No More Learning

The king may be instigated by
one man to the destruction of another; he may sometimes think himself
endangered by the virtues of a subject; he may dread the successful
general or the popular orator; his avarice may point out golden
confiscations; and his guilt may whisper that he can only be secure by
cutting off all power of revenge.

But what can a parent hope from the oppression of those who were born to
his protection, of those who can disturb him with no competition, who
can enrich him with no spoils? Why cowards are cruel may be easily
discovered; but for what reason, not more infamous than cowardice, can
that man delight in oppression who has nothing to fear?

The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation,
that those whom he injures are always in his sight. The injustice of a
prince is often exercised upon those of whom he never had any personal
or particular knowledge; and the sentence which he pronounces, whether
of banishment, imprisonment, or death, removes from his view the man
whom he condemns. But the domestick oppressor dooms himself to gaze upon
those faces which he clouds with terrour and with sorrow; and beholds
every moment the effects of his own barbarities. He that can bear to
give continual pain to those who surround him, and can walk with
satisfaction in the gloom of his own presence; he that can see
submissive misery without relenting, and meet without emotion the eye
that implores mercy, or demands justice, will scarcely be amended by
remonstrance or admonition; he has found means of stopping the avenues
of tenderness, and arming his heart against the force of reason.

Even though no consideration should be paid to the great law of social
beings, by which every individual is commanded to consult the happiness
of others, yet the harsh parent is less to be vindicated than any other
criminal, because he less provides for the happiness of himself. Every
man, however little he loves others, would willingly be loved; every man
hopes to live long, and therefore hopes for that time at which he shall
sink back to imbecility, and must depend for ease and cheerfulness upon
the officiousness of others. But how has he obviated the inconveniencies
of old age, who alienates from him the assistance of his children, and
whose bed must be surrounded in the last hours, in the hours of languor
and dejection, of impatience and of pain, by strangers to whom his life
is indifferent, or by enemies to whom his death is desirable?

Piety will, indeed, in good minds overcome provocation, and those who
have been harassed by brutality will forget the injuries which they have
suffered, so far as to perform the last duties with alacrity and zeal.
But surely no resentment can be equally painful with kindness thus
undeserved, nor can severer punishment be imprecated upon a man not
wholly lost in meanness and stupidity, than, through the tediousness of
decrepitude, to be reproached by the kindness of his own children, to
receive not the tribute but the alms of attendance, and to owe every
relief of his miseries, not to gratitude but to mercy.



No. 149. TUESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1751.

_Quod non sit Pylades hoc tempore, non sit Orestes,
Miraris? Pylades, Marce, bibebat idem.
Nec melior panis, turdusve dabatur Oresti:
Sed par, atque eadem coena duobus erat. --
Te Cadmea Tyrus, me pinguis Gallia vestit:
Vis te purpureum, Marce, sagatus amem?
Ut praestem Pyladen, aliquis mihi praestet Orestem.
Hoc non fit verbis, Marce: ut ameris, ama_. MART. Lib. vi. Ep. xi.

You wonder now that no man sees
Such friends as those of ancient Greece.
Here lay the point--Orestes' meat
Was just the same his friend did eat;
Nor can it yet be found, his wine
Was better, Pylades, than thine.
In home-spun russet, I am drest,
Your cloth is always of the best;
But, honest Marcus, if you please
To chuse me for your Pylades,
Remember, words alone are vain;
Love--if you would be lov'd again. F. LEWIS.

TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

No depravity of the mind has been more frequently or justly censured
than ingratitude. There is indeed sufficient reason for looking on those
that can return evil for good, and repay kindness and assistance with
hatred or neglect, as corrupted beyond the common degrees of wickedness;
nor will he, who has once been clearly detected in acts of injury to his
benefactor, deserve to be numbered among social beings; he has
endeavoured to destroy confidence, to intercept sympathy, and to turn
every man's attention wholly on himself.

There is always danger lest the honest abhorrence of a crime should
raise the passions with too much violence against the man to whom it is
imputed. In proportion as guilt is more enormous, it ought to be
ascertained by stronger evidence. The charge against ingratitude is very
general; almost every man can tell what favours he has conferred upon
insensibility, and how much happiness he has bestowed without return;
but perhaps, if these patrons and protectors were confronted with any
whom they boast of having befriended, it would often appear that they
consulted only their pleasure or vanity, and repaid themselves their
petty donatives by gratifications of insolence and indulgence of
contempt.

It has happened that much of my time has been passed in a dependent
state, and consequently I have received many favours in the opinion of
those at whose expense I have been maintained; yet I do not feel in my
heart any burning gratitude or tumultuous affection; and, as I would not
willingly suppose myself less susceptible of virtuous passions than the
rest of mankind, I shall lay the history of my life before you, that you
may, by your judgment of my conduct, either reform, or confirm, my
present sentiments. My father was the second son of a very ancient and
wealthy family. He married a lady of equal birth, whose fortune, joined
to his own, might have supported his posterity in honour; but being gay
and ambitious, he prevailed on his friends to procure him a post, which
gave him an opportunity of displaying his elegance and politeness. My
mother was equally pleased with splendour, and equally careless of
expense; they both justified their profusion to themselves, by
endeavouring to believe it necessary to the extension of their
acquaintance, and improvement of their interest; and whenever any place
became vacant, they expected to be repaid. In the midst of these hopes
my father was snatched away by an apoplexy; and my mother, who had no
pleasure but in dress, equipage, assemblies, and compliments, finding
that she could live no longer in her accustomed rank, sunk into
dejection, and in two years wore out her life with envy and discontent.

I was sent with a sister, one year younger than myself, to the elder
brother of my father. We were not yet capable of observing how much
fortune influences affection, but flattered ourselves on the road with
the tenderness and regard with which we should be treated by our uncle.
Our reception was rather frigid than malignant; we were introduced to
our young cousins, and for the first month more frequently consoled than
upbraided; but in a short time we found our prattle repressed, our dress
neglected, our endearments unregarded, and our requests referred to the
housekeeper.

The forms of decency were now violated, and every day produced new
insults. We were soon brought to the necessity of receding from our
imagined equality with our cousins, to whom we sunk into humble
companions without choice or influence, expected only to echo their
opinions, facilitate their desires, and accompany their rambles. It was
unfortunate that our early introduction into polite company, and
habitual knowledge of the arts of civility, had given us such an
appearance of superiority to the awkward bashfulness of our relations,
as naturally drew respect and preference from every stranger; and my
aunt was forced to assert the dignity of her own children, while they
were sculking in corners for fear of notice, and hanging down their
heads in silent confusion, by relating the indiscretion of our father,
displaying her own kindness, lamenting the misery of birth without
estate, and declaring her anxiety for our future provision, and the
expedients which she had formed to secure us from those follies or
crimes, to which the conjunction of pride and want often gives occasion.
In a short time care was taken to prevent such vexatious mistakes; we
were told, that fine clothes would only fill our heads with false
expectations, and our dress was therefore accommodated to our fortune.

Childhood is not easily dejected or mortified. We felt no lasting pain
from insolence or neglect; but finding that we were favoured and
commended by all whose interest did not prompt them to discountenance
us, preserved our vivacity and spirit to years of greater sensibility.
It then became irksome and disgusting to live without any principle of
action but the will of another, and we often met privately in the garden
to lament our condition, and to ease our hearts with mutual narratives
of caprice, peevishness, and affront.

There are innumerable modes of insult and tokens of contempt, for which
it is not easy to find a name, which vanish to nothing in an attempt to
describe them, and yet may, by continual repetition, make day pass after
day in sorrow and in terrour. Phrases of cursory compliment and
established salutation may, by a different modulation of the voice, or
cast of the countenance, convey contrary meanings, and be changed from
indications of respect to expressions of scorn. The dependant who
cultivates delicacy in himself, very little consults his own
tranquillity. My unhappy vigilance is every moment discovering some
petulance of accent, or arrogance of mien, some vehemence of
interrogation, or quickness of reply, that recals my poverty to my mind,
and which I feel more acutely, as I know not how to resent it.

You are not, however, to imagine, that I think myself discharged from
the duties of gratitude, only because my relations do not adjust their
looks, or tune their voices to my expectation. The insolence of
benefaction terminates not in negative rudeness or obliquities of
insult. I am often told in express terms of the miseries from which
charity has snatched me, while multitudes are suffered by relations
equally near to devolve upon the parish; and have more than once heard
it numbered among other favours, that I am admitted to the same table
with my cousins.

That I sit at the first table I must acknowledge, but I sit there only
that I may feel the stings of inferiority. My inquiries are neglected,
my opinion is overborne, my assertions are controverted, and, as
insolence always propagates itself, the servants overlook me, in
imitation of their master; if I call modestly, I am not heard; if
loudly, my usurpation of authority is checked by a general frown. I am
often obliged to look uninvited upon delicacies, and sometimes desired
to rise upon very slight pretences.

The incivilities to which I am exposed would give me less pain, were
they not aggravated by the tears of my sister, whom the young ladies are
hourly tormenting with every art of feminine persecution. As it is said
of the supreme magistrate of Venice, that he is a prince in one place
and a slave in another, my sister is a servant to her cousins in their
apartments, and a companion only at the table. Her wit and beauty drew
so much regard away from them, that they never suffer her to appear with
them in any place where they solicit notice, or expect admiration; and
when they are visited by neighbouring ladies and pass their hours in
domestick amusements, she is sometimes called to fill a vacancy,
insulted with contemptuous freedoms, and dismissed to her needle, when
her place is supplied. The heir has of late, by the instigation of his
sisters, begun to harass her with clownish jocularity; he seems inclined
to make his first rude essays of waggery upon her; and by the
connivance, if not encouragement, of his father, treats her with such
licentious brutality, as I cannot bear, though I cannot punish it.

I beg to be informed, Mr. Rambler, how much we can be supposed to owe to
beneficence, exerted on terms like these? to beneficence which pollutes
its gifts with contumely, and may be truly said to pander to pride? I
would willingly be told, whether insolence does not reward its own
liberalities, and whether he that exacts servility can, with justice, at
the same time, expect affection?

I am, Sir, &c.

HYPERDULUS.



No. 150. SATURDAY, AUGUST 24, 1751.

--_O munera nondum
Intellecta Deum! _ LUCAN.

--Thou chiefest good!
Bestow'd by Heav'n, but seldom understood. ROWE.

As daily experience makes it evident that misfortunes are unavoidably
incident to human life, that calamity will neither be repelled by
fortitude, nor escaped by flight; neither awed by greatness, nor eluded
by obscurity; philosophers have endeavoured to reconcile us to that
condition which they cannot teach us to mend, by persuading us that most
of our evils are made afflictive only by ignorance or perverseness, and
that nature has annexed to every vicissitude of external circumstances
some advantage sufficient to over-balance all its inconveniencies.

This attempt may, perhaps, be justly suspected of resemblance to the
practice of physicians, who, when they cannot mitigate pain, destroy
sensibility, and endeavour to conceal, by opiates, the inefficacy of
their other medicines. The panegyrists of calamity have more frequently
gained applause to their wit, than acquiescence to their arguments; nor
has it appeared that the most musical oratory, or subtle ratiocination,
has been able long to overpower the anguish of oppression, the
tediousness of languor, or the longings of want.

Yet, it may be generally remarked, that, where much has been attempted,
something has been performed; though the discoveries or acquisitions of
man are not always adequate to the expectations of his pride, they are
at least sufficient to animate his industry. The antidotes with which
philosophy has medicated the cup of life, though they cannot give it
salubrity and sweetness, have at least allayed its bitterness, and
contempered its malignity; the balm which she drops upon the wounds of
the mind abates their pain, though it cannot heal them.

By suffering willingly what we cannot avoid, we secure ourselves from
vain and immoderate disquiet; we preserve for better purposes that
strength which would be unprofitably wasted in wild efforts of
desperation, and maintain that circumspection which may enable us to
seize every support, and improve every alleviation. This calmness will
be more easily obtained, as the attention is more powerfully withdrawn
from the contemplation of unmingled unabated evil, and diverted to those
accidental benefits which prudence may confer on every state.

Seneca has attempted, not only to pacify us in misfortune, but almost to
allure us to it, by representing it as necessary to the pleasures of the
mind. _He that never was acquainted with adversity_, says he, _has seen
the world but on one side, and is ignorant of half the scenes of
nature_. He invites his pupil to calamity, as the Syrens allured the
passenger to their coasts, by promising that he shall return [Greek:
pleiona eidos], with increase of knowledge, with enlarged views, and
multiplied ideas.

Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the
last; and perhaps always predominates in proportion to the strength of
the contemplative faculties. He who easily comprehends all that is
before him, and soon exhausts any single subject, is always eager for
new inquiries; and, in proportion as the intellectual eye takes in a
wider prospect, it must be gratified with variety by more rapid flights,
and bolder excursions; nor perhaps can there be proposed to those who
have been accustomed to the pleasures of thought, a more powerful
incitement to any undertaking, than the hope of filling their fancy with
new images, of clearing their doubts, and enlightening their reason.

When Jason, in Valerius Flaccus, would incline the young prince Acastus
to accompany him in the first essay of navigation, he disperses his
apprehensions of danger by representations of the new tracts of earth
and heaven, which the expedition would spread before their eyes; and
tells him with what grief he will hear, at their return, of the
countries which they shall have seen, and the toils which they have
surmounted:

_O quantum terrae, quantum cognoscere coeli
Permissum est! pelagus quantos aperimus in usus!
Nunc forsan grave reris opus: sed laeta recurret
Cum ratis, et caram cum jam mihi reddet Iolcon;
Quis pudor heu nostros tibi tunc audire labores!
Quam referam visas tua per suspiria gentes! _ ARG. Lib. i. 168.

Led by our stars, what tracts immense we trace!
From seas remote, what funds of science raise!
A pain to thought! but when the heroick band
Returns applauded to their native land,
A life domestick you will then deplore,
And sigh while I describe the various, shore. EDW. CAVE.

Acastus was soon prevailed upon by his curiosity to set rocks and
hardships at defiance, and commit his life to the winds; and the same
motives have in all ages had the same effect upon those whom the desire
of fame or wisdom has distinguished from the lower orders of mankind.

If, therefore, it can be proved that distress is necessary to the
attainment of knowledge, and that a happy situation hides from us so
large a part of the field of meditation, the envy of many who repine at
the sight of affluence and splendour will be much diminished; for such
is the delight of mental superiority, that none on whom nature or study
have conferred it, would purchase the gifts of fortune by its loss.

It is certain, that however the rhetorick of Seneca may have dressed
adversity with extrinsick ornaments, he has justly represented it as
affording some opportunities of observation, which cannot be found in
continual success; he has truly asserted, that to escape misfortune is
to want instruction, and that to live at ease is to live in ignorance.

As no man can enjoy happiness without thinking that he enjoys it, the
experience of calamity is necessary to a just sense of better fortune:
for the good of our present state is merely comparative, and the evil
which every man feels will be sufficient to disturb and harass him, if
he does not know how much he escapes. The lustre of diamonds is
invigorated by the interposition of darker bodies; the lights of a
picture are created by the shades. The highest pleasure which nature has
indulged to sensitive perception, is that of rest after fatigue; yet,
that state which labour heightens into delight, is of itself only ease,
and is incapable of satisfying the mind without the superaddition of
diversified amusements.

Prosperity, as is truly asserted by Seneca, very much obstructs the
knowledge of ourselves. No man can form a just estimate of his own
powers by unactive speculation. That fortitude which has encountered no
dangers, that prudence which has surmounted no difficulties, that
integrity which has been attacked by no temptations, can at best be
considered but as gold not yet brought to the test, of which therefore
the true value cannot be assigned. _He that traverses the lists without
an adversary, may receive_, says the philosopher, _the reward of
victory, but he has no pretensions to the honour_. If it be the highest
happiness of man to contemplate himself with satisfaction, and to
receive the gratulations of his own conscience; he whose courage has
made way amidst the turbulence of opposition, and whose vigour has
broken through the snares of distress, has many advantages over those
that have slept in the shades of indolence, and whose retrospect of time
can entertain them with nothing but day rising upon day, and year
gliding after year.

Equally necessary is some variety of fortune to a nearer inspection of
the manners, principles, and affections of mankind. Princes, when they
would know the opinions or grievances of their subjects, find it
necessary to steal away from guards and attendants, and mingle on equal
terms among the people. To him who is known to have the power of doing
good or harm, nothing is shewn in its natural form. The behaviour of all
that approach him is regulated by his humour, their narratives are
adapted to his inclination, and their reasonings determined by his
opinions; whatever can alarm suspicion, or excite resentment, is
carefully suppressed, and nothing appears but uniformity of sentiments,
and ardour of affection. It may be observed, that the unvaried
complaisance which ladies have the right of exacting, keeps them
generally unskilled in human nature; prosperity will always enjoy the
female prerogatives, and therefore must be always in danger of female
ignorance. Truth is scarcely to be heard, but by those from whom it can
serve no interest to conceal it.



No. 151. TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 1751.

[Greek:--Amphi d anthro-
pon phresin amplakiai
Anarithmatoi kremantai
Touto d amachanon eurein,
O ti nun, kai en teleu-
ta, phertaton andri tuchein. ] PINDAR, Ol. vii. 43.
[Transcriber's note: line breaks and hyphenation in original. ]

But wrapt in error is the human mind,
And human bliss is ever insecure:
Know we what fortune yet remains behind?
Know we how long the present shall endure? WEST.

The writers of medicine and physiology have traced, with great
appearance of accuracy, the effects of time upon the human body, by
marking the various periods of the constitution, and the several stages
by which animal life makes its progress from infancy to decrepitude.
Though their observations have not enabled them to discover how manhood
may be accelerated, or old age retarded, yet surely, if they be
considered only as the amusements of curiosity, they are of equal
importance with conjectures on things more remote, with catalogues of
the fixed stars, and calculations of the bulk of planets.

It had been a task worthy of the moral philosophers to have considered
with equal care the climactericks of the mind; to have pointed out the
time at which every passion begins and ceases to predominate, and noted
the regular variations of desire, and the succession of one appetite to
another.

The periods of mental change are not to be stated with equal certainty;
our bodies grow up under the care of nature, and depend so little on our
own management, that something more than negligence is necessary to
discompose their structure, or impede their vigour. But our minds are
committed in a great measure first to the direction of others, and
afterwards of ourselves. It would be difficult to protract the weakness
of infancy beyond the usual time, but the mind may be very easily
hindered from its share of improvement, and the bulk and strength of
manhood must, without the assistance of education and instruction, be
informed only with the understanding of a child.

Yet, amidst all the disorder and inequality which variety of discipline,
example, conversation, and employment, produce in the intellectual
advances of different men, there is still discovered, by a vigilant
spectator, such a general and remote similitude, as may be expected in
the same common nature affected by external circumstances indefinitely
varied. We all enter the world in equal ignorance, gaze round about us
on the same objects, and have our first pains and pleasures, our first
hopes and fears, our first aversions and desires, from the same causes;
and though, as we proceed farther, life opens wider prospects to our
view, and accidental impulses determine us to different paths, yet as
every mind, however vigorous or abstracted, is necessitated, in its
present state of union, to receive its informations, and execute its
purposes, by the intervention of the body, the uniformity of our
corporeal nature communicates itself to our intellectual operations; and
those whose abilities or knowledge incline them most to deviate from the
general round of life, are recalled from eccentricity by the laws of
their existence.

If we consider the exercises of the mind, it will be found that in each
part of life some particular faculty is more eminently employed. When
the treasures of knowledge are first opened before us, while novelty
blooms alike on either hand, and every thing equally unknown and
unexamined seems of equal value, the power of the soul is principally
exerted in a vivacious and desultory curiosity. She applies by turns to
every object, enjoys it for a short time, and flies with equal ardour to
another. She delights to catch up loose and unconnected ideas, but
starts away from systems and complications, which would obstruct the
rapidity of her transitions, and detain her long in the same pursuit.

When a number of distinct images are collected by these erratick and
hasty surveys, the fancy is busied in arranging them; and combines them
into pleasing pictures with more resemblance to the realities of life as
experience advances, and new observations rectify the former. While the
judgment is yet uninformed, and unable to compare the draughts of
fiction with their originals, we are delighted with improbable
adventures, impracticable virtues, and inimitable characters: but, in
proportion as we have more opportunities of acquainting ourselves with
living nature, we are sooner disgusted with copies in which there
appears no resemblance. We first discard absurdity and impossibility,
then exact greater and greater degrees of probability, but at last
become cold and insensible to the charms of falsehood, however specious,
and, from the imitations of truth, which are never perfect, transfer our
affection to truth itself.

Now commences the reign of judgment or reason; we begin to find little
pleasure but in comparing arguments, stating propositions, disentangling
perplexities, clearing ambiguities, and deducing consequences. The
painted vales of imagination are deserted, and our intellectual activity
is exercised in winding through the labyrinths of fallacy, and toiling
with firm and cautious steps up the narrow tracks of demonstration.
Whatever may lull vigilance, or mislead attention, is contemptuously
rejected, and every disguise in which errour may be concealed, is
carefully observed, till, by degrees, a certain number of incontestable
or unsuspected propositions are established, and at last concatenated
into arguments, or compacted into systems.

At length weariness succeeds to labour, and the mind lies at ease in the
contemplation of her own attainments, without any desire of new
conquests or excursions. This is the age of recollection and narrative;
the opinions are settled, and the avenues of apprehension shut against
any new intelligence; the days that are to follow must pass in the
inculcation of precepts already collected, and assertion of tenets
already received; nothing is henceforward so odious as opposition, so
insolent as doubt, or so dangerous as novelty.

In like manner the passions usurp the separate command of the successive
periods of life. To the happiness of our first years nothing more seems
necessary than freedom from restraint: every man may remember that if he
was left to himself, and indulged in the disposal of his own time, he
was once content without the superaddition of any actual pleasure. The
new world is itself a banquet; and, till we have exhausted the freshness
of life, we have always about us sufficient gratifications: the sunshine
quickens us to play, and the shade invites us to sleep.

But we soon become unsatisfied with negative felicity, and are solicited
by our senses and appetites to more powerful delights, as the taste of
him who has satisfied his hunger must be excited by artificial
stimulations. The simplicity of natural amusement is now past, and art
and contrivance must improve our pleasures; but, in time, art, like
nature, is exhausted, and the senses can no longer supply the cravings
of the intellect.

The attention is then transferred from pleasure to interest, in which
pleasure is perhaps included, though diffused to a wider extent, and
protracted through new gradations. Nothing now dances before the eyes
but wealth and power, nor rings in the ear, but the voice of fame;
wealth, to which, however variously denominated, every man at some time
or other aspires; power, which all wish to obtain within their circle of
action; and fame, which no man, however high or mean, however wise or
ignorant, was yet able to despise. Now prudence and foresight exert
their influence: no hour is devoted wholly to any present enjoyment, no
act or purpose terminates in itself, but every motion is referred to
some distant end; the accomplishment of one design begins another, and
the ultimate wish is always pushed off to its former distance.

At length fame is observed to be uncertain, and power to be dangerous;
the man whose vigour and alacrity begin to forsake him, by degrees
contracts his designs, remits his former multiplicity of pursuits, and
extends no longer his regard to any other honour than the reputation of
wealth, or any other influence than his power. Avarice is generally the
last passion of those lives of which the first part has been squandered
in pleasure, and the second devoted to ambition. He that sinks under the
fatigue of getting wealth, lulls his age with the milder business of
saving it.

I have in this view of life considered man as actuated only by natural
desires, and yielding to their own inclinations, without regard to
superior principles, by which the force of external agents may be
counteracted, and the temporary prevalence of passions restrained.
Nature will indeed always operate, human desires will be always ranging;
but these motions, though very powerful, are not resistless; nature may
be regulated, and desires governed; and, to contend with the
predominance of successive passions, to be endangered first by one
affection, and then by another, is the condition upon which we are to
pass our time, the time of our preparation for that state which shall
put an end to experiment, to disappointment, and to change.



No. 152. SATURDAY, AUGUST 31, 1751.

--Tristia maestum
Vullum verba decent, iratum plena minarum. HOR. De Ar. Poet. 105.

Disastrous words can best disaster shew;
In angry phrase the angry passions glow. ELPHINSTON.

"It was the wisdom," says Seneca, "of ancient times, to consider what is
most useful as most illustrious. " If this rule be applied to works of
genius, scarcely any species of composition deserves more to be
cultivated than the epistolary style, since none is of more various or
frequent use through the whole subordination of human life.

It has yet happened that, among the numerous writers which our nation
has produced, equal, perhaps, always in force and genius, and of late in
elegance and accuracy, to those of any other country, very few have
endeavoured to distinguish themselves by the publication of letters,
except such as were written in the discharge of publick trusts, and
during the transaction of great affairs; which, though they afford
precedents to the minister, and memorials to the historian, are of no
use as examples of the familiar style, or models of private
correspondence.

If it be inquired by foreigners, how this deficiency has happened in the
literature of a country, where all indulge themselves with so little
danger in speaking and writing, may we not without either bigotry or
arrogance inform them, that it must be imputed to our contempt of
trifles, and our due sense of the dignity of the publick? We do not
think it reasonable to fill the world with volumes from which nothing
can be learned, nor expect that the employments of the busy, or the
amusements of the gay, should give way to narratives of our private
affairs, complaints of absence, expressions of fondness, or declarations
of fidelity.

A slight perusal of the innumerable letters by which the wits of France
have signalized their names, will prove that other nations need not be
discouraged from the like attempts by the consciousness of inability;
for surely it is not very difficult to aggravate trifling misfortunes,
to magnify familiar incidents, repeat adulatory professions, accumulate
servile hyperboles, and produce all that can be found in the despicable
remains of Voiture and Scarron.

Yet, as much of life must be passed in affairs considerable only by
their frequent occurrence, and much of the pleasure which our condition
allows, must be produced by giving elegance to trifles, it is necessary
to learn how to become little without becoming mean, to maintain the
necessary intercourse of civility, and fill up the vacuities of actions
by agreeable appearances. It had therefore been of advantage, if such of
our writers as have excelled in the art of decorating insignificance,
had supplied us with a few sallies of innocent gaiety, effusions of
honest tenderness, or exclamations of unimportant hurry.

Precept has generally been posterior to performance. The art of
composing works of genius has never been taught but by the example of
those who performed it by natural vigour of imagination, and rectitude
of judgment. As we have few letters, we have likewise few criticisms
upon the epistolary style. The observations with which Walsh has
introduced his pages of inanity, are such as give him little claim to
the rank assigned him by Dryden among the criticks. _Letters_, says he,
_are intended as resemblances of conversation, and the chief
excellencies of conversation are good humour and good breeding_. This
remark, equally valuable for its novelty and propriety, he dilates and
enforces with an appearance of complete acquiescence in his own
discovery.

No man was ever in doubt about the moral qualities of a letter. It has
been always known that he who endeavours to please must appear pleased,
and he who would not provoke rudeness must not practise it. But the
question among those who establish rules for an epistolary performance
is how gaiety or civility may be properly expressed; as among the
criticks in history it is not contested whether truth ought to be
preserved, but by what mode of diction it is best adorned.

As letters are written on all subjects, in all states of mind, they
cannot be properly reduced to settled rules, or described by any single
characteristick; and we may safely disentangle our minds from critical
embarrassments, by determining that a letter has no peculiarity but its
form, and that nothing is to be refused admission, which would be proper
in any other method of treating the same subject. The qualities of the
epistolary style most frequently required, are ease and simplicity, an
even flow of unlaboured diction, and an artless arrangement of obvious
sentiments. But these directions are no sooner applied to use, than
their scantiness and imperfection become evident. Letters are written to
the great and to the mean, to the learned and the ignorant, at rest and
in distress, in sport and in passion. Nothing can be more improper than
ease and laxity of expression, when the importance of the subject
impresses solicitude, or the dignity of the person exacts reverence.

That letters should be written with strict conformity to nature is true,
because nothing but conformity to nature can make any composition
beautiful or just.
But it is natural to depart from familiarity of
language upon occasions not familiar. Whatever elevates the sentiments
will consequently raise the expression; whatever fills us with hope or
terrour, will produce some perturbation of images and some figurative
distortions of phrase. Wherever we are studious to please, we are afraid
of trusting our first thoughts, and endeavour to recommend our opinion
by studied ornaments, accuracy of method, and elegance of style.

If the personages of the comick scene be allowed by Horace to raise
their language in the transports of anger to the turgid vehemence of
tragedy, the epistolary writer may likewise without censure comply with
the varieties of his matter. If great events are to be related, he may
with all the solemnity of an historian deduce them from their causes,
connect them with their concomitants, and trace them to their
consequences. If a disputed position is to be established, or a remote
principle to be investigated, he may detail his reasonings with all the
nicety of syllogistick method. If a menace is to be averted, or a
benefit implored, he may, without any violation of the edicts of
criticism, call every power of rhetorick to his assistance, and try
every inlet at which love or pity enters the heart.

Letters that have no other end than the entertainment of the
correspondents are more properly regulated by critical precepts, because
the matter and style are equally arbitrary, and rules are more
necessary, as there is a larger power of choice. In letters of this
kind, some conceive art graceful, and others think negligence amiable;
some model them by the sonnet, and will allow them no means of
delighting but the soft lapse of calm mellifluence; others adjust them
by the epigram, and expect pointed sentences and forcible periods. The
one party considers exemption from faults as the height of excellence,
the other looks upon neglect of excellence as the most disgusting fault;
one avoids censure, the other aspires to praise; one is always in danger
of insipidity, the other continually on the brink of affectation.

When the subject has no intrinsick dignity, it must necessarily owe its
attractions to artificial embellishments, and may catch at all
advantages which the art of writing can supply. He that, like Pliny,
sends his friend a portion for his daughter, will, without Pliny's
eloquence or address, find means of exciting gratitude, and securing
acceptance; but he that has no present to make but a garland, a riband,
or some petty curiosity, must endeavour to recommend it by his manner of
giving it.

The purpose for which letters are written when no intelligence is
communicated, or business transacted, is to preserve in the minds of the
absent either love or esteem: to excite love we must impart pleasure,
and to raise esteem we must discover abilities. Pleasure will generally
be given, as abilities are displayed by scenes of imagery, points of
conceit, unexpected sallies, and artful compliments. Trifles always
require exuberance of ornament; the building which has no strength can
be valued only for the grace of its decorations. The pebble must be
polished with care, which hopes to be valued as a diamond; and words
ought surely to be laboured, when they are intended to stand for things.



No. 153. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1751

_Turba Remi? Sequitur Fortunam, ut semper, et odit
Damnatos_. JUV. Sat. x. 73.

The fickle crowd with fortune comes and goes;
Wealth still finds followers, and misfortune foes.

TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

There are occasions on which all apology is rudeness. He that has an
unwelcome message to deliver, may give some proof of tenderness and
delicacy, by a ceremonial introduction and gradual discovery, because
the mind, upon which the weight of sorrow is to fall, gains time for the
collection of its powers; but nothing is more absurd than to delay the
communication of pleasure, to torment curiosity by impatience, and to
delude hope by anticipation.

I shall therefore forbear the arts by which correspondents generally
secure admission, for I have too long remarked the power of vanity, to
doubt that I shall be read by you with a disposition to approve, when I
declare that my narrative has no other tendency than to illustrate and
corroborate your own observations.

I was the second son of a gentleman, whose patrimony had been wasted by
a long succession of squanderers, till he was unable to support any of
his children, except his heir, in the hereditary dignity of idleness.
Being therefore obliged to employ that part of life in study which my
progenitors had devoted to the hawk and hound, I was in my eighteenth
year despatched to the university, without any rural honours. I had
never killed a single woodcock, nor partaken one triumph over a
conquered fox.

At the university I continued to enlarge my acquisitions with little
envy of the noisy happiness which my elder brother had the fortune to
enjoy; and, having obtained my degree, retired to consider at leisure to
what profession I should confine that application which had hitherto
been dissipated in general knowledge. To deliberate upon a choice which
custom and honour forbid to be retracted, is certainly reasonable; yet
to let loose the attention equally to the advantages and inconveniencies
of every employment is not without danger; new motives are every moment
operating on every side; and mechanicks have long ago discovered, that
contrariety of equal attractions is equivalent to rest.

While I was thus trifling in uncertainty, an old adventurer, who had
been once the intimate friend of my father, arrived from the Indies with
a large fortune; which he had so much harassed himself in obtaining,
that sickness and infirmity left him no other desire than to die in his
native country. His wealth easily procured him an invitation to pass his
life with us; and, being incapable of any amusement but conversation, he
necessarily became familiarized to me, whom he found studious and
domestick. Pleased with an opportunity of imparting my knowledge, and
eager of any intelligence that might increase it, I delighted his
curiosity with historical narratives and explications of nature, and
gratified his vanity by inquiries after the products of distant
countries, and the customs of their inhabitants.

My brother saw how much I advanced in the favour of our guest, who,
being without heirs, was naturally expected to enrich the family of his
friend, but never attempted to alienate me, nor to ingratiate himself.
He was, indeed, little qualified to solicit the affection of a
traveller, for the remissness of his education had left him without any
rule of action but his present humour. He often forsook the old
gentleman in the midst of an adventure, because the horn sounded in the
court-yard, and would have lost an opportunity, not only of knowing the
history, but sharing the wealth of the mogul, for the trial of a new
pointer, or the sight of a horse-race.

It was therefore not long before our new friend declared his intention
of bequeathing to me the profits of his commerce, as the only man in the
family by whom he could expect them to be rationally enjoyed. This
distinction drew upon me the envy not only of my brother but my father.

As no man is willing to believe that he suffers by his own fault, they
imputed the preference which I had obtained to adulatory compliances, or
malignant calumnies. To no purpose did I call upon my patron to attest
my innocence, for who will believe what he wishes to be false? In the
heat of disappointment they forced their inmate by repeated insults to
depart from the house, and I was soon, by the same treatment, obliged to
follow him.

He chose his residence in the confines of London, where rest,
tranquillity, and medicine, restored him to part of the health which he
had lost. I pleased myself with perceiving that I was not likely to
obtain the immediate possession of wealth which no labour of mine had
contributed to acquire; and that he, who had thus distinguished me,
might hope to end his life without a total frustration of those
blessings, which, whatever be their real value, he had sought with so
much diligence, and purchased with so many vicissitudes of danger and
fatigue.

He, indeed, left me no reason to repine at his recovery, for he was
willing to accustom me early to the use of money, and set apart for my
expenses such a revenue as I had scarcely dared to image. I can yet
congratulate myself that fortune has seen her golden cup once tasted
without inebriation. Neither my modesty nor prudence was overwhelmed by
affluence; my elevation was without insolence, and my expense without
profusion. Employing the influence which money always confers, to the
improvement of my understanding, I mingled in parties of gaiety, and in
conferences of learning, appeared in every place where instruction was
to be found, and imagined that, by ranging through all the diversities
of life, I had acquainted myself fully with human nature, and learned
all that was to be known of the ways of men.

It happened, however, that I soon discovered how much was wanted to the
completion of my knowledge, and found that, according to Seneca's
remark, I had hitherto seen the world but on one side. My patron's
confidence in his increase of strength tempted him to carelessness and
irregularity; he caught a fever by riding in the rain, of which he died
delirious on the third day. I buried him without any of the heir's
affected grief or secret exultation; then preparing to take a legal
possession of his fortune, I opened his closet, where I found a will,
made at his first arrival, by which my father was appointed the chief
inheritor, and nothing was left me but a legacy sufficient to support me
in the prosecution of my studies.

I had not yet found such charms in prosperity as to continue it by any
acts of forgery or injustice, and made haste to inform my father of the
riches which had been given him, not by the preference of kindness, but
by the delays of indolence and cowardice of age. The hungry family flew
like vultures on their prey, and soon made my disappointment publick, by
the tumult of their claims, and the splendour of their sorrow.

It was now my part to consider how I should repair the disappointment. I
could not but triumph in my long list of friends, which comprised almost
every name that power or knowledge entitled to eminence; and, in the
prospect of the innumerable roads to honour and preferment, which I had
laid open to myself by the wise use of temporary riches, I believed
nothing necessary but that I should continue that acquaintance to which
I had been so readily admitted, and which had hitherto been cultivated
on both sides with equal ardour.

Full of these expectations, I one morning ordered a chair, with an
intention to make my usual circle of morning visits. Where I first
stopped I saw two footmen lolling at the door, who told me without any
change of posture, or collection of countenance, that their master was
at home, and suffered me to open the inner door without assistance. I
found my friend standing, and, as I was tattling with my former freedom,
was formally entreated to sit down; but did not stay to be favoured with
any further condescensions.

My next experiment was made at the levee of a statesman, who received me
with an embrace of tenderness, that he might with more decency publish
my change of fortune to the sycophants about him. After he had enjoyed
the triumph of condolence, he turned to a wealthy stockjobber, and left
me exposed to the scorn of those who had lately courted my notice, and
solicited my interest.

I was then set down at the door of another, who, upon my entrance,
advised me, with great solemnity, to think of some settled provision for
life. I left him, and hurried away to an old friend, who professed
himself unsusceptible of any impressions from prosperity or misfortune,
and begged that he might see me when he was more at leisure.

Of sixty-seven doors, at which I knocked in the first week after my
appearance in a mourning dress, I was denied admission at forty-six; was
suffered at fourteen to wait in the outer room till business was
despatched; at four, was entertained with a few questions about the
weather; at one, heard the footman rated for bringing my name; and at
two was informed, in the flow of casual conversation, how much a man of
rank degrades himself by mean company.

My curiosity now led me to try what reception I should find among the
ladies; but I found that my patron had carried all my powers of pleasing
to the grave. I had formerly been celebrated as a wit, and not
perceiving any languor in my imagination, I essayed to revive that
gaiety which had hitherto broken out involuntarily before my sentences
were finished. My remarks were now heard with a steady countenance, and
if a girl happened to give way to habitual merriment, her forwardness
was repressed with a frown by her mother or her aunt.

Wherever I come I scatter infirmity and disease; every lady whom I meet
in the Mall is too weary to walk; all whom I entreat to sing are
troubled with colds: if I propose cards, they are afflicted with the
head-ach; [Transcriber's note: sic] if I invite them to the gardens,
they cannot bear a crowd.

All this might be endured; but there is a class of mortals who think my
understanding impaired with my fortune, exalt themselves to the dignity
of advice, and, whenever we happen to meet, presume to prescribe my
conduct, regulate my economy, and direct my pursuits. Another race,
equally impertinent and equally despicable, are every moment
recommending to me an attention to my interest, and think themselves
entitled, by their superior prudence, to reproach me if I speak or move
without regard to profit.

Such, Mr. Rambler, is the power of wealth, that it commands the ear of
greatness and the eye of beauty, gives spirit to the dull, and authority
to the timorous, and leaves him from whom it departs, without virtue and
without understanding, the sport of caprice, the scoff of insolence, the
slave of meanness, and the pupil of ignorance.

I am, &c.



No. 154. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 1751.

_--Tibi res antiquae laudis et artis
Ingredior, sanctos ausus recludere fontes_. VIR. Geo. ii. 174.

For thee my tuneful accents will I raise,
And treat of arts disclos'd in ancient days;
Once more unlock for thee the sacred spring. DRYDEN.

The direction of Aristotle to those that study politicks, is first to
examine and understand what has been written by the ancients upon
government; then to cast their eyes round upon the world, and consider
by what causes the prosperity of communities is visibly influenced, and
why some are worse, and others better administered.

The same method must be pursued by him who hopes to become eminent in
any other part of knowledge. The first task is to search books, the next
to contemplate nature. He must first possess himself of the intellectual
treasures which the diligence of former ages has accumulated, and then
endeavour to increase them by his own collections.

The mental disease of the present generation, is impatience of study,
contempt of the great masters of ancient wisdom, and a disposition to
rely wholly upon unassisted genius and natural sagacity. The wits of
these happy days have discovered a way to fame, which the dull caution
of our laborious ancestors durst never attempt; they cut the knots of
sophistry which it was formerly the business of years to untie, solve
difficulties by sudden irradiations of intelligence, and comprehend long
processes of argument by immediate intuition.

Men who have flattered themselves into this opinion of their own
abilities, look down on all who waste their lives over books, as a race
of inferior beings, condemned by nature to perpetual pupilage, and
fruitlessly endeavouring to remedy their barrenness by incessant
cultivation, or succour their feebleness by subsidiary strength. They
presume that none would be more industrious than they, if they were not
more sensible of deficiencies; and readily conclude, that he who places
no confidence in his own powers, owes his modesty only to his weakness.

It is however certain, that no estimate is more in danger of erroneous
calculations than those by which a man computes the force of his own
genius. It generally happens at our entrance into the world, that, by
the natural attraction of similitude, we associate with men like
ourselves, young, sprightly, and ignorant, and rate our accomplishments
by comparison with theirs; when we have once obtained an acknowledged
superiority over our acquaintances, imagination and desire easily extend
it over the rest of mankind, and if no accident forces us into new
emulations, we grow old, and die in admiration of ourselves.

Vanity, thus confirmed in her dominion, readily listens to the voice of
idleness, and sooths the slumber of life with continual dreams of
excellence and greatness. A man, elated by confidence in his natural
vigour of fancy and sagacity of conjecture, soon concludes that he
already possesses whatever toil and inquiry can confer. He then listens
with eagerness to the wild objections which folly has raised against the
common means of improvement; talks of the dark chaos of indigested
knowledge; describes the mischievous effects of heterogeneous sciences
fermenting in the mind; relates the blunders of lettered ignorance;
expatiates on the heroick merit of those who deviate from prescription,
or shake off authority; and gives vent to the inflations of his heart by
declaring that he owes nothing to pedants and universities.

All these pretensions, however confident, are very often vain. The
laurels which superficial acuteness gains in triumphs over ignorance
unsupported by vivacity, are observed by Locke to be lost, whenever real
learning and rational diligence appear against her; the sallies of
gaiety are soon repressed by calm confidence; and the artifices of
subtilty are readily detected by those, who, having carefully studied
the question, are not easily confounded or surprised.

But, though the contemner of books had neither been deceived by others
nor himself, and was really born with a genius surpassing the ordinary
abilities of mankind; yet surely such gifts of Providence may be more
properly urged as incitements to labour, than encouragements to
negligence. He that neglects the culture of ground naturally fertile, is
more shamefully culpable, than he whose field would scarcely recompense
his husbandry.

Cicero remarks, that not to know what has been transacted in former
times, is to continue always a child. If no use is made of the labours
of past ages, the world must remain always in the infancy of knowledge.
The discoveries of every man must terminate in his own advantage, and
the studies of every age be employed on questions which the past
generation had discussed and determined. We may with as little reproach
borrow science as manufactures from our ancestors; and it is as rational
to live in caves till our own hands have erected a palace, as to reject
all knowledge of architecture which our understandings will not supply.

To the strongest and quickest mind it is far easier to learn than to
invent. The principles of arithmetick and geometry may be comprehended
by a close attention in a few days; yet who can flatter himself that the
study of a long life would have enabled him to discover them, when he
sees them yet unknown to so many nations, whom he cannot suppose less
liberally endowed with natural reason, than the Grecians or Egyptians?

Every science was thus far advanced towards perfection, by the emulous
diligence of contemporary students, and the gradual discoveries of one
age improving on another. Sometimes unexpected flashes of instruction
were struck out by the fortuitous collision of happy incidents, or an
involuntary concurrence of ideas, in which the philosopher to whom they
happened had no other merit than that of knowing their value, and
transmitting, unclouded, to posterity, that light which had been kindled
by causes out of his power. The happiness of these casual illuminations
no man can promise to himself, because no endeavours can procure them;
and therefore whatever be our abilities or application, we must submit
to learn from others what perhaps would have lain hid for ever from
human penetration, had not some remote inquiry brought it to view; as
treasures are thrown up by the ploughman and the digger in the rude
exercise of their common occupations. The man whose genius qualifies him
for great undertakings, must at least be content to learn from books the
present state of human knowledge; that he may not ascribe to himself the
invention of arts generally known; weary his attention with experiments
of which the event has been long registered; and waste, in attempts
which have already succeeded or miscarried, that time which might have
been spent with usefulness and honour upon new undertakings.

But, though the study of books is necessary, it is not sufficient to
constitute literary eminence. He that wishes to be counted among the
benefactors of posterity, must add by his own toil to the acquisitions
of his ancestors, and secure his memory from neglect by some valuable
improvement. This can only be effected by looking out upon the wastes of
the intellectual world, and extending the power of learning over regions
yet undisciplined and barbarous; or by surveying more exactly our
ancient dominions, and driving ignorance from the fortresses and
retreats where she skulks undetected and undisturbed. Every science has
its difficulties, which yet call for solution before we attempt new
systems of knowledge; as every country has its forests and marshes,
which it would be wise to cultivate and drain, before distant colonies
are projected as a necessary discharge of the exuberance of inhabitants.

No man ever yet became great by imitation. Whatever hopes for the
veneration of mankind must have invention in the design or the
execution; either the effect must itself be new, or the means by which
it is produced. Either truths hitherto unknown must be discovered, or
those which are already known enforced by stronger evidence, facilitated
by clearer method, or elucidated by brighter illustrations.

Fame cannot spread wide or endure long that is not rooted in nature, and
matured by art. That which hopes to resist the blast of malignity, and
stand firm against the attacks of time, must contain in itself some
original principle of growth. The reputation which arises from the
detail or transposition of borrowed sentiments, may spread for awhile,
like ivy on the rind of antiquity, but will be torn away by accident or
contempt, and suffered to rot unheeded on the ground.



No. 155. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1751.

_--Steriles transmisimus annos,
Haec aevi mihi prima dies, haec limina vitae_. STAT. i. 362.

--Our barren years are past;
Be this of life the first, of sloth the last. ELPHINSTON.

No weakness of the human mind has more frequently incurred
animadversion, than the negligence with which men overlook their own
faults, however flagrant, and the easiness with which they pardon them,
however frequently repeated.

It seems generally believed, that as the eye cannot see itself, the mind
has no faculties by which it can contemplate its own state, and that
therefore we have not means of becoming acquainted with our real
characters; an opinion which, like innumerable other postulates, an
inquirer finds himself inclined to admit upon very little evidence,
because it affords a ready solution of many difficulties. It will
explain why the greatest abilities frequently fail to promote the
happiness of those who possess them; why those who can distinguish with
the utmost nicety the boundaries of vice and virtue, suffer them to be
confounded in their own conduct; why the active and vigilant resign
their affairs implicitly to the management of others; and why the
cautious and fearful make hourly approaches towards ruin, without one
sigh of solicitude or struggle for escape.

When a position teems thus with commodious consequences, who can without
regret confess it to be false? Yet it is certain that declaimers have
indulged a disposition to describe the dominion of the passions as
extended beyond the limits that nature assigned. Self-love is often
rather arrogant than blind; it does not hide our faults from ourselves,
but persuades us that they escape the notice of others, and disposes us
to resent censures lest we should confess them to be just. We are
secretly conscious of defects and vices, which we hope to conceal from
the publick eye, and please ourselves with innumerable impostures, by
which, in reality, nobody is deceived.

In proof of the dimness of our internal sight, or the general inability
of man to determine rightly concerning his own character, it is common
to urge the success of the most absurd and incredible flattery, and the
resentment always raised by advice, however soft, benevolent, and
reasonable. But flattery, if its operation be nearly examined, will be
found to owe its acceptance, not to our ignorance, but knowledge of our
failures, and to delight us rather as it consoles our wants than
displays our possessions. He that shall solicit the favour of his patron
by praising him for qualities which he can find in himself, will be
defeated by the more daring panegyrist who enriches him with
adscititious excellence. Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a
present. The acknowledgment of those virtues on which conscience
congratulates us, is a tribute that we can at any time exact with
confidence; but the celebration of those which we only feign, or desire
without any vigorous endeavours to attain them, is received as a
confession of sovereignty over regions never conquered, as a favourable
decision of disputable claims, and is more welcome as it is more
gratuitous.

Advice is offensive, not because it lays us open to unexpected regret,
or convicts us of any fault which had escaped our notice, but because it
shews us that we are known to others as well as to ourselves; and the
officious monitor is persecuted with hatred, not because his accusation
is false, but because he assumes that superiority which we are not
willing to grant him, and has dared to detect what we desired to
conceal.

For this reason advice is commonly ineffectual. If those who follow the
call of their desires, without inquiry whither they are going, had
deviated ignorantly from the paths of wisdom, and were rushing upon
dangers unforeseen, they would readily listen to information that recals
them from their errours, and catch the first alarm by which destruction
or infamy is denounced. Few that wander in the wrong way mistake it for
the right, they only find it more smooth and flowery, and indulge their
own choice rather than approve it: therefore few are persuaded to quit
it by admonition or reproof, since it impresses no new conviction, nor
confers any powers of action or resistance. He that is gravely informed
how soon profusion will annihilate his fortune, hears with little
advantage what he knew before, and catches at the next occasion of
expense, because advice has no force to suppress his vanity. He that is
told how certainly intemperance will hurry him to the grave, runs with
his usual speed to a new course of luxury, because his reason is not
invigorated, nor his appetite weakened.

The mischief of flattery is, not that it persuades any man that he is
what he is not, but that it suppresses the influence of honest ambition,
by raising an opinion that honour may be gained without the toil of
merit; and the benefit of advice arises commonly not from any new light
imparted to the mind, but from the discovery which it affords of the
publick suffrages. He that could withstand conscience is frighted at
infamy, and shame prevails when reason is defeated.

As we all know our own faults, and know them commonly with many
aggravations which human perspicacity cannot discover, there is,
perhaps, no man, however hardened by impudence or dissipated by levity,
sheltered by hypocrisy or blasted by disgrace, who does not intend some
time to review his conduct, and to regulate the remainder of his life by
the laws of virtue. New temptations indeed attack him, new invitations
are offered by pleasure and interest, and the hour of reformation is
always delayed; every delay gives vice another opportunity of fortifying
itself by habit; and the change of manners, though sincerely intended
and rationally planned, is referred to the time when some craving
passion shall be fully gratified, or some powerful allurement cease its
importunity.

Thus procrastination is accumulated on procrastination, and one
impediment succeeds another, till age shatters our resolution, or death
intercepts the project of amendment. Such is often the end of salutary
purposes, after they have long delighted the imagination, and appeased
that disquiet which every mind feels from known misconduct, when the
attention is not diverted by business or by pleasure.

Nothing surely can be more unworthy of a reasonable nature, than to
continue in a state so opposite to real happiness, as that all the peace
of solitude, and felicity of meditation, must arise from resolutions of
forsaking it. Yet the world will often afford examples of men, who pass
months and years in a continual war with their own convictions, and are
daily dragged by habit, or betrayed by passion, into practices which
they closed and opened their eyes with purposes to avoid; purposes
which, though settled on conviction, the first impulse of momentary
desire totally overthrows.

The influence of custom is indeed such, that to conquer it will require
the utmost efforts of fortitude and virtue; nor can I think any man more
worthy of veneration and renown, than those who have burst the shackles
of habitual vice. This victory, however, has different degrees of glory
as of difficulty; it is more, heroick as the objects of guilty
gratification are more familiar, and the recurrence of solicitation more
frequent. He that, from experience of the folly of ambition, resigns his
offices, may set himself free at once from temptation to squander his
life in courts, because he cannot regain his former station. He who is
enslaved by an amorous passion, may quit his tyrant in disgust, and
absence will, without the help of reason, overcome by degrees the desire
of returning. But those appetites to which every place affords their
proper object, and which require no preparatory measures or gradual
advances, are more tenaciously adhesive; the wish is so near the
enjoyment, that compliance often precedes consideration, and, before the
powers of reason can be summoned, the time for employing them is past.

Indolence is therefore one of the vices from which those whom it once
infects are seldom reformed. Every other species of luxury operates upon
some appetite that is quickly satiated, and requires some concurrence of
art or accident which every place will not supply; but the desire of
ease acts equally at all hours, and the longer it is indulged is the
more increased. To do nothing is in every man's power; we can never want
an opportunity of omitting duties. The lapse to indolence is soft and
imperceptible, because it is only a mere cessation of activity; but the
return to diligence is difficult, because it implies a change from rest
to motion, from privation to reality:

--_Facilis descensus Averni:
Noctes atque dies patet atri junua ditis;
Sed revocare gradum, saperasque evadere ad auras,
Hoc opus, hic labor est_. --VIR. Aen. Lib. vi. 126.

The gates of Hell are open night and day;
Smooth the descent, and easy is the way;
But to return, and view the cheerful skies,
In this the task and mighty labour lies. DRYDEN.

Of this vice, as of all others, every man who indulges it is conscious:
we all know our own state, if we could be induced to consider it, and it
might perhaps be useful to the conquest of all these ensnarers of the
mind, if, at certain stated days, life was reviewed. Many things
necessary are omitted, because we vainly imagine that they may be always
performed; and what cannot be done without pain will for ever be
delayed, if the time of doing it be left unsettled. No corruption is
great but by long negligence, which can scarcely prevail in a mind
regularly and frequently awakened by periodical remorse. He that thus
breaks his life into parts, will find in himself a desire to distinguish
every stage of his existence by some improvement, and delight himself
with the approach of the day of recollection, as of the time which is to
begin a new series of virtue and felicity.



No. 156. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1751.

_Nunquam aliud Natura, aliud Sapientia dicit_. Juv. Sat. xiv. 321.

For Wisdom ever echoes Nature's voice.

Every government, say the politicians, is perpetually degenerating
towards corruption, from which it must be rescued at certain periods by
the resuscitation of its first principles, and the re-establishment of
its original constitution. Every animal body, according to the methodick
physicians, is, by the predominance of some exuberant quality,
continually declining towards disease and death, which must be obviated
by a seasonable reduction of the peccant humour to the just equipoise
which health requires.

In the same manner the studies of mankind, all at least which, not being
subject to rigorous demonstration, admit the influence of fancy and
caprice, are perpetually tending to errour and confusion. Of the great
principles of truth which the first speculatists discovered, the
simplicity is embarrassed by ambitious additions, or the evidence
obscured by inaccurate argumentation; and as they descend from one
succession of writers to another, like light transmitted from room to
room, they lose their strength and splendour, and fade at last in total
evanescence.

The systems of learning therefore must be sometimes reviewed,
complications analyzed into principles, and knowledge disentangled from
opinion. It is not always possible, without a close inspection, to
separate the genuine shoots of consequential reasoning, which grow out
of some radical postulate, from the branches which art has ingrafted on
it. The accidental prescriptions of authority, when time has procured
them veneration, are often confounded with the laws of nature, and those
rules are supposed coëval with reason, of which the first rise cannot be
discovered.

Criticism has sometimes permitted fancy to dictate the laws by which
fancy ought to be restrained, and fallacy to perplex the principles by
which fallacy is to be detected; her superintendence of others has
betrayed her to negligence of herself; and, like the ancient Scythians,
by extending her conquests over distant regions, she has left her throne
vacant to her slaves.

Among the laws of which the desire of extending authority, or ardour of
promoting knowledge, has prompted the prescription, all which writers
have received, had not the same original right to our regard. Some are
to be considered as fundamental and indispensable, others only as useful
and convenient; some as dictated by reason and necessity, others as
enacted by despotick antiquity; some as invincibly supported by their
conformity to the order of nature and operations of the intellect;
others as formed by accident, or instituted by example, and therefore
always liable to dispute and alteration.

That many rules have been advanced without consulting nature or reason,
we cannot but suspect, when we find it peremptorily decreed by the
ancient masters, that only three speaking personages should appear at
once upon the stage; a law, which, as the variety and intricacy of
modern plays has made it impossible to be observed, we now violate
without scruple, and, as experience proves, without inconvenience.

The original of this precept was merely accidental. Tragedy was a
monody, or solitary song in honour of Bacchus, improved afterwards into
a dialogue by the addition of another speaker; but the ancients,
remembering that the tragedy was at first pronounced only by one, durst
not for some time venture beyond two; at last, when custom and impunity
had made them daring, they extended their liberty to the admission of
three, but restrained themselves by a critical edict from further
exorbitance.

By what accident the number of acts was limited to five, I know not that
any author has informed us; but certainly it is not determined by any
necessity arising either from the nature of action, or propriety of
exhibition. An act is only the representation of such a part of the
business of the play as proceeds in an unbroken tenour, or without any
intermediate pause.