You are as yet upright; but you are
a banker,--at least, the next thing to it. I feel the delicacy of the
subject; but cash must pass through your hands, sometimes to a great
amount. If in an unguarded hour--But I will hope better. Consider the
scandal it will bring upon those of your persuasion. Thousands would go
to see a Quaker hanged, that would be indifferent to the fate of a
Presbyterian or an Anabaptist. Think of the effect it would have on the
sale of your poems alone, not to mention higher considerations! I
tremble, I am sure, at myself, when I think that so many poor victims of
the law, at one time of their life, made as sure of never being hanged
as I, in my presumption, am too ready to do myself. What are we better
than they? Do we come into the world with different necks? Is there any
distinctive mark under our left ears? Are we unstrangulable, I ask you?
Think of these things. I am shocked sometimes at the shape of my own
fingers, not for their resemblance to the ape tribe (which is
something), but for the exquisite adaptation of them to the purposes of
picking fingering, etc. No one that is so framed, I maintain it, but
should tremble.
C. L.
[1] Taylor and Hessey succeeded John Scott as editors of the "London
Magazine" (of which they were also publishers), and it was to this
periodical that most of Lamb's Elia Essays were contributed.
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