[M]ethinks, it is enough to mortify the Proudest of us all, to remember, that, altho’ we may adorn our outward Parts with fine Cloaths, and sweeten them with costly Essences, yet our Insides are no better than common Bogs, and are composed of Materials too foul to name. […] This is a true State of the human Body; and, I fear, that upon Examination, our Minds will appear but little better; and, that the Emanations of one do not surpass in Cleanliness the Voidings of the other. If we survey the learned World, as it is called, what do its modern Productions consist in, but the Excrements of Wit, and Sham-Patriotism, Bawdy, Blasphemy, and Disputes among Players. What is thy Shop, O Jacob! but a Bog-House, fill’d with nothing but Bum-Fodder. […] Bending my Eye downwards, into this subterraneous Cavity, I said to myself, Does Man live for this? Do all his Pursuits tend only to encrease these Stenches, and swell this noisome Profundity? Alas, for nothing else! The Toils and Ambition of the Great, as well as the Labours and Fatigues of the Vulgar, are subservient to this End. For what do we live, but to eat and drink, and exonerate ourselves in these voracious Abysses? The Body of Man is but a Thorough-fare to the common Receptacles of all Things. What an infinite Variety of Creatures is here blended together? Methinks I see, and, Oh! that I could not say, I smell ten Thousand various Dishes, toss’d up together, and jumbled into a second Chaos of Matter.
Serious and Cleanly Meditations upon an House-of-Office. Humbly inscribed to the Gold-finders of Great-Britain. By Jeffrey Broadbottom, Esq. [1744]
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