Passy, May 23. 1785.
I sent you a few Lines the other Day, with the Medallion, when I
should have written more but was prevented by the coming in of a
Bavard, who worried me till Evening. I bore with him, and now you
are to bear with me: For I shall probably bavarder in answering
your Letter.
I am not acquainted with the Saying of Alphonsus which you
allude to, as a Sanctification of your Rigidity in refusing to
allow me the Plea of Old Age as an Excuse for my Want of
Exactitude in Correspondence. What was that Saying? You do not it
seems, feel any occasion for such an Excuse, tho’ you are, as you
say, rising 75. But I am rising (perhaps more properly falling)
80. and I leave the Excuse with you till you arrive at that Age;
perhaps you may then be more sensible of its Validity, and see fit
to use it for your self.
I must agree with you that the Gout is bad, and that the Stone
is worse. I am happy in not having them both together: and I join
in your Prayer that you may live till you die without either. But
I doubt the Author of the Epitaph you send me was a little
mistaken, when he speaking of the World, he says that
It is so natural to wish to be well spoken of, whether alive or
dead, that I imagine he could not be quite exempt from that
Desire, and that at least he wish’d to be thought a Wit, or he
would not have given himself the Trouble of writing so good an
Epitaph to leave behind him. Was it not as worthy of his Care that
the World should say he was an honest and a good man? I like
better the concluding Sentiment in the old Song call’d the Old
Man’s Wish, wherein after wishing for a warm House in a Country
Town, an easy Horse,? some good old Authors, ingenious and
chearful Companions, a Pudding on Sundays with stout Ale and a
Bottle of Burgundy, &c. &c. in separate Stanzas, each ending
with this Burthen
But what signifys our Wishing. Things happen after all as they
will happen. I have sung that wishing Song a thousand times when I
was young, and now find at Fourscore that the three Contraries
have befallen me; being subject to the Gout, and the Stone, and
not being yet Master of all my Passions. Like the proud Girl in my
Country, who wish’d and resolv’d not to marry a Parson, nor a
Presbyterian, nor an Irishman, and at length found herself married
to an Irish Presbyterian Parson. You see I have some reason to
wish that in a future State I may not only be as well as I was,
but a little better. And I hope it: For I too, with your Poet,
trust in God. And when I observe that there is great Frugality as
well as Wisdom in his Works, since he has been evidently sparing
both of Labour and Materials; for by the various wonderful
Inventions of Propagation he has provided for the continual
peopling his World with Plants and Animals without being at the
Trouble of repeated new Creations; and by the natural Reduction of
compound Substances to their original Elements, capable of being
employ’d in new Compositions, he has presented the Necessity of
creating new Matter; for that the Earth, Water, Air and perhaps
fire which, being compounded, from Wood, do when the Wood is
dissolved return and again become Air, Earth, Fire and Water: I
say that when I see nothing annihilated, and not even a Drop of
Water wasted, I cannot suspect the Annihilation of Souls, or
believe that he will suffer the daily Waste of Millions of Minds
ready made that now exist, and put himself to the continual
Trouble of making new ones. Thus finding myself to in the World, I
believe I shall in some Shape or other always exist: And with all
the Inconveniences human Life is liable to, I shall not object to
a new edition of mine; hoping however that the Errata of the last
may be corrected.
I return your Note of Children receiv’d in the Foundling
Hospital at Paris from 1741 to 1755 inclusive, and I have added
the Years preceding as far back as 1710, together with the general
Christnings of the City, and the Years succeeding down to 1770.
Those since that Period I have not been able to obtain. I have
noted in the Margin the gradual Increase, viz. from every tenth
Child so thrown upon the Publick till it comes to every third.
Fifteen Years have pass’d since the last Account, and probably it
may now amount to one half. Is it right to encourage this
monstrous Deficiency of natural Affection? A Surgeon I met with
here, excus’d the Women of Paris, by Saying seriously that they
could not give Suck, Car, dit il, ils n’ont point des Tetons. He
assur’d me it was a Fact, and had me look at them, and observe how
flat they were in the Breast; they have nothing more there, says
he, that I have upon the Back of my Hand. I have since thought
that there might be some Truth in his Observation, and that
possibly Nature finding they made no use of Bubbies, has left off
giving them any. Yet since Rousseau, with admirable Eloquence
pleaded for the Rights of Children to their Mother’s Milk, the
Mode has chang’d a little, and some Ladies of Quality now suckle
their Infants and find Milk enough. May the Mode descend to the
lower Ranks, till it becomes no longer the Custom to pack their
Infants away, as soon as born, to the Enfans-trouvés, with the
careless Observation that the King is better able to maintain
them. I am credibly inform’d that nine tenths of them die there
pretty soon; which is said to be a great Relief to the
Institution, whose Funds would not otherwise be sufficient to
bring up the Remainder: Except the few Persons of Quality
abovementioned, and the Multitude who send to the Hospital, the
Practice is to hire Nurses in the Country to carry out the
Children and take care of them there. Here is an Office for
examining the Health of Nurses, and giving them Licenses. They
come to Town on certain days of the Week in Companies to receive
the Children, and we often meet Trains of them on the Road
returning to the neighbouring Villages with each a Child in Arms.
But those who are good enough to try this way of raising their
Children, are often not able to pay the Expense; so that the
Prisons of Paris are crowded with wretched Fathers and Mothers
confined pour mois de Nourice; tho’ it is laudably a favorite
Charity to pay for them and set such Prisoners at Liberty. I wish
Success to the new Project of assisting the Poor to keep their
Children at home; because I think there is no Nurse like a Mother
(or not many) and that if Parents did not immediately send their
Infants out of their Sight, they would in a few Days begin to love
them, and thence be spurr’d to greater Industry for their
Maintenance. This is a Subject you understand better than I, and
therefore having perhaps said too much, I drop it. I only add to
the Notes a Remark from the History of the Academy of Sciences,
much in favour of the Foundling Institution.
The Philadelphia Bank goes on, as I hear, very well. What you
call the Cincinnati Institution is no Institution of our
Government, but a private Convention among the Officers of our
late Army, and so universally dislik’d by the People that it is
suppos’d it will be dropt. It was consider’d as an Attempt to
establish something like an hereditary Rank or Nobility. I hold
with you that it was wrong; may I add that all descending Honours
are wrong and absurd; that the Honour of virtuous Actions
appertains only to him that performs them, and is in its nature
incommunicable. If it were communicable by Descent, it must also
be divisible among the Descendants, and the more ancient the
Family, the less would be found existing in any one Branch of it;
to say nothing of the greater Chance of unlucky Interruptions.
Our Constitution seems not to be well understood with you. If
the Congress were a permanent Body, there would be more Reason in
being jealous of giving it Powers. But its Members are chosen
annually, cannot be chosen more than three Years successively,
nor-more than three Years in seven, and any of them may be
recall’d at any time, whence their Constituents shall be
dissatisfied with their Conduct. They are of the People and return
again to mix with the People, having no more durable pre-eminence
than the different Grains of Sand in an Hourglass. Such an
Assembly cannot easily become dangerous to Liberty. They are the
Servants of the People, sent together to do the People’s Business
and promote the public Welfare; their Powers must be sufficient,
or their Duties cannot be performed. They have no profitable
Appointments, but a mere Payment of daily Wages, such as are
scarcely equivalent to their Expences, so that having no Chance
for great Places and enormous Salaries or Pensions as in some
Countries, there is no bruiging or bribing for Elections. I wish
old England were as happy in its Government, but I do not see it.
Your People however think their Constitution the best in the
World, and affect to despise ours. It is comfortable to have a
good Opinion of one’s self and of every thing that belongs to us,
to think one’s own Religion, King and Wife the best of all
possible Wives Kings and Religions. I remember three Greenlanders,
who had travell’d two Years in Europe, under the Care of some
Moravian Missionaries, and had visited Germany, Denmark, Holland
and England, when I ask’d them at Philadelphia, (where they were
in their Way home) whether now they had seen how much more
commodiously the white People lived by the help of the Arts, they
would not chuse to remain among us, their Answer was that they
were pleas’d with having had an Opportunity of Seeing so many fine
Things, but they chose to live in their own Country, Which Country
by the way consisted of Rock only; for the Moravians were obliged
to carry Earth in their Ship from New York for the pupose of
making there a Cabbage Garden.
By Mr. Dolland’s Saying that my double Spectacles can only serve
particular Eyes, I doubt he has not been rightly inform’d of their
Construction. I imagine it will be found pretty generally true,
that the same Convexity of Glass through which a Man sees clearest
and best at the Distance proper for Reading, is not the best for
greater Distances. I therefore had formerly two Pair of
Spectacles, which I shifted occasionally, as in travelling I
sometimes read and often wanted to regard the Prospects. Finding
this Change troublesome and not always sufficiently ready, I had
the Glasses cut, and half of each kind associated in the same
Circle, thus By this means, as I wear my Spectacles constantly, I
have only to move my Eyes up or down as I want to see distincly
far or near, the proper glasses being always ready. This I find
more particularly convenient since my being in France, the Glasses
that serve me best at Table to see what I eat, not being the best
to see the Faces of those on the other Side of the Table who speak
to me; and when one’s Ears are not well accustomed to the Sounds
of a Language, a Sight of the Movements in the Features of him
that speaks helps to explain, so that I understand French better
by the help of my Spectacles.
My intended Translator of your Piece, the only one I know who
understands the Subject as well as the two Languages, which a
Translator ought to do or he cannot make so good a Translation, is
at present occupied in an Affair that prevents his undertaking it;
but that will soon be over. I thank you for the Notes. I should be
glad to have another of the printed Pamphlets.
We shall always be ready to take your Children if you Send them
to us. I only wonder that since London draws to itself and
consumes such Numbers of your Country-People, your Country should
not to supply their Places, want and willingly receive the
Children you have to dispose of. That Circumstance, together with
the Multitude who voluntarily part with their Freedom as Men, to
serve for a time as Lacqueys, or for Life as Soldiers in
consideration of small Wages, seems to me a Proof that your Island
is over-peopled. And yet it is afraid of Emigrations!
Adieu, my dear Friend, and believe me ever, Yours very
affectionately
Geo. Whatley, Esqr