passion made up of scorn and pity, 'what are the pleasures you propose? To eat before you are hungry, drink before you are a-thirst, sleep before you are a-tired, to gratify appetites before they are raised, and raise such appetites as nature never planted. You never heard the most delicious music,which is the praise of one's self; nor saw the most beautiful object, which is the work of one's own hands. Your votaries pass away their youth in a dream of mistaken pleasures, while they are hoarding up anguish, torment, and remorse for old age. As for me, I am the friend of the gods and of good men, an agreeable companion to the artizan, a household guardian to the fathers of families, a patron and protector of servants, an associate in all true and generous friendships. The banquets of my votaries are never costly, but always delicious; for none eat or drink at them who are not invited by hunger and thirst. Their slumbers are sound, and their wakings cheerful. My young men have the pleasure of hearing themselves praised by those who are in years; and those who are in years, of being honoured by those who are young. In a word, my followers are favoured by the gods, beloved by their acquaintance, esteemed by their country, and, after the close of their labours, honoured by posterity.' We know by the life of this memorable hero, to which of these two ladies he gave up his heart; and, I believe, every one who reads this will do him the justice to approve his choice. I very much admire the speeches of these ladies as containing in them the chief arguments for a life of virtue, or a life of pleasure, that could enter into the thoughts of a heathen; but am particularly pleased with the different figures he gives the two goddesses. Our modern authors have represented pleasure or vice with an alluring face, but ending in snakes and monsters. Here she appears in all the charms of beauty, though they are all false and borrowed; and by that means composes a vision entirely natural and pleasing. 'Though you are stricken in years, and lieve you will say, there are not frequently such have had great experience in the world, I bedifficult occasions to act in with decency, as those wherein I am entangled. I am a woman in love, and that you will allow to be the most unhappy of all circumstances in human life. Nature has formed us with a strong reluctance against owning such a passion, and custom has made it criminal in us to make advances. A gentlemen, whom I will call Fabio, has the entire possession of my heart. I am so intimately acquainted with him that he makes no scruple of communicating to me an ardent affection he has for Cleora, a friend of mine, who also makes me her confidant. Most part of my life I am in company with the one or the other, and am always entertained with his those ladies who think they are virtuous if passion, or her triumph. Cleora is one of they are not guilty; and, without any delicacy of choice, resolves to take the best offer which shall be made to her. With this prospect she until she sees what lovers will fall into her puts off declaring herself in favour of Fabio, snares, which she lays in all public places, with all the art of gesture and glances. This resolution she has herself told me. Though I love him better than life, I would not gain him by betraying Cleora; or committing such a tresspass against modesty, as letting him know myself that I love him. You are an astrologer, what shall I do? 'DIANNA DOUBTFUL.' This lady has said very justly, that the condition of a women in love is of all others the most miserable. Poor Diana! how must she be racked with jealousy, when Fabio talks of Cleora! how with indignation, when Cleora makes a property of Fabio! A female lover is in the condition of a ghost, that wanders about its beloved treasure, without power to speak, until it is spoken to. I desire Diana to continue in this circumstance: for I see an eye of comfort in her case, and will take all proper measures to extricate her out of this unhappy game of cross-purposes. Since Cleora is upon the catch with her charms, and has no particular regard for Fabio, I shall place a couple of spe I have translated this allegory for the benefit of the youth of Great Britain; and particularly of those who are still in the deplorable state of non-existence, and whom I most earnestly entreat to come into the world. Let my embryos show the least inclination to any single virtue, and I shall allow it to be a struggling towards birth. I do not expect of them that, like the hero in the foregoing story, they should go about as soon as they are born, with a club in their hands, and a lion's skin on their shoulders, to root out monsters, and destroy tyrants; but, as the finest author of all antiquity has said upon this very occasion, though a inan has not the abilities to distinguish himself in the most shining parts of a great cha-cial fellows in her way, who shall both address racter, he has certainly the capacity of being just, faithful, modest, and temperate. to her, and have each a better estate than Fabio. They are both already taken with her, and are preparing for being of her retinue the to communicate to the youth of Great Britain ensuing winter. To women of this worldly turn, as I apprehend Cleora to be, we must reckon backward in our computation of merit; and when a fair lady thinks only of making her spouse a convenient domestic, the notion of worth and value is altered, and the lover is the more acceptable, the less he is considerable. The two I shall throw into the way of Cleora are, Orson Thicket and Mr. Walter Wisdom. Orson is a huntsman, whose father's death, and some difficulties about legacies, brought him out of the woods to town last November. He was at that time one of those country savages, who despise the softness they meet in town and court; and professedly show their strength and roughness in every motion and gesture, in scorn of our bowing and cringing. He was, at his first appearance, very remarkable for that piece of good breeding peculiar to natural Britons, to wit, defiance; and showed every one he met he was as good a man as he. But, in the midst of all this fierceness, he would sometimes attend the discourse of a man of sense, and look at the charms of a beauty, with his eyes and mouth open. He was in this posture when, in the beginning of last December, he was shot by Cleora from a side-box. From that moment he softened into humanity, forgot his dogs and horses, and now moves and speaks with civility and address. Wat. Wisdom, by the death of an elder brother, came to a great estate, when he had proceeded just far enough in his studies to be very impertinent, and at the years when the law gives him possession of his fortune, and his own constitution is too warm for the management of it. Orson is learning to fence and dance, to please and fight for his mistress; and Walter preparing fine horses, and a jingling chariot, to enchant her. All persons concerned will appear at the next opera, where will begin the wild-goose-chase; and I doubt Fabio will see himself so over-looked for Orson or Walter, as to turn his eyes on the modest passion and becoming languor in the countenance of Diana; it being my design to supply with the art of love, all those who preserve the sincere passion of it. Will's Coffee-house, November 23. An ingenious and worthy gentleman, my ancient friend, fell into discourse with me this evening, upon the force and efficacy which the writings of good poets have on the minds of their intelligent readers; and recommended to me his sense of the matter, thrown together in the following manner, which he desired me Probably Dr. Thomas Walker, head schoolmaster at the Chartreux, where Steele and Addison were his scholars, for perhaps Dr. Ellis, then master of the Chartreux in my Essays. I choose to do it in his own words. 'I have always been of opinion,' says he, that virtue sinks deepest into the heart of man, when it comes recommended by the powerful charms of poetry. The most active principle in our mind is the imagination: to it a good poet makes his court perpetually, and by this faculty takes care to gain it first. Our passions and inclinations come over next; and our reason surrenders itself, with pleasure, in the end. Thus, the whole soul is insensibly betrayed into morality, by bribing the fancy with beautiful and agreeable images of those very things that in the books of the philosophers appear austere, and have at the best but a kind of forbidding aspect. In a word, the poets do, as it were, strew the rough paths of virtue so full of flowers, that we are not sensible of the uneasiness of them; and imagine ourselves in the midst of pleasures, and the most bewitching allurements, at the time we are making progress in the severest duties of life. All men agree, that licentious poems do, of all writings, soonest corrupt the heart. And why should we not be as universally persuaded, that the grave and serious performances of such as write in the most engaging manner, by a kind of divine impulse, must be the most effectual persuasives to goodness? If, therefore, were blessed with a son, in order to the forming of his manners, which is making him truly my son, I should be continually putting into his hand some fine poet. The graceful sentences, and the manly sentiments, so frequently to be met with in every great and sublime writer, are, in my judgment, the most ornamental and valuable furniture that can be, for a young gentleman's head; methinks they show like so much rich embroidery upon the brain. Let me add to this, that humanity and tenderness, without which there can be no true greatness in the mind, are inspired by the muses in such pathetical language, that all we find in prose-authors towards the raising and improving of these passions is, in comparison, but cold, or lukewarm at the best. There is, besides, a certain elevation of soul, a sedate magnanimity, and a noble turn of virtue, that distinguishes the hero from the plain honest man, to which verse can only raise us. The bold metaphors, and sounding numbers, peculiar to the poets, rouse up all our sleeping faculties, and alarm the whole powers of the soul, much like that excellent trumpeter mention by Virgil:? -Quo non præstantior alter Ære ciere viros, Martemque accendere cantu. Virg. Æn. vi. 165. -None so renown'd With breathing brass to kindle fierce alarms. Dryden. I fell into this train of thinking this evening upon reading a passage in a masque writ by Milton, where two brothers are introduced is not the business of a good play to make seeking their sister, whom they had lost in a every man a hero; but it certainly gives him dark night and thick wood. One of the bro- a livelier sense of virtue and merit, than he thers is apprehensive lest the wandering virgin had when be entered the theatre. should be over-powered with fears, through the darkness and loneliness of the time and place. This gives the other occasion to make the following reflections, which, as I read them, made me forget my age, and renewed in me the warm desires after virtue, so natural to uncorrupted youth. I do not think my sister so to seek, And the sweet peace that goodness bosoms ever, This rational pleasure, as I always call it, has for many years been very little tasted: but I am glad to find that the true spirit of it is reviving again amongst us, by a due regard to what is presented, and by supporting only one playhouse. It has been within the observation of the youngest amongst us, that while there were two houses, they did not outvie each other by such representations as tended to the instruction and ornament of life, but by introducing mimical dances, and fulsome buffooneries. For when an excellent tragedy was to be acted in one house, the ladder-dancer carried the whole town to the other. Indeed such an evil as this must be the natural consequence of two theatres, as certainly as that there are more who can see than can think. Every one is sensible of the danger of the fellow on the ladder, and can see his activity in coming down safe; but very few are judges of the distress of a hero in a play, or of his manner of bebaviour in those circumstances. Thus, to please the people, two houses must entertain them with what they can understand, and not with things which are designed to improve their understanding: and the readiest way to gain good audiences must be, to offer such things Hor. 2. Ep. i. 166. as are most relished by the crowd; that is to say, immodest action, empty show, or impertinent activity. In short, two houses cannot hope to subsist, but by means which are contradictory to the very institution of a theatre in a well-governed kingdom.* Were all too ruffled, and sometimes impair'd: ..... No. 99.] Saturday, November 26, 1709. Spirat tragicum satis et feliciter andet. He, fortunately bold, breathes true sublime. I HAVE been this evening recollecting what passages, since I could first think, have left the strongest impressions upon my mind; and, after strict inquiry, I am convinced that the impulses I have received from theatrical representations have had a greater effect than otherwise would have been wrought in me by the little occurrences of my private life! My old friends, Hart+ and Mohun, the one by his natural and proper force, the other by his great skill and art, never failed to send me home full of such ideas as affected my behaviour, and made me insensibly more courteous and humane to my friends and acquaintance. It * Milton's Comus' was founded on the following real story: The earl of Bridgewater being president of Wales, In 1634, had his residence at Ludlow-Castle, in Shropshire; Lord Bracly and Mr. Egerton, his sons, and lady Alice Egerton, his daughter, passing through a place called the Hay-wood Forest, in Herefordshire, were benighted, and the lady was for some short time lost. This accident being related to their father upon their arrival at his castle, furnished a subject which Milton wrought into one of the finest poems of the kind in any language. ↑ Hart was boy or apprentice to Robinson, at the playhouse in Black Friars, where he acted women's parts. When the civil wars broke out, and the stage was put down, many, indeed most of the players went into the royal army, and lost or exposed their lives for the king. 1 Mohun was likewise bred up to the business of a player, for be also was an apprentice, and played women's parts. I have ever had this sense of the thing, and for that reason have rejoiced that my ancient coeval friend of Drury-lane, though he had sold off most of his moveables, still kept possession of his palace; and trembled for him, when he had lately liked to have been taken by a stratagem. There have, for many ages, been a certain learned sort of unlearned men in this nation, called attornies, who have taken upon them to solve all difficulties by increasing them, and are called upon to the assistance of all who are lazy, or weak of understanding. The insolence of a ruler of this palace made bim resign the possession of it to the management of my above-mentioned friend, Divito.+ From the year 1570 to the year 1629, when the play. house in White Friars was finished, no less toan seventeen play-houses had been built. This and the following paragraph refer to a transaction between William Collier, Esq. and Christopher Rich, Esq. two lawyers, of which there is here given a very ludicrous account, Rich was the patentee of Drury-lane theatre, when Collier, having first obtained a licence to head a company of players, procured next a lease of Drury-lane playhouse, from the landlords of it, and under this authority, by the help of a hired rabble, he forcibly expelled Rich and gut possession. Divito was too modest to know when to resign it, until he had the opinion and sentence of the law for his removal. Both these in length of time were obtained against him; but as the great Archimedes defended Syracuse with so powerful engines, that if he threw a rope or piece of wood over the wall, the enemy fled; so Divito had wounded all adversaries with so much skill, that men feared even to be in the right against him. For this reason, the lawful ruler sets up an attorney to expel an attorney, and chose a name dreadful to the stage, who only seemed able to beat Divito out of his entrenchments. On the twenty-second instant, a night of public rejoicing, the enemies of Divito made a largess to the people of faggots, tubs, and other combustible matter, which was erected into a bonfire before the palace. Plentiful cans were at the same time distributed among the dependencies of that principality; and the artful rival of Divito, observing them prepared for enterprise, presented the lawful owner of the neighbouring edifice, and showed his deputation under him. War immediately ensued upon the peaceful empire of wit and the muses; the Goths and Vandals sacking Rome did not threaten a more barbarous devastation of arts and sciences. But, when they had forced their entrance, the experienced Divito had detatched all his subjects, and evacuated all his stores. The neighbouring inhabitants report, that the refuse of Divito's followers marched off the night before, disguised in magnificence; doorkeepers came out clad like cardinals, and scenedrawers like heathen gods. Divito himself was wrapped up in one of his black clouds, and left to the enemy nothing but an empty stage, full of trap-doors, known only to himself and his adherents. vants have wrought night and day ever since, to furnish out the necessaries for these deceased. But so it is, sir, that of this vast number of dead bodies that go putrifying up and down the streets, not one of them has come to us to be buried. Though we should be loath to be any hinderance to our good friends the physicians, yet we cannot but take notice what infection her majesty's subjects are liable to from the horrible stench of so many corses. Sir, we will not detain you; our case in short is this: here are we embarked in this undertaking for the public good: now, if people should be suffered to go on unburied at this rate, there is an end of the usefullest manufactures and handicrafts of the kingdom: for where will be your sextons, coffin-makers, and plumbers? what will become of your embalmers, epitaph-mongers, and chief mourners? We are loath to drive this matter any farther, though we tremble at the consequences of it; for if it shall be left to every dead man's discretion not to be buried until he sees his time, no man can say where that will end; but thus much we will take upon us to affirm, that such a toleration will be intolerable. : 'What would make us easy in this matter is no more, but that your worship would be pleased to issue out your orders to ditto Dead to repair forthwith to our office, in order to their interment; where constant attendance shall be given to treat with all persons according to their quality, and the poor to be buried for nothing and for the convenience of such persons as are willing enough to be dead, but that they are afraid their friends and relations should know it, we have a back door into Warwick-street, from whence they may be interred with all secrecy imaginable, and without loss of time, or hinderance of business. But in case of obstinacy, for we would gladly make a thorough riddance, we desire a further power from your worship, to take up such deceased as shall not have complied with your first orders, wherever we meet them and if after that there shall be complaints of any persons so offending, let them lie at our doors. We are, your worship's until death, : From my own Apartment, November 25. I have already taken great pains to inspire notions of honour and virtue into the people of this kingdom, and used all gentle methods imaginable, to bring those who are dead in idleness, folly, and pleasure, into life, by applying themselves to learning, wisdom, and industry. But, since fair means are ineffectual, I must proceed to extremities, and shall give my good friends, the company of upholders, 'P. S. We are ready to give in our printed full power to bury all such dead as they meet with, who are within my former descriptions proposals at large; and if your worship apof deceased persons. In the mean time the proves of our undertaking, we desire the folfollowing remonstrance of that corporation Ilowing advertisement may be inserted in your take to be very just. next paper: 'The master and company Whereas a commission of interment has been awarded against doctor John Partridge, philomath, professor of physic and astrology; and whereas the said Partridge hath not surrendered himself nor shown cause to the contrary; these are to certify, that the company of upholders will proceed to bury him from Cord wainers-hall, on Tuesday the twenty-ninth in- | loose and irregular, discovers itself too much stant, where any six of his surviving friends, in several parts of it. who still believe him to be alive, are desired to come prepared to hold up the pall. Methought I saw the same azure sky diversified with the same glorious luminaries which 'Note. We shall light away at six in the had entertained me a little before I fell asleep. evening, there being to be a sermon.' No. 100.] Tuesday, November 29, 1709. Sheer-lane, November 28. I was last week taking a solitary walk in the garden of Lincoln's-Inn (a favour that is indulged me by several of the benchers, who are my intimate friends, and grown old with me in this neighbourhood) when, according to. the nature of men in years, who have made but little progress in the advancement of their fortune or their fame, I was repining at the sudden rise of many persons who are my juniors, and indeed, at the unequal distribution of wealth, honour, and all other blessings of life. I was lost in this thought, when the night came upon me, and drew my mind into a far more agreeable contemplation. The heaven above me appeared in all its glories, and presented me with such a hemisphere of stars as made the most agreeable prospect imaginable to one who delights in the study of nature. It happened to be a freezing night, which had purified the whole body of air into such a bright transparent æther, as made every constellation visible; and, at the same time, gave such a particular glowing to the stars, that I thought it the richest sky I had ever seen. I could not behold a scene so wonderfully adorned and lighted up, if I may be allowed that expression, without suitable meditations on the author of such illustrious and amazing objects: for, on these occasions, philosophy suggests motives to religion, and religion adds pleasure to philosophy. I was looking very attentively on that sign in the heavens which is called by the name of the Balance, when, on a sudden, there appeared in it an extraordinary light, as if the sun should rise at midnight. By ts increasing in breadth and lustre, I soor, found that it approached towards the earth; and at length could discern something like a shadow hovering in the midst of a great glory, which, in a little time after, distinctly perceived to be the figure of a woman. I fancied at first, it might have been the angel, or intelligence that guided the constellation from which it descended; but, upon a nearer view, I saw about her, all the emblems with which the goddess of justice is usually described. Her countenance was unspeakably awful and majestic, but exquisitely beautiful to those whose eyes were strong enough to behold it; her smiles transported with rapture, her frowns terrified to despair. She held in her hand a mirror, endowed with the same qualities as that which the painters put into the band of truth. There streamed from it a light, which distinguished itself from all the splendours that surrounded her, more than a flash of lightning shines in the midst of day-light. As she moved it in her hand, it brightened the heavens, the air, or the earth. When she had descended so low as to be seen and heard by mortals, to make the pomp of her appearance more supportable, she threw darkness and clouds about her, that tempered the light into a thousand beautiful shades and colours, and multiplied that lustre, which was before too strong and dazzling, into a variety of milder glories. In the mean time, the world was in an alarm, and all the inhabitants of it gathered together upon a spacious plain; so that I seemed to have the whole species before my eyes. A voice was As soon as I had recovered my usual tem- heard from the clouds, declaring the intention per and serenity of soul, I retired to my lodg- of this visit, which was to restore and approings, with the satisfaction of having passed priate to every one living what was his due. away a few hours in the proper employments The fear and hope, joy and sorrow, which apof a reasonable creature; and promising my-peared in that great assembly, after this solemn self that my slumbers would be sweet, I no sooner fell into them, but I dreamed a dream, or saw a vision, for I know not which to call it, that seemed to rise out of my evening me. ditation, and had something in it so solemn and serious, that I cannot forbear communicating it; though, I must confess, the wildness of imagination, which, in a dream, is always From this being mentioned as a favour from the benchers,' it should seem that the liberty of walking in the gardens of the inns of court was not generally allowed, as it has been of late years. declaration, are not to be expressed. The first edict was then pronounced, 'That all titles and claims to riches and estates, or to any part of them, should be immediately vested in the rightful owner.' Upon this, the inhabitants of the earth held up the instruments of their tenure, whether in parchment, paper, wax, or any other form of conveyance; and as the goddess moved the mirror of truth which she Libra, or the Balance, is next the sign Virgo, into which Astræa, the goddess of justice, was translated, when she could no longer stay on eartn. |