Part 1 — The Answer of a young Vestal to the Queen.
Reading edition
GOOD Heavens! Madam, how piously did your majesty begin your letter! and what pleasure did I take to see such hopeful dispositions to virtue! But what was that enchanting vice that put you out of the good road? Was it the Devil? If so, why did you not make use of holy-water? For we, poor creatures, oppose no other buckler against the darts of Satan, when he conjures up the frailty of the flesh to disturb us: but I beg your pardon, you were then a Lutheran, and holy-water has no efficacy, but only for true Catholicks. My confessor has so often preached charity to me, that I cannot but bewail the fate of the poor gentleman you lov’d so dearly, and treated so barbarously. Oh, my dear St. Francis! What sort of love was that! And how unfortunate are those precious souls that have parts of pleasing you! One may very well perceive, by that piece of barbarity, you neither believed Purgatory, or fear’d Hell; and I would not have been guilty of such an action for all your excellent qualities and grandeur. I hear you talk’d of sometimes, and in such a manner, that it makes me often sigh, pant, and pull down my veil; and I feel a terrible fit coming upon me by reading your confession.
Madam, I much rejoice to hear, You’ll take a stone up in your ear; For I’m a frail transgressor too, And I we the sport as well as you, But then I chuse to do the work. Within the pale of holy kirk: For absolution cures the scars } Contracted in venereal wars, } And saves our sex a world of prayers. } Had you this ghostly counsel taken, You might till now have sav’d your bacon. ’Tis safe intriguing with a flamen } Who sanctifies their work with Amen, } Then who would trust ungodly laymen?} Do, Madam, as you please, but I } None but with priesthood will employ, } With them I’ll live, with them I’ll die. } Who like the Pelion spear are sure, With the same ease they wound to cure.
But ’tis easy to judge your conscience is as large as the sleeve of a [42] Cordelier, since you began in the spirit, and ended in the flesh. Notwithstanding what I have merrily own’d in rhime, more to entertain your majesty, than express my true sentiments, there are certain hours when I could willingly follow your example; and if you would obtain from the holy father a dispensation of my vows, which now grow burthensome to me, I would break a lance in your quarrel: this I am sure of, that the world will think it less strange to see a nun renounce her convent, than a queen her crown.