THE ART OF PUNNING.
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R. 26. The Rule of Mortification is when a man having got the thanks and laugh of a company for a good pun, an enemy to the art swears he read it in "Cambridge Jests." This is such an inversion of it, that I think I may be allowed to make examples of these kind of people in verse:
Thus puppies, that adore the dark,
Against bright Cynthia howl and bark;
Although the Regent of the Night,
Like us, is gay with borrow'd light.
R. 27. The Professionary Rule[1] is, to frame a story, and swear you were present at an event where
every
- ↑ An improvement on this Rule, which Dr. Swift has adopted in his "Full and true Account of Wood's Procession to the Gallows," attracted the following warm applause of the noble Author of the Remarks. "I have said so much in one of my former letters of the cause which gave rise to them [the Drapier's Letters], and of the effect which they had upon the nation, that I need say no more in this place, than to recommend them to your perusal, for the style and conduct of their manner: but, lest they may appear too grave to so young a man, and one who is so little interested in the present, and much less in the past affairs of Ireland, you will find a paper at the end of them that will excite your risibility, or I am mistaken. — The whole is a piece of ridicule too powerful for the strongest gravity to withstand." Orrery's Remarks, p. 126 — Yet what at last is this merry-making machine? Why the author describes the several artificers attending W. Wood (represented by a log of timber) to the gallows, and each of them expressing his resentment in the terms of his calling: the cook will baste him; the books-seller will turn over a new leaf with him; the tailor will sit on his skirts. His lordship then leads up the laugh, with Risum teneatis, amici? If he did not, we should want such a note as the prudent parson put to the pathetick part of his funeral sermon. Here pull out your handkerchief, and weep. Every apprentice, who has not sense enough to learn his art, is soon able
to
