sneaking Fear or Tenderness; It being a sort of partaking in the Guilt
to keep any Terms with Vices.

It is from hence that _Juvenal_, as a _Satirist_, is greatly superior
to _Horace_; But indeed many of the short Compositions of _Horace_,
which are indiscriminately ranged together, under the general Name
of _Satires_, are not properly such, but Pieces of _Raillery_ or
_Ridicule_.

As _Raillery_, in order to be decent, can only be exercised upon
_slight_ Misfortunes and Foibles, attended with no deep Mischief, nor
with any Reproach upon real Merit, so it ought only to be used between
_Equals_ and _Intimates_; It being evidently a Liberty too great to
be taken by an _Inferior_; and too inequitable to be taken by a
_Superior_, as his Rank shields him from any Return.

_Raillery_ is the most agreeable, when it is founded on a _slight_
Embarrassment or Foible, which upon being unfolded, appears to have
arisen from the _real Merit_, or from the _Excess_ of any _Virtue_,
in the Person attack'd.

But yet this Embarrassment must always be _real_, and attended with
the Chagrin or Confusion of the _rally'd_ Person, or capable of being
fairly suppos'd to have been so; otherwise the Attack will be void of
all Poignancy, and Pleasure to the Company; And evaporate either into
_indirect Flattery_, or else into the _Insipid_.

Thus, to attack a _fine Lady_ upon the Enemies she has made, by the
mischievous Effects of her Beauty, will be properly genteel indirect
_Flattery_--if it be well conducted,--otherwise, the _Insipid_; But