There is nothing like being a member of a body of men. Be a work ever so ridiculous, it is puff’d into success. Thus it was, that Eolipila’s invention gain’d ground. People flock’d to his house. The gay ladies went thither in their own equipages, prudent women in hackney-coaches; the devouts sent their confessors or footmen, and nuns their doorkeepers. Everybody must have a muzzle, so that not one from the dutchess down to the cobler’s Joan, but had one either for the fashion or for reasons.

The Bramins, who had declared the prattle of Toys to be a divine punishment, and flatter’d themselves with a reformation of manners and other advantages from it, could not without horror see a machine, which eluded the vengeance of heaven and their hopes. Scarcely had they come down from their pulpits, but they mount again, thunder, roar, make the oracles to speak, and pronounce that a muzzle is an infernal machine, and that there is no salvation for those who shall use them. “Carnal women, quit your muzzles; submit,” cried they, “to the will of Brama. Permit the voice of your Toys to awaken that of your consciences, and blush not to acknowledge crimes, which you have not been ashamed to commit.”