' perhaps not every way as fatal.
It was a late learned Physician who said, that the Women wearing Hoops would make the next Age all Cripples; that drinking Tea would make them Rheumatick; that taking Snuff would make them Lunatick: To which it was said, by way of Repartee, the Doctor being a little of a Libertine, that the Levity of the present Times will make the next Age Atheists; the Cavilling at Scripture, (which is now the grand Mode) make them Hereticks; and the talking Nonsense make them all Fools: And now, I think, I may with equal Propriety add, that the Vice of this Age will make the next Age rotten.
Crime has an unhappy propagating Quality; 'tis always in progression. If one Age talks Heresy, the next Age talks Blasphemy: If one Age talks Faction, the next Age talksTreason;
