CHAPTER XV

Dr. _Slop_ was within an ace of being an exception to all this argumentation: for happening to have his green bays bag upon his knees, when he began to parody my uncle _Toby_--’twas as good as the best mantle in the world to him: for which purpose, when he foresaw the sentence would end in his new-invented _forceps_, he thrust his hand into the bag in order to have them ready to clap in, when your reverences took so much notice of the ***, which had he managed----my uncle _Toby_ had certainly been overthrown: the sentence and the argument in that case jumping closely in one point, so like the two lines which form the salient angle of a ravelin, ----Dr. _Slop_ would never have given them up; --and my uncle _Toby_ would as soon have thought of flying, as taking them by force: but Dr. _Slop_ fumbled so vilely in pulling them out, it took off the whole effect, and what was a ten times worse evil (for they seldom come alone in this life) in pulling out his _forceps_, his _forceps_ unfortunately drew out the _squirt_ along with it.

When a proposition can be taken in two senses--’tis a law in disputation, That the respondent may reply to which of the two he pleases, or finds most convenient for him. ----This threw the advantage of the argument quite on my uncle _Toby’s_ side. ----“Good God!” cried my uncle _Toby_, “_are children brought into the world with a squirt?_”

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