Page:Lady Anne Granard 2.pdf/153

Rh dormitory in Welbeck Street; for in one case she only learnt how much she could endure, in the other she will find how much she can enjoy. Nothing improves the understanding like strong contrasts! But where can he be? He seems absolutely withdrawn, after all the pains I have taken, boring myself to death as I did with those serious women, who plagued me terribly with talking about things nobody that was anybody ever used to think of; but the world is in a horrid state, undoubtedly. I don't wonder at Lady Sarah Butterlip exposing it as she does, and making money of it, for in truth, 'the times are out of joint,' and deserve lashing. "Let me see! the Methodist-man who wrote against Shakespeare made a great deal of money, and had nothing to fear on the score of prosecutions for libel, which is a great matter. Could one write against Milton, I wonder, with effect? He was a low creature, a schoolmaster, a cross husband, a great rebel; but that wouldn't tell against him now. I can't undertake him to any purpose; for the party who were delighted to put down the player-man support him, I have understood. Time was, writing at all would have been deemed shocking; but it has really been done so much of late in one's own world, even by some who were born in it, that I see no objection, except the trouble; but the girls could do that. Five or six hundred pounds would surely be little enough for my name on a title-page, and if one could