A Lecture On Heads | Page 9

me as an unmannerly satirist; we respect the taste and understanding, as much as we admire {33}the beauty and delicacy of the sex; but surely no woman of sense would suppose we meant to offend her, if we said she was the most improper person in the world to be made a captain of horse, or a member of parliament.
This is the head [takes the head] of a Female Moderator, or President of the Ladies' Debating Society: she can prove to a demonstration that man is an usurper of dignities and preferments, and that her sex has a just right to participation of both with him: she would have physicians in petticoats, and lawyers with high heads and French curls; then she would have young women of spirit to command our fleets and armies, and old ones to govern the state:--she pathetically laments that {34}women are considered as mere domestic animals, fit only for making puddings, pickling cucumbers, or registering cures for the measles and chincough. If this lady's wishes for reformation should ever be accomplished, we may expect to hear that an admiral is in the histerics, that a general has miscarried, and that a prime minister was brought to bed the moment she opened the budget.
This is the head [shews it] of a Male Moderator, and president of eloquence, at one of her schools in this metropolis. We have schools for fencing, schools for dancing, and schools at which we learn every thing but those things which we {35}ought to learn: but this is a school to teach a man to be an orator; it can convert a cobler into a Demosthenes; make him thunder over porter, and lighten over gin, and qualify him to speak on either side of the question in the house of commons, who has not so much as a single vote for a member of parliament.
Here political tobacconists smoke the measures of government in cut and dry arguments; here opposition taylors prove the nation has been cabbaged; here sadlers, turned statesmen, find a curb for the ministry; here the minority veteran players argue that the scene ought to be shifted; that the king's household wants a better manager; that there is no necessity for a wardrobe-keeper; that his majesty's company are a set of very bad actors; and he humbly moves that the king should discharge his prompter. Some time ago, the president of this society had a great constitutional point to decide; but not acquitting himself to the satisfaction of the ladies, this spirited female seized the chair of state, and with the crack of her fan opened the business of the evening; declaring, as women had wisely abolished the vulgar custom of domestic employment, she saw no reason why their knowledge should be confined to the dress of a {36}head or the flounce of a petticoat; that government, in peace and war, was as much their province as the other sex, nay more; with regard to peace, very little was to be expected where women did not rule with absolute sway; in respect to war, she insisted, at least, upon an equivalent, and quoted the examples of many heroines, from the days of Boadicea, who headed her own armies, down to Hannah Snell, who served in the ranks; she appealed to her auditors if, notwithstanding their plumes, that assembly had not as warlike an appearance as half the officers of the guards, and doubted not but they'd prove to have full as much courage, if ever put to their shifts. "In history and politics," continued she, "have not we a Macaulay? in books of entertainment, a Griffiths? and in dramatic works an author that, in the last new comedy of 'Which is the Man,' disputes the bays with the genius of Drury? Ladies, were it possible to find a man that would dispute the eloquence of our tongues, I am sure he must readily yield to the superior eloquence of our eyes." The gallery cried 'Bravo!' the assembly joined in general plaudit; and Miss Susannah Cross-stich was chosen nem. con. perpetual president.
{37}Before I put these heads on one side, I shall give a derivation of their title. Moderator is derived from mode, the fashion, and rate, a tax; and, in its compound sense, implies that Fashion advised these two to lay their heads together, in order to take advantage of the passion of the public for out-of-the-way opinions, and out-of-the-way undertakings. This head seems to be of that order that should inculcate the doctrine of charity, meekness, and benevolence: but, not finding his labours in the vineyard sufficiently rewarded, according to the value he sets upon himself, is now (like many of his functions) an apostate from grace to faction; and, with a political pamphlet in his hand, instead of a