[The Monikins by J. Fenimore Cooper]@TWC D-Link bookThe Monikins CHAPTER XI 1/18
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A PHILOSOPHY THAT IS BOTTOMED ON SOMETHING SUBSTANTIAL--SOME. REASONS PLAINLY PRESENTED, AND CAVILLING OBJECTIONS PUT TO FLIGHT BY A CHARGE OF LOGICAL BAYONETS. Dr.Reasono was quite as reasonable, in the personal embellishments of his lyceum, as any public lecturer I remember to have seen, who was required to execute his functions in the presence of ladies.
If I say that his coat had been brushed, his tail newly curled, and that his air was a little more than usually "solemnized," as Captain Poke described it in a decent whisper, I believe all will be said that is either necessary or true.
He placed himself behind a foot-stool, which served as a table, smoothed its covering a little with his paws, and at once proceeded to business.
It may be well to add that he lectured without notes, and, as the subject did not immediately call for experiments, without any apparatus. Waving his tail towards the different parts of the room in which his audience were seated, the philosopher commenced. "As the present occasion, my hearers," he said, "is one of those accidental calls upon science, to which all belonging to the academies are liable, and does not demand more than the heads of our thesis to be explained, I shall not dig into the roots of the subject, but limit myself to such general remarks as may serve to furnish the outlines of our philosophy, natural, moral, and political--" "How, sir," I cried, "have you a political as well as a moral philosophy ?" "Beyond a question; and a very useful philosophy it is.
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