WILLIAM SHENSTONE. BORN 1714: DIED 1763. (From "Essays on Men and Manners.") A HUMORIST. To form an estimate of the proportion which one man's happiness bears to another's, we are to consider the mind that is allotted him with as much attention as the circumstances. It were superfluous to evince that the same objects which one despises, are frequently to another the substantial source of admiration. The man of business and the man of pleasure are to each other mutually contemptible; and a blue garter has less charms for some, than they can discover in a butterfly. The more candid and sage observer condemns neither for his pursuits; but for the derision he so profusely lavishes upon the disposition of his neighbour. He concludes that schemes infinitely various were at first intended for our pursuit and pleasures, and that some find their account in heading a cry of hounds, as much as others in the dignity of lord chiefjustice. Having premised thus much, I proceed to give some account of a character which came within the sphere of my own observation. Not the entrance of a cathedral, not the sound of a passing bell, not the furs of a magistrate, nor the sables of a funeral, were fraught with half the solemnity of face! Nay, so wonderfully serious was he observed to be on all occasions, that it was found hardly possible to be otherwise in his company. He quashed the loudest tempest of laughter, whenever he entered the room; and men's features, though ever so much roughened, were sure to grow smooth at his approach. risibility, with which it is supposed to be always joined. Indeed he acquired the character of the most ingenious person of his county, from this meditative temper. Not that he had ever made any great discovery of his talents; but a few oracular declarations, joined with a common opinion that he was writing somewhat for posterity, completed his reputation. Numbers would have willingly depreciated his character, had not his known sobriety and reputed sense deterred them. He was one day overheard at his devotions, returning his most fervent thanks for some particularities in his situation, which the generality of mankind would have but little regarded. "Accept," said he, "the gratitude of Thy most humble, yet most happy creature, not for silver or gold, the tinsel of mankind, but for those amiable peculiarities which Thou hast so graciously interwoven both with my fortune and my complexion: for those treasures so well adapted to that frame of mind Thou hast assigned me. "That the surname which has descended to me is liable to no pun. "That it runs chiefly upon vowels and liquids. "That I have a picturesque countenance rather than one that is esteemed of regular features. "That there is an intermediate hill, intercepting my view of a nobleman's seat, whose illobtained superiority I cannot bear to recollect. "That my estate is overrun with brambles, resounds with cataracts, and is beautifully varied with rocks and precipices, rather than an even cultivated spot, fertile of corn, or wine, or oil; or those kinds of productions in which the sons of men delight themselves. The man had nothing vicious, or even illnatured in his character; yet he was the dread of all jovial conversation; the young, the gay, "That as Thou dividest Thy bounties imparfound their spirits fly before him. Even the tially; giving riches to one, and the contempt of kitten and the puppy, as it were by instinct, riches to another, so Thou hast given me, in the would forego their frolics, and be still. The midst of poverty, to despise the insolence of depression he occasioned was like that of a riches, and by declining all emulation that is damp or vitiated air. Unconscious of any ap-founded upon wealth, to maintain the dignity parent cause, you found your spirits sink insensibly and were any one to sit for the picture of ill-luck, it is not possible the painter could select a more proper person. Yet he did not fail to boast of a superior share of reason, even for the want of that very faculty, "The essays are good, displaying an ease and grace of style united to judgment and discrimination. They have not the mellow ripeness of thought and learning of Cowley's Essays, but they resemble them more closely than any others we possess."-Chambers's Cyclopædia of English Literature, vol. i., p. 717. and superiority of the muses. "That I have a disposition either so elevated or so ingenuous, that I can derive to myself amusement from the very expedients and contrivances with which rigorous necessity furnishes my invention. "That I can laugh at my own follies, foibles, and infirmities; and that I do not want infirmities to employ this disposition." night, as he was contemplating, by the side of a This poor gentleman caught cold one winter's crystal stream, by moonshine. This afterwards terminated in a fever that was fatal to him. Since his death, I have been favoured with the inspection of his poetry, of which I preserved a catalogue for the benefit of my readers. OCCASIONAL POEMS. On his dog, that growing corpulent refused a crust when it was offered him. To the memory of a pair of breeches, that had done him excellent service. Having lost his trusty walking-staff, he complaineth. by familiarity in respect, was generally made up to us by the affection it procured; and that an absolute solitude was so very contrary to our natures, that were he excluded from society but for a single fortnight, he would be exhilarated at the sight of the first beggar that he saw. What follows were thoughts thrown out in our further discourse upon the subject; without order or connection, as they occur to my remembrance. Some reserve is a debt to prudence; as free To his mistress, on her declaring that she loved dom and simplicity of conversation is a debt to parsnips better than potatoes. On an ear-wig that crept into a nectarine that it might be swallowed by Cloe. good-nature. There would not be any absolute necessity for reserve, if the world were honest: yet, even then, On cutting an artichoke in his garden the day it would prove expedient. For, in order to atthat Queen Anne cut her little finger. Epigram on a wooden peg. tain any degree of deference, it seems necessary that people should imagine you have more ac Ode to the memory of the great modern-who complishments than you discover. first invented shoe-buckles. ON RESERVE. Taking an evening's walk with a friend in the country, among many grave remarks, he was making the following observation : "There is not," says he, "any one quality so inconsistent with respect, as what is commonly called familiarity. You do not find one in fifty whose regard is proof against it. At the same time, it is hardly possible to insist upon such a deference as will render you ridiculous, if it be supported by common sense. Thus much at least is evident, that your demands will be so successful, as to procure a greater share than if you had made no such demand. I may frankly own to you, Leander, that I frequently derived uneasiness, from a familiarity with such persons as despised everything they could obtain with ease. Were it not better therefore to be somewhat frugal of our affability, at least to allot it only to few persons of discernment who can make the proper distinction betwixt real dignity and pretended to neglect those characters, which, being impatient to grow familiar, are at the same time very far from familiarity-proof: to have posthumous fame in view, which affords us the most pleasing landscape: to enjoy the amusement of reading, and the consciousness that reading paves the way to general esteem: to preserve a constant regularity of temper, and also of constitution, for the most part but little consistent with a promiscuous intercourse with men: to shun all illiterate, though ever so jovial assemblies, insipid, perhaps, when present, and upon reflection painful to meditate on those absent or departed friends, who value or valued us for those qualities with which they were best acquainted: to partake with such a friend as you, the delights of a studious and rational retirement-are not these the paths that lead to happiness? " In answer to this (for he seemed to feel some late mortification) I observed, that what we lost It is on this depends one of the excellences of the judicious Virgil. He leaves you something ever to imagine: and such is the constitution of the human mind, that we think so highly of nothing, as of that whereof we do not see the bounds. This, as Mr Burke ingeniously observes, affords the pleasure when we survey a cylinder; * and Sir John Suckling says: "They who know all the wealth they have are poor; He's only rich who cannot tell his store. A person who would secure to himself great deference, will, perhaps, gain his point by silence, as effectually as by anything he can say. To be, however, a niggard of one's observation is so much worse than to hoard up one's money, as the former may be both imparted and retained at the same time. Men oftentimes pretend to proportion their respect to real desert; but a supercilious reserve and distance wearies them into a compliance with more. This appears so very manifest to many persons of the lofty character, that they use no better means to acquire respect than like highwaymen to make a demand of it. They will, like Empedocles, jump into the fire, rather than betray the mortal part of their character. It is from the same principle of distance that nations are brought to believe that their great duke kn,weth all things; as is the case in some countries. "Men, while no human form or fault they see, "For some small worth he had, the man was prized; He added frankness-and he grew despised." * Treatise of the sublime and beautiful. "We want comets, not ordinary planets: 'Tædit quotidianarum harum formarum." Hunc cœlum, et stellas, et decendentia certis Tempora momentis, sunt qui formidine nulla Imbuti spectent." Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed. They are sensitive plants, which will not bear too familiar approaches. Let us be careful to distinguish modesty, which is ever amiable, from reserve, which is only prudent. A man is hated sometimes for pride, when it was an excess of humility gave the occasion. What is often termed shyness, is nothing more than refined sense, and an indifference to common observations. The reserved man's intimate acquaintance are, for the most part fonder of him, than the persons of a more affable character, i.e., he pays them a greater compliment than the other can do his, as he distinguishes them more. It is indolence, and the pain of being upon one's guard, that makes one hate an artful char acter. The most reserved of men, that will not exchange two syllables together in an English coffee-house, should they meet at Ispahan, would drink sherbet, and eat a mess of rice together. The man of show is vain: the reserved man is proud more properly. The one has greater depth the other a more lively imagination. The one is more frequently respected: the other more generally beloved. The one a Cato; the other a Cæsar. Vide Sallust. What Cæsar said of "Rubicupdos anio; pallidos timeo," may be applied to familiarity and reserve. A reserved man often makes it a rule to leave company with a good speech and I believe sometimes proceeds so far as to leave company, because he has made one. Yet it is fate often, like the mole, to imagine himself deep, when he is near the surface. Were it prudent to decline this reserve, and this horror of disclosing foibles; to give up a part of character to secure the rest? The world will certainly insist upon having some part to pull to pieces. Let us throw out some follies to the envious; as we give up counters to a highwayman, or a barrel to a whale, in order to save one's money and one's ship: to let it make exceptions to one's head of hair, if one can escape being stabbed in the heart. The reserved man should drink double glasses. Prudent men lock up their motives; letting familiars have a key to their heart, as to their garden. A reserved man is in continual conflict with the social part of his nature; and even grudges himself the laugh into which he is sometimes betrayed. "Seldom he smiles And smiles in such a sort as he disdained "A fool and his words are soon parted;" for so should the proverb run. Common understanding, like cits in gardening, allow no shades to their picture. Modesty often passes for errant haughtiness: as what is deemed spirit in a horse proceeds from fear. The higher character a person supports, the more he should regard his minutest actions. The reserved man should bring a certificate of his honesty, before he be admitted into company. Reserve is no more essentially connected with understanding, than a church organ with devotion, or wine with good-nature.* AN OPINION OF GHOSTS. It is remarkable, how much the belief of ghosts and apparitions of persons departed, has lost ground within these fifty years. This may per haps be explained by the general growth of knowledge, and by the consequent decay of supersti tion, even in those kingdoms where it is most essentially interwoven with religion. The same credulity, which disposed the mind to believe the miracles of a popish saint, set aside at once the interposition of reason; and produced a fondness for the marvellous, which it was the priest's advantage to promote. It may be natural enough to suppose that a be lief of this kind might spread in the days of popish infatuation. A belief, as much supported by ignorance, as the ghosts themselves were indebted to the night. But whence comes it, that narratives of this kind have at any time been given by persons of veracity, of judgment, and of learning? men neither liable to be deceived themselves, nor to be suspected of an inclination to deceive others, though it were their interest; nor who could be supposed to have any interest in it, even though it were their inclination? Here seems a further explanation wanting than what can be drawn from superstition. I go upon a supposition, that the relations themselves were false. For as to the arguments sometimes used in this case, that had there been no true shilling there had been no counterfeit, it seems wholly a piece of sophistry. The true shilling here should mean the living person; and the counterfeit resemblance, the posthumous figure of him, that either strikes our senses or our imagination. Supposing no ghost then ever appeared, is it a consequence that no man could ever imagine that they saw the figure of a person deceased? Surely These were no other than a collection of hints, when I proposed to write a poetical essay on Reserve |