than I do; I never mind her motions; she never inquires into mine. We speak to one another civilly, hate one another heartily; and because it is vulgar to lie and soak together, we have each of us our several settle-bed." That of "soaking together" is as good as if Dorimant had spoken it himself; and I think, since he puts human nature in as ugly a form as the circumstance will bear, and is a staunch unbeliever, he is very much wronged in having no part of the good fortune bestowed in the last act. To speak plain of this whole work, I think nothing but being lost to a sense of innocence and virtue, can make any one see this comedy, without observing more frequent occasion to move sorrow and indignation, than mirth and laughter. At the same time I allow it to be nature, but it is nature in its utmost corruption and degeneracy.*-R. No. 66.1 WEDNESDAY, MAY 16, 1711. Jam nunc, et incestos amores Behold a ripe and melting maid What nets to spread, where subtle baits to lay; THE two following letters are upon a subject of very great importance, though expressed without any air of gravity. "SIR, "TO THE SPECTATOR. "I take the freedom of asking your advice in behalf of a young country kinswoman of mine who is lately come to town, and under my care for her education. She is very pretty, but you cannot imagine how unformed a creature it is. She comes to my hands just as nature left her, half finished, and without any acquired improvements. When I look on her I often think of the Belle Sauvage mentioned in one of your papers. Dear Mr. Spectator, help me to make her comprehend the visible graces of speech, and the dumb eloquence of motion; for she is at present a perfect stranger to both. She knows no way to express herself but by her tongue, and that always to signify her meaning. Her eyes serve her only to see with, and she is utterly a foreigner to the language of looks and glances. In this I fancy you could help her better than any body. I have bestowed two months in teaching her to sigh when she is not concerned, and to smile when she is not pleased, and am ashamed to own she makes little or no improvement. Then she is no more able now to walk, than she was to go at a year old. By walking, you will easily know I mean that regular but easy motion which gives our persons so irresistible a grace as if we moved to music, and is a kind of disengaged figure; or, if I may so speak, recitative dancing. But the want of this I cannot blame in her, for I find she has no ear, and means nothing by walking but to change her place. I could pardon too her blushing, if she knew how to carry herself in it, and if it did not manifestly injure her complexion. • How could it be otherwise, when the author of this play was Sir George Etheridge, and the character of Dorimant that of Wilmot, Earl of Rochester? "Being employed by Celimene to make up and send to you her letter, I make bold to recommend the case therein mentioned to your consideration, because she and I happen to differ a little in our notions. I, who am a rough man, am afraid the young girl is in a fair way to be spoiled: therefore, pray, Mr. Spectator, let us have your opinion of this fine thing called fine breeding; for I am afraid it differs too much from that plain thing called good breeding. "Your most humble servant." The general mistake among us in the educating our children is, that in our daughters we take care of their persons and neglect their minds; in our sons we are so intent upon adorning their minds, that we wholly neglect their bodies. It is from this that you shall see a young lady celebrated and admired in all the assemblies about town, when her elder brother is afraid to come into a room. From this ill management it arises, that we frequently observe a man's life is half spent, before he is taken notice of; and a woman in the prime of her years is out of fashion and neglected. The boy I shall consider upon some other occasion, and at present stick to the girl and I am the more inclined to this, because I have several letters which complain to me, that my female readers have not understood me for some days last past, and take themselves to be unconcerned in the present turn of my writing. -When a girl is safely brought from her nurse, before she is capable of forming one single notion of any thing in life, she is delivered to the hands of her dancing master; and with a collar round her neck, the pretty wild thing is taught a fantastical gravity of behaviour, and forced to a particular way of holding her head, heaving her breast, and moving with her whole body; and all this under pain of never having a husband, if she steps, looks, or moves awry. This gives the young lady wonderful workings of imagination, what is to pass between her and this husband, that she is every moment told of, and for whom she seems to be educated. Thus her fancy is engaged to turn all her endeavours to the ornament of her person, as what must determine her good and ill in this life and she naturally thinks, if she is tall enough, she is wise enough, for any thing for which her education makes her think she is designed To make her an agreeable person is the main purpose of her parents; to that is all their cost, to that all their care directed; and from this general folly of parents we owe our present numerous race of coquettes. These reflections puzzle me, when I think of giving my advice on the subject of managing the wild thing mentioned in the letter of my correspondent. sure there is a middle way to be followed; the management of a young lady's person is not to be over But looked, but the erudition of her mind is much and I was prevailed upon by her and her mother to more to be regarded. According as this is ma-go last night to one of his balls. I must own to you, naged, you will see the mind follow the appetites of Sir, that having never been to such a place before, the body, or the body express the virtues of the mind. I was very much pleased and surprised with that part Cleomira dances with all the elegance of motion imaginable; but her eyes are so chastised with the simplicity and innocence of her thoughts, that she raises in her beholders admiration and good-will, but no loose hope or wild imagination. The true art in this case is, to make the mind and body improve together; and, if possible, to make gesture follow thought, and not let thought be employed upon gesture.-R. No. 67.] THURSDAY, MAY 17, 1711. LUCIAN, in one of his dialogues, introduces a philosopher chiding his friend for his being a lover of dancing and a frequenter of balls. The other undertakes the defence of his favourite diversion, which, he says, was at first invented by the goddess Rhea, and preserved the life of Jupiter himself from the cruelty of his father Saturn. He proceeds to show, that it had been approved by the greatest men in all ages; that Homer calls Merion a fine dancer; and says, that the graceful mien and great agility which he had acquired by that exercise, distinguished him above the rest in the armies both of Greeks and Trojans. He adds, that Pyrrhus gained more reputation by inventing the dance which is called after his name, than by all his other actions: that the Lacedæmonians, who were the bravest people in Greece, gave of his entertainment which he called French Dancing. There were several young men and women whose limbs seemed to have no other motion but purely what the music gave them. After this part was over, they began a diversion which they call country dancing, and wherein there were also some things not disagreeable, and divers emblematical figures, composed, as I guess, by wise men, for the instruction of youth. "Among the rest, I observed one which, I think, they call Hunt the Squirrel,' in which, while the woman flies, the man pursues her; but as soon as she turns, he runs away, and she is obliged to follow. "The moral of this dance does, I think, very aptly recommend modesty and discretion to the female sex. "But as the best institutions are liable to corruption, so, Sir, I must acquaint you, that very great abuses are crept into this entertainment. I was amazed to see my girl handed by and handing young fellows with so much familiarity; and I could not have thought it had been in the child. They very often made use of a most impudent and lascivious step called 'Setting,' which I know not how to describe to you, but by telling you that it is the very reverse of Back to Back. At last an impudent young dog bid the fiddlers play a dance called 'Moll Pately, and after having made two or three capers, ran to his partner, locked his arms in hers, and whisked her round cleverly above ground in such a manner that I, who sat upon one of the lowest benches, saw farther above her shoe than I can think great encouragement to this diversion, and made fit to acquaint you with. I could no longer endure their Hormus (a dance much resembling the French Brawl) famous all over Asia: that there were still extant some Thessalonian statues erected to the honour of their best dancers; and that he wondered how his brother philosopher could declare himself against the opinions of those two persons whom he professed so much to admire-Homer and Hesiod; the latter of which compares valour and dancing together, and says, that "the gods have bestowed fortitude on some men, and on others a disposition for dancing." Lastly, he puts him in mind that Socrates (who, in the judgment of Apollo, was the wisest of men), was not only a professed admirer of this exercise in others, but learned it himself when he was an old man. The morose philosopher is so much affected by these and some other authorities, that he becomes a convert to his friend, and desires he would take him with him when he went to his next ball. I love to shelter myself under the examples of great men; and I think I have sufficiently showed that it is not below the dignity of these my speculations to take notice of the following letter, which I suppose is sent me by some substantial tradesman about 'Change. "SIR, "I am a man in years, and by an in the world have acquired enough to give my chil. dren a liberal education, though I was an utter stranger to it myself. My eldest daughter, a girl of sixteen, has for some time been under the tuition of Monsieur Rigadoon, a dancing-master in the city; honest industry * Erudition seems to be here used in an uncommon sense, for cultivation or instruction. those enormities; wherefore, just as my girl was going to be made a whirligig, I ran in, seized on the child, and carried her home. "Sir, I am not yet old enough to be a fool I suppose this diversion might be first invented to keep up a good understanding between young men and women, and so far I am not against it; but I shall never allow of these things. I know not what you will say to this case at present, but am sure, had you been with me, you would have seen matter of great speculation. "I am, yours," &c. I must confess I am afraid that my correspondent had too much reason to be a little out of humour at the treatment of his daughter, but I conclude that he would have been much more so, had he seen one of those kissing dances in which Will Honeycomb assures me they are obliged to dwell almost a minute on the fair one's lips or they will be too quick for the music, and dance quite out of time. I am not able, however to give my final sentence against this diversion; and am of Mr. Cowley's opinion, that so much of dancing, at least, as belongs to the behaviour and a handsome carriage of the body, is extremely useful, if not absolutely ne cessary. as we We generally form such ideas of people at first sight, are hardly ever persuaded to lay aside afterward; for this reason, a man would wish to have nothing disagreeable or uncomely in his approaches, and to be able to enter a room with a good grace. I might add, that a moderate knowledge in the little rules of good breeding, gives a man some assurance, and makes him easy in all companies. For want of this, I have seen a professor of a liberal science at a loss to salute a lady; and a most excel lent mathematician not able to determine whether he should stand or sit while my lord drank to hin.. It is the proper business of a dancing-master to regulate these matters; though hough I take it to be a just observation, that unless you add something of your own to what these fine gentlemen teach you, and which they are wholly ignorant of themselves, you will much sooner get the character of an affected fop than a well-bred man. As for country dancing, it must indeed be confessed that the great familiarities between the two sexes on this occasion may sometimes produce very dangerous consequences; and I have often thought that few ladies' hearts are so obdurate as not to be melted by the charms of music, the force of motion, and a handsome young fellow, who is continually playing before their eyes, and convincing them that he has the perfect use of all his limbs. But as this kind of dance is the particular invention of our own country, and as every one is more or less a proficient in it, I would not discountenance it; but rather suppose it may be practised innocently by others as well as myself, who am often partner to my landlady's eldest daughter. POSTSCRIPT. Having heard a good character of the collection of pictures which is to be exposed to sale on Friday next; and concluding from the following letter, that the person who collected them is a man of no inelegant taste, I will be so much his friend as to publish it, provided the reader will only look upon it as filling up the place of an advertisement: From the Three Chairs, in the Piazzas, Covent Garden. "As you are a spectator, I think we who make it our business to exhibit any thing to public view, ought to apply ourselves to you for your approbation. I have travelled Europe to furnish out a show for up structive, and unreserved discourse, is that which passes between two persons who are familiar and intimate friends. On these occasions, a man gives a loose to every passion and every thought that is permost, discovers his most retired opinions of per sons and things, tries the beauty and strength of his sentiments, and exposes his whole soul to the exa mination of his friend. Tully was the first who observed, that friendship improves happiness and abates misery, by the doubling of our joy, and dividing of our grief; a thought in which he hath been followed by all the essayers upon friendship that have written since his time. Sir Francis Bacon has finely described other advantages, or, as he calls them, fruits of friendship; and, indeed, there is no subject of morality which has been better handled and more exhausted than this. Among the several fine things which have been spoken of it, I shall beg leave to quote some out of a very ancient author, whose book would be regarded by our modern wits as one of the most shining tracts of morality that is extant, if it appeared under the name of a Confucius, or of any celebrated Grecian philosopher: I mean the little apocryphal treatise, entitled The Wisdom of the Son of Sirach. How finely has he described the art of making friends by an obliging and affable behaviour!-and laid down that precept, which a late excellent author has delivered as his own, That we should have many wellwishers, but few friends. "Sweet language will multiply friends; and a fair-speaking tongue will increase kind greetings. Be in peace with many, nevertheless have but one counsellor of a thousand."* With what prudence does he caution us in the choice of our friends! And with what strokes of nature (I could almost say of humour) has he described the behaviour of a treacherous and self-interested friend! "If thou wouldst get a friend, prove him first, and be not hasty to credit him: for some man you, and have brought with me what has been ad- is a friend for his own occasion, and will not abide mired in every country through which I passed. You have declared in many papers, that your greatest delights are those of the eye, which I do not doubt but I shall gratify with as beautiful objects as yours ever beheld. If castles, forests, ruins, fine women, and graceful men, can please you, I dare promise you much satisfaction, if you will appear at my auction on Friday next. A sight is, I suppose, as grateful to a Spectator as a treat to another person, and therefore I hope you will pardon this invitation from, Χ. "Sir, "Your most obedient humble servant, No. 68.] FRIDAY, MAY 18, 1711. Nos duo turba sumus OVID, Met. i. 355. ONE would think that the larger the company is in which we are engaged, the greater variety of thoughts and subjects would be started in discourse; but instead of this, we find that conversation is never so much straitened and confined as in numerous as semblies. When a multitude meet together on any subject of discourse, their debates are taken up chiefly with forms and general positions; nay, if we come into a more contracted assembly of men and women, the talk generally runs upon the weather, fashion, news, and the like public topics. In proportion as conversation gets into clubs and knots of friends, it descends into particulars, and grows more free and communicative: but the most open, inSPECTATOR.-Nos. 11 & 12. "A in the day of thy trouble. And there is a friend, who being turned to enmity and strife, will discover thy reproach." Again, "Some friend is a companion at the table, and will not continue in the day of thy affliction: but in thy prosperity he will be as thyself, and will be bold over thy servants. If thou be brought low he will be against thee, and hide himself from thy face."† What can be more strong and pointed than the following verse? " Separate thyself from thine enemies, and take heed of thy friends." In the next words he particularizes one of those fruits of friendship which is described at length by the two famous authors above mentioned, and falls into a general eulogium of friendship, which is very just as well as very sublime. faithful friend is a strong defence; and he that hath found such a one hath found a treasure. Nothing doth countervail a faithful friend, and his excellency is invaluable. A faithful friend is the medicine of life; and they that fear the Lord shall find him. Whoso feareth the Lord shall direct his friendship aright; for as he is, so shall his neighbour (that is his frien friend) be also."‡ I do not remember to have met with any saying that has pleased me more than that of a friend's bei being the medicine of life, to express the efficacy of friendship in healing the pains and anguish which naturally cleave to our existence in this world; and am wonderfully pleased with the tura in the last sentence, that a virtuous man shall as a blessing meet with a friend who is as virtuous as himself. There is another saying in the same Ecclus. vi. 5, 6. ↑ Ibid. vi. 7, et seqq. Ibid, vi. 15-18. G author, which would have been very much admired in a heathen writer: "Forsake not an old friend, for the new is not comparable to him: a new friend is as new wine; when it is old thou shalt drink it with pleasure."* With what strength of allusion, and force of thought, has he described the breaches and violations of friendship?" Whoso casteth a stone at the birds frayeth them away; and he that upbraideth his friend, breaketh friendship. Though thou drawest a sword at a friend, yet despair not, for there may be a returning to favour. If thou hast opened thy mouth against thy friend, fear not, for there may be a reconciliation; except for upbraiding, or pride, or disclosing of secrets, or a treacherous wound; for, for these things every friend will depart."† We may observe in this and several other precepts in this author, those little familiar instances and illustrations which are so much admired in the moral writings of Horace and Epictetus. There are very beautiful instances of this nature in the following passages, which are likewise written on the same subject: "Whoso discovereth secrets loseth his credit, and shall never find a friend to his mind. Love thy friend, and be faithful to him; but if thou bewrayeth his secret, follow no more after him: foras a man hath destroyed his enemy, so hast thou lost the love of thy friend; as one that letteth a bird go out of his hand, so hast thou let thy friend go, and shall not get him again: follow after him no more, for he is too far off; he is as a roe escaped out of the snare. As for a wound it may be bound up, and after reviling there may be a reconciliation; but he that bewrayeth secrets is without hope."‡ Among the several qualifications of a good friend, this wise man has very justly singled out constancy and faithfulness, as the principal: to these, others have added virtue, knowledge, discretion, equality in age and fortune, and, as Cicero calls it, Morum comitas, "a pleasantness of temper." If I were to give my opinion upon such an exhausted subject, I should join to these other qualifications, a certain equability or evenness of behaviour. A man often contracts a friendship with one whom perhaps he does not find out till after a year's conversation; when on a sudden some latent ill humour breaks out upon him, which he never discovered or suspected at his first entering into an intimacy with him. There are several persons who in some certain periods of their lives are inexpressibly agreeable, and in others as odious and detestable. Martial has given us a very pretty picture of one of this species, in the following epigram: Difficilis, facilis, jucundus, acerbus es idem, It is very unlucky for a man to be entangled in a friendship with one, who, by these changes and vicissitudes of humour, is sometimes amiable and sometimes odious: and as most men are at some times in admirable frame and disposition of mind, it should be one of the greatest tasks of wisdom to keep ourselves well when we are so, and never to go out of that which is the agreeable part of our cha racter.-C. Ecclus ix, 10. ↑ Ibid. xxii. 20--22. ↑ Ib d. xxvii. 16, et seqq. This ground with Bacchus, that with Ceres suits; THERE is no place in the town which I so much love to frequent as the Royal Exchange. It gives me a secret satisfaction, and in some measure gratifies my vanity, as I am an Englishman, to see so rich an assembly of countrymen and foreigners, consulting together upon the private business of mankind, and making this metropolis a kind of emporium for the whole earth. I must confess I look upon highchange to be a great council, in which all considerable nations have their representatives. Factors in the trading world are what ambassadors are in the politic world; they negotiate affairs, conclude treaties, and maintain a good correspondence between those wealthy societies of men that are divided from one another by seas and oceans, or live on the different extremities of a continent. I have often been pleased to hear disputes adjusted between an inhabitant of Japan and an alderman of London; or to see a subject of the Great Mogul entering into a league with one of the Czar of Muscovy. I am infinitely delighted in mixing with these several ministers of commerce, as they are distinguished by their different walks and different languages. Sometimes I am jostled among a body of Armenians; sometimes I am lost in a crowd of Jews; and sometimes make one in a group of Dutchmen. I am a Dane, Swede, or Frenchman, at different times; or rather fancy myself like the old philosopher, who upon being asked what countryman he was, replied, that he was a citizen of the world Though I very frequently visit this busy multi. tude of people, I am known to nobody there but my friend Sir Andrew, who often smiles upon me as he sees me bustling in the crowd, but at the same time connives at my presence without taking farther notice of me. There is indeed a merchant of Egypt, who just knows me by sight, having formerly remitted me some money to Grand Cairo; but as I am not versed in modern Coptic, our conferences go no farther than a bow and a grimace. This grand scene of business gives me an infinite variety of solid and substantial entertainments. As I am a great lover of mankind, my heart naturally overflows with pleasure at the sight of a prosperous and happy multitude, insomuch that at many public solemnities I cannot forbear expressing my joy with tears that have stolen down my cheeks. For this reason I am wonderfully delighted to see such a body of men thriving in their own private fortunes, and at the same time promoting the public stock; or, in other words, raising estates for their own families, by bringing into their country whatever is wanting, and carrying out of it whatever is superfluous. Nature seems to have taken a particular care to disseminate her blessings among the different regions of the world, with an eye to this mutual intercourse and traffic among mankind, that the natives of the several parts of the globe might have a kind of dependence upon one another, and be united together by their common interest. Almost every degree produces something peculiar to it. The food often grows in one country, and the sauce in another. The fruits of Portugal are corrected by the produce of Barbadoes, and the infusion of a China plant is sweetened by the pith of an Indian cane. The Philippic Islands give a flavour to our European bowls. The single dress of a woman of quality is often the product of a hundred climates. The muff and the fan come together from different ends of the earth. The scarf is sent from the torrid zone, and the tippet from beneath the pole. The brocade petticoat rises out of the mines of Peru, and the diamond necklace out of the bowels of Indostan. If we consider our own country in its natural prospect, without any of the benefits and advantages of commerce, what a barren. uncomfortable spot of earth falls to our share! Natural historians tell us, that no fruit grows originally among us, besides hips and haws, acorns and pig-nuts, with other delicacies of the like nature; that our climate of itself, and without the assistance of art, can make no farther advances towards a plum than to a sloe, and carries an apple to no greater perfection than a crab: that our melons, our peaches, our figs, our apricots, and cherries, are strangers among us, imported in different ages, and naturalized in our English gardens; and that they would all degenerate and fall away into the trash of our own country, if they were wholly neglected by the planter, and left to the mercy of our sun and soil. Nor has traffic more enriched our vegetable world, than it has improved the whole face of nature among us. Our ships are laden with the harvest of every climate. Our tables are stored with spices, and oils, and wines. Our rooms are filled with pyramids of China, and adorned with the workmanship of Japan. Our morning's draught comes to us from the remotest corners of the earth. We repair our bodies by the drugs of America, and repose ourselves under Indian canopies. My friend, Sir Andrew, calls the vineyards of France our gardens; the spice-islands our hot-beds; the Persians our silk-weavers, and the Chinese our potters. Nature, indeed, furnishes us with the bare necessaries of life, but traffic gives us a great variety of what is useful, and at the same time supplies us with every thing that is convenient and ornamental. Nor is it the least part of this our happiness, that whilst we enjoy the remotest products of the north and south, we are free from those extremities of weather which give them birth; that our eyes are refreshed with the green fields of Britain, and at the same time that our palates are feasted with fruits that rise between the tropics. For these reasons there are not more useful members in a commonwealth than merchants. They knit mankind together in a mutual intercourse of good offices, distribute the gifts of nature, find work for the poor, add wealth to the rich, and magnificence to the great. Our English merchant converts the tin of his own country into gold, and exchanges its wool for rubies. The Mahometans are clothed in our British manufacture, and the inhabitants of the frozen zone warmed with the fleeces of our sheep. When I have been upon the 'Change, I have often faucied one of our old kings standing in person, where he is represented in effigy, and looking down upon the wealthy concourse of people with which that place is every day filled. In this case, how would he be surprised to hear all the languages of Europe spoken in this little spot of his former dominions, and to see so many private men, who in his time would have been the vassals of some.powerful baron, negotiating like princes for greater sums of money than were formerly to be met with in the royal treasury! Trade, without enlarging the British territories, has given us a kind of additional empire. It has multiplied the number of the rich, made our landed estates infinitely more valuable than they were formerly, and added to them an accession of other estates as valuable as the lands themselves.-C. No. 70.] MONDAY, MAY 21, 1711. WHEN I travelled, I took a particular delight in hearing the songs and fables that are coine from father to son, and are most in vogue among the common people of the countries through which I passed; for it is impossible that any thing should be universally tasted and approved by a multitude, though they are only the rabble of a nation, which hath not in it some peculiar aptness to please and gratify the mind of man. Human nature is the same in all reasonable creatures; and whatever falls in with it, will meet with admirers amongst readers of all qualities and conditions. Moliere, as we are told by Monsieur Boileau, used to read all his comedies to an old woman who was his housekeeper, as she sat with him at her work by the chimney-corner; and could foretel the success of his play in the theatre, from the reception it met at his fire-side-for he tells us the audience always followed the old woman, and never failed to laugh in the same place. I know nothing which more shews the essential and inherent perfection of simplicity of thought, above that which I call the Gothic manner in writing, than this-that the first pleases all kinds of palates, and the latter only such as have formed to themselves a wrong artificial taste upon little fanciful authors and writers of epigram. Homer, Virgil, or Milton, so far as the language of their poems is understood, will please a reader of plain common sense, who would neither relish nor comprehend an epigram of Martial, or a poem of Cowley; so, on the contrary, an ordinary song or ballad that is the delight of the common people, cannot fail to please all such readers as are not unqualified for the entertainment by their affectation or ignorance; and the reason is plain-because the same paintings of nature which recommend it to the most ordinary reader will appear beautiful to the most refined. The old song of Chevy-Chace is the favourite ballad of the common people of England; and Ben Jonson used to say, he had rather have been the author of it than of all his works. Sir Philip Sydney, in his discourse of Poetry, speaks of it in the following words: "I never heard the old song of Percy and Douglas, that I found not my heart more moved than with a trumpet: and yet it is sung by some blind crowder with no rougher voice than rude style; which being so evil apparelled in the dust a and cobweb of that uncivil age, what would it work trimmed in the gorgeous eloquence of Pindar?" For my own part, I am so professed an admirer of |