"I wonder what companions she has met with--there is a magnetism in good-nature which will ever attract its like--so if she meets with beings the least social--but that's as chance wills!"

— Sancho, Charles Ignatius (1729-1780)


Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed by J. Nichols
Date
1782
Metaphor
"I wonder what companions she has met with--there is a magnetism in good-nature which will ever attract its like--so if she meets with beings the least social--but that's as chance wills!"
Metaphor in Context
THERE is something inexpressibly flattering in the notion of your being warmer--from the idea of your much obliged friend's caring for you;--in truth we could not help caring about you--our thoughts travelled with you over night from Bond Street to the Inn.--The next day at noon--"Well, now she's above half way--alas! no, she will not get home till Saturday night--I wonder what companions she has met with--there is a magnetism in good-nature which will ever attract its like--so if she meets with beings the least social--but that's as chance wills!"--Well, night arrives--and now our friend has reached the open arms of parental love--excess of delightful endearments gives place to tranquil enjoyments--and all are happy in the pleasure they give each other.--Were I a Saint or a Bishop, and was to pass by your door, I would stop, and say, Peace be upon this dwelling!--and what richer should I leave it?--for I trust where a good man dwells, there peace makes its sweet abode.--When you have read Boffuet, you will find at the end, that it was greatly wished the learned author had brought the work down lower--but I cannot help thinking he concluded his design as far as he originally meant.--Mrs. Sancho
(I. xxxi, pp. 87-8; p. 69 in Carretta)
Categories
Provenance
Reading; text from DocSouth
Citation
Five entries in ESTC (1782, 1783, 1784). [Second edition in 1783, third in 1784.]

See Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, An African. In Two Volumes. To Which Are Prefixed, Memoirs of His Life (London: Printed by J. Nichols, 1782). <Link to text from Documenting the American South at UNC>

Reading Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, ed. Vincent Carretta (New York: Penguin, 1998).
Date of Entry
07/11/2013

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.