In spite of all this preliminary discussion the scheme was not immediately carried out. In November, 1712 (No. 528), "Rachel Welladay" wrote reproachfully: "You never have given us the Catalogue of a Lady's Library as you promised." And it was not till 1714 that _The Ladies' Library_ was published by Steele. Though in three volumes and quite expensive, it became at once so popular that there was an eighth edition by 1772.[430] The book was said to be "Written by a Lady," but it is in reality a compilation from seventeenth-century authors. In the _Athenæum_ (July 5, 1884) is an article by Mr. Aitkin in which the chief passages are traced to Taylor's _Holy Living_ (168 pages), Fleetwood's _Relative Duties of Parents and Children_, _The Whole Duty of Man_, _The Government of the Tongue_, _The Ladies' Calling_ (208 pages), Locke's _Treatise on Education_, Lucas's _Practical Christianity and Enquiry after Happiness_, Scott's _Christian Life_, Tillotson's _Sermons_, Mary Astell's _Serious Proposal_ (86 pages), Halifax's _Advice to a Daughter_ (47 pages), Hickes's _Education of a Daughter_. Angry charges were brought against Steele for his use of such copious extracts from Jeremy Taylor, as "an infringement on the rights of the poor orphans who have very little else to subsist on,"[431] and Mary Astell commented satirically on the consistency of the author who had shown his teeth against her _Serious Proposal_ and then had transcribed "above a hundred pages of it" into his _Ladies' Library_. But no individual cavils interfered with the general approval. The book was received as an extremely judicious compilation of the best passages from authoritative sources. _The Ladies' Calling_, _Advice to a Daughter_, _A Serious Proposal_, and _The Education of a Daughter_, however unacceptable to modern thought many of their fundamental assumptions and practical rules may be, represented the highest and most dignified contemporary views as to the rights and responsibilities of women. Brought together thus in one survey these ideas would make a cumulative impression. There was nothing in the quotations to antagonize or terrify the most conservative religious readers, yet the total effect of the book would be a recognition of woman's ability to think on important and difficult questions, and the outcome would be to give her insensibly a more honorable place in home, social, and church life. [Sidenote: The Gentleman Instructed (8th ed., 1728)]