XVII. SAD TRANSPOSITION.

IT seemeth marvellous to me that many mechanics, (few able to read, and fewer to write their names,) turning soldiers and captains in our wars, should be so soon and so much improved. They seemed to me to have commenced per saltum in their understandings. I profess, without flouting or flattering, I have much admired with what facility and fluentness, how pertinently and properly, they have expressed themselves, in language which they were never born nor bred to, but have industriously acquired by conversing with their betters.

What a shame would it be, if such who have been of genteel extraction, and have had liberal education, should (as if it were by exchange of souls) relapse into ignorance and barbarism!

What an ignominy would it be for them to be buried in idleness, and in the immoderate pursuit of pleasures and vicious courses, till they besot their understandings, when they see soldiers arrived at such an improvement, who were bred tailors, shoemakers, cobblers, &c.

Not that I write this (God knoweth my heart) in disgrace of them, because they were bred in so mean callings, which are both honest in themselves and useful in the commonwealth; yea, I am so far from thinking ill of them for 257being bred in so poor trades, that I should think better of them for returning unto them again.