The learned Whiston published in
the circumstance a fulfilment of a prophecy of Esdras, and St. Andre
loudly urged the authenticity of the entire fable and of the theories
that were founded upon it. But the satiric pen of Swift, the burin of
Hogarth, and the graver investigations of Cheselden at last turned the
popular tide, and covered St. Andre in particular with such a load of
contemptuous obloquy as to drive him forever from the high circles he
had moved in. So great was his spleen, that, from that time forth, he
would never suffer a dish upon his table or a syllable in his
conversation that could in any way bring to mind the absurd occasion of
his disgrace.
If all reports are to be believed, St. Andre's career had led him into
many singular adventures. He had saved Voltaire's life, by violently
detaining Lord Peterborough, when the latter stood prepared to punish
with peremptory death some peccadillo of the Frenchman's. Voltaire fled
from the scene, while his adversary struggled to be released. His
services to Pope, when the poet was overturned in Lord Bolingbroke's
coach, did not protect him from a damaging allusion in the Epilogue to
the Satires, where the source of the wealth that he got by his marriage
with Lady Betty Molyneux is more plainly than politely pointed out.
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