Amorist

Is an Artificer, or Maker of Love, a sworn servant to all Ladies, like an Officer in a Corporation. Though no one in particular will own any Title to him, yet he never fails, upon all Occasions, to offer his services, and they as seldom to turn it back again untouched. He commits nothing with them, but himself to their good Graces ; and they recommend him back again to his own, where he finds so kind a Reception, that he wonders how he does fail of it every where else. His Passion is as easily set on Fire as a Fart, and as soon out again. He is charged an primed with Love Powder like a Gun, and the least sparkle of an Eye gives Fire to him, and off he goes, but seldom, or never, hits the Mark. He has common Places and Precedents of Repartees and Letters for all Occasions ; and falls as readily into his Method of making love, as a Parson does into his Form of Matrimony. He converses, as Angela are said to do, by Intuition, and expresses himself by sighs most significantly. He follows his Visits, as Men do their Business, and is very industrious in waiting on the Ladies, where his Affairs lie ; among which those of greatest Concernment are Questions and Commands, Purposes, and other such received Forms of With and Conversation ; in which he is so deeply studied, that in all Questions and Doubts that arise, he is appealed to, and very learnedly declares, which was the most true and primitive Way of proceeding in the purest Times. For these Virtues he never fails of his summons to all Balls, where he manages the Country-Dances with singular Judgment, and is frequently an Assistant at L’hombre; and these are all the Uses they make of his Parts, beside the sport they give themselves in laughing at him, which he takes for singular Favours, and interprets to his own Advantage, though it never goes further; for all his Employments being public, he is never admitted to any private services, and they despise him as not Woman’s Meat: For he applies to too many to be trusted by any one; as Bastards by having many Fathers, have none at all. He goes often mounted in a Coach as a Convoy, to guard the Ladies, to take the Dust in Hyde-Park; where by his prudent Management of the Glass Windows he secures them from Beggars, and returns fraught with China-Oranges and Ballads. Thus he is but a Gentleman-Usher General, and his Business is to carry one Lady’s services to another, and bring back the others in Exchange.