per again, and then aloud, "But you know that person;" then whisper again. The thing would be well enough, if they whispered to keep the folly of what they say among friends; but, alas, they do it to preserve the importance of their thoughts. I am sure I could name you more than one person whom no man living ever heard talk upon any subject in nature, or ever saw in his whole life with a book in his hand, that, I know not how, can whisper something like knowledge of what has and does pass in the world; which you would think he learned from some familiar spirit that did not think him worthy to receive the whole story. But in truth whisperers deal only in half accounts of what they entertain you with. A great help to their discourse is, "That the town says, and people begin to talk very freely, and they had it from persons too considerable to be named, what they will tell you when things are riper." My friend has winked upon me any day since I came to town last, and has communicated to me as a secret, that he designed in a very short time to tell me a secret; but I shall know what he means, he now assures me, in less than a fortnight's time. But I must not omit the dearer part of mankind, I mean the ladies, to take up a whole paper upon grievances which concern the men only; but shall humbly propose, that we change fools for an experiment only. A certain set of ladies complain they are frequently perplexed with a visitant, who affects to be wiser than they are; which character he hopes to preserve by an obstinate gravity, and great guard against discovering his opinion upon any occasion whatsoever. A painful silence has hitherto gained him no farther advantage, than that as he might, if he had behaved himself with freedom, been excepted against but as to this and that particular, he now offends in the whole. To relieve these ladies, my good friends and correspondents, I shall exchange my dancing outlaw for their dumb visitant, and assign the silent gentleman all the haunts of the dancer; in order to which, I have sent them by the penny-post the following letters for their conduct in their new conversations : "SIR, I have, you may be sure, heard of your irregularities without regard to my observations upon you; but shall not treat you with so much rigour as you deserve. If you will give yourself the trouble to repair to the place mentioned in the postcript to this letter at seven this evening, you will be conducted into a spacious room well-lighted, where there are ladies and music. You will see a young lady laughing next the window to the street; you may take her out, for she loves you as well as she does any man, though she never saw you before. She never thought in her life, any more than yourself. She will not be surprised when you accost her, nor concerned when you leave her. Hasten from a place where you are laughed at, to one where you will be admired. You are of no consequence, therefore go where you will be welcome for being so. "Your humble servant." "I am the young widow of a country gentleman, who has left me entire mistress of a large fortune, which he agreed to as an equivalent for the difference in our years. In these circumstances it is not extraordinary to have a crowd of admirers; which I have abridged in my own thoughts, and reduced to a couple of candidates only, both young, and neither of them disagreeable in their persons: according to the common way of computing, in one the estate more than deserves my fortune, in the other my fortune more than deserves the estate. When I consider the first, I own I am so far a woman I cannot avoid being delighted with the thoughts of living great; but then he seems to receive such a degree of courage from the knowledge of what he has, he looks as if he was going to confer an obligation on me; and the readiness he accosts me with, makes me jealous I am only hearing a repetition of the same things he has said to a hundred women before. When I consider the other, I see myself approached with so much modesty and respect, and such a doubt of himself, as betrays, methinks, an affection within, and a belief at the same time that he himself would be the only by my consent. What an unexceptionable husband could I make out of both! but since that is impossible, I beg to be concluded by your opinion. It is absolutely in your power to dispose of "MADAM, "Your most obedient servant, "SYLVIA.". "You do me great honour in your application to me on this important occasion; I shall therefore talk to you with the tenderness of a father, in gratitude for your giving me the authority of one. You do not seem to make any great distinction between these gentlemen as to their persons; the whole question lies upon their circumstances and behaviour. If the one is less respectful because he is rich, and the other more obsequious because he is not so, they are in that point moved by the same principle, the consideration of fortune, and you must place them in each other's circumstances before you can judge of their inclination. To avoid confusion in discussing this point, I will call the richer man Strephon, and the other Florio. If you believe Florio with Strephon's estate would behave himself as he does now, Florio is certainly your man; but if you think • Waller Strephon, were he in Florio's condition, would be as obsequious as Florio is now, you ought for your own sake to choose Strephon; for where the men are equal, there is no doubt riches ought to be a reason for preference. After this manner, my dear child, I would have you abstract them from their circum. stances; for you are to take it for granted, that he who is very humble only because he is poor, is the very same man in nature, with him who is haughty because he is rich. "When you have gone thus far, as to consider the figure they make towards you; you will please, my dear, next to consider the appearance you make towards them. If they are men of discerning, they can observe the motives of your heart: and Florio can see when he is disregarded only upon account of fortune, which makes you to him a mercenary creature; and you are still the same thing to Strephon, in taking him for his wealth only; you are therefore to consider whether you had rather oblige, than receive an obligation. What an unexceptionable husband could I make out of both!" It would therefore, methinks, be a good way to determine yourself. Take him in whom what you like is not transferable to another; for if you choose otherwise, there is no hopes your husband will ever have what you liked in his rival; but intrinsic qualities in one man may very probably purchase every thing that is adventitious in another. In plainer terms; he whom you take for his personal perfections will sooner arrive at the gifts of fortune, than he whom you take for the sake of his fortune attain to personal perfections. If Strephon is not as accomplished and agreeable as Florio, marriage to you will never make him so; but marriage to you may make Florio as rich as Strephon. There fore to make a sure purchase, employ fortune upon certainties, but do not sacrifice certainties to fortune. " I am, your most obedient, T. humble servant." "The marriage-life is always an insipid, a vex- No. 150.] WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1711. atious, or a happy condition. The first is, when two people of no genius or taste for themselves meet together, upon such a settlement as has been thought reasonable by parents and conveyancers from an exact valuation of the land and cash of both parties. In this case the young lady's person is no more regarded than the house and improvements in purchase of an estate; but she goes with her fortune, rather than her fortune with her. These make up the crowd or vulgar of the rich, and fill up the lumber of the human race, without beneficence towards those below them, or respect towards those above them; and lead a despicable, independent, and useless life, without sense of the laws of kindness, good-nature, mutual offices, and the elegant satisfactions which flow from reason and virtue. "The vexatious life arises from a conjunction of two people of quick taste and resentment, put toge ther for reasons well known to their friends, in which especial care is taken to avoid (what they think the chief of evils) poverty, and ensure to them riches, with every evil besides. These good people live in a constant constraint before company, and too great familiarity alone. When they are within observation, they fret at each other's carriage and behaviour; when alone, they revile each other's person and conduct. In company they are in a purgatory, when only together in a hell. The happy marriage is, where two persons meet and voluntarily make choice of each other without principally regarding or neglecting the circumstances of fortune or beauty. These may still love in spite of adversity or sickness: the former we may in some measure defend ourselves from, the other is the portion of our very make. When you have a true notion of this sort of passion, your humour of living great will vanish out of your imagination, and you will find love has nothing to do with state. Solitude, with the person beloved, has a pleasure, even in a woman's mind, beyond show or pomp. You are therefore to consider which of your lovers will like you best undressed, which will bear with you most when out of humour; and your way to this is to ask of yourself, which of them you value most for his own sake? and by that judge which gives the greater instances of his valuing you for yourself only. "After you have expressed some sense of the humble approach of Florio, and a little disdain at Strephon's assurance in his address, you cry out, Nil habet infelix paupertas durius in se Juv. Sat. iii. 152. Want is the scorn of every wealthy fool, As I was walking in my chamber the morning before I went last into the country, I heard the hawkers with great vehemence crying about a paper, entitled, The Ninety-nine Plagues of an Empty Purse. I had indeed some time before observed, that the orators of Grub-street had dealt very much in plagues. They have already published in the same month, The Plagues of Matrimony, The Plagues of a Single life, The Nineteen Plagues of a Chambermaid, The Plagues of a Coachman, The Plagues of a Footman, and The Plague of Plagues. The success these several plagues met with, probably gave occasion to the above-mentioned poem on an empty purse. However that be, the same noise so frequently repeated under my window, drew me insensibly to think on some of those inconveniences and mortifications which usually attend on poverty, and, in short, gave birth to the present speculation; for after my fancy had run over the most obvious and common calamities which men of mean fortunes are liable to, it descended to those little insults and contempts which, though they may seem to dwindle into nothing when a man offers to describe them, are perhaps in themselves more cutting and insupportable than the former. Juvenal with a great deal of humour and reason tells us, that nothing bore harder upon a poor man in his time, than the con tinual ridicule which his habit and dress afforded to the beaux of Rome: Quid, quod materiam præbet causasque jocorum Juv. Sat. iii. 147. Add that the rich have stíll á gibe in store, It is on this occasion that he afterwards adds the It must be confessed that few things make a man coffee-house near the Temple. I had not been there appear more despicable, or more prejudice his hear- long when there came in an elderly man very meanly ers against what he is going to offer, than an awk- dressed, and sat down by me; he had a thread-bare ward or pitiful dress; insomuch that, I fancy, had loose coat on, which it was plain he wore to keep Tully himself pronounced one of his orations with himself warm, and not to favour his under suit, a blanket about his shoulders, more people would which seemed to have been at least its contempohave laughed at his dress than have admired his elo-rary; his short wig and hat were both answerable quence: This last reflection made me wonder at a to the rest of his apparel. He was no sooner seated Pleasure seizes the whole man who addicts himself to it, and will not give him leisure for any good office in life which contradicts the gaiety of the present hour. You may indeed observe in people of pleasure a certain complacency and absence of all severity, which the habit of a loose unconcerned life gives them; but tell the man of pleasure your secret wants, cares, or sorrows, and you will find that he has given up the delicacy of his passions to the crav-ment is to put an end, as fast as they can, to that set of men, who, without being subjected to it by the unkindness of their fortunes, are contented to draw upon themselves the ridicule of the world in this particular. I mean such as take it into their heads, that the first regular step to be a wit is to commence a sloven. It is certain nothing has so much debased that which must have been otherwise so great a character; and I know not how to account for it, unless it may possibly be in complaisance to those narrow minds who can have no notion of the same persons possessing different accomplishments; or that it is a sort of sacrifice which some men are contented to make to calumny, by allowing it to fasten on one part of their character, while they are endeavouring to establish another. Yet however unaccountable this foolish custom is, I am afraid it could plead a long prescription; and probably gave too much occasion for the vulgar definition still remaining among us of a heathen philosopher. I have seen the speed of a Terre fikus, stoken in King Charles the Second's reign; in which he describes two very eminent men, who were perhaps the greatest scholars of their age; and after having mentioned the entire friendship between them, concludes that, "they had but one mind, one purse, one chamber, and one hat." The men of business were also infected with a sort of singularity little better than this. I have heard my father say, that a broad-brimmed hat, short hair, and unfolded handkerchief, were in his time absolutely necessary to denote a "notable man;" and that he had known two or three, who aspired to the character of "very notable," wear shoe-strings with great success. To the honour of our present age, it must be allowed, that some of our greatest geniuses for wit and business have almost entirely broken the neck of these absurdities. Victor, after having dispatched the most important affairs of the commonwealth, has appeared at an assembly, where all the ladies have declared him the genteelest man in the company; and in Atticus, though every way one of the greatest geniuses the age has produced, one sees nothing particular in his dress or carriage to denote his pretensions to wit and learning: so that at present a man may venture to cock up his hat, and wear a fashionable wig, without being taken for a rake or a fool. The medium between a fop and a sloven is what a man of sense would endeavour to keep; yet I remember Mr. Osborn advises his son to appear in his habit rather above than below his fortune; and tells him that he will find a handsome suit of clothes always procures some additional respect. I have indeed myself observed that my banker ever bows lowest to me when I wear my full-bottomed wig; and writes me "Mr." or "Esq." according as he sees me dressed. I shall conclude this paper with an adventure thich I was myself an eye-witness of very lately. nappened the other day to call in at a celebrated than he called for a dish of tea; but as several gentlemen in the room wanted other things, the boys of the house did not think themselves at leisure to mind him. I could observe the old fellow was very uneasy at the affront, and at his being obliged to repeat his commands several times to no purpose; until at last one of the lads presented him with some stale tea in a broken dish, accompanied with a plate of brown sugar; which so raised his indignation, that after several obliging appellations of dog and rascal, he asked him aloud before the whole company, "why he must be used with less respect than that fop there?" pointing to a well-dressed young gentleman who was drinking tea at the opposite table. The boy of the house replied with a good deal of pertness, "that his master had two sorts of customers, and that the gentleman at the other table had given him many a sixpence for wiping his shoes." By this time the young Templar, who found his honour concerned in the dispute, and that the eyes of the whole coffee-house were upon him, had thrown aside a paper he had in his hand, and was coming towards us, while we at the table made what haste we could to get away from the impending quarrel, but were all of us surprised to see him as he approached nearer put on an air of deference and respect. To whom the old man said, "Hark you, sirrah, I will pay off your extravagant bills once more, but will take effectual care for the future, that your prodigality shall not spirit up a parcel of rascals to insult your father." Though I by no means approve either the impudence of the servants or the extravagance of the son, I cannot but think the old gentleman was in some measure justly served for walking in masquerade, I mean in appearing in a dress so much beneath his quality and estate.-X. No. 151.] THURSDAY, AUGUST 23, 1711. Maximas virtutes jacere omnes necesse est voluptate dominante -TULL. de Fin. Where pleasure prevails, all the greatest virtues will lose their power. I KNOW no one character that gives reason a greater shock, at the same time that it presents a good ridiculous image to the imagination, than that of a man of wit and pleasure about the town. This description of a man of fashion, spoken by some with a mixture of scorn and ridicule, by others with great gravity as a laudable distinction, is in every body's mouth that spends any time in conversation. My friend Will Honeycomb has this expression very frequently; and I never could understand by the story which follows upon his mention of such a one, but that his man of wit and pleasure was either a drunkard too old for wenching, or a young lewd fellow with some liveliness, who would converse with you, receive kind offices of you, and at the same time debauch your sister, or lie with your wife. According to this description, a man of wit, when he could have wenches for crowns apiece which he liked quite as well, would be so extravagant as to bribe servants, make false friendships, fight relations; I say, according to him, plain and simple vice was too little for a man of wit and pleasure; but he would leave an easy and accessible wicked ness, to come at the same thing with only the addition of certain falsehood and possible murder. Will thinks the town grown very dull, in that we do not hear so much as we used to do of these coxcombs, whom (without observing it) he describes as the most infamous rogues in nature, with relation to friendship, love, or conversation. When pleasure is made the chief pursuit of life, it will necessarily follow that such monsters as these will arise from a constant application to such blandishments as naturally root out the force of reason and reflection, and substitute in their place a general impatience of thought, and a constant pruriency of inordinate desire. Pleasure, when it is a man's chief purpose, disappoints itself; and the constant application to it palls the faculty of enjoying it, though it leaves the sense of our inability for that we wish, with a disrelish of every thing else. Thus the intermediate seasons of the man of pleasure are more heavy than one would impose upon the vilest criminal. Take him when he is awaked too soon after a debauch, or disappointed in following a worthless woman without truth, and there is no man living whose being is such a weight of vexation as his is. He is an utter stranger to the pleasing reflections in the evening of a well-spent day, or the gladness of heart or quickness of spirit in the morning after profound sleep or indolent slumbers. He is not to be at ease any longer than he can keep reason and good sense without his curtains; otherwise he will be haunted with the reflection, that he could not believe such a one the woman that upon trial he found her. What has he got by his conquest, but to think meanly of her for whom a day or two before he had the highest honour? And of himself for perhaps wronging the man whom of all men living he himself would least willingly have injured ? plauses; but, on the other side, consider the old age of those who have passed their days in labour, industry, and virtue; their decays make them but appear the more venerable, and the imperfections of their bodies are beheld as a misfortune to human society that their make is so little durable. But to return more directly to my man of wit and pleasure. In all orders of men, wherever this is the chief character, the person who wears it is a negligent friend, father, and husband, and entails poverty on his unhappy decendants. Mortgages, diseases, and settlements, are the legacies a man of wit and pleasure leaves to his family. All the poor rogues that make such lamentable speeches after every sessions at Tyburn, were, in their way, men of wit and pleasure before they fell into the adventures which brought them thither. Irresolution and procrastination in all a man's affairs, are the natural effects of being addicted to pleasure. Dishonour to the gentleman, and bankruptcy to the trader, are the portion of either whose chief purpose of life is delight. The chief cause that this pursuit has been in all ages received with so much quarter from the soberer part of mankind, has been, that some men of great talents have sacrificed themselves to it. The shining qualities of such people have given a beauty to whatever they were engaged in, and a mixture of wit has recommended madness. For let any man who knows what it is to have passed much time in a series of jollity, mirth, wit, or humorous entertainments, look back at what he was all that while a-doing, and he will find that he has been at one instant sharp to some man he is sorry to have offended, impertinent to some one it was cruelty to treat with such freedom, ungracefully noisy at such a time, unskilfully open at such a time, unmercifully calumnious at such a time; and, from the whole course of his applauded satisfactions, un able in the end to recollect any circumstance which can add to the enjoyment of his own mind alone, or which he would put his character upon with other men. Thus it is with those who are best made for becoming pleasures; but how monstrous is it in the generality of mankind who pretend this way, without genius or inclination towards it! The scene, then, is wild to an extravagance: this is, as if fools should mimic madmen. Pleasure of this kind is the intemperate meals and loud jollities of the common rate of country gentlemen, whose practice and way of enjoy ings of his appetites. He little knows the perfect joy he loses, for the disappointing gratifications which he pursues. He looks at Pleasure as she approaches, and comes to him with the recommendation of warm wishes, gay looks, and graceful motion; but he does not observe how she leaves his presence with disorder, impotence, downcast shame, and conscious imperfection. She makes our youth inglorious, our age shameful. Will Honeycomb gives us twenty intimations in an evening of several hags whose bloom was given up to his arms; and would raise a value to himself for having had, as the phrase is, "very good women." Will's good women are the comfort of his heart, and support him, I warrant, by the memory of past interviews with persons of their condition! No, there is not in the world an occasion wherein vice makes so fantastical a figure, as at the meeting of two old people who have been partners in unwarrantable pleasure. To tell a toothless old lady that she once had a good set, or a defunct wencher that he was the admired thing of the town, are satires instead of ap little particle of reason they have when they are sober. These men of wit and pleasure dispatch their senses as fast as possible, by drinking until they cannot taste, smoking until they cannot see, and roaring until they cannot hear.-Т. No. 152.] FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 1711. Like leaves on trees the race of man is found.-POPE'S HOM THERE is no sort of people whose conversation is so pleasant as that of military men, who derive their courage and magnanimity from thought and reflection. The many adventures which attend their way of life makes their conversation so full of incidents, and gives them so frank an air in speaking of what they have been witnesses of, that no company can be more amiable than that of men of sense who are soldiers. There is a certain irregular way in their narrations or discourse, which has something more warm and pleasing than we meet with among men who are used to adjust and methodize their thoughts. I was this evening walking in the fields with my always with contempt and raillery), and in the friend Captain Sentry, and I could not, from the many relations which I drew him into of what passed when he was in the service, forbear expressing my wonder, that the "fear of death," which we, the rest of mankind, arm ourselves against with so much contemplation, reason, and philosophy, should appear so little in camps, that common men march into open breaches, meet opposite battalions, not only without reluctance, but with alacrity. My friend answered what I said in the following man"What you wonder at may very naturally be the subject of admiration to all who are not conversant in camps; but when a man has spent some time in that way of life, he observes a certain mechanic courage which the ordinary race of men become ner: beginning of the action received a wound he was sensible was mortal; his reflection on this occasion was, 'I wish I could live another hour, to see how this blundering coxcomb will get clear of this business. "I remember two young fellows who rid in the same squadron of a troop of horse, who were ever together; they ate, they drank, they intrigued; in a word, all their passions and affections seemed to tend the same way, and they appeared serviceable to each other in them. We were in the dusk of the evening to march over a river, and the troop these gentlemen belonged to were to be transported in a ferry-boat, as fast as they could. One of the friends was now in the boat, while the other was drawn up with others by the water-side, waiting the return of masters of from acting always in a crowd. They the boat. A disorder happened in the passage by see indeed many drop, but then they see many more alive; they observe themselves escape very narrowly, and they do not know why they should not again. Besides which general way of loose thinking, they usually spend the other part of their time in pleasures upon which their minds are so entirely bent, that short labours or dangers are but a cheap purchase of jollity, triumph, victory, fresh quarters, new scenes, and uncommon adventures. Such are the thoughts of the executive part of an army, and indeed of the gross of mankind in general; but none of these men of mechanical courage have ever made any great figure in the profession of arms. Those who are formed for command, are such as have reasoned themselves, out of a consideration of greater good than length of days, into such a negligence of their being, as to make it their first position, that it is one day to be resigned; and since it is, in the prosecution of worthy actions and service of mankind, they can put it to habitual hazard. The event of our designs, say they, as it relates to others, is uncertain; but as it relates to ourselves it must be prosperous, while we are in the pursuit of our duty, and within the terms upon which Providence has ensured our happiness, whether we die or live. All that nature has prescribed must be good; and as death is near to us, it is absurdity to fear it. Fear loses its purpose when we are sure it cannot preserve us, and we should draw resolution to meet it from the impossibility to escape it. Without a resignation to the necessity of dying, there can be no capacity in man to attempt any thing that is glorious: but when they have once attained to that perfection, the pleasures of a life spent in martial ad. ventures are as great as any of which the human mind is capable. The force of reason gives a certain beauty mixed with conscience of well-doing and thirst of glory to all which before was terrible and ghastly to the imagination. Add to this, that the fellowship of danger, the common good of mankind, the general cause, and the manifest virtue you may observe in so many men who made no figure until that day, are so many incentives to destroy the little consideration of their own persons. Such are the heroic part of soldiers, who are qualified for leaders. As to the rest whom I before spoke of, I know not how it is, but they arrive at a certain habit of being void of thought, insomuch that on occasion of the most imminent danger they are still in the same indifference. Nay, I remember an instance of a gay Frenchman, who was led on in battle by a superior officer (whose conduct it was his custom to speak of The Frenchman here alluded to was the Chevalier de Flouriles, a lieutenant-general under the Prince of Conde, at the battle of Senelf, in 1674. an unruly horse; and a gentleman who had the rein of his horse negligently ntly under his arın, was forced into the water by his horse's jumping over. The friend on the shore cried out, Who is that is drowned, trow? He was immediately answered, Your friend Harry Thompson.' He very gravely replied, 'Ay, he had a mad horse.' This short epithet from such a familiar, without more words, gave me, at that time under twenty, a very moderate opinion of the friendship of companions. Thus is affection and every other motive of life in the generality rooted out by the present busy scene about them; they lament no man whose capacity can be supplied by another; and where men converse without delicacy, the next man you meet will serve as well as he whom you have lived with half your life. To such the devastation of countries, the misery of inhabitants, the cries of the pillaged, and the silent sorrow of the great unfortunate, are ordinary objects; their minds are bent upon the little gratifications of their own senses and appetites, forgetful of compassion, insensible of glory, avoiding only shame; their whole hearts taken up with the trivial hope of meeting and being merry. These are the people who make up the gross of the soldiery. But the fine gentleman in that band of men is such a one as I have now in my eye, who is foremost in all danger to which he is ordered. His officers are his friends and companions, as they are men of honour and gentlemen; the private men his brethren, as they are of his species. He is beloved of all that behold him. They wish him in danger as he views their ranks, that they may have occasions to save him at their own hazard. Mutual love is the order of the files where he commands; every man afraid for himself and his neighbour, not lest their commander should punish them, but lest he should be offended. Such is his regiment who knows mankind, and feels their distresses so far as to prevent them. Just in distributing what is their due, he would think himself below their tailor to wear a snip of their clothes in lace upon his own; and below the most rapacious agent should he enjoy a farthing above his own pay. Go on, brave man! immortal glory is thy fortune, and immortal happiness thy reward."-Т. No. 153.] SATURDAY, AUGUST 25, 1711. Habet natura ut aliarum omnium rerum sic vivendi modum; senectus autem peractio ætatis est tanquam fabulæ. Cujus defatigationem fugere debemus, præsertim adjuncta satietate. FULL. de Senect. Life, as well as all other things, hath its bounds assigned by nature; and its conclusion, like the last act of a play, is old age, the fatigue of which we ought to shun, especially when our appetites are fully satisfied. Or all the impertinent wishes which we hear ex |