No More Learning

xv. 232.

The dreadful wrinkles when poor Helen spy'd,
Ah! why this second rape? with tears she cry'd,
Time, thou devourer, and thou, envious age,
Who all destroy with keen corroding rage,
Beneath your jaws, whate'er have pleas'd or please,
Must sink, consum'd by swift or slow degrees.
ELPHINSTON.


An old Greek epigrammatist, intending to shew the miseries that attend the
last stage of man, imprecates upon those who are so foolish as to wish
for long life, the calamity of continuing to grow old from century to
century. He thought that no adventitious or foreign pain was requisite;
that decrepitude itself was an epitome of whatever is dreadful; and
nothing could be added to the curse of age, but that it should be
extended beyond its natural limits.

The most indifferent or negligent spectator can indeed scarcely retire
without heaviness of heart, from a view of the last scenes of the tragedy
of life, in which he finds those who, in the former parts of the drama,
were distinguished by opposition of conduct, contrariety of designs, and
dissimilitude of personal qualities, all involved in one common distress,
and all struggling with affliction which they cannot hope to overcome.

The other miseries, which way-lay our passage through the world, wisdom
may escape, and fortitude may conquer: by caution and circumspection we
may steal along with very little to obstruct or incommode us; by spirit
and vigour we may force a way, and reward the vexation of contest by the
pleasures of victory. But a time must come when our policy and bravery
shall be equally useless; when we shall all sink into helplessness and
sadness, without any power of receiving solace from the pleasures that
have formerly delighted us, or any prospect of emerging into a second
possession of the blessings that we have lost.

The industry of man has, indeed, not been wanting in endeavours to procure
comforts for these hours of dejection and melancholy, and to gild the
dreadful gloom with artificial light. The most usual support of old age
is wealth. He whose possessions are large, and whose chests are full,
imagines himself always fortified against invasions on his authority. If
he has lost all other means of government, if his strength and his reason
fail him, he can at last alter his will; and therefore all that have
hopes must, likewise have fears, and he may still continue to give laws
to such as have not ceased to regard their own interest.

This is, indeed, too frequently the citadel of the dotard, the last
fortress to which age retires, and in which he makes the stand against the
upstart race that seizes his domains, disputes his commands, and cancels
his prescriptions. But here, though there may be safety, there is no
pleasure; and what remains is but a proof that more was once possessed.

Nothing seems to have been more universally dreaded by the ancients than
orbity, or want of children; and, indeed, to a man who has survived all
the companions of his youth, all who have participated his pleasures
and his cares, have been engaged in the same events, and filled their
minds with the same conceptions, this full-peopled world is a dismal
solitude. He stands forlorn and silent, neglected or insulted, in the
midst of multitudes, animated with hopes which he cannot share, and
employed in business which he is no longer able to forward or retard; nor
can he find any to whom his life or his death are of importance, unless
he has secured some domestick gratifications, some tender employments,
and endeared himself to some whose interest and gratitude may unite them
to him.

So different are the colours of life as we look forward to the future,
or backward to the past; and so different the opinions and sentiments
which this contrariety of appearance naturally produces, that the
conversation of the old and young ends generally with contempt or pity
on either side. To a young man entering the world with fulness of hope,
and ardour of pursuit, nothing is so unpleasing as the cold caution,
the faint expectations, the scrupulous diffidence, which experience and
disappointments certainly infuse; and the old man wonders in his turn that
the world never can grow wiser, that neither precepts, nor testimonies,
can cure boys of their credulity and sufficiency; and that not one can be
convinced that snares are laid for him, till he finds himself entangled.

Thus one generation is always the scorn and wonder of the other; and the
notions of the old and young are like liquors of different gravity and
texture, which never can unite. The spirits of youth sublimed by health,
and volatilized by passion, soon leave behind them the phlegmatick
sediment of weariness and deliberation, and burst out in temerity and
enterprise. The tenderness, therefore, which nature infuses, and which
long habits of beneficence confirm, is necessary to reconcile such
opposition; and an old man must be a father to bear with patience those
follies and absurdities which he will perpetually imagine himself to find
in the schemes and expectations, the pleasures and the sorrows, of those
who have not yet been hardened by time, and chilled by frustration.

Yet it may be doubted, whether the pleasure of seeing children ripening
into strength, be not overbalanced by the pain of seeing some fall in
the blossom, and others blasted in their growth; some shaken down with
storms, some tainted with cankers, and some shrivelled in the shade; and
whether he that extends his care beyond himself, does not multiply his
anxieties more than his pleasures, and weary himself to no purpose, by
superintending what he cannot regulate.

But though age be to every order of human beings sufficiently terrible, it
is particularly to be dreaded by fine ladies, who have had no other end
or ambition than to fill up the day and the night with dress, diversions,
and flattery, and who, having made no acquaintance with knowledge, or
with business, have constantly caught all their ideas from the current
prattle of the hour, and been indebted for all their happiness to
compliments and treats. With these ladies, age begins early, and very
often lasts long; it begins when their beauty fades, when their mirth
loses its sprightliness, and their motion its ease. From that time all
which gave them joy vanishes from about them; they hear the praises
bestowed on others, which used to swell their bosoms with exultation.
They visit the seats of felicity, and endeavour to continue the habit of
being delighted. But pleasure is only received when we believe that we
give it in return. Neglect and petulance inform them that their power and
their value are past; and what then remains but a tedious and comfortless
uniformity of time, without any motion of the heart, or exercise of the
reason?

Yet, however age may discourage us by its appearance from considering
it in prospect, we shall all by degrees certainly be old; and therefore
we ought to inquire what provision can be made against that time of
distress? what happiness can be stored up against the winter of life? and
how we may pass our latter years with serenity and cheerfulness?

If it has been found by the experience of mankind, that not even the best
seasons of life are able to supply sufficient gratifications, without
anticipating uncertain felicities, it cannot surely be supposed that
old age, worn with labours, harassed with anxieties, and tortured with
diseases, should have any gladness of its own, or feel any satisfaction
from the contemplation of the present. All the comfort that can now be
expected must be recalled from the past, or borrowed from the future;
the past is very soon exhausted, all the events or actions which the
memory can afford pleasure are quickly recollected; and the future lies
beyond the grave, where it can be reached only by virtue and devotion.

Piety is the only proper and adequate relief of decaying man. He that
grows old without religious hopes, as he declines into imbecility, and
feels pains and sorrows incessantly crowding upon him, falls into a gulph
of bottomless misery, in which every reflection must plunge him deeper,
and where he finds only new gradations of anguish, and precipices of
horrour.




No. 70. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1750.


_----Argentea proles,_
_Auro deterior, fulvo pretiosior ære. _
OVID, Met. i. 114.

Succeeding times a silver age behold,
Excelling brass, but more excell'd by gold.
DRYDEN.


Hesiod, in his celebrated distribution of mankind, divides them into three
orders of intellect. "The first place," says he, "belongs to him that
can by his own powers discern what is right and fit, and penetrate to the
remoter motives of action. The second is claimed by him that is willing
to hear instruction, and can perceive right and wrong when they are shewn
him by another; but he that has neither acuteness nor docility, who can
neither find the way by himself, nor will be led by others, is a wretch
without use or value. "

If we survey the moral world, it will be found, that the same division
may be made of men, with regard to their virtue. There are some whose
principles are so firmly fixed, whose conviction is so constantly present
to their minds, and who have raised in themselves such ardent wishes for
the approbation of God, and the happiness with which he has promised to
reward obedience and perseverance, that they rise above all other cares
and considerations, and uniformly examine every action and desire, by
comparing it with the divine commands. There are others in a kind of
equipoise between good and ill; who are moved on the one part by riches
or pleasure, by the gratifications of passion and the delights of sense;
and, on the other, by laws of which they own the obligation, and rewards
of which they believe the reality, and whom a very small addition of
weight turns either way. The third class consists of beings immersed
in pleasure, or abandoned to passion, without any desire of higher
good, or any effort to extend their thoughts beyond immediate and gross
satisfactions.

The second class is so much the most numerous, that it may be considered
as comprising the whole body of mankind. Those of the last are not very
many, and those of the first are very few; and neither the one nor the
other fall much under the consideration of the moralists, whose precepts
are intended chiefly for those who are endeavouring to go forward up the
steeps of virtue, not for those who have already reached the summit, or
those who are resolved to stay for ever in their present situation.

To a man not versed in the living world, but accustomed to judge only by
speculative reason, it is scarcely credible that any one should be in
this state of indifference, or stand undetermined and unengaged, ready to
follow the first call to either side. It seems certain, that either a man
must believe that virtue will make him happy, and resolve therefore to
be virtuous, or think that he may be happy without virtue, and therefore
cast off all care but for his present interest. It seems impossible that
conviction should be on one side, and practice on the other; and that
he who has seen the right way should voluntarily shut his eyes, that
he may quit it with more tranquillity. Yet all these absurdities are
every hour to be found; the wisest and best men deviate from known and
acknowledged duties, by inadvertency or surprise; and most are good
no longer than while temptation is away, than while their passions are
without excitements, and their opinions are free from the counteraction
of any other motive.

Among the sentiments which almost every man changes as he advances into
years, is the expectation of uniformity of character. He that without
acquaintance with the power of desire, the cogency of distress, the
complications of affairs, or the force of partial influence, has filled
his mind with the excellence of virtue, and, having never tried his
resolution in any encounters with hope or fear, believes it able to
stand firm whatever shall oppose it, will be always clamorous against
the smallest failure, ready to exact the utmost punctualities of right,
and to consider every man that fails in any part of his duty, as without
conscience and without merit; unworthy of trust or love, of pity or
regard; as an enemy whom all should join to drive out of society, as a
pest which all should avoid, or as a weed which all should trample.

It is not but by experience, that we are taught the possibility of
retaining some virtues, and rejecting others, or of being good or bad
to a particular degree. For it is very easy to the solitary reasoner, to
prove that the same arguments by which the mind is fortified against one
crime are of equal force against all, and the consequence very naturally
follows, that he whom they fail to move on any occasion, has either never
considered them, or has by some fallacy taught himself to evade their
validity; and that, therefore, when a man is known to be guilty of one
crime, no farther evidence is needful of his depravity and corruption.

Yet such is the state of all mortal virtue, that it is always uncertain
and variable, sometimes extending to the whole compass of duty, and
sometimes shrinking into a narrow space, and fortifying only a few avenues
of the heart, while all the rest is left open to the incursions of
appetite, or given up to the dominion of wickedness. Nothing therefore
is more unjust than to judge of man by too short an acquaintance,
and too slight inspection; for it often happens, that in the loose,
and thoughtless, and dissipated, there is a secret radical worth, which
may shoot out by proper cultivation; that the spark of heaven, though
dimmed and obstructed, is yet not extinguished, but may, by the breath
of counsel and exhortation, be kindled into flame.

To imagine that every one who is not completely good is irrecoverably
abandoned, is to suppose that all are capable of the same degree
of excellence; it is indeed to exact from all that perfection which
none ever can attain. And since the purest virtue is consistent with
some vice, and the virtue of the greatest number with almost an equal
proportion of contrary qualities, let none too hastily conclude, that all
goodness is lost, though it may for a time be clouded and overwhelmed;
for most minds are the slaves of external circumstances, and conform to
any hand that undertakes to mould them, roll down any torrent of custom
in which they happen to be caught, or bend to any importunity that bears
hard against them.

It may be particularly observed of women, that they are for the most
part good or bad, as they fall among those who practise vice or virtue;
and that neither education nor reason gives them much security against
the influence of example. Whether it be that they have less courage to
stand against opposition, or that their desire of admiration makes them
sacrifice their principles to the poor pleasure of worthless praise, it
is certain, whatever be the cause, that female goodness seldom keeps its
ground against laughter, flattery, or fashion.

For this reason, every one should consider himself as entrusted, not only
with his own conduct, but with that of others; and as accountable, not
only for the duties which he neglects, or the crimes that he commits, but
for that negligence and irregularity which he may encourage or inculcate.
Every man, in whatever station, has, or endeavours to have, his followers,
admirers, and imitators, and has therefore the influence of his example
to watch with care; he ought to avoid not only crimes, but the appearance
of crimes, and not only to practise virtue, but to applaud, countenance,
and support it. For it is possible that for want of attention, we may
teach others faults from which ourselves are free, or by a cowardly
desertion of a cause which we ourselves approve, may pervert those who
fix their eyes upon us, and having no rule of their own to guide their
course, are easily misled by the aberrations of that example which they
choose for their direction.




No. 71. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1750.


_Vivere quod propero pauper, nec inutilis annis;_
_Da veniam: properat vivere nemo satis. _
MART. Lib. ii. Ep. xc. 4.

True, sir, to live I haste, your pardon give,
For tell me, who makes haste enough to live?
F. LEWIS.


Many words and sentences are so frequently heard in the mouths of men,
that a superficial observer is inclined to believe, that they must
contain some primary principle, some great rule of action, which it is
proper always to have present to the attention, and by which the use of
every hour is to be adjusted. Yet, if we consider the conduct of those
sententious philosophers, it will often be found, that they repeat these
aphorisms, merely because they have somewhere heard them, because they
have nothing else to say, or because they think veneration gained by
such appearances of wisdom, but that no ideas are annexed to the words,
and that, according to the old blunder of the followers of Aristotle,
their souls are mere pipes or organs, which transmit sounds, but do not
understand them.

Of this kind is the well-known and well-attested position, that _life is
short_, which may be heard among mankind by an attentive auditor, many
times a day, but which never yet within my reach of observation left
any impression upon the mind; and perhaps, if my readers will turn their
thoughts back upon their old friends, they will find it difficult to call
a single man to remembrance, who appeared to know that life was short
till he was about to lose it.

It is observable that Horace, in his account of the characters of men, as
they are diversified by the various influence of time, remarks, that the
old man is _dilator, spe longus_, given to procrastination, and inclined
to extend his hopes to a great distance. So far are we generally from
thinking what we often say of the shortness of life, that at the time
when it is necessarily shortest, we form projects which we delay to
execute, indulge such expectations as nothing but a long train of events
can gratify, and suffer those passions to gain upon us, which are only
excusable in the prime of life.

These reflections were lately excited in my mind, by an evening's
conversation with my friend Prospero, who, at the age of fifty-five, has
bought an estate, and is now contriving to dispose and cultivate it with
uncommon elegance. His great pleasure is to walk among stately trees,
and lie musing in the heat of noon under their shade; he is therefore
maturely considering how he shall dispose his walks and his groves, and
has at last determined to send for the best plans from Italy, and forbear
planting till the next season.

Thus is life trifled away in preparations to do what never can be done,
if it be left unattempted till all the requisites which imagination can
suggest are gathered together. Where our design terminates only in our
own satisfaction, the mistake is of no great importance; for the pleasure
of expecting enjoyment is often greater than that of obtaining it, and
the completion of almost every wish is found a disappointment; but when
many others are interested in an undertaking, when any design is formed,
in which the improvement or security of mankind is involved, nothing
is more unworthy either of wisdom or benevolence, than to delay it from
time to time, or to forget how much every day that passes over us takes
away from our power, and how soon an idle purpose to do an action, sinks
into a mournful wish that it had once been done.

We are frequently importuned, by the bacchanalian writers, to lay hold on
the present hour, to catch the pleasures within our reach, and remember
that futurity is not at our command.

Το ῥοδον ακμαζει βαιον χρονον· ἡν δε παρελθης,
Ζητων ἑυρησεις ου ῥοδον, αλλα βατον.

Soon fades the rose; once past the fragrant hour,
The loiterer finds a bramble for a flow'r.

But surely these exhortations may, with equal propriety, be applied to
better purposes; it may be at least inculcated that pleasures are more
safely postponed than virtues, and that greater loss is suffered by
missing an opportunity of doing good, than an hour of giddy frolick and
noisy merriment.

When Baxter had lost a thousand pounds, which he had laid up for the
erection of a school, he used frequently to mention the misfortune as
an incitement to be charitable while God gives the power of bestowing,
and considered himself as culpable in some degree for having left a
good action in the hands of chance, and suffered his benevolence to be
defeated for want of quickness and diligence.

It is lamented by Hearne, the learned antiquary of Oxford, that this
general forgetfulness of the fragility of life, has remarkably infected
the students of monuments and records; as their employment consists first
in collecting, and afterwards in arranging or abstracting what libraries
afford them, they ought to amass no more than they can digest; but when
they have undertaken a work, they go on searching and transcribing,
call for new supplies, when they are already overburthened, and at last
leave their work unfinished. _It is_, says he, _the business of a good
antiquary, as of a good man, to have mortality always before him_.

Thus, not only in the slumber of sloth, but in the dissipation of
ill-directed industry, is the shortness of life generally forgotten. As
some men lose their hours in laziness, because they suppose, that there
is time enough for the reparation of neglect; others busy themselves
in providing that no length of life may want employment; and it often
happens, that sluggishness and activity are equally surprised by the
last summons, and perish not more differently from each other, than the
fowl that received the shot in her flight, from her that is killed upon
the bush.

Among the many improvements made by the last centuries in human knowledge,
may be numbered the exact calculations of the value of life; but whatever
may be their use in traffick, they seem very little to have advanced
morality. They have hitherto been rather applied to the acquisition of
money, than of wisdom; the computer refers none of his calculations to
his own tenure, but persists, in contempt of probability, to foretel old
age to himself, and believes that he is marked out to reach the utmost
verge of human existence, and see thousands and ten thousands fall into
the grave.

So deeply is this fallacy rooted in the heart, and so strongly guarded by
hope and fear against the approach of reason, that neither science nor
experience can shake it, and we act as if life were without end, though
we see and confess its uncertainty and shortness.

Divines have, with great strength and ardour, shewn the absurdity of
delaying reformation and repentance; a degree of folly, indeed, which
sets eternity to hazard. It is the same weakness, in proportion to the
importance of the neglect, to transfer any care, which now claims our
attention, to a future time; we subject ourselves to needless dangers
from accidents which early diligence would have obviated, or perplex
our minds by vain precautions, and make provision for the execution of
designs, of which the opportunity once missed never will return.

As he that lives longest lives but a little while, every man may be
certain that he has no time to waste. The duties of life are commensurate
to its duration, and every day brings its task, which if neglected is
doubled on the morrow. But he that has already trifled away those months
and years, in which he should have laboured, must remember that he has
now only a part of that of which the whole is little; and that since the
few moments remaining are to be considered as the last trust of heaven,
not one is to be lost.




No. 72. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1750.


_Omnis Aristippum decuit color, et status, et res,_
_Tentantem majora, fere præsentibus æquum. _
HOR. Lib. i. Ep. xvii. 23.

Yet Aristippus ev'ry dress became,
In ev'ry various change of life the same;
And though he aim'd at things of higher kind,
Yet to the present held an equal mind.
FRANCIS.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

Those who exalt themselves into the chair of instruction, without
inquiring whether any will submit to their authority, have not
sufficiently considered how much of human life passes in little
incidents, cursory conversation, slight business, and casual amusements;
and therefore they have endeavoured only to inculcate the more awful
virtues, without condescending to regard those petty qualities, which
grow important only by their frequency, and which, though they produce
no single acts of heroism, nor astonish us by great events, yet are every
moment exerting their influence upon us, and make the draught of life
sweet or bitter by imperceptible instillations. They operate unseen and
unregarded, as change of air makes us sick or healthy, though we breathe
it without attention, and only know the particles that impregnate it by
their salutary or malignant effects.

You have shewn yourself not ignorant of the value of those subaltern
endowments, yet have hitherto neglected to recommend good-humour to the
world, though a little reflection will shew you that it is the _balm of
being_, the quality to which all that adorns or elevates mankind must owe
its power of pleasing. Without good-humour, learning and bravery can only
confer that superiority which swells the heart of the lion in the desert,
where he roars without reply, and ravages without resistance. Without
good-humour, virtue may awe by its dignity, and amaze by its brightness;
but must always be viewed at a distance, and will scarcely gain a friend
or attract an imitator.

Good-humour may be defined a habit of being pleased; a constant and
perennial softness of manner, easiness of approach, and suavity of
disposition; like that which every man perceives in himself, when the
first transports of new felicity have subsided, and his thoughts are only
kept in motion by a slow succession of soft impulses. Good-humour is a
state between gaiety and unconcern; the act or emanation of a mind at
leisure to regard the gratification of another.

It is imagined by many, that whenever they aspire to please, they are
required to be merry, and to shew the gladness of their souls by flights
of pleasantry, and bursts of laughter. But though these men may be for
a time heard with applause and admiration, they seldom delight us long.
We enjoy them a little, and then retire to easiness and good-humour, as
the eye gazes awhile on eminences glittering with the sun, but soon turns
aching away to verdure and to flowers.

Gaiety is to good-humour as animal perfumes to vegetable fragrance; the
one overpowers weak spirits, and the other recreates and revives them.
Gaiety seldom fails to give some pain; the hearers either strain their
faculties to accompany its towerings, or are left behind in envy and
despair. Good-humour boasts no faculties which every one does not believe
in his own power, and pleases principally by not offending.

It is well known that the most certain way to give any man pleasure, is
to persuade him that you receive pleasure from him, to encourage him to
freedom and confidence, and to avoid any such appearance of superiority
as may overbear and depress him. We see many that by this art only spend
their days in the midst of caresses, invitations, and civilities; and
without any extraordinary qualities or attainments, are the universal
favourites of both sexes, and certainly find a friend in every place.
The darlings of the world will, indeed, be generally found such as excite
neither jealousy nor fear, and are not considered as candidates for
any eminent degree of reputation, but content themselves with common
accomplishments, and endeavour rather to solicit kindness than to raise
esteem; therefore in assemblies and places of resort it seldom fails
to happen, that though at the entrance of some particular person every
face brightens with gladness, and every hand is extended in salutation,
yet if you pursue him beyond the first exchange of civilities, you will
find him of very small importance, and only welcome to the company, as
one by whom all conceive themselves admired, and with whom any one is at
liberty to amuse himself when he can find no other auditor or companion;
as one with whom all are at ease, who will hear a jest without criticism,
and a narrative without contradiction, who laughs with every wit, and
yields to every disputer.

There are many whose vanity always inclines them to associate with those
from whom they have no reason to fear mortification; and there are times
in which the wise and the knowing are willing to receive praise without
the labour of deserving it, in which the most elevated mind is willing
to descend, and the most active to be at rest. All therefore are at
some hour or another fond of companions whom they can entertain upon
easy terms, and who will relieve them from solitude, without condemning
them to vigilance and caution. We are most inclined to love when we have
nothing to fear, and he that encourages us to please ourselves, will not
be long without preference in our affection to those whose learning holds
us at the distance of pupils, or whose wit calls all attention from us,
and leaves us without importance and without regard.

It is remarked by prince Henry, when he sees Falstaff lying on the
ground, that _he could have better spared a better man_. He was well
acquainted with the vices and follies of him whom he lamented, but
while his conviction compelled him to do justice to superior qualities,
his tenderness still broke out at the remembrance of Falstaff, of the
cheerful companion, the loud buffoon, with whom he had passed his time in
all the luxury of idleness, who had gladded him with unenvied merriment,
and whom he could at once enjoy and despise.

You may perhaps think this account of those who are distinguished for
their good-humour, not very consistent with the praises which I have
bestowed upon it. But surely nothing can more evidently shew the value
of this quality, than that it recommends those who are destitute of all
other excellencies, and procures regard to the trifling, friendship to
the worthless, and affection to the dull.

Good-humour is indeed generally degraded by the characters in which
it is found; for, being considered as a cheap and vulgar quality, we
find it often neglected by those that, having excellencies of higher
reputation and brighter splendour, perhaps imagine that they have some
right to gratify themselves at the expense of others, and are to demand
compliance, rather than to practise it. It is by some unfortunate mistake
that almost all those who have any claim to esteem or love, press their
pretensions with too little consideration of others. This mistake, my
own interest, as well as my zeal for general happiness, makes me desirous
to rectify; for I have a friend, who, because he knows his own fidelity
and usefulness, is never willing to sink into a companion: I have a wife
whose beauty first subdued me, and whose wit confirmed her conquest, but
whose beauty now serves no other purpose than to entitle her to tyranny,
and whose wit is only used to justify perverseness.

Surely nothing can be more unreasonable than to lose the will to please,
when we are conscious of the power, or show more cruelty than to chuse
any kind of influence before that of kindness. He that regards the
welfare of others, should make his virtue approachable, that it may be
loved and copied; and he that considers the wants which every man feels,
or will feel, of external assistance, must rather wish to be surrounded
by those that love him, than by those that admire his excellencies, or
solicit his favours; for admiration ceases with novelty, and interest
gains its end and retires. A man whose great qualities want the ornament
of superficial attractions, is like a naked mountain with mines of gold,
which will be frequented only till the treasure is exhausted.

I am, &c.

PHILOMIDES.




No. 73. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1750.


_Stulte, quid o frustra votis puerilibus optas,_
_Quæ non ulla tulit, fertque, feretque, dies. _
OVID, Trist. Lib. iii. El. viii. 11.

Why thinks the fool with childish hope to see
What neither is, nor was, nor e'er shall be?
ELPHINSTON.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

If you feel any of that compassion which you recommend to others, you will
not disregard a case which I have reason from observation to believe very
common, and which I know by experience to be very miserable. And though
the querulous are seldom received with great ardour of kindness, I hope
to escape the mortification of finding that my lamentations spread the
contagion of impatience, and produce anger rather than tenderness. I
write not merely to vent the swelling of my heart, but to inquire by what
means I may recover my tranquillity; and shall endeavour at brevity in
my narrative, having long known that complaint quickly tires, however
elegant, or however just.

I was born in a remote county, of a family that boasts alliances with the
greatest names in English history, and extends its claims of affinity to
the Tudors and Plantagenets. My ancestors, by little and little, wasted
their patrimony, till my father had not enough left for the support
of a family, without descending to the cultivation of his own grounds,
being condemned to pay three sisters the fortunes allotted them by my
grandfather, who is suspected to have made his will when he was incapable
of adjusting properly the claims of his children, and who, perhaps without
design, enriched his daughters by beggaring his son. My aunts being, at
the death of their father, neither young nor beautiful, nor very eminent
for softness of behaviour, were suffered to live unsolicited, and by
accumulating the interest of their portions grew every day richer and
prouder. My father pleased himself with foreseeing that the possessions
of those ladies must revert at last to the hereditary estate, and that
his family might lose none of its dignity, resolved to keep me untainted
with a lucrative employment; whenever therefore I discovered any
inclination to the improvement of my condition, my mother never failed
to put me in mind of my birth, and charged me to do nothing with which I
might be reproached when I should come to my aunts' estate.

In all the perplexities or vexations which want of money brought upon
us, it was our constant practice to have recourse to futurity. If any
of our neighbours surpassed us in appearance, we went home and contrived
an equipage, with which the death of my aunts was to supply us. If any
purse-proud upstart was deficient in respect, vengeance was referred to
the time in which our estate was to be repaired. We registered every act
of civility and rudeness, inquired the number of dishes at every feast,
and minuted the furniture of every house, that we might, when the hour
of affluence should come, be able to eclipse all their splendour, and
surpass all their magnificence.

Upon plans of elegance and schemes of pleasure the day rose and set,
and the year went round unregarded, while we were busied in laying out
plantations on ground not yet our own, and deliberating whether the
manor-house should be rebuilt or repaired. This was the amusement of
our leisure, and the solace of our exigencies; we met together only to
contrive how our approaching fortune should be enjoyed; for in this our
conversation always ended, on whatever subject it began. We had none of
the collateral interests which diversify the life of others with joys and
hopes, but had turned our whole attention on one event, which we could
neither hasten nor retard, and had no other object of curiosity than the
health or sickness of my aunts, of which we were careful to procure very
exact and early intelligence.

This visionary opulence for a while soothed our imagination, but
afterwards fired our wishes, and exasperated our necessities, and my
father could not always restrain himself from exclaiming, that _no
creature had so many lives as a cat and an old maid_. At last, upon
the recovery of his sister from an ague, which she was supposed to have
caught by sparing fire, he began to lose his stomach, and four months
afterwards sunk into his grave.

My mother, who loved her husband, survived him but a little while, and
left me the sole heir of their lands, their schemes, and their wishes.
As I had not enlarged my conceptions either by books or conversation,
I differed only from my father by the freshness of my cheeks, and the
vigour of my step; and, like him, gave way to no thoughts but of enjoying
the wealth which my aunts were hoarding.

At length the eldest fell ill. I paid the civilities and compliments which
sickness requires with the utmost punctuality. I dreamed every night
of escutcheons and white gloves, and inquired every morning at an early
hour, whether there were any news of my dear aunt. At last a messenger
was sent to inform me that I must come to her without the delay of a
moment. I went and heard her last advice, but opening her will, found
that she had left her fortune to her second sister.

I hung my head; the youngest sister threatened to be married, and every
thing was disappointment and discontent. I was in danger of losing
irreparably one third of my hopes, and was condemned still to wait for
the rest. Of part of my terror I was soon eased; for the youth whom his
relations would have compelled to marry the old lady, after innumerable
stipulations, articles, and settlements, ran away with the daughter of
his father's groom; and my aunt, upon this conviction of the perfidy of
man, resolved never to listen more to amorous addresses.

Ten years longer I dragged the shackles of expectation, without ever
suffering a day to pass, in which I did not compute how much my chance
was improved of being rich to-morrow. At last the second lady died,
after a short illness, which yet was long enough to afford her time for
the disposal of her estate, which she gave to me after the death of her
sister.

I was now relieved from part of my misery; a larger fortune, though not
in my power, was certain and unalienable; nor was there now any danger,
that I might at last be frustrated of my hopes by a fret of dotage,
the flatteries of a chambermaid, the whispers of a tale-bearer, or the
officiousness of a nurse. But my wealth was yet in reversion, my aunt was
to be buried before I could emerge to grandeur and pleasure; and there
were yet, according to my father's observation, nine lives between me
and happiness.

I however lived on, without any clamours of discontent, and comforted
myself with considering, that all are mortal, and they who are
continually decaying must at last be destroyed.
But let no man from this time suffer his felicity to depend on the death
of his aunt. The good gentlewoman was very regular in her hours, and
simple in her diet, and in walking or sitting still, waking or sleeping,
had always in view the preservation of her health. She was subject to
no disorder but hypochondriac dejection; by which, without intention,
she increased my miseries, for whenever the weather was cloudy, she would
take her bed and send me notice that her time was come. I went with all
the haste of eagerness, and sometimes received passionate injunctions
to be kind to her maid, and directions how the last offices should be
performed; but if before my arrival the sun happened to break out, or
the wind to change, I met her at the door, or found her in the garden,
bustling and vigilant, with all the tokens of long life.

Sometimes, however, she fell into distempers, and was thrice given over by
the doctor, yet she found means of slipping through the gripe of death,
and after having tortured me three months at each time with violent
alternations of hope and fear, came out of her chamber without any other
hurt than the loss of flesh, which in a few weeks she recovered by broths
and jellies.

As most have sagacity sufficient to guess at the desires of an heir, it
was the constant practice of those who were hoping at second hand, and
endeavoured to secure my favour against the time when I should be rich,
to pay their court, by informing me that my aunt began to droop, that
she had lately a bad night, that she coughed feebly, and that she could
never climb May-hill; or, at least, that the autumn would carry her off.
Thus was I flattered in the winter with the piercing winds of March, and
in summer, with the fogs of September. But she lived through spring and
fall, and set heat and cold at defiance, till, after near half a century,
I buried her on the fourteenth of last June, aged ninety-three years,
five months, and six days.

For two months after her death I was rich, and was pleased with that
obsequiousness and reverence which wealth instantaneously procures.
But this joy is now past, and I have returned again to my old habit of
wishing. Being accustomed to give the future full power over my mind,
and to start away from the scene before me to some expected enjoyment,
I deliver up myself to the tyranny of every desire which fancy suggests,
and long for a thousand things which I am unable to procure. Money
has much less power than is ascribed to it by those that want it. I had
formed schemes which I cannot execute, I had supposed events which do not
come to pass, and the rest of my life must pass in craving solicitude,
unless you can find some remedy for a mind, corrupted with an inveterate
disease of wishing, and unable to think on any thing but wants, which
reason tells me will never be supplied.

I am, &c.

CUPIDUS.




No. 74. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1750.


_Rixatur de lana sæpe caprina. _
HOR. Lib i. Ep. xviii. 15.

For nought tormented, she for nought torments.
ELPHINSTON.


Men seldom give pleasure, where they are not pleased themselves; it is
necessary, therefore, to cultivate an habitual alacrity and cheerfulness,
that in whatever state we may be placed by Providence, whether we
are appointed to confer or receive benefits, to implore or to afford
protection, we may secure the love of those with whom we transact. For
though it is generally imagined, that he who grants favours, may spare
any attention to his behaviour, and that usefulness will always procure
friends; yet it has been found, that there is an art of granting requests,
an art very difficult of attainment; that officiousness and liberality
may be so adulterated, as to lose the greater part of their effect; that
compliance may provoke, relief may harass, and liberality distress.

No disease of the mind can more fatally disable it from benevolence, the
chief duty of social beings, than ill-humour or peevishness; for though
it breaks not out in paroxysms of outrage, nor bursts into clamour,
turbulence, and bloodshed, it wears out happiness by slow corrosion,
and small injuries incessantly repeated. It may be considered as the
canker of life, that destroys its vigour, and checks its improvement,
that creeps on with hourly depredations, and taints and vitiates what
it cannot consume.

Peevishness, when it has been so far indulged, as to outrun the motions
of the will, and discover itself without premeditation, is a species of
depravity in the highest degree disgusting and offensive, because no
rectitude of intention, nor softness of address, can ensure a moment's
exemption from affront and indignity. While we are courting the favour
of a peevish man, and exerting ourselves in the most diligent civility,
an unlucky syllable displeases, an unheeded circumstance ruffles and
exasperates; and in the moment when we congratulate ourselves upon having
gained a friend, our endeavours are frustrated at once, and all our
assiduity forgotten, in the casual tumult of some trifling irritation.

This troublesome impatience is sometimes nothing more than the symptom
of some deeper malady. He that is angry without daring to confess his
resentment, or sorrowful without the liberty of telling his grief, is
too frequently inclined to give vent to the fermentations of his mind
at the first passages that are opened, and to let his passions boil over
upon those whom accident throws in his way. A painful and tedious course
of sickness frequently produces such an alarming apprehension of the
least increase of uneasiness, as keeps the soul perpetually on the watch,
such a restless and incessant solicitude, as no care or tenderness can
appease, and can only be pacified by the cure of the distemper, and the
removal of that pain by which it is excited.

Nearly approaching to this weakness, is the captiousness of old age. When
the strength is crushed, the senses dulled, and the common pleasures
of life become insipid by repetition, we are willing to impute our
uneasiness to causes not wholly out of our power, and please ourselves
with fancying that we suffer by neglect, unkindness, or any evil which
admits a remedy, rather than by the decays of nature, which cannot be
prevented or repaired. We therefore revenge our pains upon those on whom
we resolve to charge them; and too often drive mankind away at the time
we have the greatest need of tenderness and assistance.

But though peevishness may sometimes claim our compassion, as the
consequence or concomitant of misery, it is very often found, where
nothing can justify or excuse its admission. It is frequently one of the
attendants on the prosperous, and is employed by insolence in exacting
homage, or by tyranny in harassing subjection. It is the offspring of
idleness or pride; of idleness anxious for trifles; or pride unwilling to
endure the least obstruction of her wishes. Those who have long lived in
solitude indeed naturally contract this unsocial quality, because, having
long had only themselves to please, they do not readily depart from their
own inclinations; their singularities therefore are only blameable, when
they have imprudently or morosely withdrawn themselves from the world;
but there are others, who have, without any necessity, nursed up this
habit in their minds, by making implicit submissiveness the condition of
their favour, and suffering none to approach them, but those who never
speak but to applaud, or move but to obey.

He that gives himself up to his own fancy, and converses with none but
such as he hires to lull him on the down of absolute authority, to
sooth him with obsequiousness, and regale him with flattery, soon grows
too slothful for the labour of contest, too tender for the asperity of
contradiction, and too delicate for the coarseness of truth; a little
opposition offends, a little restraint enrages, and a little difficulty
perplexes him; having been accustomed to see every thing give way to his
humour, he soon forgets his own littleness, and expects to find the world
rolling at his beck, and all mankind employed to accommodate and delight
him.

Tetrica had a large fortune bequeathed to her by an aunt, which made
her very early independent, and placed her in a state of superiority
to all about her. Having no superfluity of understanding, she was soon
intoxicated by the flatteries of her maid, who informed her that ladies,
such as she, had nothing to do but take pleasure their own way; that she
wanted nothing from others, and had therefore no reason to value their
opinion; that money was every thing; and that they who thought themselves
ill-treated, should look for better usage among their equals.

Warm with these generous sentiments, Tetrica came forth into the world,
in which she endeavoured to force respect by haughtiness of mien and
vehemence of language; but having neither birth, beauty, nor wit, in any
uncommon degree, she suffered such mortifications from those who thought
themselves at liberty to return her insults, as reduced her turbulence
to cooler malignity, and taught her to practise her arts of vexation only
where she might hope to tyrannize without resistance. She continued from
her twentieth to her fifty-fifth year to torment all her inferiors with
so much diligence, that she has formed a principle of disapprobation, and
finds in every place something to grate her mind, and disturb her quiet.

If she takes the air, she is offended with the heat or cold, the glare of
the sun, or the gloom of the clouds; if she makes a visit, the room in
which she is to be received is too light, or too dark, or furnished with
something which she cannot see without aversion. Her tea is never of the
right sort; the figures on the China give her disgust. Where there are
children, she hates the gabble of brats; where there are none, she cannot
bear a place without some cheerfulness and rattle. If many servants are
kept in a house, she never fails to tell how lord Lavish was ruined by a
numerous retinue; if few, she relates the story of a miser that made his
company wait on themselves. She quarrelled with one family, because she
had an unpleasant view from their windows; with another, because the
squirrel leaped within two yards of her; and with a third, because she
could not bear the noise of the parrot.

Of milliners and mantua-makers she is the proverbial torment. She compels
them to alter their work, then to unmake it, and contrive it after another
fashion; then changes her mind, and likes it better as it was at first;
then will have a small improvement. Thus she proceeds till no profit can
recompense the vexation; they at last leave the clothes at her house, and
refuse to serve her. Her maid, the only being who can endure her tyranny,
professes to take her own course, and hear her mistress talk. Such is the
consequence of peevishness; it can be borne only when it is despised.

It sometimes happens that too close an attention to minute exactness,
or a too rigorous habit of examining every thing by the standard of
perfection, vitiates the temper, rather than improves the understanding,
and teaches the mind to discern faults with unhappy penetration. It is
incident likewise to men of vigorous imagination to please themselves
too much with futurities, and to fret because those expectations
are disappointed, which should never have been formed. Knowledge and
genius are often enemies to quiet, by suggesting ideas of excellence,
which men and the performances of men cannot attain. But let no man
rashly determine, that his unwillingness to be pleased is a proof
of understanding, unless his superiority appears from less doubtful
evidence; for though peevishness may sometimes justly boast its descent
from learning or from wit, it is much oftener of a base extraction, the
child of vanity and nursling of ignorance.




No. 75. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 1750.


_Diligitur nemo, nisi cui Fortuna secunda est. _
_Quæ, simul intonuit, proxima quæque fugat. _
OVID, Ex Ponto. Lib. ii. Ep. iii. 23.

When smiling Fortune spreads her golden ray,
All crowd around to flatter and obey:
But when she thunders from an angry sky,
Our friends, our flatterers, our lovers fly.
Miss A. W. [49]


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

The diligence with which you endeavour to cultivate the knowledge of
nature, manners, and life, will perhaps incline you to pay some regard
to the observations of one who has been taught to know mankind by
unwelcome information, and whose opinions are the result, not of solitary
conjectures, but of practice and experience.

I was born to a large fortune, and bred to the knowledge of those arts
which are supposed to accomplish the mind, and adorn the person of a
woman. To these attainments, which custom and education almost forced
upon me, I added some voluntary acquisitions by the use of books, and
the conversation of that species of men whom the ladies generally mention
with terrour and aversion under the name of scholars, but whom I have
found a harmless and inoffensive order of beings, not so much wiser than
ourselves, but that they may receive as well as communicate knowledge,
and more inclined to degrade their own character by cowardly submission,
than to overbear or oppress us with their learning or their wit.

From these men, however, if they are by kind treatment encouraged to talk,
something may be gained, which, embellished with elegancy, and softened
by modesty, will always add dignity and value to female conversation; and
from my acquaintance with the bookish part of the world I derived many
principles of judgment and maxims of prudence, by which I was enabled
to draw upon myself the general regard in every place of concourse or
pleasure. My opinion was the great rule of approbation, my remarks were
remembered by those who desired the second degree of fame, my mien was
studied, my dress was imitated, my letters were handed from one family
to another, and read by those who copied them as sent to themselves; my
visits were solicited as honours, and multitudes boasted of an intimacy
with Melissa, who had only seen me by accident, and whose familiarity
had never proceeded beyond the exchange of a compliment, or return of
a courtesy.

I shall make no scruple of confessing that I was pleased with this
universal veneration, because I always considered it as paid to my
intrinsick qualities and inseparable merit, and very easily persuaded
myself that fortune had no part in my superiority. When I looked upon my
glass, I saw youth and beauty, with health that might give me reason to
hope their continuance; when I examined my mind, I found some strength
of judgment, and fertility of fancy; and was told that every action was
grace, and that every accent was persuasion.

In this manner my life passed like a continual triumph, amidst
acclamations, and envy, and courtship, and caresses: to please Melissa
was the general ambition, and every stratagem of artful flattery was
practised upon me. To be flattered is grateful, even when we know that
our praises are not believed by those who pronounce them; for they prove,
at least, our power, and show that our favour is valued, since it is
purchased by the meanness of falsehood. But, perhaps, the flatterer is
not often detected, for an honest mind is not apt to suspect, and no one
exerts the power of discernment with much vigour when self-love favours
the deceit.

The number of adorers, and the perpetual distraction of my thoughts by new
schemes of pleasure, prevented me from listening to any of those who crowd
in multitudes to give girls advice, and kept me unmarried and unengaged
to my twenty-seventh year, when, as I was towering in all the pride of
uncontested excellency, with a face yet little impaired, and a mind
hourly improving, the failure of a fund, in which my money was placed,
reduced me to a frugal competency, which allowed little beyond neatness
and independence.

I bore the diminution of my riches without any outrages of sorrow, or
pusillanimity of dejection. Indeed I did not know how much I had lost,
for having always heard and thought more of my wit and beauty, than of
my fortune, it did not suddenly enter my imagination, that Melissa could
sink beneath her established rank, while her form and her mind continued
the same; that she could cease to raise admiration but by ceasing to
deserve it, or feel any stroke but from the hand of time.

It was in my power to have concealed the loss, and to have married,
by continuing the same appearance, with all the credit of my original
fortune; but I was not so far sunk in my own esteem, as to submit to the
baseness of fraud, or to desire any other recommendation than sense and
virtue. I, therefore, dismissed my equipage, sold those ornaments which
were become unsuitable to my new condition, and appeared among those with
whom I used to converse with less glitter, but with equal spirit.

I found myself received at every visit, with sorrow beyond what is
naturally felt for calamities in which we have no part, and was
entertained with condolence and consolation so frequently repeated, that
my friends plainly consulted rather their own gratification, than my
relief. Some from that time refused my acquaintance, and forbore, without
any provocation, to repay my visits; some visited me, but after a longer
interval than usual, and every return was still with more delay; nor
did any of my female acquaintances fail to introduce the mention of my
misfortunes, to compare my present and former condition, to tell me how
much it must trouble me to want the splendour which I became so well, to
look at pleasures which I had formerly enjoyed, and to sink to a level
with those by whom I had been considered as moving in a higher sphere,
and who had hitherto approached me with reverence and submission, which
I was now no longer to expect.

Observations like these, are commonly nothing better than covert insults,
which serve to give vent to the flatulence of pride, but they are now
and then imprudently uttered by honesty and benevolence, and inflict
pain where kindness is intended; I will, therefore, so far maintain my
antiquated claim to politeness, as to venture the establishment of this
rule, that no one ought to remind another of misfortunes of which the
sufferer does not complain, and which there are no means proposed of
alleviating. You have no right to excite thoughts which necessarily give
pain whenever they return, and which perhaps might not have revived but
by absurd and unseasonable compassion.

My endless train of lovers immediately withdrew, without raising any
emotions. The greater part had indeed always professed to court, as it is
termed, upon the square, had inquired my fortune, and offered settlements;
these had undoubtedly a right to retire without censure, since they had
openly treated for money, as necessary to their happiness, and who can
tell how little they wanted any other portion? I have always thought the
clamours of women unreasonable, who imagine themselves injured because
the men who followed them upon the supposition of a greater fortune,
reject them when they are discovered to have less. I have never known
any lady, who did not think wealth a title to some stipulations in her
favour; and surely what is claimed by the possession of money is justly
forfeited by its loss. She that has once demanded a settlement has
allowed the importance of fortune: and when she cannot shew pecuniary
merit, why should she think her cheapener obliged to purchase?

My lovers were not all contented with silent desertion. Some of them
revenged the neglect which they had formerly endured by wanton and
superfluous insults, and endeavoured to mortify me, by paying, in my
presence, those civilities to other ladies, which were once devoted only
to me. But, as it had been my rule to treat men according to the rank
of their intellect, I had never suffered any one to waste his life in
suspense, who could have employed it to better purpose, and had therefore
no enemies but coxcombs, whose resentment and respect were equally below
my consideration.

The only pain which I have felt from degradation, is the loss of that
influence which I had always exerted on the side of virtue, in the
defence of innocence, and the assertion of truth. I now find my opinions
slighted, my sentiments criticised, and my arguments opposed by those
that used to listen to me without reply, and struggle to be first in
expressing their conviction.

The female disputants have wholly thrown off my authority; and if I
endeavour to enforce my reasons by an appeal to the scholars that happen
to be present, the wretches are certain to pay their court by sacrificing
me and my system to a finer gown, and I am every hour insulted with
contradiction by cowards, who could never find till lately that Melissa
was liable to errour.

There are two persons only whom I cannot charge with having changed their
conduct with my change of fortune. One is an old curate that has passed
his life in the duties of his profession, with great reputation for his
knowledge and piety; the other is a lieutenant of dragoons. The parson
made no difficulty in the height of my elevation to check me when I was
pert, and instruct me when I blundered; and if there is any alteration,
he is now more timorous, lest his freedom should be thought rudeness. The
soldier never paid me any particular addresses, but very rigidly observed
all the rules of politeness, which he is now so far from relaxing, that
whenever he serves the tea, he obstinately carries me the first dish, in
defiance of the frowns and whispers of the table,

This, Mr. Rambler, is _to see the world_. It is impossible for those
that have only known affluence and prosperity, to judge of themselves
or others. The rich and the powerful live in a perpetual masquerade, in
which all about them wear borrowed characters; and we only discover in
what estimation we are held, when we can no longer give hopes or fears.

I am, &c.

MELISSA.

[Footnote 49: Anna Williams, of whom an account is given in the Life of Dr.
Johnson, prefixed to this edition. ]




No. 76. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1750.


_----Silvis, ubi passim_
_Palantes error certo de tramite pellit,_
_Ille sinistrorsum, hic dextrorsum abit; unus utrique_
_Error, sed variis illudit partibus. _
HOR. Lib. ii. Sat iii. 48.

While mazy error draws mankind astray
From truth's sure path, each takes his devious way;
One to the right, one to the left recedes,
Alike deluded, as each fancy leads.
ELPHINSTON.


It is easy for every man, whatever be his character with others, to
find reasons for esteeming himself, and therefore censure, contempt,
or conviction of crimes, seldom deprive him of his own favour. Those,
indeed, who can see only external facts, may look upon him with
abhorrence? but when he calls himself to his own tribunal, he finds every
fault, if not absolutely effaced, yet so much palliated by the goodness
of his intention, and the cogency of the motive, that very little
guilt or turpitude remains; and when he takes a survey of the whole
complication of his character, he discovers so many latent excellencies,
so many virtues that want but an opportunity to exert themselves in act,
and so many kind wishes for universal happiness, that he looks on himself
as suffering unjustly under the infamy of single failings, while the
general temper of his mind is unknown or unregarded.

It is natural to mean well, when only abstracted ideas of virtue are
proposed to the mind, and no particular passion turns us aside from
rectitude; and so willing is every man to flatter himself, that the
difference between approving laws, and obeying them, is frequently
forgotten; he that acknowledges the obligations of morality, and pleases
his vanity with enforcing them to others, concludes himself zealous in
the cause of virtue, though he has no longer any regard to her precepts,
than they conform to his own desires; and counts himself among her warmest
lovers, because he praises her beauty, though every rival steals away
his heart.

There are, however, great numbers who have little recourse to the
refinements of speculation, but who yet live at peace with themselves,
by means which require less understanding, or less attention. When
their hearts are burthened with the consciousness of a crime, instead
of seeking for some remedy within themselves, they look round upon the
rest of mankind, to find others tainted with the same guilt: they please
themselves with observing, that they have numbers on their side; and
that, though they are hunted out from the society of good men, they are
not likely to be condemned to solitude.

It may be observed, perhaps without exception, that none are so
industrious to detect wickedness, or so ready to impute it, as they
whose crimes are apparent and confessed. They envy an unblemished
reputation, and what they envy they are busy to destroy; they are
unwilling to suppose themselves meaner and more corrupt than others, and
therefore willingly pull down from their elevations those with whom they
cannot rise to an equality. No man yet was ever wicked without secret
discontent, and according to the different degrees of remaining virtue,
or unextinguished reason, he either endeavours to reform himself, or
corrupt others; either to regain the station which he has quitted, or
prevail on others to imitate his defection.

It has always been considered as an alleviation of misery not to suffer
alone, even when union and society can contribute nothing to resistance
or escape; some comfort of the same kind seems to incite wickedness
to seek associates, though indeed another reason may be given, for as
guilt is propagated the power of reproach is diminished, and among numbers
equally detestable every individual may be sheltered from shame, though
not from conscience.

Another lenitive by which the throbs of the breast are assuaged, is, the
contemplation, not of the same, but of different crimes. He that cannot
justify himself by his resemblance to others, is ready to try some other
expedient, and to inquire what will rise to his advantage from opposition
and dissimilitude. He easily finds some faults in every human being,
which he weighs against his own, and easily makes them preponderate
while he keeps the balance in his own hand, and throws in or takes out
at his pleasure circumstances that make them heavier or lighter. He then
triumphs in his comparative purity, and sets himself at ease, not because
he can refute the charges advanced against him, but because he can
censure his accusers with equal justice, and no longer fears the arrows
of reproach, when he has stored his magazine of malice with weapons
equally sharp and equally envenomed.

This practice, though never just, is yet specious and artful, when the
censure is directed against deviations to the contrary extreme. The man
who is branded with cowardice, may, with some appearance of propriety,
turn all his force of argument against a stupid contempt of life, and
rash precipitation into unnecessary danger. Every recession from temerity
is an approach towards cowardice, and though it be confessed that
bravery, like other virtues, stands between faults on either hand, yet
the place of the middle point may always be disputed; he may therefore
often impose upon careless understandings, by turning the attention
wholly from himself, and keeping it fixed invariably on the opposite
fault; and by shewing how many evils are avoided by his behaviour, he
may conceal for a time those which are incurred.

But vice has not always opportunities or address for such artful
subterfuges; men often extenuate their own guilt, only by vague and
general charges upon others, or endeavour to gain rest to themselves,
by pointing some other prey to the pursuit of censure.

Every whisper of infamy is industriously circulated, every hint of
suspicion eagerly improved, and every failure of conduct joyfully
published, by those whose interest it is, that the eye and voice of the
publick should be employed on any rather than on themselves.

All these artifices, and a thousand others equally vain and equally
despicable, are incited by that conviction of the deformity of
wickedness, from which none can set himself free, and by an absurd
desire to separate the cause from the effects, and to enjoy the profit of
crimes without suffering the shame. Men are willing to try all methods of
reconciling guilt and quiet, and when their understandings are stubborn
and uncomplying, raise their passions against them, and hope to overpower
their own knowledge.

It is generally not so much the desire of men, sunk into depravity, to
deceive the world as themselves, for when no particular circumstances make
them dependant on others, infamy disturbs them little, but as it revives
their remorse, and is echoed to them from their own hearts. The sentence
most dreaded is that of reason and conscience, which they would engage
on their side at any price but the labours of duty, and the sorrows of
repentance. For this purpose every seducement and fallacy is sought, the
hopes still rest upon some new experiment till life is at an end; and
the last hour steals on unperceived, while the faculties are engaged in
resisting reason, and repressing the sense of the Divine disapprobation.




No. 77. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 11, 1750.


_Os dignum æterno nitidum quod fulgeat auro,_
_Si mallet laudare Deum, cui sordida monstra_
_Prætulit, et liquidam temeravit crimine vocem. _
PRUDENT.

A golden statue such a wit might claim,
Had God and virtue rais'd the noble flame;
But ah! how lewd a subject has he sung,
What vile obscenity profanes his tongue.
F. LEWIS.


Among those, whose hopes of distinction, or riches, arise from an opinion
of their intellectual attainments, it has been, from age to age, an
established custom to complain of the ingratitude of mankind to their
instructors, and the discouragement which men of genius and study suffer
from avarice and ignorance, from the prevalence of false taste, and the
encroachment of barbarity.

Men are most powerfully affected by those evils which themselves feel, or
which appear before their own eyes; and as there has never been a time of
such general felicity, but that many have failed to obtain the rewards to
which they had, in their own judgment, a just claim, some offended writer
has always declaimed, in the rage of disappointment, against his age or
nation; nor is there one who has not fallen upon times more unfavourable
to learning than any former century, or who does not wish, that he had
been reserved in the insensibility of non-existence to some happier
hour, when literary merit shall no longer be despised, and the gifts and
caresses of mankind shall recompense the toils of study, and add lustre
to the charms of wit.

Many of these clamours are undoubtedly to be considered only as the bursts
of pride never to be satisfied, as the prattle of affectation, mimicking
distresses unfelt, or as the common places of vanity solicitous for
splendour of sentences, and acuteness of remark. Yet it cannot be denied
that frequent discontent must proceed from frequent hardships, and though
it is evident, that not more than one age or people can deserve the
censure of being more averse from learning than any other, yet at all
times knowledge must have encountered impediments, and wit been mortified
with contempt, or harassed with persecution.

It is not necessary, however, to join immediately in the outcry, or to
condemn mankind as pleased with ignorance, or always envious of superior
abilities. The miseries of the learned have been related by themselves,
and since they have not been found exempt from that partiality with which
men look upon their own actions and sufferings, we may conclude that
they have not forgotten to deck their cause with the brightest ornaments,
and strongest colours. The logician collected all his subtilties when
they were to be employed in his own defence; and the master of rhetorick
exerted against his adversary all the arts by which hatred is embittered,
and indignation inflamed.

To believe no man in his own cause, is the standing and perpetual rule
of distributive justice. Since therefore, in the controversy between the
learned and their enemies, we have only the pleas of one party, of the
party more able to delude our understandings, and engage our passions,
we must determine our opinion by facts uncontested, and evidences on each
side allowed to be genuine.

By this procedure, I know not whether the students will find their cause
promoted, or the compassion which they expect much increased. Let their
conduct be impartially surveyed; let them be allowed no longer to direct
attention at their pleasure, by expatiating on their own deserts; let
neither the dignity of knowledge overawe the judgment, nor the graces of
elegance seduce it. It will then, perhaps, be found, that they were not
able to produce claims to kinder treatment, but provoked the calamities
which they suffered, and seldom wanted friends, but when they wanted
virtue.

That few men, celebrated for theoretick wisdom, live with conformity to
their precepts, must be readily confessed; and we cannot wonder that the
indignation of mankind rises with great vehemence against those, who
neglect the duties which they appear to know with so strong conviction the
necessity of performing. Yet since no man has power of acting equal to
that of thinking, I know not whether the speculatist may not sometimes
incur censures too severe, and by those who form ideas of his life from
their knowledge of his books, be considered as worse than others, only
because he was expected to be better.

He, by whose writings the heart is rectified, the appetites counteracted,
and the passions repressed, may be considered as not unprofitable to the
great republick of humanity, even though his behaviour should not always
exemplify his rules. His instructions may diffuse their influence to
regions, in which it will not be inquired, whether the author be _albus
an ater_, good or bad; to times, when all his faults and all his follies
shall be lost in forgetfulness, among things of no concern or importance
to the world; and he may kindle in thousands and ten thousands that flame
which burnt but dimly in himself, through the fumes of passion, or the
damps of cowardice. The vicious moralist may be considered as a taper,
by which we are lighted through the labyrinth of complicated passions:
he extends his radiance further than his heat, and guides all that are
within view, but burns only those who make too near approaches.

Yet since good or harm must be received for the most part from those to
whom we are familiarly known, he whose vices overpower his virtues, in
the compass to which his vices can extend, has no reason to complain that
he meets not with affection or veneration, when those with whom he passes
his life are more corrupted by his practice than enlightened by his
ideas. Admiration begins where acquaintance ceases; and his favourers are
distant, but his enemies at hand.

Yet many have dared to boast of neglected merit, and to challenge their
age for cruelty and folly, of whom it cannot be alledged that they have
endeavoured to increase the wisdom or virtue of their readers. They
have been at once profligate in their lives, and licentious in their
compositions; have not only forsaken the paths of virtue, but attempted
to lure others after them. They have smoothed the road of perdition,
covered with flowers the thorns of guilt, and taught temptation sweeter
notes, softer blandishments, and stronger allurements.

It has been apparently the settled purpose of some writers, whose powers
and acquisitions place them high in the rank of literature, to set
fashion on the side of wickedness; to recommend debauchery and lewdness,
by associating them with qualities most likely to dazzle the discernment,
and attract the affections; and to shew innocence and goodness with such
attendant weaknesses as necessarily expose them to contempt and derision.

Such naturally found intimates among the corrupt, the thoughtless, and the
intemperate; passed their lives amidst the levities of sportive idleness,
or the warm professions of drunken friendship; and fed their hopes with
the promises of wretches, whom their precepts had taught to scoff at
truth. But when fools had laughed away their sprightliness, and the
languors of excess could no longer be relieved, they saw their protectors
hourly drop away, and wondered and stormed to find themselves abandoned.
Whether their companions persisted in wickedness, or returned to virtue,
they were left equally without assistance; for debauchery is selfish and
negligent, and from virtue the virtuous only can expect regard.

It is said by Florus of Catiline, who died in the midst of slaughtered
enemies, that _his death had been illustrious, had it been suffered
for his country_. Of the wits who have languished away life under the
pressures of poverty, or in the restlessness of suspense, caressed and
rejected, flattered and despised, as they were of more or less use to
those who styled themselves their patrons, it might be observed, that
their miseries would enforce compassion, had they been brought upon them
by honesty and religion.

The wickedness of a loose or profane author is more atrocious than that of
the giddy libertine, or drunken ravisher, not only because it extends its
effects wider, as a pestilence that taints the air is more destructive
than poison infused in a draught, but because it is committed with cool
deliberation. By the instantaneous violence of desire, a good man may
sometimes be surprised before reflection can come to his rescue; when
the appetites have strengthened their influence by habit, they are not
easily resisted or suppressed; but for the frigid villainy of studious
lewdness, for the calm malignity of laboured impiety, what apology can
be invented? What punishment can be adequate to the crime of him who
retires to solitudes for the refinement of debauchery; who tortures his
fancy, and ransacks his memory, only that he may leave the world less
virtuous than he found it; that he may intercept the hopes of the rising
generation; and spread snares for the soul with more dexterity?

What were their motives, or what their excuses, is below the dignity of
reason to examine. If having extinguished in themselves the distinction
of right and wrong, they were insensible of the mischief which they
promoted, they deserved to be hunted down by the general compact, as no
longer partaking of social nature; if influenced by the corruption of
patrons, or readers, they sacrificed their own convictions to vanity or
interest, they were to be abhorred with more acrimony than he that murders
for pay; since they committed greater crimes without greater temptations.

_Of him, to whom much is given, much shall be required. _ Those, whom God
has favoured with superior faculties, and made eminent for quickness
of intuition, and accuracy of distinctions, will certainly be regarded
as culpable in his eye, for defects and deviations which, in souls
less enlightened, may be guiltless. But, surely, none can think without
horrour on that man's condition, who has been more wicked in proportion
as he had more means of excelling in virtue, and used the light imparted
from heaven only to embellish folly, and shed lustre upon crimes.




No. 78. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1750.


_----Mors sola fatetur,_
_Quantula sint hominum corpuscula.