My re opening of the Bishop Berkeley’s crusade seemed to have gone unnoticed and unremarked on. I concede there are many distracting events and competing cures and lures. And it would be an act of hubris tending towards the extreme that my port hole should be visited before or instead of others. Besides, we don’t offer unclad bodies in contorted poses or cheap watered down milk or devices guaranteed to provide non stop titilitation or savagely reduced air fares together with delux accomodation and free desert cycling tours to Samarkland or Taskent. Nor sadly do we offer cheap storm damaged banana. Our only saleable products in truth are the eminent bishop’s tar water recipes and his delectable and far seeing observations, recommended to be savoured at the rate of 2 co ordinated sentences a day.

To expatiate on our wares a little, consider the following.

Concerning the recuperative powers of his fabled tar water (vouched for by my exacting neigbour and long devotee of the Lord and his faithful daughter in law Mary, Rosa Rosalino) I can do no better than quote his eminence. He writes in his 1747 paper (Siris):L

….” if the lute be not well tuned, the musician fails in his harmony. And, in our present state, the operations of the mind so far depend on the right tone or good condition of its instrument that anything which greatly contributes to preserve or recover the health of the body is well worth the attention of the mind.

He concludes his recommendation by adding that ‘these considerations (i.e. the harmonious operations of the mind) have moved me to communicate the salutary virtues of tar-water; to which I have thought myself obliged by the duty everyman owes to mankind”.

As I am sure you will agree a more persuasive pitch on behalf of a yet to be popularly embraced commodity is difficult to imagine. What other product can boast – with support from a very satisfied patron – to improve the toneful and good conditioning of that indispensable instrument, the mind.

I leave yu with these reflections.  Recipes for the afore mentioned tar water can be obtained via this site. A small token of appreciation would be appreciated, in proportion to one’s capacity.

In deepest Thornbury where I now reside – except for the late summer months when I and Mayr retreat to the coast – the weather is glorious. A lovely blue canopy stretches over head and and a soft waffing breeze trickles between the Frangipanies. Mayr is currently exploring the ether looking for corporate errors and dysfunctions and the availability of good condition Kyoto furniture, a rare indulgence of hers along with freshly painted surfaces.

A more sustained reading and probing of the Bishop’s Principles of Human Knowledge – a magnificent stimulus to the harmonious operations of the mind – will follow shortly.

I have offered my services free of charge to the wayward colonel love me truely Gadadfi but have yet to receive a reply from him or his representatives.

May you the discerning consumers – collectively known as the market and whether yu are chivering in Taskent or ruminating on current film fables in wellington street – be less churlish.

much love

The remote antipodean ancestor of the former eminent Bishop Berkeley of Cloyne

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