_The Muzzles._
While the Bramins were making Brama speak, airing their Pagoda's by
processions, and exhorting the people to repentance; others were
thinking how to reap benefit by the prattle of Toys.
Great cities swarm with persons, whom misery renders industrious.--They
neither rob nor pick pockets: but they are to pick-pockets, what
pick-pockets are to gamblers. They know every thing, they do every
thing. They go up and down, they insinuate themselves. They are found
at court, in the city, at Westminster hall, at church, at the play, at
ladies toilets, in coffee-houses, at balls, opera's and in academies.
They are any thing that you would have them be. Do you sollicit a
pension, they have the minister's ear. Have you a law-suit, they will
sollicite for you. Do you love gaming, they will make a party with you;
good chear, they keep a good kitchen; women, they will introduce you
to Amina or Acaris. From which of the two would you please to purchase
the distemper? Take your choice, they will undertake your cure. Their
chief occupation is to find the ridicules of private persons, and to
make advantage of the follies of the public. From them it is, that
papers are distributed in the streets, at the gates of temples, at the
play-house doors, and other public places, by which you are advertised
gratis, that such an one living at the Louvre, St. John's, the temple,
or the abby, at such a sign, dupes mankind at home from nine in the
morning to noon, and abroad the rest of the day.
Scarce had the Toys began to speak, when one of these sharpers
fill'd the houses of Banza with a printed bill of this form and
tenor.----Advertisement to the ladies. And underneath in small
Italic, by permission of my lord the great Seneschal, and with the
approbation of the gentlemen of the royal academy of sciences. And
lower down: The Sieur Eolipila of the royal academy of Banza, Member
of the royal society of Monoémugi, of the imperial academy of Biafara,
of the academy of the curious of Loango, of the society of Camur in
Monomotapa, of the institute of Ereeco, and of the royal academies
of Beleguanza and Angola; who has for many years given courses of
baubles, with the applause of the court, the town, and the province;
has, in favour of the fair sex, invented muzzles or portable gags,
which deprive Toys of the use of speech, without obstructing their
natural functions. They are neat and convenient. He has some of all
sizes, of all prices, and for all ages: and he has had the honour to
serve persons of the highest distinction with them.
There is nothing like being a member of a body of men. Be a work ever
so ridiculous, it is puff'd into success. Thus it was, that Eolipila's
invention gain'd ground. People flock'd to his house. The gay ladies
went thither in their own equipages, prudent women in hackney-coaches;
the devouts sent their confessors or footmen, and nuns their
door-keepers. Every body must have a muzzle, so that not one from the
dutchess down to the cobler's Joan, but had one either for the fashion
or for reasons.
The Bramins, who had declared the prattle of Toys to be a divine
punishment, and flatter'd themselves with a reformation of manners and
other advantages from it, could not without horror see a machine, which
eluded the vengeance of heaven and their hopes. Scarcely had they come
down from their pulpits, but they mount again, thunder, roar, make the
oracles to speak, and pronounce that a muzzle is an infernal machine,
and that there is no salvation for those who shall use them. "Carnal
women, quit your muzzles; submit," cried they, "to the will of Brama.
Permit the voice of your Toys to awaken that of your consciences, and
blush not to acknowledge crimes, which you have not been ashamed to
commit."
But their exclamations were of little avail: the same fate attended
muzzles, that had formerly attended the gowns without sleeves. The
preachers were left to catch cold in the temples. All the women took
gags, and quitted them not, either till they found them useless, or
were tired of them.