Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 5.djvu/135

Rh me, I would be glad by Gd to see any of your scholars with his nouns, and his verbs, and his philosophy, and trigonometry, what a figure he would make at a siege, or blockade, or rencountering Dn me," &c. After which he proceeded with a volley of military terms, less significant, sounding worse, and harder to be understood, than any that were ever coined by the commentators upon Aristotle. I would not here be thought to charge the soldiery with ignorance and contempt of learning, without allowing exceptions, of which I have known many; but however the worst example, especially in a great majority, will certainly prevail.

I have heard, that the late earl of Oxford, in the time of his ministry, never passed by White's chocolatehouse (the common rendezvous of infamous sharpers and noble cullies) without bestowing a curse upon that famous academy, as the bane of half the English nobility. I have likewise been told another passage concerning that great minister, which, because it gave a humorous idea of one principal ingredient in modern education, take as follows. Le Sack, the famous French dancingmaster, in great admiration, asked a friend, whether it were true, that Mr. Harley was made an earl and lord treasurer? and finding it confirmed, said, "well; I wonder what the devil the queen could see in him; for I attended him two years, and he was the greatest dunce that ever I taught ." Another