"SIR,[1]

"It must be allowed, that Esquire Bickerstaff is of all authors the most
ingenuous. There are few, very few, that will own themselves in a
mistake, though all the World sees them to be in downright nonsense.
You'll be pleased, Sir, to pardon this expression, for the same reason
for which you once desired us to excuse you when you seemed anything
dull. Most writers, like the generality of Paul Lorrain's[2] saints, seem
to place a peculiar vanity in dying hard. But you, Sir, to show a good
example to your brethren, have not only confessed, but of your own accord
mended the indictment. Nay, you have been so good-natured as to discover
beauties in it, which, I will assure you, he that drew it never dreamed
of: And to make your civility the more accomplished, you have honoured
him with the title of your kinsman,[3] which, though derived by the left
hand, he is not a little proud of. My brother (for such Obadiah is) being
at present very busy about nothing, has ordered me to return you his
sincere thanks for all these favours; and, as a small token of his
gratitude, to communicate to you the following piece of intelligence,
which, he thinks, belongs more properly to you than to any others of our
modern historians.

"_Madonella_, who as it was thought had long since taken her flight
towards the ethereal mansions, still walks, it seems, in the regions of
mortality; where she has found, by deep reflections on the revolution[4]
mentioned in yours of June the 23rd, that where early instructions have
been wanting to imprint true ideas of things on the tender souls of those
of her sex, they are never after able to arrive at such a pitch of
perfection, as to be above the laws of matter and motion; laws which are
considerably enforced by the principles usually imbibed in nurseries and
boarding-schools. To remedy this evil, she has laid the scheme of a