Westmacott Charles Molloy - The Punster's Pocket-book стр 9.

R. 26. The Rule of Mortification is, when a man having got the thanks and laugh of a company for a good pun, an enemy to the art swears he read it in "Cambridge Jests." This is such an inversion of it, that I think I may be allowed to make examples of these kind of people in verse:

R. 27. The Professionary Rule is, to frame a story, and swear you were present at an event where every man talked in his own calling; ex. gr. Major swears he was present at the seizing of a pick-pocket by a great rabble in Smithfield; and that he heard

A Tailor say, 'Send the dog to hell .'

The Cook, 'Let me be at him, I'll baste him.'

The Joiner, 'It is plain the dog was caught in the fact; I saw him.'

The Blacksmith, 'He is a fine spark indeed!'

The Butcher, 'Knock down the shambling cur.'

The Glazier, 'Make the light shine through him .'

The Bookseller, 'Bind him over.'

The Sadler, 'Pummel him.'

The Farmer, 'Thrash the dog.'

A Popish Priest going by, 'I'll make the Devil fly out of him .'

R. 29. The Hypothetic Rule is, when you suppose things hardly consistent to be united, for the sake of a pun: as for instance suppose a person in the pillory had received a full discharge of eggs upon every part of his face but the handle of it; why should he make the longest verses in the world? Ans. Versos Alexandrinos , i. e. All-eggs-and-dry-nose.

R. 30. The Rule of Naturalization is, that punning is free of all languages: as for the Latin Romanos you may say 'Roman nose' Temeraria , 'Tom, where are you?' Oxoniæ prospectus , 'Pox on you, pray speak to us. For the French quelque chose , you may say in English 'kick shoes.' When one says of a thief, 'I wish he was transported;' answer, 'he is already fur enough.' Dr. Swift made an excellent advantage of this rule one night: when a certain peevish gentleman in his company had lost his spectacles , he bid him 'have a good heart, for, if it continued raining all night, he would find them in the morning.' 'Pray, how so?' 'Why, sir,

R. 32. The Rule of Scandal. Never to speak well of another punster; ex. gr. 'Who, he! Lord, sir, he has not sense enough to play at crambo;' or 'He does not know the meaning of synonymous words;' or, 'He never rose so high as a conundrum or a carrywhichit.'

R. 33. The Rule of Catch is, when you hear a man conning a pun softly to himself, to whip it out of his mouth, and pass it upon the company for your own: as for instance; mustard happened to be mentioned in company where I was, and a gentleman with his eyes fixed upon the ceiling, was at Mus mus, sinapi sinapi snap eye bite nose ; One in the company, over-hearing him, bit him, and snapped it up, and said, 'Mustard is the stoutest seed in the world, for it takes the greatest man by the nose .'

R. 34. The Golden Rule allows you to change one syllable

for another; by this, you may either lop off, insert, or add to a word; ex. gr.

For Church Kirk .

For Bangor Clangor .

For Presbyter Has-biter .

Let us now consider a new case; as for instance, 'The church of England, as by law established.' Put a T before it, and it is Test-ablished : take away the Test and put in o , and it is Abolished .

How much was Tom Gordon, the late ingenious author of Parson Alberoni, obliged to it, in that very natural story which he framed concerning the preacher, where he tells you, one of the congregation called the minister an Humbassandor for an Ambassador.

Give me leave, courteous reader, to recommend to your perusal and practice this most excellent rule, which is of such universal use and advantage to the learned world, that the most valuable discoveries, both as to antiquities and etymologies, are made by it; nay, further, I will venture to say, that all words which are introduced to enrich and make a language copious, beautiful, and harmonious, arise chiefly from this rule. Let any man but consult Bentley's Horace, and he will see what useful discoveries that very learned gentleman has made by the help of this rule; or, indeed, poor Horace would have lain under the eternal reproach of making 'a fox eat oats ,' had not the learned doctor, with great judgment and penetration, found out nitedula to be a blunder of the librarians for vulpecula ; which nitedula , the doctor says, signifies a grass-mouse , and this clears up the whole matter, because it makes the story hang well together: for all the world knows, that weazles have a most tender regard and affection to grass mice, whereas they hate foxes as they do fire-brands. In short, all various lections are to be attributed to this rule: so are all the Greek dialects; or Homer would have wanted the sonorous beauty of his oio's. But the greatest and best masters of this rule, without dispute, were the Dorians, who made nothing of saying tin for soie , tenos for ekeinos , surisdomes for surizomen , &c. From this too we have our quasis in Lexicons. Was it not, by rule the 34th, that the Samaritan, Chaldee, Æthiopic, Syriac, Arabic, and Persian languages were formed from the original Hebrew? for which I appeal to the Polyglot. And among our modern languages, are not the Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and French, derived and formed from the Latin by the same power? How much poets have been obliged to it, we need no further proof than the figures prothesis , epenthesis , apocope , paragoge , and ellipsis . Trimming and fitting of words to make them more agreeable to our ears, Dionysius Halicarnassensis has taken notice of, in his book 'De Compositione Vocum,' where he pleasantly compares your polite reformers of words to masons with hammers, who break off rugged corners of stones, that they may become more even and firm in their places.