Bernard Mandeville’s 'A Modest Defence of Publick Stews'

In A Modest Defence of Publick Stews (1724) its reputed author Dr. Bernard Mandeville argues that the best solution to the problems of prostitution (with its related evils of venereal disease, infanticide and other crimes) is not to stamp it out-an impossibility-but to legalize it and regulate it under strict government supervision. This proposal seems serious enough, but Mandeville’s satire, with bawdy humor and passages of deliberately faulty reasoning, calls into question the seriousness of this somewhat utopian project. In this first annotated edition, the editor reveals that this complex work often relies upon ancient Classical and Renaissance authors (Plato, Ovid, Martial, Shakespeare, Ariosto, Milton, Butler and especially Montaigne) and that it merits reconsideration as a work richer in literary values and vitality than most readers had previously imagined. It also remains very pertinent to our ongoing debates on prostitution and sexuality in this era of HIV and AIDS.