REV. DR. FOLLIOTT. To be sure, sir, in these instances, and in
many others, the term brother must be taken in its utmost latitude
of interpretation: we are all brothers, nevertheless. But to
return to the point. Now these two large figures, one with drapery
on the lower half of the body, and the other with no drapery at
all; upon my word, sir, it matters not what godfathers and
godmothers may have promised and vowed for the children of this
world, touching the devil and other things to be renounced, if such
figures as those are to be put before their eyes.

MR. CROTCHET. Sir, the naked figure is the Pandemian Venus, and
the half-draped figure is the Uranian Venus; and I say, sir, that
figure realises the finest imaginings of Plato, and is the
personification of the most refined and exalted feeling of which
the human mind is susceptible; the love of pure, ideal,
intellectual beauty.

REV. DR. FOLLIOTT. I am aware, sir, that Plato, in his Symposium,
discourseth very eloquently touching the Uranian and Pandemian
Venus: but you must remember that, in our universities, Plato is
held to be little better than a misleader of youth; and they have
shown their contempt for him, not only by never reading him (a mode
of contempt in which they deal very largely), but even by never
printing a complete edition of him; although they have printed many
ancient books, which nobody suspects to have been ever read on the
spot, except by a person attached to the press, who is, therefore,
emphatically called "the reader."

MR. CROTCHET. Well, sir?