like unripe Fruit; and certainly if a Woman is strong enough to bring forth a Child, she is beyond all Doubt strong enough to nurse it afterwards.  It grieves me to observe and consider how many poor Children are daily ruin’d by careless Nurses; and yet how tender ought they to be of a poor Infant, since the least Hurt or Blow, especially upon the Head, may make it senseless, stupid, or otherwise miserable for ever?

But I cannot well leave this Subject as yet; for it seems to me very unnatural, that a Woman that has fed a Child as Part of her self for nine Months, should have no Desire to nurse it farther, when brought to Light and before her Eyes, and when by its Cry it implores her Assistance and the Office of a Mother.  Do not the very cruellest of Brutes tend their young ones with all the Care and Delight imaginable?  For how can she be call’d a Mother that will not nurse her young ones?  The Earth is called the Mother of all Things, not because she produces, but because she maintains and nurses what she produces.  The Generation of the Infant is the Effect of Desire, but the Care of it argues Virtue and Choice.  I am not ignorant but that there are some Cases of Necessity where a Mother cannot give Suck, and then out of two Evils the least must be chosen; but there are so very few, that I am sure in a Thousand there is hardly one real Instance; for if a Woman does but know that her Husband can spare about three or six Shillings a Week extraordinary, (altho this is but seldom considered) she certainly, with the Assistance of her Gossips, will soon perswade the good Man to send the Child to Nurse, and easily impose upon him by pretending In-disposition.  This Cruelty is supported by Fashion, and Nature gives Place to Custom. SIR, Your humble Servant.

T.

[Footnote 1:  [nursing of], and in first reprint.]

[Footnote 2:  [seeing], and in 1st r.]

[Footnote 3:  [is, why], and in 1st. r.]

[Footnote 4:  Mother,]

* * * * *

No. 247.  Thursday, December 13, 1711.  Addison.

  [Greek:—­Ton d akamatos rheei audae Ek stomaton haedeia—­Hes.]

We are told by some antient Authors, that Socrates was instructed in Eloquence by a Woman, whose Name, if I am not mistaken, was Aspasia.  I have indeed very often looked upon that Art as the most proper for the Female Sex, and I think the Universities would do well to consider whether they should not fill the Rhetorick Chairs with She Professors.

It has been said in the Praise of some Men, that they could Talk whole Hours together upon any Thing; but it must be owned to the Honour of the other Sex, that there are many among them who can Talk whole Hours together upon Nothing.  I have known a Woman branch out into a long Extempore Dissertation upon the Edging of a Petticoat, and chide her Servant for breaking a China Cup, in all the Figures of Rhetorick.