At the same time that
one esteems the Virtue, one is tempted to laugh at the Simplicity which
accompanies it. When a Man is made up wholly of the Dove, without the
least Grain of the Serpent in his Composition, he becomes ridiculous in
many Circumstances of Life, and very often discredits his best Actions.
The _Cordeliers_ tell a Story of their Founder St. _Francis_, that as he
passed the Streets in the Dusk of the Evening, he discovered a young
Fellow with a Maid in a Corner; upon which the good Man, say they,
lifted up his Hands to Heaven with a secret Thanksgiving, that there was
still so much Christian Charity in the World. The Innocence of the Saint
made him mistake the Kiss of a Lover for a Salute of Charity. I am
heartily concerned when I see a virtuous Man without a competent
Knowledge of the World; and if there be any Use in these my Papers, it
is this, that without presenting Vice under any false alluring Notions,
they give my Reader an Insight into the Ways of Men, and represent human
Nature in all its changeable Colours. The Man who has not been engaged
in any of the Follies of the World, or, as _Shakespear_ expresses it,
_hackney'd in the Ways of Men_, may here find a Picture of its Follies
and Extravagancies.
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