University of Virginia Library

MARY ASTELL'S WORK TOWARD A NEW EDITION OF
A SERIOUS PROPOSAL TO THE LADIES, PART II

by
E. Derek Taylor

Mary Astell (1666–1731) is probably best known today as the author of the
ubiquitously anthologized Some Reflections Upon Marriage (1700), a cunning
diatribe against the hypocritical marriage practices of early-eighteenth-century
England that well deserves its current reputation as one of the foundational texts
of Western feminism. Reflections was also popular in its day, reaching a fourth edi-
tion in England in 1730 when William Parker, who had taken over the stock of
Astell's longtime bookseller Richard Wilkin, agreed "to republish her most popu-
lar books" (Perry 315). Specifically, along with Reflections, Parker issued a "new"
third edition of The Christian Religion, As Profess'd by a Daughter of the Church of Eng-
land (first edition 1705; second edition 1717), the pinnacle of Astell's sophisticated
philosophical and theological thought, while in the same year Edmund Parker
(no evident relationship to William) released a third edition of Astell's correspon-
dence with Neoplatonist John Norris of Bemerton (1656–1711), Letters Concerning
the Love of God (first edition 1695; second edition 1705).[1] The popularity of Astell's
first published work, A Serious Proposal to the Ladies (1694), had burned brightly, if
swiftly, as well; it reached its fourth and final edition in 1701, coupled with the
one significant work penned by Astell that never saw a subsequent edition, A
Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Part II (1697). Given the alacrity with which Wilkin
combined the two works—they first were published together in 1697, the same
year that Part II had earlier been issued seriatim—it would appear that Part II
simply did not sell well, and that the remainders of the original sheets made their
way into the combined editions of 1697 and 1701. This would explain why, even
in the combined edition of 1701, which contains the fourth and final revision of
Part I, the title page to Part II is unchanged—and why Patricia Springborg found
no discrepancies between this 1701 issue of Part II and the original printing of
1697 in her modern edition of Parts I and II. [2]

Perhaps Astell had misjudged her audience. In Part I (hereafter abbreviated
SPI) she had outlined in inspired terms her "serious proposal" to construct ex-
clusively female religious academies wherein women could advance their minds
and spirits secluded from a male-dominated culture that encouraged them, she
charged, to remain addle-brained and pretty. Although her detractors won the

day by smearing the plan as closet Catholicism, Astell's argument, an admixture
of wide-eyed idealism and urgent practicality, caught on with a reading public
comprising ever more women, and would continue for decades to appeal to a
broad range of thinkers interested in the problems of (in particular) young women,
among them, to name a significant few, Daniel Defoe and Samuel Richardson.[3]
Part II (hereafter abbreviated SPII), written largely in response to the failure of
SPI to elicit requisite financial backing, attempted to provide in print what Astell
had been unable to secure in bricks and mortar. Ruth Perry has aptly charac-
terized SPII as "a training manual for Norris's brand of Christian Platonism,"
a "kind of 'how-to-do-it' manual to be used at home" by women interested in
self-education (83). Its erudite distillation of the philosophical principles of Des-
cartes and those who had variously taken up his mande (Antoine Arnauld, Pierre
Malebranche, Norris, and, in small measure, John Locke) is probably more true
to Astell's general tendencies as a thinker and writer than SPI—Norris, it should
be noted, was at first shocked to learn that his incisive interlocutor in Letters was
a woman, while Francis Atterbury, bishop of Rochester, admitted to a friend,
"I dread to engage her"[4] —but it was evidently unappealing to readers who had
been charmed with the romantic patina of Astell's initial proposal.[5] Many women
were likely enamored more with the idea of a safe-haven than with Astell's decid-
edly ambitious conception of a proper curriculum.

However much her audience may have resisted SPII, Astell, it turns out, did
not abandon it. Her work toward a second edition exists in the pastedowns, free
endpapers, and margins of her personal copy, now housed in the Northampton
Records Office, UK.

I discovered this copy of Astell's work by what might best be characterized
as an informed accident. At the time, I was investigating connections between
non-juror and Boehmean mystic William Law, novelist Samuel Richardson, and
Astell and Norris. I knew from A. Keith Walker's book (William Law, 1973) that
Law had once owned, as part of his public library in King's Cliffe, several of
Norris's works, including his and Astell's Letters, and I tracked the remainders of

FIGURE 1. Astell's notes on the operating costs of Sutton's Hospital, on the recto of the final
rear free endpaper of her copy of A Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Part II.

this library to the Northampton Records Office. From its catalogue of the Law-
Library Collection, I learned that several books contained inscriptions indicating
that they had once belonged to Astell herself.[6] Perry's excellent biography of
Astell enabled me to clear up this puzzling discovery; Elizabeth Hutcheson, who
along with Hester Gibbon joined Law in a life of religious meditation and service
in King's Cliffe in 1744, was Astell's close friend and executrix of her will (519,
note 27). Hutcheson, it seems clear, donated to Law's charitable library those
books Astell had left behind.

The copy of SPII I found in this collection contains no such inscription,
however, and so I began with the hypothesis that the substantial handwritten
annotations and textual corrections throughout the book pointed to Law, who,
according to Walker, frequently marked his texts. Perhaps he had considered
reintroducing the world to Astell's neglected treatise? Having found an example
of Law's handwriting,[7] however, I was forced to discard this hypothesis and to
pursue what I considered an unlikely, if tantalizing, possibility—namely, that the
additions had been penned (and penciled) by Astell herself. This possibility was
confirmed by Professor Perry when she explained in an email that looking over
the reproductions I had sent was like "bumping into an old friend after many
years." (A sample of Astell's handwriting in this volume appears in figure 1.)

In the remainder of this essay, I seek to accomplish three fundamental tasks:
(1) to provide a general account of Astell's notes, comments, and emendations to
her text; (2) to propose a likely timeframe for her additions and revisions; and,
(3) to offer some tentative suggestions regarding both Astell's purposes in revising
her text and the logic informing the changes she elected to make. I conclude by
suggesting ways that this text might qualify, even change, our understanding of
Astell, her development as a writer, and the nature of her social commitments as
a public—and female—intellectual.

What?

Astell used both pen and pencil to make various additions, deletions, and
substitutions within the text of her copy of SPII; she also added significant pa-
ratextual comments and notes to the front and rear endpapers and pastedowns.
Many of the in-text changes follow a general pattern of revision evident in, for
instance, the single-word changes between the first and second editions of Let-
ters Concerning the Love of God (1695; 1705). Stylistically, Astell almost invariably
revised "downwards," substituting less rarified words for her sometimes esoteric,
or archaic, terminology. Thus, in letter 3 of Letters, Astell replaced "recondite"

with "hidden," and "Benevolence" with "Good-will." In letter 5, "meliorating"
becomes "improvement," while "sapid" becomes "relishing." In letter 7, "de-
faulting" and "peccant" are replaced by "taking" and "sinful," while in letter 9
"Diagnostick" is changed to "Mark."[8] This same tendency is apparent in Astell's
revisions of SPII; "lost its haut goust" becomes "lost its relish," "than a Bon-mien"
is changed to "than a good mien," "Nutrition" becomes "Nourishment," "Acu-
men" becomes "Sharpness," and "fill up my Vacuities" is replaced by "supply
my Wants."[9]

In all of her major works, Astell was necessarily attempting to strike a delicate
balance between accessibility and erudition; her changes thus reflect, at least in
part, a conscious attempt to narrow the distance between herself and those less-
educated women she hoped to reach. As she explains in the preface to Letters,
Astell was "far … from coveting the Fame of being singular" as an "ingenious
Woman"; she had a true rationalist's faith that any woman, "by employing her
Faculties the right way"—i.e., by receiving a proper education—could achieve
a high level of intellectual acuity (66). On the other hand, Astell was a gifted
thinker, and, in a sense, her own best witness. The smarter her writing, the more
convincing her argument that women's minds differed from men's in application,
not substance. In short, Astell needed to impress without putting off—a particu-
larly difficult line to negotiate given the vast discrepancy between the most and
least educated members of her intended audience, and one that became even
more pronounced with the onset of satires on Astell's "singularity" as a thinker
in the first decade of the eighteenth century.[10]

All of Astell's in-text notes and emendations have been recorded in Appendix 1.
It is certain that she made many of these changes after 1714, when the three-
volume The Ladies Library appeared in print. Volume one of this work contains
an extensive selection stolen, with some editorial changes, from chapter three of
SPII; Astell interlaces with pen and pencil many, but not all, of these unsolicited
editorial changes into her text and margins.

It is conceivable that a few in-text changes may have been made as the first
issue was still being printed in 1697. For instance, Astell's printed text reads
"we grope in the dark"; Astell has crossed out "grope" in ink and inserted in
the margin "stumble." While the copy of SPII in the British Library also has
the original "grope," Patricia Springborg's copy text in the Folger Library has
"stumble," indicating that stop-press changes must have been made along the

way.[11] It is possible, then, that Astell made this change in 1697 for the original
compositors to follow; but it is also possible, and I think more likely, that this an-
notation and others like it reflect a later attempt on Astell's part to bring the text
into accord with the final state of the first printing. This would explain why Astell
made in-text corrections to errors already included in the list of errata.[12]

Surrounding the text are various but, I believe, related additions. I have
transcribed these in a series of appendices, as follows:

• Appendix 2. Front pastedown—references to The Ladies Library; biography of Fénelon; ref-
  erence to "changes."
• Appendix 3. First front free endpaper, recto and verso—note on English statutes relating
  to the "erection of hospitals," etc.
• Appendix 4. Penultimate rear free endpaper, recto—quotation from a sermon by George
  Hickes.
• Appendix 5. Final rear free endpaper, recto and verso—accounts for "Sutton's Hospital."

Throughout, I have recorded Astell's comments as faithfully as possible. Illegible
words or phrases have been denoted as such in brackets, except where a plausible
guess could be made, in which case any uncertain word is preceded by an itali-
cized question mark. I have provided a brief introduction to each appendix.

When?

The vast majority of Astell's various handwritten comments, notes, and
emendations must have been added sometime during the final 16 years of her
life, i.e., sometime between 1715 and 1731. The first two references on the front
pastedown—to The Ladies Library (1714) and to the deceased Fénelon (d. January
1715)—do not, of course, definitively date the entirety of Astell's various inser-
tions and changes to her text (indeed, as noted above, there are a few possible
in-text exceptions to this time-frame). But inasmuch as the interrelated nature
of the additions suggest a rhetorical strategy on Astell's part—a point I hope to
establish in the course of this introductory essay—a reasonably focused period of
composition may safely be supposed. Astell began and ceased her editorial work
on SPII, I think, for a variety of related reasons that may be traced to a five-year
period, beginning after 1715 and ending around 1720.

It was during these years that Astell became centrally involved in securing the
future of the Chelsea school for girls she had founded in 1709—"Astell's project
from idea to execution," Perry explains (233). The school, which provided a rudi-
mentary education for "daughters of Chelsea Hospital veterans" (239), fits neatly
into a broad social pattern of benevolent engagement that spread throughout the
long eighteenth century, comprising figures from across the political and religious
spectrum. It is fully appropriate that Astell's copy of SPII would find a permanent
home in the King's Cliffe Library, where, to quote from the inscription above the
lintel, "Books of Piety are … lent to any Persons of this or ye Neighbouring Towns."[13]

The library was only one of host of charitable projects conducted in the 1750s
by William Law, Elizabeth Hutcheson, and Hester Gibbon—including tenement
houses for elderly widows and, fittingly enough, schools for poor boys and girls.

If, in her choice of eleemosynary project, Astell was very much a woman of
her age—M. G. Jones claims of Astell's contemporaries, "the charity school was
their favorite form of benevolence" (3)—she was also, of course, quite literally
pursuing her own longstanding interest in promoting female education. It is true
that the Chelsea school differed in important ways from the unabashedly religious
academy Astell had envisioned in SPI, wherein women of family would have re-
tired, for various reasons and perhaps only for a while, into a veritable utopia of
female companionship and Christian rationalism; "no rhapsodies there," Perry
quips of the Chelsea school, "about Christian love and the need to bend one's
thought always to God" (239). Nevertheless, Astell's school did address the most
pressing concern she had underscored in SPI: the lack of an established venue
for female education. That these were poor girls instead of women of means, that
the school's curriculum consisted of practicing reading and writing rather than
meditating on Arnauld and Malebranche, that religious instruction dwindled
from rapturous to perfunctory–these were differences in degree to Astell, not in
kind (though, undoubtedly, the differences are pronounced). The Chelsea school
was the fruit, however bruised, however long in ripening, of the quite serious
proposal Astell had offered to the reading public over a decade before in her
first published work.

It is both fitting and telling that Astell's final original composition, Bart'lemy
Fair: Or, An Enquiry after Wit (1709), appeared in the same year that the Chel-
sea school began operating—an indicator, as Perry has suggested, not only of
her waning popularity as a writer, but of a decided shift in her social commit-
ments.[14] However, despite her work on behalf of the Chelsea school during this
period—and despite the onset of a nagging cataract in 1710 (Perry 231)—Astell
nevertheless found time, if not to compose new proposals, reflections, or enqui-
ries, then to revise considerably at least one of her previously published works:
Wilkin published the second edition of her Christian Religion in 1717, a substantial
revision of the original edition of 1705.[15] Might Astell have caught the revision
bug at this period? Having turned the corrected pages of Christian Religion over
to her bookseller, perhaps Astell's momentum carried her to one final text need-
ful of editorial attention, one perfectly suited to carry her then current project
more fully into the public eye. She may already have "overstayed her welcome
in the world of letters," as Perry suggests (231), but Astell would seem to have
discovered good reason to linger a litde while longer.

At its opening, the Chelsea school was housed "in borrowed rooms on the
premises of the Royal Hospital" (Perry 240); there it remained and operated for

153 years. A borrowed school, however, is not a school of one's own. "[F]rom
at least 1719," Perry explains, "Astell actively campaigned … for the land and
construction costs to build a separate establishment" (240). It was to this end,
I believe, that Astell made the various notes, addenda, and corrections in her
copy of SPII, a new edition of which, had it been published, might have stoked
public interest in her capital campaign on behalf of the Chelsea school. The
failure of her campaign, as Perry notes, may be adequately explained "by the
stock market crash of 1720" (240); then, as now, charitable organizations suf-
fered tremendously in times of economic stress. This fact alone might have been
enough to kill the new edition on which Astell was at work, but it was not alone.
In the same year that the South Sea Bubble burst, thereby siphoning away the
financial resources Astell's proposed schoolhouse desperately needed, Richard
Wilkin died, leaving Astell without the bookseller on whom she had depended
throughout her 25-year publishing career. The gradual petering out of emen-
dations to Astell's text—as shown below in Appendix 1, she made only a few
changes in the final 50 pages—may very well reflect the suffocating weight of
this confluence of discouraging events.

Why?

It must be remembered that by the time Astell came to make the vast ma-
jority (quite possibly all) of the changes to and comments in her copy of SPII, it
had long ceased to exist as a text separate from SPI. In the final two of its three
issues (1697 and 1701), SPII had been bound with corrected new editions of SPI;
though a title page announced the work in "two parts," the separate title page
to SPII never changed from the initial printing of 1697. In other words, as Astell
pondered her revision, she likely would have been thinking of A Serious Proposal to
the Ladies Parts I and II, not of the second part alone, even though the text in which
she recorded her changes and additions was not itself bound with SPI.

This fact may explain the nature of the paratextual additions Astell wrote
on the opening and closing blank leaves of her book, many of which would ap-
pear to be more directly related to the primary argument of SPI—i.e., the need
for the education of women through the establishment of academies—than to
that of SPII, which adduces a plan for self education. French theologian François
Fénelon, for example—a figure of evident interest to Astell during the period
in question[16] —mattered to Astell because the education of girls had mattered to
him; it is not coincidence that the brief biography of him she added to the front
pastedown (see Appendix 2) opens with a reference to his Traité de l'education des
filles (1687), wherein the influential French theologian had argued that custom,

not nature, dictated against the academic instruction of girls, and that educating
children, rather than just boys, would have salubrious, not destructive, social re-
sults. The long passage Astell recorded on the recto of the penultimate rear free
endpaper from a 1684 sermon by Fénelon's English translator, George Hickes,
likewise underscores the importance of implementing a societal plan for female
education—i.e., of actually "building schools" (see Appendix 4).[17] Hickes's was
the sort of plan Astell herself would later propose in SPI, of course, perhaps with-
out thinking fully of the legal and logistical hurdles such an establishment would
need to clear. Now, however, she seems prepared to mount not only a moral,
but a legal justification for constructing female schools. On the recto and verso
of the first front free endpaper, Astell has transcribed from Sir Edward Coke's
The Second Part of the Institutes of the Laws of England (1641) the operative portions
of two English statutes (39. Eliz. Cap. 5. and 21. Jac. Cap. 1) that clear the way
for private citizens to build and incorporate charitable "hospitals" or "houses of
God" (see Appendix 3). By establishing this legal footing, Astell effectively aligns
her proposal with a demonstrably English and Protestant tradition of privately
sponsored charity, thereby justifying her campaign for establishing a separate
Chelsea school facility.[18] The Charterhouse school, also known as Sutton's Hos-
pital after its founder, Thomas Sutton (1532–1611), must have struck Astell as
exemplary of the sort of charitably funded institution she was hoping to found;
she has included an account of its operating costs on the recto and verso of the
final rear free endpaper (see Appendix 5 and figure 1).

For all of the practical ramifications a new edition would have entailed, how-
ever, Astell's motives were not purely benevolent. In pointing to Elizabethan and
Jacobean statutes legitimizing her proposal for female academies, for instance,
Astell belatedly answers the primary charge laid at her door by those who had
attacked SPI when it was first published some 20 years before—namely, that it
amounted to de facto Catholicism. (Astell, it should be noted, would never have
used the phrase "protestant nunnery" to characterize her proposed institutions.[19]

John Locke (d. 1704), another of Astell's early opponents, also resurfaces in the
annotations within the text of SPII itself—though, it is important to note, her
references to him here are at worst ambiguous, at best respectful, and thus work
against Springborg's insistent reading of SPII as unrepentantly anti-Lockean in
intent.[20]

Those behind The Ladies Library, first published in 1714,[21] were similarly in
Astell's sights, albeit in a decidedly complex fashion. A compilation of uncredited
excerpts from a host of writers, Astell among them, The Ladies Library claims on its
title page to have been "Written by a Lady" but "Published by Mr. Steele"; Sir
Richard Steele also provided the dedication and the preface to the first volume.
Astell held him responsible for the plagiarism—as she had for satiric attacks on
her in The Tatler—and his Whiggism would only further have inspired her invari-
ably Tory-leaning pen. (The actual author of The Ladies Library, George Berkeley,
was only definitively revealed in 1980 by Stephen Parks.[22] ) It is clear from the
front pastedown (Appendix 2) that Astell was looking for grounds on which to
confront Steele. The Ladies Library, she here correctly points out, "recom. Poetry
p. 22. & discomends it p. 25.V.1."—precisely the sort of obvious logical contra-
diction on which Astell liked to seize when on the attack.[23] And in pointing to
"p361–365 V.2," Astell may be expanding the charge of thievery beyond SPII, to
a more subtle borrowing of her arguments in Reflections Upon Marriage.[24]

Yet, on the other hand, Astell appears either to accept or, at least, to consider
accepting a number of Berkeley's revisions to the excerpt he lifted from SPII. She
does not record every variant as she would have done, one assumes, were she
simply keeping track.[25] Instead, she seems to weigh his changes, both minor and
major, at times even revising his revision.[26] True, several of Astell's attempts to
comport her text with Berkeley's break down syntactically, the inchoateness of
the "revised" text suggesting a level of uncertainty, or perhaps haste, on her part.
And, to be sure, Astell's pointed reference in her Preface to the second edition of
Bart'lemy Fair (1722) to Steele's (as she thought it) piracy suggests, at the very least,
skepticism as to the value of the revisions: "[O]ur honest Compilator has made an
honourable Amends to the Author, (I know not what he has to the Book-Seller)
by transcribing above an hundred Pages in to his Ladies Library, verbatim; except
in a few Places, which if the Reader takes the Trouble to compare, perhaps he
will not find improv'd" (quoted in Perry 230).

Ultimately, then, one can only speculate as to Astell's plans for those of Berke-
ley's revisions she incorporated into her text. Given the fact that these changes
exist alongside other revisions unrelated to Berkeley's pilfering, and that Astell
tinkered with his changes even as she recorded them, I tend to think that she
would indeed have followed some of Berkeley's unsolicited editorial advice in a
new edition of SPII—probably with a requisite, and perfectly Astellian, satiric
jab at the original theft. One can easily imagine Astell "thanking" Steele in a new
preface for his editorial assistance, and noting that in acknowledging his minor
changes, she is doing more than he felt compelled to do when he copied an en-
tire chapter of her book. After all, she might have noted, unlike herself, Steele
had benefited from a free education at a respected institution—having been ac-
cepted by the respected Charterhouse school in 1684 as a gownboy, essentially a
scholar-in-residence. Surely, the product of Thomas Sutton's charitable bounty,
the evidence for which Astell had dutifully recorded down to the penny (see Ap-
pendix 5), would join her in soliciting charitable donations toward the Chelsea
school for girls. So subtle a response, however, would obviously have been pre-
cluded when Astell was forced to abandon her plans for a second edition in 1720,
which might explain her scoffing dismissal of the revisions two years later in
Bart'lemy Fair.

How does this text affect our understanding of Astell? On the one hand, it
most assuredly does not clear up any sensational mysteries for which our post-
Possession sentiments hunger—Astell has scribbled in her book neither an an-
nouncement of sexual passion for another woman, nor the name of the "eminent
clergyman" (rendered, one fantasizes, in a clever but discernible anagram) to
whom George Ballard claims she had been affianced at a young age (385, note).
Nevertheless, it does work to flesh out, if only in small measure, the biogra-
phy of a woman who has discovered herself to us only, if at all, as in a glass,
darkly. (Even Ballard, writing in 1752, was forced to rely primarily on hearsay
in his brief account of her life.) Who knew, for instance, that Astell had read
works by René Rapin (Appendix 1, 89.10–16), yet another in a growing list of
Cartesian Catholics peopling her list of intellectual influences? Or the degree
to which she herself recognized, or came to recognize, the precedents in Fé-
nelon and Hickes for her arguments on behalf of women? And if we have come
to recognize Astell's derision for Locke and Steele, her equivocal treatment of
them in her copy of SPII will perhaps give us pause, for it may reveal a more
complex reaction on Astell's part to these erstwhile adversaries than heretofore
assumed.

But more than anything else, Astell's book reveals a clue as to how its author's
mind was working at a critical point in her history—as well as a lesson in the
tenuous nature of book production at this time. If the dating I have proposed in
this essay is more or less correct, then the degree to which Astell relied on her
bookseller Richard Wilkin may have been even more pronounced than previ-
ously recognized. I do not pretend to know with certainty how Astell would have
used the material she recorded in her copy of SPII in a new edition. Perhaps,
taking as a model the substantial "Preface" Astell added to the third edition of
Some Reflections Upon Marriage (1706), her comments would have served as fodder
for a new introduction to her undeniably dated, but not outmoded, work. The
Chelsea school, I have suggested, must have struck Astell as the logical exten-
sion of her original hobby horse; and, however much one may be reminded of
Parson Adams's myopic faith in the value of his volumes of sermons in Henry
Fielding's Joseph Andrews (1742), she still believed—or wished to believe—in the
ability of her earliest works to communicate her sense of urgency on this score.
Indeed, in this respect, the piracy of The Ladies Library may very well have inspired
Astell to contemplate a new edition by showing her that the world continued to
be interested in the subject.

Although Astell's work toward a new edition of SPII did not make it into
print, she never abandoned the project that had in large measure stimulated her
revisions. Even as death, in the form of breast cancer, approached in 1730, she
was still actively seeking donations "towards building a charity school for the
teaching and instructing of the children of poor soldiers belonging to Chelsea
Hospital."[27]

APPENDIX 1

Text of A Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Part II [1]

Introduction

Astell made use of a variety of markings and methods for correcting or com-
menting upon her own text. Emendations are sometimes interlined within the
text itself, but more often are found in the margins and linked to particular points
in the text with corresponding asterisks. I have recorded as faithfully as possible
in the Original column all emendations, including Astell's abbreviations, using
a modified version of the system of bracketed transcription and editorial explana-
tion proposed by David L. Vander Meulen and G. Thomas Tanselle:

Vander Meulen and Tanselle suggest emphasizing either the original or the re-
vised reading by consistently including within brackets either deleted or added
words; I have modified slightly their system by reporting within brackets all af-
fected words, i.e., both the original and the revised text. Astell's changes are
then standardized in an admittedly speculative New Edition? column in order
to provide a clean text of her revisions. Thus, where the opening entry in the
Original column reads "and Inconsiderate had [taken up inserted in left margin for
canceled imbib'd] to," the same phrase in the New Edition? column reads "and
Inconsiderate had taken up to." Astell's marginal references to particular texts
or authors likewise have been recorded within brackets in the ORIGINAL column
following the italicized phrase marginal note inserted.

Astell made her changes and marginal comments primarily in pencil, but
sometimes in pen, and with no discernable pattern; in the emendation of 17.6
(76.2-1 fb), for instance, she crossed out two words, one in pencil, the other in
pen. All changes made in pen are recorded as such; where confusion might arise,
pencil markings are also explicitly noted. Editorial silence thus indicates that the
markings are in pencil.

The majority of the changes here transcribed stem from Astell's engagement
with Berkeley's revised plagiarism of the third chapter of SPII, which comprises
the bulk of his chapter on "IGNORANCE" in the first volume of The Ladies Li-
brary (1714), pp. 438-524 (Berkeley's appropriation of Astell covers pp. 447-524).
Her documentation of Berkeley's work is consistently three pages discrepant
from the copy I first consulted, "printed for J. T. and Sold by W. Mears … and
J. Brown," according to the title page. As it turns out, The Ladies Library was pub-
lished in two different editions in 1714, the other one, according to its title page,

"printed for Jacob Tonson," without further amplification. This form does indeed
match the pagination provided in Astell's marginal citations, and it appears to
be the earlier of the two versions. Where appropriate, I have drawn attention in
my notes to revisions made in the second edition. Berkeley often changed Astell's
punctuation, capitalization, and spelling, but I have made note of such variants
only where they seem to have been of interest to Astell. Astell frequently cites
Berkeley's text by page in the margins; where she does not, I do so in a footnote.
In the footnotes I have also tracked significant departures from The Ladies Library
and made note of those occasions on which Astell herself seems to lose the thread
of her emendatory intentions.

All references are keyed by page and line number both to Astell's copy of
the 1697 edition of SPII and to Patricia Springborg's modern edition of A Serious
Proposal to the Ladies Parts I & II (Pickering & Chatto, 1997); the 1697 edition is
given first, followed by the Springborg edition in parentheses. The abbreviation
"fb" stands for "from the bottom of the page."

Text

                 

Original	New Edition?
4.11 (72.13-14)] and Inconsiderate had [taken up inserted in left margin for canceled imbib'd] to	and Inconsiderate had taken up to
5.3-4 (72.22-23)] which [in interlined] Justice [should interlined above canceled requires to] be paid	which in Justice should be paid
6.4fb (73.9)] nothing but [airy canceled] Noise	nothing but Noise
8.6fb (73.4fb-3fb)] tho I shou'd [?wth ?our Clearest Demonstration have prov'd it easy inserted in bottom margin for canceled have prov'd it feasible with the clearest Demonstration], and	tho I shou'd with our clearest Demon- stration have prov'd it easy, and
12.12 (75.9)] lost its [relish inserted in left margin for canceled haut goust {previous two words italicized in original}]; Wisdom	lost its relish; Wisdom
12.14 (75-10)] than a [good interlined in pen above canceled Bon {previous word itali- cized in original}] -mien	than a good-mien
14.6fb (76.4)] Petitioners, [the comma inserted] who	Petitioners, who
17.6 (76.2fb-1 fb)] they've [per- haps canceled in pencil] almost lost …	they've almost lost … which were afforded

                   

which [probably canceled in pen] were afforded
22.1-2 (78.11 fb-10fb)] know [what it is to be interlined in pen above canceled in pen wherein the Nature of] a true Chris- tian [consists canceled in pen]; and	know what it is to be a true Christian; and
22.8 fb (78.2fb)] duly serv'd [yet can- celed in pen][2] in	duly serv'd in
24.14 (81.10-9fb)] for its [Nourishmt inserted in left margin for canceled Nutri- tion], as	for its Nourishment, as
24.2fb (81.4fb)] much [Sharpness in- serted in pen in left margin for canceled in pen Acumen] and	much Sharpness and
26.7 (82.21-22)] them [is inserted in pen in left margin] he [is canceled in pen] to be accounted [of interlined in pen], if	them is he to be accounted of, if
29.8-9 (83.17-18)] I do to [supply in- serted in pen in right margin for canceled in pen fill up] my [W written over V of next word] Va[nts interlined above canceled cu- ities], to	I do to supply my Wants, to
31.12 (84.8)] precipitately, [not only canceled in pen] without[, but against canceled in pen][3] its	precipitately, without its
32.3 (84.16)] cou'd [deny his assent in- serted in pen in bottom margin for canceled in pen demur] to[4]	cou'd deny his assent to
41.14-19 (89.9-15)] Disengage…. search after Truth [marginal note inserted Rapin Refl D 1 5.31][5]

             

47.4-5 (91-13)] we [stumble inserted in pen in right margin for canceled in pen grope][6] in	we stumble in
49.2fb-50.2 (92.13-14)] An Opinion … thing considerable [marginal note inserted Lock][7]
68.9fb-7fb (99.1)] The perfection of the Understanding consisting in the Clear- ness [marginal note inserted in left margin ?Liv'Libro p 448- v. 1][8]
69.9 (99.9)] For being [as inserted in right margin for canceled that] we are, [the comma inserted] but [marginal note inserted 448]	For being as we are, but
70.3fb-1fb (100.5-6)] different, [as … follows canceled].[9]	different.
71.8-11 (100.11-13)] things at once: [There are som particular Truths of wch inserted in right margin for canceled And likewise, because] GOD has not thought fit to communicate such Ideas to us, as are necessary to the disquisi- tion of [ym inserted in right margin for can- celed some Particular Truths], [marginal note inserted 449]	things at once: There are some particular Truths of which GOD has not thought fit to communicate such Ideas to us, as are necessary to the dis- quisition of them.
71.18 (100.16-17)] by [Intention inserted in right margin for canceled Intuition] or[10]	by Intention or

                 

78.7fb (102.1fb)] real [Vertues inserted in left margin for canceled Verities], if [mar- ginal note inserted 454]	real Vertues, if
79.9-10 (103.8)] neither [is interlined for canceled do I think] there's [the 's can- celed] any[11]	neither is there any
81.15-18 (104.1-2)] In a word … proper Object. [marginal note inserted 15- 17? Rapin Ref D1-5 23][12]
83.8fb-6fb (104.8fb-7fb)] what is truly the Object of Faith, [marginal note in- serted? Rap D 1 5 23][13]
84.10fb-9fb (105.5-6)] had? ¶ [In a wd inserted for canceled To sum up all]: We[14]	had? ¶ In a word: We
86.1fb-87.4 (105.1fb-106.2)] estimate. ¶ [It is therefore very fit that after we canceled] have [ing interlined] consider'd the Capacity of the Understanding in general, we [must inserted in right margin for canceled shou'd] descend [marginal note inserted 460]	estimate, ¶ Having consider'd the Ca- pacity of the Understanding in general, we must descend
88.7-8 (106.16-17)] that [some inserted for canceled so we] may be [continually inserted in left margin for canceled mutually] useful [marginal note inserted 461]	that some may be continually useful
90.1fb (107.14-15)] train of [un inter- lined for canceled im at beginning of next word] immortified[15]	train of unmortified
93.14-16 (108.11-12)] except the little [soules yt envy ym inserted in right mar-	except the little Souls that envy them. ¶ To help

                   

gin for canceled Soul'd Enviers of 'em]. ¶ To help[16]
94.7-8 (108.20-21)] for, [thereby can- celed] to gratify [thereby inserted in left margin] their Secret Envy, [as interlined for canceled by] diverting us from[17]	for, to gratify thereby their Secret Envy, as diverting us from
95.2fb-96.5 (109.5-8)] him, [he con- tradicts … bear canceled]. Their Gall [marginal note inserted 466]	him. Their Gall
96.15-16(109.14)] a Wo on those [of in- serted in left margin] whom all Men shall speak well [of canceled] so[18]	a Wo on those of whom all Men shall speak well so
96.6fb (109.17)] commonly [has ye Applause of ye world inserted for canceled bears away the Bell]. If [marginal note inserted 467][19]	has the Applause of the world. If
97.6fb-98.7 (109.8fb-2fb)] them. [But is there. … beautify canceled]. If [then canceled] instead of [Jostling and can- celed] Disputing [& Laughing with ym inserted in left margin for canceled with our Fellow Travellers], of [marginal note in- serted 467]	them. If instead of Disputing and Laughing with them, of
98.15-19 (110.3-5)] another. [What.… rectify'd? canceled] We[20]	another. We
98.8fb-7fb (110.6-7)] reach, [& in- serted for deleted move … Sphere] not abuse[21]	reach, and not abuse
98. 3fb-1fb (110.8-g)] others, [be … 'em canceled]. ¶ We[22]	others. ¶ We
99.2fb (110.21)] is [yn inserted in right margin for canceled thus] defective [mar- ginal note inserted 468]	is then defective

             

100.8fb-7fb (110.6fb)] have, [tho inserted in left margin for canceled till] clearness [marginal note inserted 469]	have, tho clearness
101.11-4fb (111.3-11)] Imagination. [But … of. canceled] They[23]	Imagination. ¶ They
105.5 (112.19-20)] shew of [very great canceled] Ingenuity[24]	shew of Ingenuity
105.1 fb (112.10fb)] perfectly [perhaps canceled] it[25]	perfectly it
107.7fb (113-15)] does not [next word underlined] choak [marginal note inserted Err][26]	does not choque
108.6-7 (113.21-22)] If then [for ye Future inserted in left margin] we wou'd [hereafter canceled] think [marginal note inserted 474][27]	If then for the Future we wou'd think
109.6fb-110.13 (114.5-15)] System. ['Tis impossible … purpose. Canceled] ¶ [Volatileness of Thought occasions inserted in left margin for canceled Doing so we shall prevent] Rashness and Precip- itation in our Judgments, [as also too great a conceit of inserted in left margin for canceled which is occasion'd by that Vol- atileness we have been speaking of, to- gether with an over-weaning opinion] of[28] our Selves. All the irregularities of our Will proceed from those [e interlined for 0 in the previous word] false Judgments [we make canceled], thro [marginal note inserted 475][29]	System. ¶ Volitileness of Thought oc- casions Rashness and Precipitation in our Judgments, as also too great a Conceit of our Selves. All the irregu- larities of our Will proceed from these false Judgments, thro

               

110.5fb-4fb (114.19-20)] Mind, [before … Glory! Canceled]. But we seek[30]	Mind. But we seek
111.3-4 (114.15fb))] This Precipitation is [wt inserted for canceled that which] gives[31]	This Precipitation is what gives
112.4-5 (114.1fb))] For [first four letters canceled in the next word] hereby [this means inserted in left margin] the [marginal note inserted 476]	For by this means the
112.4fb-113.11 (115.9-17)] them. [We…. him. ¶ In sum, canceled] whatever[32]	them. Whatever
113.5fb-3fb (115.22-24)] into, [nor … Truth, canceled] The General Causes[33]	into. The General Causes
114.5-6 (115.11 fb)] And the best way [that canceled] I[34]	And the best way I
114.8-9 (115.10fb-9fb)] Errors [proceed from ever what inserted in left margin for canceled proceed they from what] Cause they may[35]	Errors proceed from ever what Cause they may
114.9fb-115.8 (115.5fb-116.4)] of any [palbable {sic} inserted in left margin for canceled Culpable] Error, [we shou'd inserted in left margin] Not [to canceled] Judge of any thing which we don't Ap- prehend, [we shou'd inserted in left mar- gin for canceled to] suspend our Assent till we see just cause to give it, and to determine nothing till the Strength and Clearness of the Evidence oblige us to it. [we shou'd inserted in left margin for can- celed To] withdraw our selves as much as may be from Corporeal things, that pure Reason may be heard the better; [we shou'd inserted in left margin for can- celed to] make that use of our senses for	of any palpable Error. We shou'd not Judge of any thing which we don't Ap- prehend, we shou'd Suspend our As- sent till we see just Cause to give it, and to determine nothing but the Strength and Clearness of the Evidence oblige us to it. We shou'd withdraw our selves as much as may be from Cor- poreal things, that pure Reason may be heard the better; we shou'd make that use of our senses for which they are design'd and fitted, the preserva- tion of the Body, but not to depend on their Testimony in our Enquiries after Truth. We shou'd particularly divest ourselves of mistaken Self-love, little

           

which they are design'd and fitted, the preservation of the Body, but not to depend on their Testimony in our En- quiries after Truth, [we shoud inserted in right margin] Particularly [to canceled] divest our selves of mistaken Self-love, little Ends, and mean Designs, and [we shoud inserted in right margin for canceled to] keep [marginal note inserted 477][36]	Ends, and mean Designs, and we shou'd keep
115.4-5fb (116.8-12)] so. [we shoud in- serted in right margin for canceled But to] be passionately in Love with Truth, as being throughly sensible of her Excel- lency and Beauty, [we shd inserted in right margin for canceled To] embrace her how opposite soever she may some- times be to our Humours and Designs, to bring these over to her, and never attempt to make her truckle to them. [we shd inserted in right margin for canceled To] be so[37]	so. We shou'd be passionately in Love with Truth, as being throughly sensi- ble of her Excellency and Beauty. We shou'd embrace her how opposite so- ever she may sometimes be to our Hu- mours and Designs, to bring these over to her, and never attempt to make her truckle to them. We shou'd be so
116.2-4 (116.15-16)] Miscarriages. [These are ye Tr inserted in left margin for canceled For indeed] it concerns us most to know [such Truths as these canceled], it is not material [marginal note 478]	Miscarriages. These are the Truths it concerns us most to know, it is not material
117.5-8 (116.g-8fb)] She does not treat them so tenderly and [familiarly inserted in right margin for canceled fawningly, with so much Ceremony and Complaisance] as [marginal note inserted 479]	She does not treat them so tenderly and familiarly as
117.16-119.2 (116.3fb-117.18)] and Var- nish. [But to…. ¶ Above all…. Ex- cites them, canceled] ¶ §IV. As to[38]	and Varnish. ¶ §IV. As to
119.5-119.11 (117.18-21)] Thinking, [we inserted in right margin for canceled if … I] shall [39]	Thinking, we shall

             

119.6fb-2fb (117.12-10fb)] For as a [very canceled] Judicious Writer on this Subject [of ye Art of Thinking inserted in right margin for canceled (to whose In- genious Remarks and Rules I am much obliged)] well observes[40]	For as a Judicious Writer on this Subject of the Art of Thinking well observes
122.7 (118.20-21)] it. [And canceled] since Truth [marginal note inserted 481]	it. Since Truth
123.13-15 (118.1fb-119.1)] shou'd Think as Justly, [they can interlined above tho'] not as [Copiously inserted in right mar- gin for canceled Capaciously {previous word italicized in original}], as [marginal note inserted 482][41]	shou'd Think as Justly, tho' they can- not as Copiously, as
125.10 (119.14fb)] Equality between 2 [times interlined in ink above canceled in ink and] 2 [& 4 interlined in ink]is[42]	Equality between 2 times 2 and 4 is
128.15-16 (120-9fb-8fb)] Words and Actions as it becomes Wise Persons and Good Christians [marginal note in- serted ?Rapns Refl D1 5 32][43]
129.7fb-6fb (121.8-9)] Who [final three letters in next word canceled] cannot [bear inserted for canceled endure] to be [mar- ginal note inserted 486[44]	Who can bear to be
130.4fb-131.1 (121.23-25)] conse- quently [how canceled] can we be Un- derstood [? And canceled] if sometimes we annex one Idea to a Word, and sometimes another [? interlined for can- celed,] we [first letter of previous word capi- talized] may [marginal note inserted 487][45]	consequently can we be Understood if sometimes we annex one Idea to a Word, and sometimes another? We may

           

132.11-12 (122.6)] Thus [are inserted in left margin for canceled many times] our Ideas [often inserted in left margin for can- celed are] thought [marginal note inserted 488]	Thus are our Ideas often thought
132.6fb (122.11)] them. [Thus inserted in left margin for? canceled So that] after [marginal note inserted 488][46]	them. Thus after
133.10-14 (122.19-21)] Always obser- ving … highest Evidence and Convic- tion [marginal note inserted Locke][47]
134.1fb-135-1 (123.4-5)] Distinct, ¶ [open bracket before next word] That[48]
135.16 (123.12)] as he ought. Thus we may have [marginal note inserted Les Princip de la Philos de M Des Car-tes Pt 1 45][49]
136.9-137.1 (123.17-8fb)] not. [And were it…. complain of canceled]. ¶ As Judgments[50]	not. ¶ As Judgments

             

138.7fb-6fb (124.15-16)] by Equiva- lents, [the comma canceled] conversation [marginal note inserted 492][51]	by Equivalents conversation
139.8-143.13 (124.15fb-126.4)] Bal- lancing. [But….'em. canceled] ¶ But because[52]	Ballancing. ¶ But because
141.13 (125.15-16)] regularly [cted in- serted in pen in right margin for canceled in pen nex'd in next word] connex'd[53]	regularly connected
143.7fb-4fb (126.7-10)] following Rules, [which Rules, … of 'em. canceled] ¶We have[54]	following Rules. ¶We have
144.11-18 (126.17-20)] Rule I. [And therefore we shou'd in the first place, canceled] Acquiant [y interlined at beginning of next word] our selves throughly with the State of the Question, have a Distinct Notion of [y interlined at beginning of next word] our Subject whatever it be, and of the Terms [you interlined above next word] we make use of, knowing precisely what it is [you interlined above next word] we drive at: [that so we may in the second canceled], [marginal note added 493]	Rule I. Acquiant your selves throughly with the State of the Question, have a Distinct Notion of your Object whatever it be, and of the Terms you make use of, knowing precisely what it is you drive at.
145.3fb-1fb (126.2fb-1fb)] Rule III. [Our Business … {next word italicized in original} To canceled] conduct [y inserted in left margin as first letter of next word] our Thoughts [55]	Rule III. Conduct your Thoughts
146.3-19 (127.1-10)] Compos'd. [I need not … that canceled] Order makes ev- erything, Easie, Strong and Beautiful, and that the Superstructure is neither like to Last or Please unless the Foun- dation be duly laid, [for this is obvious	Compos'd. Order makes everything, Easie, Strong and Beautiful, and that the Superstructure is neither like to Last or Please unless the Foundation be duly laid. Nor are they likely to solve the Difficult, who have neglected

               

to the most Superficial Reader, canceled] Nor are they likely to solve the Dif- ficult, who have neglected or slightly pass'd over the Easie Questions. [Our Knowledge … more Abstruse, canceled] ¶Rule IV. [In this Method … {next two words italicized in original} Not to canceled] leave any [56]	or slightly pass'd over the Easie Ques- tions. ¶Rule IV. Leave any
147.1 (127.13)] Object, if we [read in- serted in right margin for canceled view] but [marginal note inserted 494]	Object, if we read but
148.4 (127.11 fb)] Pieces: [And let us take inserted in left margin for canceled Ever taking] care to [marginal note in- serted 494]	Pieces: And let us take care to
148.9 (127.8fb)] Rule V. [To which pur- pose we must canceled] Always keep [yor inserted in left margin for? canceled our {pre- vious word italicized in original}] Subject [57]	Rule V. Always keep your Subject
149.9-12 (128.6-7)] Rule VI. [All which … which is, {next word italicized in original} To canceled] judge no further than we Perceive [58]	Rule VI. Judge no further than we Perceive
149.17 (128.10)] did so only, [the comma inserted] where[59]	did so only, where
151.8-9 (128.7fb)] found, [final letter of next word canceled] enjoyns us[60]	found, enjoyn us
151.11-15 (i28-5fb-4fb)] But by this we may learn ([the open parenthesis canceled] and so we may by every thing that such weak and fallible Creatures as we are	But by this we may learn and so we may by every thing that such weak and fallible Creatures as we are be sure to think Candidly

                     

[be sure inserted for canceled perform]) [the close parentheses canceled] to think Candidly [marginal note inserted 497][61]
152.5 (129.5-6)] Idea. ¶ [For ?canceled] if[62]	Idea, ¶ If
153.1 (129.17)] But if it be [made can- celed] a Question [marginal note inserted 498]	But if it be a Question
153.9fb (129.13fb)] This. [If therefore inserted in right margin for canceled So that] if we[63]	If therefore we
154.2fb-1fb (130.5-6)] Being. ¶ [For in the first place, canceled] what ever[64]	Being, ¶ What ever
155.14-15 (130.13)] Nor can they derive [their inserted in right margin for canceled either] Being [& interlined above canceled or] Perfection [marginal note inserted 500]	Nor can they derive their Being and Perfection
157.10-11 (130.1fb-131.1)] hastning? ¶ [To Sum up all: canceled] Since[65]	hastning? ¶ Since
158.4 (131.10)] must needs [entertain inserted in left margin for canceled contain] in [marginal note inserted 502]	must needs entertain in
158.10-1fb (131.14-22)] necessary, ¶ [Perhaps these Arguments…. forgot again. But canceled] if some[66]	necessary. ¶ If some
159.8fb-7fb (131.7-6fb)] Happy must be Rich, and [all canceled] who are Rich [marginal note inserted 502]	Happy must be Rich, and who are Rich
160.16-18 (132.7-8)] Happy ([the open parenthesis canceled] in the Enjoyment…	Happy in the Enjoyment … Silver, therefore

                 

Silver,) [the close parenthesis closed] therefore[67]
160.7fb-161.15 (132.8-20)] disting- uish'd. [& inserted for canceled ¶We may further…. we find, that] we cannot [marginal note inserted 503]	distinguish'd and we cannot
162.6fb-5fb (132.2fb-1fb)] Banners [final letter of previous word canceled] of Error[68]	Banner of Error
163.1fb-164.17 (133.15-24)] Truth. ¶ [Neither…. of 'em. ¶ But canceled] it[69]	Truth. ¶ It
167.1-4 (134.19-20)] We all pretend ¶ to this [it's true ?canceled], and think our selves Injur'd if it be not believed [semicolon interlined for canceled that] we are Disninterss'd [marginal note inserted 507][70]	We all pretend to this, and think our selves Injur'd if it be not believed; we are Disinterss'd
168.17-18 (135.3-4)] of Education, Capacity, [ye inserted in pen for canceled of] Leisure, and [ye interlined in pencil] Opportunity[71]	of Education, Capacity, the Leisure, and the Opportunity
169.9-10 (135.13)] not conclude [it inserted in right margin for canceled in] such[72]	not conclude it such
169.2fb-1fb (135.21)] Present Interest, [wch inserted for canceled which is that which] weighs [marginal note inserted 509][73]	Present Interest, which weighs
173.6 (136.11fb)] expect. [So that can- celed] when we [marginal note inserted 511]	expect. When we

                 

173.14-15 (136.7fb)] us ([the open pa- renthesis canceled if other Considerations will not) [the close parenthesis canceled] to be[74]	us if other Considerations will not to be
174.4-5 (137-3)] hereafter, [semicolon in- serted in left margin] When [first letter of previous word crossed through] we[75]	hereafter; when we
174.9 (137.5)] Encouragement, [the comma changed to a period] how [first letter of previous word capitalized] low[76]	Encouragement. How low
175.12-13 (137.19-20)] Beauty. [So that… well observes, canceled] all[77]	Beauty. All
178.1fb-179.1 (138.8fb-7fb)] we're [ye inserted in right margin] then [the final letter of the previous word canceled] perplext and Obscure Writers [marginal note inserted 515][78]	we're the perplext and Obscure Writers
179.12-13 (138.1fb)] yet not [verbose in- serted for? canceled Wordy] and tedious[79]	yet not verbose and tedious
179.2fb-1fb (139.7)] believe, [the pe- riod changed to a semicolon] [also inserted in right margin] Always [marginal note in- serted 515]	believe; also always
180.7fb-181.6 (139.17-24)] meant it. [But this…. Minds. ¶In a word, can- celed] I know[80]	meant it. ¶ I know
183.4-6 (140.13)] Meditations, [yt in- serted in right margin for canceled This] affects a Grave that a Florid Style [mar- ginal note inserted 517][81]	Meditations. That affects a Grave that a Florid Style

               

183.14-16 (140.18)] Reason, the [parity inserted for canceled purity] and propri- ety of Expression [marginal note inserted 517] [82]	Reason, the parity and propriety of Expression
184.13 (140.8fb)] were [first letter of next word underlined] Impartial [marginal note inserted 518][83]	were impartial
184.2fb-1fb (140.1fb-141.1)] us. ¶ [In doing this inserted for canceled And if we do so I believe] we shall[84]	us. ¶ In doing this we shall
188.2fb-190.4 (142.17-34)] recommend it. ¶ [And since Piety…. do good to. ¶[Besides, by being canceled] [marginal note inserted 521] True Christians [we canceled] have Really that Love for oth- ers which all who desire to perswade must pretend to; [they have inserted for canceled we've] that [marginal note inserted 521]	recommend it. ¶True Christians have Really that Love for others which all who desire to perswade must pretend to; they have that
191.9 (143.13-14)] Provoke, [now arriv'd to a more scandalous degree of Rage & Insoln yn ever inserted in ink in top margin] whence [marginal note inserted in pencil 522][85]	Provoke, now arriv'd to a more scan- dalous degree of Rage and Insolence then ever whence
193.8 (144.3-4)] we. ¶ [I've said can- celed] nothing [has been sd inserted in right margin] of [marginal note inserted 524]	we. ¶ Nothing has been said of
194.6-7 (144.16-17)] Conversation ¶ But for [marginal note inserted thus for L Lib][86]
216.2fb-1fb (153.15-16)] them, ¶ [For inserted in left margin for canceled But] as	them, For as

   

293.9 (180.2fb)] disagreeableness [in them interlined]?	disagreeableness in them?
298 (182[87] )] ERRATA. [marginal note in- serted p 107 cho / que][88]

APPENDIX 2

Front Pastedown

Introduction

Astell makes several direct references to The Ladies Library (1714) at the top
of the page. Though many of her words are smudged beyond recognition, the
still legible points of reference suggest that she was fishing for ammunition to use
against it and its author.

In the middle of the page, Astell has penned a brief biography of François
Fénelon, including the date of his death, a significant fact when considering the
possible dating of Astell's additions to her text.

Astell often uses asterisks to mark her in-text emendations; this would appear to
be the purport of the phrase "allowing all changes" which follows the asterisk here.

At the bottom of the page is the shelfmark (3 D 17) used by William Law's
library in King's Cliffe.

Text

• Ladys Library recom. Poetry p. 22. & discomends it p. 25. V.1. See [two words illegible] of
  Lad [word illegible] P361-365 V.2
• [word illegible] made of pt.3-V3 [the citation appears to have been superimposed over a citation which
  may have read pt.3-p. 337]
• Mr. Fenelon wrot L'Educ. des. Filles at ye reqt of ye Duke of Beauvilliers afterwards Gov-
  ernor to ye D. of Burgundy 1689. (He also wrot Sur le Ministere des Pasteurs) L'abbe
  de Langeron was Reader, & D. Le Valois Jesuit, Confessor ?to ye Prince, L'abbe de
  Flenoy sub Preceptor. 6 y ye A. Bp liv'd a Favorite at Court wth out any Benefice (ex-
  cept a small Priory his Uncle had resign'd) & yn ye K. gave him ye Abby of St Valery
  & a little after ye A. Bpr of Camb wch he wou'd not accept but on condition to be
  9 moneths there & 3 wth ye Princes, & gave up St Vallery & his Priory. His Maxims of
  ye S wrote in 1697. Banish'd ye [illegible] Aug. 1697. Banish'd wn ye D. of Burg. was
  15. Died Jan 8 1715/16.
• * allowing all changes

APPENDIX 3

First Front Free Endpaper, Recto and Verso

Introduction

Astell summarizes the opening portion of Edward Coke's exposition of an
Elizabethan statute pertaining to the incorporation of charitable institutions (Sec-
ond Part [fifth ed. 1671]). Many of her phrases come directly from Coke's legal
commentary; see 720-725, especially 722-723.

The legal parameters here delineated clearly shaped Astell's plan for the Chel-
sea school. She is careful in her letter of 4 Sept. 1730 to Lady Betty Hastings to
distinguish between the £200 her aristocratic supporter had pledged "towards
building a charity school" and the "£200 more" she planned to raise "by benefac-
tions towards the use of the building" (reprinted in Perry 399; emphasis mine)—i.e., the
maximum initial endowment allowed without procuring a license of Mortmain,
essentially a tax paid to the monarch for the right to incorporate. Blackstone's dis-
cussion of this point in Commentaries (1765-69) is illuminating: "THE parliament,
we observed, by it's absolute and transcendent authority, may perform this, or any
other act whatsoever: and actually did perform it to a great extent, by statute 39
Eliz. c. 5. which incorporated all hospitals and houses of correction founded by
charitable persons, without farther trouble: and the same has been done in other
cases of charitable foundations. But otherwise it is not usual thus to intrench upon
the prerogative of the crown, and the king may prevent it when he pleases. And,
in the particular instance before-mentioned, it was done, as sir Edward Coke
observes, to avoid the charges of incorporation and licences of mortmain in small
benefactions; which in his days were grown so great, that it discouraged many men
to undertake these pious and charitable works" (1.18.462). Governmental concern
that too much privately held land was passing into charitable corporations—and
thereby rendered inalienable—led to the passing in 1736 of statute 9 George II
c.36, the so-called "Statute of Mortmain," which strictly limited the ability of own-
ers to make charitable dispositions of their properties. For an excellent account
of the imprecision with which concepts of charity and mortmain historically have
been conflated, see Chantel Stebbings, "Charity Land: A Mortmain Confusion,"
The Journal of Legal History 12.1 (1991): 7-19.

Text

• N. By 39 Eliz. c. 5. wch was made perpetual by 21. Jac. I. C. 1 Concerning ye Erection
  of Hospitals & Houses of Correction [two words scratched out] also Measons de dieu. &
  abiding places. [word scratched out] Any Person may erect such a house wthout licence
  of Mortmain, & endow it wth Manners, Lands, Tenemts hereditamts in fee-simple free-
  hold, to ye value of 200 £ & no more, nor less than 10£ p. annum. But if by improvemt,
  ye Land wch was not above 200 £ p an. at ye endowmnt, becomes worth more, they
  may enjoy its Goods and Chattels (real or personal) they may take of wt value soever.
  It cannot be erected by any other Instrument but by deed enrolled in ye Chancery,
  in Parchment. The Persons must be plac'd & nam'd wn ye Founder gives ym yr name
  of Incorporation, & yn ye Law by ye Act Incorporates ym.

APPENDIX 4

Penultimate Rear Free Endpaper, Recto

Introduction

Astell excerpts a sizable passage from a sermon by non-juror George Hickes
(A Sermon Preached at the Church of St. Bridget [1684]). Hickes takes Hebrews 13.16
as his starting point: "But to do good, and to communicate, forget not; for with
such Sacrifices God is well-pleased."

Astell knew Hickes and so could have come at his sermon in any number of
ways. Her pagination reveals her source to be a copy of the sermon as published
individually in 1684 (the quoted material does indeed fall on pp. 26-27), but it is
worth noting the appearance in 1713 of A Collection of Sermons, Formerly Preached by
the Reverend George Hickes, D. D., 2 vols.

Text

• I wou'd also put you in mind of establishing a Fund for endowing of poor Maids, who have
  liv'd so many years in Service, & of building Schools, or Colleges for ye Education
  of Young Women, much like unto those in ye Universitys, for ye Educations of Young
  Men, but not wth out some alteration in ye Discipline and Oeconomy, as ye nature of
  such an Institution wou'd require.
• Such Colleges might be so order'd, as to become security to yE Daughters against all ye
  hazards to which they are expos'd at private schools, & likewise a Security to ye Gov-
  ernment, yt Daughters of ye Land shou'd be bred up according to ye Religion now
  establish'd in it, to ye unconceivable advantage of ye Public, in rooting out Enthusiasm
  with her Daughter Schism. Both which are upheld by nothing amongst us so much as
  by ye Women, who are so silly & deceiveable, for want of Ingenious [sic] & Orthodox
  Education & not for want of Parts methinks. Ye Rich & Honorable Lady's of ye Ch.
  Of Engl ye Elect Ladys of her Apostolical Communion, shou'd be Jealous to begin
  & carry on such a Work as this; wch upon more accounts yn I have mention'd, wou'd
  make ye Daughters of Israel be glad, & ye Daughters of Judah & Jerusulem Rejoyce.
  Dr. Hicks in his [word illegible] Sermon, Apr. 1 1684. P 26, 27.

APPENDIX 5

Final Rear Free Endpaper, Recto and Verso

Introduction

Astell records a financial record (see figure 1) for Sutton's Hospital, also
known as King James's Hospital, but better known then (and generally known
now) as the Charterhouse, a charitable institution created and supported by a
bequest in the will of Thomas Sutton (1532-1611). The "Brothers" to whom the
record refers speak to the Hospital's mission as a pensioners' home for elderly
men, many of them sailors who, to borrow a phrase from Gerald Davies, "had
served England well in the hours of her need and were now left high and dry to

beg their bread in their old age" (223). The references to "Scholars" underscore
its other function as a school for promising boys of upstanding, but financially
limited, families. Not only Richard Steele, but Joseph Addison, John Wesley, and,
in the nineteenth century, William Thackeray would benefit from Sutton's gift.

The similarity between Sutton's dual-purpose foundation and Astell's Chel-
sea school for girls, itself an outgrowth of the Royal Hospital for elderly veterans,
would not have been lost on her. Along with 80 brothers, Sutton's will made pro-
visions for 40 scholars; Astell's Chelsea school, according to Perry, "was meant
to handle thirty poor girls" (238).

Astell's source for this account is almost certainly Samuel Herne's Domus Car-
thusiana (1677), which, on 145-153, transcribes in pounds, shillings, and pence the
Establishment for the Dyets, Liveries, Stipends, Wages, and other Charges and Expences […]
at the humble Petition, and only costs and charges of Thomas Sutton, Esquire […].
Astell's handwriting here is particularly inscrutable; I devoted an embarrass-
ing number of months to discovering "Fuller's Hospital," another contemporary
almshouse near London (as it turns out), only to ascertain its utter incompatibility
with the numbers Astell recorded. I deciphered many of her other references only
by consulting Herne.

Astell records many of the specific entries she found in Herne, though she
does at times combine several entries into a single category or ignore single
entries entirely; she also renders Herne's roman numerals as arabic. Interlaced
through several of the entries in smaller print are Astell's attempts to arrive at
a "per person" figure, something Herne does only on occasion—a point of dif-
ference tracked, along with particularly archaic references, in the endnotes (ren-
dered as arabic to avoid, as much as possible, confusion). The money system in
Astell's day and for nearly three centuries beyond, it should be noted, consisted
of 12 pennies to the shilling, 20 shillings to the pound.

Text

Suttons Hospital

         

	£s d
8 At ye Masters Table weekly for Bread, 10[1]	4. 0. 0
Beer, Diet, Detriments[2]
80[3] at ye Brothers for etc. ?at 1s 7 a head (-10)	7. 13. 4
42 at ye Scholars	6. 18. 3½

       

at 3s 3½ 4½
10 at ye Manciples[4] 4s 5d	2. 4. 2[5]
2 of ye Kitchen & one Porter 4s 5d	13. 0
5 Attendts at ye ?Masters Table for ?76 Bread and Beer 9/14	5. 10

Weekly Beavors[6]

               

8 at ye Masters 1s 2d [7]	9. 4
Five Attendts 1s.2d	5. 10
40 Schol one Butlr one Groom 16½ + 2½[8]	16. 4
80 Brothers in Money a head 1.9	7. 0. 0
10 at ye Mancip 2 Kite One Por ter in money 4.7½+ ½	3. 0. 0
Dyet & Beav. Weekly Yearly	33. 6. 1.½ 1731. 18. 6½
Exceeding days[9]	44. 9. 4
	1776. 7. 10½[10]

Liverys[11]

   

80 Brothers 40s a piece	160. 0. 0
40 Schol. 36s. 2d Gowns	72. 6. 8

               

their Summer suits 29s. 6	69. 0. 0[14]
Winter suits 17s. 10d a piece	35. 13. 4
Shoes & Stockings etc.	56. 0. 0[15]
Books Paper - -	14. 0. 0
Gowns for Organist etc.[12] at 40s a ?piece	8. 0. 0
16 Grooms etc.[13]	16. 0. 0
	431. 0. 0
Wages & Fees[16]	1066. 6. 0

Ordinary Allowances

             

Masters Fuel	10. 0. 0
Preachers	5. 0. 0
Fuel for ye Hospital	152. 0. 0
Renewing ye Housold stuff	50. 0. 0
Candles	45. 0. 0
Washing etc. in all[17]	432. 16. 0
Ye Whole 3706 £ . 9s. 10½[18]

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