And, secondly, That had the said glass been there set up, nothing more would have been wanting, in order to have taken a man's character, but to have taken a chair and gone softly, as you would to a dioptrical beehive, and look'd in, --view'd the soul stark naked; --observed all her motions, --her machinations; --traced all her maggots from their first engendering to their crawling forth; --watched her loose in her frisks, her gambols, her capricios; and after some notice of her more solemn deportment, consequent upon such frisks, etc. ----then taken your pen and ink and set down nothing but what you had seen, and could have sworn to: --But this is an advantage not to be had by the biographer in this planet; --in the planet _Mercury_ (belike) it may be so, if not better still for him; ----for there the intense heat of the country, which is proved by computators, from its vicinity to the sun, to be more than equal to that of red-hot iron, --must, I think, long ago have vitrified the bodies of the inhabitants, (as the efficient cause) to suit them for the climate (which is the final cause); so that betwixt them both, all the tenements of their souls, from top to bottom, may be nothing else, for aught the soundest philosophy can shew to the contrary, but one fine transparent body of clear glass (bating the umbilical knot)--so that, till the inhabitants grow old and tolerably wrinkled, whereby the rays of light, in passing through them, become so monstrously refracted, ----or return reflected from their surfaces in such transverse lines to the eye, that a man cannot be seen through; --his soul might as well, unless for mere ceremony, or the trifling advantage which the umbilical point gave her, --might, upon all other accounts, I say, as well play the fool out o'doors as in her own house.

And the second; that nothing more would have been necessary to examine a man's character, but to have gone softly, as you would to a beehive, and looked in, - viewed the soul stark naked; observed her movements; traced all her maggots from their hatching to their crawling forth; - watched the soul's frisks and gambols; - and then to take your pen and set down what you had seen.
But this is an advantage not to be had by any biographer on this planet. In the planet Mercury, perhaps, it may be so, - for there the intense heat of the nearby sun must, I think, long ago have vitrified the bodies of the inhabitants, so that they may have fine transparent bodies of clear glass - until the inhabitants grow old and wrinkled, whereby the rays of light, in passing through them, become monstrously refracted, so that a man cannot be seen through.
