The Second Dialogue Between _Horatio_ and _Cleomenes_.


Horatio. I Believe I am within my Time.

Cleo. By above Ten Minutes.

Hor. When I came back in the Chair, I was thinking how artfully, all
this Afternoon, you avoided saying any Thing of Honour, as it relates
to the Fair Sex. Their Honour, you know, consists in their Chastity,
which is a real Virtue in your own Sense, not to be practis'd without
palpable Self-denial. To make a Vow of perpetual Virginity, and to be
resolute enough, never to break it, is a Task not to be perform'd
without the utmost Mortification to Flesh and Blood, especially in
handsome clever Women that seem to be made for Love, as you and I have
seen a great many in the Nunneries in _Flanders_. Self-liking or Pride
have Nothing to do there; for the more powerfully that Passion
operates in either Men or Women, the less Inclination they'll shew to
be mew'd up in a Cloyster, where they can have None but their own Sex
to converse with.

Cleo. The Reason why I said Nothing of Honour as it relates to the
fair Sex, was because we had spoke of it already in a former
Conversation; by the same Token, that I told you then, that [5] _the
Word Honour, I mean, the Sence of it, was very whimsical, and the
Difference in the Signification so prodigious, according as the