Chapter IX: Section III: On Reading and Speaking, (7)

13. While she was perusing it, he fixed his eyes on her face with the deepest attention; her concern gave a new softness to her beauty, and when she burst into tears, he could no longer refrain from bearing a part in her sorrow, and telling her, that he too had read the letter, and was resolved to make reparation for having been the occasion of it. My reader will not be displeased to see the second epistle which he now wrote to Amanda's mother.

MADAM,

'I am full of shame, and will never forgive myself if I have not your pardon for what I lately wrote. It was far from my intention to add trouble to the afflicted; nor could any thing but my being a stranger to you, have betrayed me into a fault, for which, if I live, I shall endeavour to make you amends as a son. You cannot be unhappy while Amanda is your daughter: nor shall be, if any thing can prevent it, which is in the power of,

MADAM,

_Your obedient humble servant_--.'

14. This letter he sent by his steward, and soon after went up to town himself to complete the generous act he had now resolved on. By his friendship and assistance, Amanda's father was quickly in a condition of retrieving his perplexed affairs. To conclude, he married Amanda, and enjoyed the double satisfaction of having restored a worthy family to their former prosperity, and of making himself happy by an alliance to their virtues.

_The Story of Abdallah and Balsora._

GUARDIAN, No. 167.

1. The following story is lately translated out of an Arabian manuscript, which I think has very much the turn of an oriental tale: and as it has never before been printed, I question not but it will be highly acceptable to my reader.

2. The name of Helim is still famous through all the eastern parts of the world. He is called among the Persians, even to this day, Helim the great physician. He was acquainted with all the powers of simples, understood all the influence of the stars, and knew the secrets that were engraved on the seal of Solomon the son of David. Helim was also governor of the black palace, and chief of the physicians to Alnareschin the great king of Persia.

3. Alnareschin was the most dreadful tyrant that ever reigned in this country. He was of a fearful, suspicious and cruel nature, having put to death, upon very slight jealousies; and surmises, five-and-thirty of his queens, and above twenty sons whom he suspected to have conspired against his life. Being at length wearied with the exercise of so many cruelties in his own family, and fearing lest the whole race of Caliphs should be entirely lost, he one day sent for Helim, and spoke to him after this manner.

4. 'Helim,' said he, 'I have long admired thy great wisdom, and retired way of living. I shall now shew thee the entire confidence which I place in thee. I have only two sons remaining, who are as yet but infants. It is my design that thou take them home with thee, and educate them as thy own. Train them up in the humble unambitious pursuits of knowledge. By this means shall the line of Caliphs be preserved, and my children succeed after me, without aspiring to my throne whilst I am yet alive.'

5. The words of my lord the king shall be obeyed, said Helim. After which he bowed, and went out of the king's presence. He then received the children into his own house, and from that time bred them up with him in the studies of knowledge and virtue. The young princes loved and respected Helim as their father, and made such improvements under him, that by the age of one-and-twenty they were instructed in all the learning of the East.

6. The name of the eldest was Ibrahim, and of the youngest Abdallah. They lived together in such a perfect friendship, that to this day it is said of intimate friends, that they live together like Ibrahim and Abdallah. Helim had an only child, who was a girl of a fine soul, and a most beautiful person. Her father omitted nothing in her education, that might make her the most accomplished woman of her age.

7. As the young princes were in a manner excluded from the rest of the world, they frequently conversed with this lovely virgin, who had been brought up by her father in the same course of knowledge and of virtue.

8. Abdallah, whose mind was of a softer turn than tint of his brother, grew by degrees so enamoured of her conversation, that he did not think he lived, when he was not in company with his beloved Balsora, for that was the name of the maid. The fame of her beauty was so great, that at length it came to the ears of the king, who, pretending to visit the young princes his sons, demanded of Helim the sight of Balsora his fair daughter.

9. The king was so enflamed with her beauty and behaviour, that he sent for Helim the next morning, and told him it was now his design to recompence him for all his faithful services; and that in order to it, he intended to make his daughter queen of Persia.

10. Helim, who knew very well the fate of all those unhappy women who had been thus advanced, and could not but be privy to the secret love which Abdallah bore his daughter; 'Far be it,' says he, 'from the king of Persia to contaminate the blood of the Caliphs, and join himself in marriage with the daughter of his physcian.'

11. The king, however, was so impatient for such a bride, that without hearing any excuses, he immediately ordered Balsora to be sent for into his presence, keeping the father with him in order to make her sensible of the honour which he designed. Balsora, who was too modest and humble to think her beauty had made such an impression on the king, was a few moments after brought into his presence as he had commanded.

12. She appeared in the king's eye as one of the virgins of paradise. But upon hearing the honour which he intended her, she fainted away, and fell down as dead at his feet. Helim wept, and after having recovered her out of the trance into which she was fallen, represented to the king that so unexpected an honour was too great to have been communicated to her all at once; but that, if he pleased, he would himself prepare her for it. The king bid him take his own away and dismissed him.

13. Balsora was conveyed again to her father's house, where the thoughts of Abdallah renewed her affliction every moment; insomuch that at length she fell into a raging fever. The king was informed of her condition by those who saw her. Helim finding no other means of extricating her from the difficulties she was in, after having composed her mind, and made her acquainted with his intentions, gave her a certain potion, which he knew would lay her asleep for many hours; and afterwards in all the seeming distress of a disconsolate father informed the king she was dead.

14. The king, who never let any sentiments of humanity come too near his heart, did not much trouble himself about the matter; however, for his own reputation, he told the father, that since it was known through the empire that Balsora died at a time when he designed her for his bride, it was his intention that she should be honoured as such after her death, that her body should be laid in the black palace, among those of his deceased queens.

15. In the meantime Abdallah, who had heard of the king's design, was not less afflicted than his beloved Balsora. As for the several circumstances of his distress, as also how the king was informed of an irrecoverable distemper into which he was fallen, they are to be found at length in the history of Helim.

16. It shall suffice to acquaint the reader, that Helim, some days after the supposed death of his daughter, gave the prince a potion of the same nature with which he had laid asleep Balsora.

17. It is the custom among the Persians, to convey in a private manner the bodies of all the royal family a little after their death, into the black palace; which is the repository of all who are descended from the Caliphs, or any way allied to them. The chief physician is always governor of the black palace; it being his office to embalm and preserve the holy family after they are dead, as well as to take care of them while they are yet living.

18. The black palace is so called from the colour of the building, which is all of the finest polished black marble. There are always burning in it five thousand everlasting lamps. It has also an hundred folding doors of ebony, which are each of them watched day and night by an hundred negroes, who are to take care that nobody enters besides the governor.

19. Helim, after having conveyed the body of his daughter into this repository, and at the appointed time received her out of the sleep into which she was fallen, took care some time after to bring that of Abdallah into the same place. Balsora, watched over him till such time as the dose he had taken lost its effect. Abdallah was not acquainted with Helim's design when he gave him this sleepy potion.

20. It is impossible to describe the surprise, the joy, the transport he was in at his first awaking. He fancied himself in the retirement of the blest, and that the spirit of his dear Balsora, who he thought was just gone before him, was the first who came to congratulate his arrival. She soon informed him of the place he was in, which notwithstanding all its horrors, appeared to him more sweet than the bower of Mahomet, in the company of his Balsora.

21. Helim, who was supposed to be taken up in the embalming of the bodies, visited the place very frequently. His greatest perplexity was how to get the lovers out of it, the gates being watched in such a manner as I have before related. This consideration did not a little disturb the two interred lovers.

22. At length Helim bethought himself, that the first day of the full moon of the month Tizpa was near at hand. Now it is a received tradition among the Persians, that the souls of those of the royal family, who are in a state of bliss, do, on the first full moon after their decease, pass through the eastern gate of the black palace, which is therefore called the Gate of Paradise, in order to take their flight for that happy place.

23. Helim, therefore, having made due preparation for this night, dressed each of the lovers in a robe of azure silk, wrought in the finest looms of Persia, with a long train of linen whiter than snow, that flowed on the ground behind them. Upon Abdallah's head he fixed a wreath of the greenest myrtle, and on Balsora's a garland of the freshest roses. Their garments were scented with the richest perfumes of Arabia.

24. Having thus prepared every thing, the full moon was no sooner up, and shining in all its brightness, but he privately opened the Gate of Paradise, and shut it after the same manner, as soon as they had passed through it.

25. The band of negroes who were posted at a little distance from the gate, seeing two such beautiful apparitions, that shewed themselves to'aclvantage by the light of the full moon, and being ravished with the odour that flowed from their garments, immediately concluded them to be the ghosts of the two persons lately deceased.

26. They fell upon their faces as they passed through the midst of them, and continued prostrate on the earth until such time as they were out of sight. They reported the next day what they had seen, but this was looked upon by the king himself and most others, as the compliment that was usually paid to any of the deceased of his family.

27. Helim had placed two of his own mules about a mile's distance from the black temple, on the spot which they had agreed upon for their rendezvous. Here he met them, and conducted them to one of his own houses, which was situated on mount _Khacan_.

28. The air of this mountain was so very healthful, that Helim had formerly transported the king thither, in order to recover him out of a long fit of sickness, which succeeded so well, that the king made him a present of the whole mountain, with a beautiful house and garden that were on the top of it.

29. In this retirement lived Abdallah and Balsora. They were both so fraught with all kinds of knowledge, and possessed with so constant and mutual a passion for each other, that their solitude never lay heavy on them.

30. Abdallah applied himself to those arts Which were agreeable to his manner of living, and the situation of the place; insomuch that in a few years he converted the whole mountain into a kind of garden, and covered every part of it with plantations or spots of flowers.

Helim was too good a father to let him want any thing that might conduce to make his retirement pleasant.

31. In about ten years after their abode in this place, the old king died, and was succeeded by his son Ibrahim, who upon the supposed death of his brother, had been called to court, and entertained there as heir to the Persian empire. Though he was some years inconsolable for the death of his brother, Helim durst not trust him with the secret, which he knew would have fatal consequences, should it by any means come to the knowledge of the old king.

32. Ibrahim was no sooner mounted to the throne, but Helim sought after a proper opportunity of making a discovery to him, which he knew would be very agreeable to so good natured and generous a prince. It so happened, that before Helim found such an opportunity as he desired, the new king Ibrahim, having been separated from his company in a chase, and almost fainting with heat and thirst, saw himself at the foot of mount Khacan. He immediately ascended the hill, and coming to Helim's house, demanded some refreshments.

33. Helim was very luckily there at that time; and after having set before the king the choicest of wines and fruits, finding him wonderfully pleased with so seasonable a treat, told him that the best part of his entertainment was to come. Upon which he opened to him the whole history of what had passed. The king was at once astonished and transported at so strange a relation, and seeing his brother enter the room with Balsora in his hand, he leaped off from the sofa on which he sat, and cried out, 'It is he! it is my Abdallah!' Having said this, he fell upon his neck, and wept.

34. The whole company for some time remained silent, and shedding tears of joy. The king at length having kindly reproached Helim for depriving him so long from such a brother, embraced Balsora with the greatest tenderness, and told her that she should now be a queen indeed, for that he would immediately make his brother king of all the conquered nations on the other side the Tigris.

35. He easily discovered in the eyes of our two lovers, that instead of being transported with the offer, they preferred their present retirement to empire. At their request, therefore, he changed his intentions, and made them a present of all the open country as far as they could sec from the top of mount Khacan.

36. Abdallah continuing to extend his former improvements, beautified this whole prospect with groves and fountains, gardens and seats of pleasure, until it became the most delicious spot of ground within the empire, and is therefore called the garden of Persia.

37. This Caliph, Ibrahim, after a long and happy reign, died without children, and was succeeded by Abdallah, a son of Abdallah and Balsora. This was that king Abdallah, who afterwards fixed the imperial residence upon mount Khacan, which continues at this time to be the favourite palace of the Persian empire.

_On Rashness and Cowardice._

RAMBLER, No. 25.

1. There are some vices and errors which, though often fatal to those in whom they are found, have yet, by the universal consent of mankind, been considered as entitled to some degree of respect, or have at least been exempted from contemptuous infamy, and condemned by the severest moralists with pity rather than detestation.

2. A constant and invariable example of this general partiality will be found in the different regard which has always been shewn to rashness and cowardice; two vices, of which, though they maybe conceived equally distant from the middle point, where true fortitude is placed, and may equally injure any public or private interest, yet the one is never mentioned without some kind of veneration, and the other always considered as a topic of unlimited and licentious censure, on which all the virulence of reproach may he lawfully exerted.

3. The same distinction is made, by the common suffrage, between profusion and avarice, and perhaps between many other opposite vices; and, as I have found reason to pay great regard to the voice of the people, in cases where knowledge has been forced upon them by experience, without long deductions or deep researches, I am inclined to believe that this distribution of respect is not without some agreement with the nature of things; and that in the faults, which are thus invested with extraordinary privileges, there are generally some latent principles of merit, some possibilities of future virtue, which may, by decrees, break from obstruction, and by time and opportunity be brought into act.

4. It may be laid down as an axiom, that it is more easy to take away superfluities than to supply defects; and therefore, he that is culpable, because he has passed the middle point of virtue, is always accounted a fairer object of hope, than he who fails by falling short. The one has all that perfection requires, and more, but the excess may be easily retrenched; the other wants the qualities requisite to excellence, and who can tell how he shall obtain them?

5. We are certain that the horse may be taught to keep pace with his fellows, whose fault it is that he leaves them behind. We know that a few strokes of the axe will lop a cedar; but what arts of cultivation can elevate a shrub?

6. To walk with circumspection and steadiness in the right path, at an equal distance between the extremes of error, ought to be the constant endeavour of every reasonable being; nor can I think those teachers of moral wisdom much to be honoured as benefactors to mankind, who are always enlarging upon the difficulty of our duties, and providing rather excuses for vice, than incentives to virtue.

7. But, since to most it will happen often, and to all sometimes, that there will be a deviation towards one side or the other, we ought always to employ our vigilance with most attention, on that enemy from which there is the greatest danger, and to stray, if we must stray, towards those parts from whence we may quickly and easily return.

8. Among other opposite qualities of the mind, which may become dangerous, though in different degrees, I have often had occasion to consider the contrary effects of presumption and despondency; of steady confidence, which promises a victory without contest, and heartless pusilanimity, which shrinks back from the thought of great undertakings, confounds difficulty with impossibility, and considers all advancement towards any new attainment, as irreversibly prohibited.

9. Presumption will be easily corrected. Every experiment will teach caution, and miscarriages will hourly shew, that attempts are not always rewarded with success. The most precipitate ardour will, in time, be taught the necessity of methodical gradation, and preparatory measures; and the most daring confidence be convinced, that neither merit nor abilities can command events.

10. It is the advantage of vehemence and activity, that they are always hastening to their own reformation; because they incite us to try whether our expectations are well grounded; and therefore detect the deceits which they are apt to occasion. But timidity is a disease of the mind more obstinate and fatal; for a man once persuaded, that any impediment is insuperable, has given it, with respect to himself, that strength and weight which it had not before.

11. He can scarcely strive with vigour and perseverance, when he has no hope of gaining the victory; and since he will never try his strength, can never discover the unreasonableness of his fears.

12. There is often to be found in men devoted to literature, a kind of intellectual cowardice, which whoever converses much among them, may observe frequently to depress the alacrity of enterprise, and by consequence to retard the improvement of science.

13. They have annexed to every species of knowledge, some chimerical character of terror and inhibition, which they transmit, without much reflection, from one to another; they first fright themselves, and then propagate the panic to their scholars and acquaintances.

14. One study is inconsistent with a lively imagination, another with a solid judgment; one is improper in the early parts of life, another requires so much time, that it is not to be attempted at an advanced age; one is dry and contracts the sentiments, another is diffuse and over-burdens the memory; one is insufferable to taste and delicacy, and another wears out life in the study of words, and is useless to a wise man, who desires only the knowledge of things.

15. But of all the bugbears by which the _infantes barbati_, boys both young and old, have been hitherto frighted from digressing into new tracts of learning, none has been more mischievously efficacious than an opinion that every kind of knowledge requires a peculiar genius, or mental constitution, framed for the reception of some ideas and the exclusion of others; and that to him whose genius is not adapted to the study which he prosecutes, all labour shall be vain and fruitless; vain as an endeavour to mingle oil and water, or, in the language of chemistry, to amalgamate bodies of heterogeneous principles.

16. This opinion we may reasonably suspect to have been propogated, by vanity, beyond the truth. It is natural for those who have raised a reputation by any science, to exalt themselves as endowed by heaven with peculiar powers, or marked out by an extraordinary designation for their profession: and to fright competitors away by representing the difficulties with which they must contend, and the necessity of qualities which are supposed to be not generally conferred, and which no man can know, but by experience, whether he enjoys.

17. To this discouragement it may possibly be answered, that since a genius, whatever it may be, is like fire in the flint, only to be produced by collision with a proper subject, it is the business of every man to try whether his faculties may not happily co-operate with his desires; and since they whose proficiency he admires, knew their own force only by the event, he needs but engage in the same undertaking, with equal spirit, and may reasonably hope for equal success.

18. There is another species of false intelligence, given by those who profess to shew the way to the summit of knowledge, of equal tendency to depress the mind with false distrust of itself, and weaken it by needless solicitude and dejection. When a scholar whom they desire to animate, consults them at his entrance on some new study, it is common to make flattering representations of its pleasantness and facility.

19. Thus they generally attain one of the two ends almost equally desirable; they either incite his industry by elevating his hopes, or produce a high opinion of their own abilities, since they are supposed to relate only what they have found, and to have proceeded with no less ease than they have promised to their followers.

20. The student, enflamed by this encouragement, sets forward in the new path, and proceeds a few steps with great alacrity; but he soon finds asperities and intricacies of which he has not been forewarned, and imagining that none ever were so entangled or fatigued before him, sinks suddenly into despair, and desists as from an expedition in which fate opposes him. Thus his terrors are multiplied by his hopes, and he is defeated without resistance, because he had no expectation of an enemy.

21. Of these treacherous instructors, the one destroys industry, by declaring that industry is vain, the other by representing it as needless: the one cuts away the root of hope, the other raises it only to be blasted. The one confines his pupil to the shore, by telling him that his wreck is certain; the other sends him to sea without preparing him for tempests.

22. False hopes and false terrors, are equally to be avoided. Every man who proposes to grow eminent by learning, should carry in his mind, at once, the difficulty of excellence, and the force of industry; and remember that fame is not conferred but as the recommence of labour, and that labour, vigorously continued, has not often failed of its reward.

_Fortitude founded upon the fear of God._

GUARDIAN, No. 167.

1. Looking over the late edition of Monsieur _Boileau's_ works, I was very much pleased with the article which he has added to his notes on the translation of _Longinus_. He there tells us, that the sublime in writing rises either from the nobleness of the thought, the magnificence of the words, or the harmonious and lively turn of the phrase, and that the perfect sublime rises from all these three in conjunction together. He produces an instance of this perfect sublime in four verses from the Athalia of Monsieur _Racine_.

2. When _Abner_, one of the chief officers of the court, represents to _Joad_ the high priest, that the queen was incensed against him, the high priest, not in the least terrified at the news, returns this answer:

_Celui que met un frein à la fureur des flots,
Scait aussi des méchans arréter les complots;
Soumis avecs respect à sa volutté sainte,
Je crains Dieu, cher Abner, & n'ai point d'autre crainte._

3. 'He who ruleth the raging of the sea, knows also how to check the designs of the ungodly. I submit myself with reverence to his holy will. O Abner! I fear my God, and I fear none but him.' Such a thought gives no less a solemnity to human nature, than it does to good writing.

4. This religious fear, when it is produced by just apprehensions of a divine power, naturally overlooks all human greatness that stands in competition with it, and extinguishes every other terror that can settle itself in the heart of a man: it lessens and contracts the figure of the most exalted person: it disarms the tyrant and executioner, and represents to our minds the most enraged and the most powerful as altogether harmless and impotent.

5. There is no true fortitude which is not founded upon this fear, as there is no other principle of so settled and fixed a nature. Courage that grows from constitution, very often forsakes a man when he has occasion for it; and when it is only a kind of instinct in the soul, breaks out on all occasions without judgment or discretion. That courage which proceeds from a sense of our duty, and from a fear of offending him that made us, acts always in an uniform manner, and according to the dictates of right reason.

6. What can a man fear who takes care in all his actions to please a Being that is omnipotent; a Being who is able to crush all his adversaries; a Being that can divert any misfortune from befalling him, or turn any such misfortune to his advantage? The person who lives with this constant and habitual regard to the great superintendant of the world, is indeed sure that no real evil can come into his lot.

7. Blessings may appear under the shape of pains, losses and disappointments, but let him have patience, and he will see them in their proper figures. Dangers may threaten him, but he may rest satisfied that they will either not reach him, or that if they do, they will be the instruments of good to him. In short, he may lock upon all crosses and accidents, sufferings and afflictions, as means which are made use of to bring him to happiness.

8. This is even the worst of that man's condition whose mind is possessed with the habitual fear of which I am now speaking. But it very often happens, that those which appear evils in our own eyes, appear also as such to him who has human nature under his care, in which case they are certainly averted from the person who has made himself, by this virtue, an object of divine favour.

9. Histories are full of instances of this nature, where men of virtue have had extraordinary escapes out of such dangers as have enclosed them, and which have seemed inevitable.

10. There is no example of this kind in Pagan history which more pleases me than that which is recorded in the life of _Timoleon_. This extraordinary man was famous for referring all his successes to Providence. _Cornelius Nepos_ acquaints us that he had in his house a private chapel in which he used to pay his devotions to the goddess who represented Providence among the heathens. I think no man was ever more distinguished by the Deity, whom he blindly worshipped, than the great person I am speaking of, in several occurrences of his life, but particularly in the following one, which I shall relate out of _Plutarch_.

11. Three persons had entered into a conspiracy to assassinate _Timoleon_ as he was offering up his devotions in a certain temple. In order to it they took their several stands in the most convenient places for their purpose. As they were waiting for an opportunity to put their design in execution, a stranger having observed one of the conspirators, fell upon him and slew him. Upon which the other two, thinking their plot had been discovered, threw themselves at _Timoleon's_ feet, and confessed the whole matter.

12. This stranger, upon examination, was found to have understood nothing of the intended assassination, but having several years before had a brother killed by the conspirator, whom he here put to death, and having till now sought in vain for an opportunity of revenge, he chanced to meet the murderer in the temple, who had planted himself there for the above-mentioned purpose.

13. _Plutarch_ cannot forbear on this occasion, speaking with a kind of rapture on the schemes of Providence, which, in this particular, had so contrived it that the stranger should, for so great a space of time, be debarred the means of doing justice to his brother, till by the same blow that revenged the death of one innocent man, he preserved the life of another.

14. For my own part, I cannot wonder that a man of _Timoleon's_ religion should have this intrepidity and firmness of mind, or that he should be distinguished by such a deliverance as I have here related.

_The folly of youthful Extravagance._

RAMBLER, No. 26.

1. It is usual for men, engaged in the same pursuits, to be inquisitive after the conduct and fortune of each other; and therefore, I suppose it will not be unpleasing to you to read an account of the various changes which have appeared in part of a life devoted to literature. My narrative will not exhibit any great variety of events, or extraordinary revolutions; but may perhaps be not less useful, because I shall relate nothing which is not likely to happen to a thousand others.

2. I was born heir to a very small fortune, and left by my father, whom I cannot remember, to the care of an uncle. He having no children, always treated me as his son, and finding in me those qualities which old men easily discover in sprightly children when they happen to love them, declared that a genius like mine should never be lost for want of cultivation.

3. He therefore placed me for the usual time at a great school, and then sent me to the university, with a larger allowance than my own patrimony would have afforded, that I might not keep mean company, but learn to become my dignity when I should be made Lord Chancellor, which he often lamented that the increase of his infirmities was very likely to preclude him from seeing.

4. This exuberance of money displayed itself in gaiety of appearance, and wantonness of expence, and introduced me to the acquaintance of those whom the same superfluity of fortune had betrayed to the same licence and ostentation: young heirs who pleased themselves with a remark very frequently in their mouths, that though they were sent by their fathers to the university, they were not under the necessity of living by their learning.

5. Among men of this class I easily obtained the reputation of a great genius, and was persuaded that, with such liveliness of imagination, and delicacy of sentiment, I should never be able to submit to the drudgery of the law.

6. I therefore gave myself wholly to the more airy and elegant parts of learning, and was often so much elated with my superiority to the youths with whom I conversed, that I began to listen with great attention, to those who recommended to me a wider and more conspicuous theatre; and was particularly touched with an observation made by one of my friends, that it was not by lingering in the university that Prior became ambassador, or Addison a secretary of state.

7. This desire was hourly increased by the solicitation of my companions, who removing one by one to London, as the caprice of their relations allowed them, or the legal dismission from the hands of their guardian put it in their power, never failed to send an account of the beauty and felicity of the new world, and to remonstrate how much was lost by every hour's continuance in a place of retirement and restraint.

8. My uncle, in the mean time, frequently harrassed me with monitory letters, which I sometimes neglected to open for a week after I received them, and generally read in a tavern, with such comments as I might show how much I was superior to instruction or advice. I could not but wonder, how a man confined to the country and unacquainted with the present system of things, should imagine himself qualified to instruct a rising genius, born to give laws to the age, refine its state, and multiply its pleasures.

9. The postman, however, still continued to bring me new remonstrances; for my uncle was very little depressed by the ridicule and reproach which he never heard. But men of parts have quick resentments; it was impossible to bear his usurpations for ever; and I resolved, once for all, to make him an example to those who imagine themselves wise because they are old, and to teach young men, who are too tame under representation, in what manner grey-bearded insolence ought to be treated.

10. I therefore one evening took my pen in hand, and after having animated myself with a catch, wrote a general answer to all his precepts, with such vivacity of turn, such elegance of irony, and such asperity of sarcasm, that I convulsed a large company with universal laughter, disturbing the neighbourhood with vociferations of applause, and five days afterwards was answered, that I must be content to live upon my own estate.

11. This contraction of my income gave me no disturbance, for a genius like mine was out of the reach of want. I had friends that would be proud to open their purses at my call, and prospects of such advancement as would soon reconcile my uncle, whom, upon mature deliberation, I resolved to receive into favour, without insisting on any acknowledgment of his offence, when the splendor of my condition should induce him to wish for my countenance.

12. I therefore went up to London before I had shewn the alteration of my condition, by any abatement of my way of living, and was received by all my academical acquaintance with triumph and congratulation. I was immediately introduced among the wits and men of spirit; and, in a short time, had divested myself of all my scholar's gravity, and obtained the reputation of a pretty fellow.

13. You will easily believe that I had no great knowledge of the world; yet I have been hindered by the general disinclination every man feels to confess poverty, from telling to any one the resolution of my uncle, and some time subsisted upon the stock of money which I had brought with me, and contributed my share as before to all our entertainments. But my pocket was soon emptied, and I was obliged to ask my friends for a small sum.

14. This was a favour which we had often reciprocally received from one another, they supposed my wants only accidental, and therefore willingly supplied them. In a short time, I found a necessity of asking again, and was again treated with the same civility, but the third time they began to wonder what that old rogue my uncle could mean by sending a gentleman to town without money; and when they gave me what I asked for, advised me to stipulate for more regular remittances.

15. This somewhat disturbed my dream of constant affluence, but I was three days after completely awaked; for entering the tavern, where we met every evening, I found the waiters remitted their complaisance, and instead of contending to light me up stairs, suffered me to wait for some minutes by the bar.

16. When I came to my company I found them unusually grave and formal, and one of them took a hint to turn the conversation upon the misconduct of young men, and enlarged upon the folly of frequenting the company of men of fortune, without being able to support the expence; an observation which the rest contributed either to enforce by repetition, or to illustrate by examples. Only one of them tried to divert the discourse, and endeavoured to direct my attention to remote questions, and common topics.

17. A man guilty of poverty easily believes himself suspected. I went, however, next morning to breakfast with him, who appeared ignorant of the drift of the conversation, and by a series of enquiries, drawing still nearer to the point, prevailed on him, not, perhaps, much against his will, to inform me, that Mr. _Dash_, whose father was a wealthy attorney near my native place, had the morning before received an account of my uncle's resentment, and communicated his intelligence with the utmost industry of groveling insolence.

18. It was no longer practicable to consort with my former friends, unless I would be content to be used as an inferior guest, who was to pay for his wine by mirth and flattery; a character which, if I could not escape it, I resolved to endure only among those who had never known me in the pride of plenty.

19. I changed my lodgings, and frequented the coffee houses in a different region of the town; where I was very quickly distinguished by several young gentlemen of high birth, and large estates, and began again to amuse my imagination with hopes of preferment, though not quite so confidently as when I had less experience.

20. The first great conquest which this new scene enabled me to gain over myself was, when I submitted to confess to a party, who invited me to an expensive diversion, that my revenues were not equal to such golden pleasures; they would not suffer me, however, to stay behind, and with great reluctance I yielded to be treated. I took that opportunity of recommending myself to some office or employment, which they unanimously promised to procure me by their joint interest.

21. I had now entered into a state of dependence, and had hopes, or fears, from almost every man I saw. If it be unhappy to have one patron, what is his misery who has so many? I was obliged to comply with a thousand caprices, to concur in a thousand follies, and to countenance a thousand errors. I endured innumerable mortifications, if not from cruelty, at least from negligence, which will creep in upon the kindest and most delicate minds, when they converse without the mutual awe of equal condition.

22. I found the spirit and vigour of liberty every moment sinking in me, and a servile fear of displeasing, stealing by degrees upon all my behaviour, till no word, or look, or action, was my own. As the solicitude to please increased, the power of pleasing grew less, and I was always clouded with diffidence where it was most my interest and wish to shine.

23. My patrons, considering me as belonging to the community, and, therefore, not the charge of any particular person, made no scruple of neglecting any opportunity of promoting me, which every one thought more properly the business of another. An account of my expectations and disappointments, and the succeeding vicissitudes of my life, I shall give you in my following letter, which will be, I hope, of use to shew how ill he forms his schemes, who expects happiness without freedom.

_I am, &c._

_The Misery of depending upon the Great._

RAMBLER, NO. 27.

1. As it is natural for every man to think himself of importance, your knowledge of the world will incline you to forgive me, if I imagine your curiosity so much excited by the former part of my narration, as to make you desire that I should proceed without any unnecessary arts of connection. I shall, therefore, not keep you longer in such suspence, as perhaps my performance may not compensate.

2. In the gay company with which I was now united, I found those allurements and delights, which the friendship of young men always affords; there was that openness which naturally produced confidence, and that ardour of profession which excited hope.

3. When our hearts were dilated with merriment, promises were poured out with unlimited profusion, and life and fortune were but a scanty sacrifice to friendship; but when the hour came, at which any effort was to be made, I had generally the vexation to find, that my interest weighed nothing against the slightest amusement, and that every petty avocation was found a sufficient plea for continuing me in uncertainty and want.

4. Their kindness was indeed sincere, when they promised they had no intention to deceive; but the same juvenile warmth which kindled their benevolence, gave force in the same proportion to every other passion, and I was forgotten as soon as any new pleasure seized on their attention.

5. _Vagrio_ told me one evening, that all my perplexities should soon be at an end, and desired me, from that instant, to throw upon him all care of my fortune, for a post of considerable value was that day become vacant, and he knew his interest sufficient to procure it in the morning. He desired me to call on him early, that he might be dressed soon enough to wait upon the minister before any other application should be made.

6. I came as he appointed, with all the flame of gratitude, and was told by his servant, that having found at his lodgings, when he came home, an acquaintance who was going to travel, he had been persuaded to accompany him to Dover, and that they had taken post-horses two hours before day.

7. I was once very near to preferment by the kindness of _Charinus_; who, at my request, went to beg a place, which he thought me likely to fill with great reputation, and in which I should have many opportunities of promoting his interest in return; and he pleased himself with imagining the mutual benefits that we should confer, and the advances that we should make by our united strength.

8. Away, therefore, he went, equally warm with friendship and ambition, and left me to prepare acknowledgements against his return. At length he came back, and told me that he had met in his way a party going to breakfast in the country, that the ladies importuned him too much to be refused, and that having passed the morning with them, he was come back to dress himself for a ball, to which he was invited for the evening.

9. I have suffered several disappointments from taylors and perriwig-makers, who, by neglecting to perform their work, withheld my patrons from court, and once failed of an establishment for life by the delay of a servant, sent to a neighbouring shop to replenish a snuff-box.

10. At last I thought my solicitude at an end, for an office fell into the gift of _Hippodamus_'s father, who being then in the country, could not very speedily fill it, and whose fondness would not have suffered him to refuse his son a less reasonable request. _Hippodamus_ therefore set forward with great expedition, and I expected every hour an account of his success.

11. A long time I waited without any intelligence, but at last received a letter from Newmarket, by which I was informed, that the races were begun, and I knew the vehemence of his passion too well to imagine that he could refuse himself his favourite amusement.

12. You will not wonder that I was at last weary of the patronage of young men, especially as I found them not generally to promise much greater fidelity as they advanced in life; for I observed that what they gained in steadiness, they lost in benevolence, and grew colder to my interest as they became more diligent to promote their own.

13. I was convinced that their liberality was only profuseness, that, as chance directed, they were equally generous to vice and virtue, that they were warm, but because they were thoughtless, and counted the support of a friend only amongst other gratifications of passion.

14. My resolution was now to ingratiate myself with men whose reputation was established, whose high stations enabled them to prefer me, and whose age exempted them from sudden changes of inclination; I was considered as a man of parts, and therefore easily found admission to the table of _Hilarius_, the celebrated orator, renowned equally for the extent of his knowledge, the elegance of his diction, and the acuteness of his wit.

15. _Hilarius_ received me with an appearance of great satisfaction, produced to me all his friends, and directed to me that part of his discourse in which he most endeavoured to display his imagination. I had now learned my own interest enough to supply him with opportunities for smart remarks and gay sallies, which I never failed to echo and applaud.

16. Thus I was gaining every hour on his affections, till, unfortunately, when the assembly was more splendid than usual, his desire of admiration prompted him to turn raillery upon me. I bore it for some time with great submission, and success encouraged him to redouble his attacks; at last my vanity prevailed over my prudence; I retorted his irony with such spirit, that _Hilarius_, unaccustomed to resistance, was disconcerted, and soon found means of convincing me, that his purpose was not to encourage a rival, but to foster a parasite.

17. I was then taken into the familiarity of _Argurio_, a nobleman eminent for judgment and criticism. He had contributed to my reputation, by the praises which he had often bestowed upon my writings, in which he owned that there were proofs of a genius that might rise high to degrees of excellence, when time, or information, had reduced its exuberance.

18. He therefore required me to consult him before the publication of any new performance, and commonly proposed innumerable alterations, without, sufficient attention to the general design, or regard to my form of style, and mode of imagination.

19. But these corrections he never failed to press as indispensably necessary, and thought the least delay of compliance an act of rebellion. The pride of an author made this treatment insufferable, and I thought any tyranny easier to be borne than that which took from me the use of my understanding.

20. My next patron was _Eutyches_ the statesman, who was wholly engaged in public affairs, and seemed to have no ambition but to be powerful and rich. I found his favour more permanent than that of the others, for there was a certain price at which it might be bought; he allowed nothing to humour or affection, but was always ready to pay liberally for the service he required.

21. His demands were, indeed, very often such as virtue could not easily consent to gratify; but virtue is not to be consulted when men are to raise their fortunes by favour of the great. His measures were censured; I wrote in his defence, and was recompensed with a place, of which the profits were never received by me without the pangs of remembering that they were the reward of wickedness; a reward which nothing but that necessity, which the consumption of my little estate in these wild pursuits had brought upon me, hindered me from throwing back in the face of my corruptor.

22. At this time my uncle died without a will, and I became heir to a small fortune. I had resolution to throw off the splendor which reproached me to myself, and retire to an humbler state, in which I am now endeavouring to recover the dignity of virtue, and hope to make some reparation for my crimes and follies, by informing others who may be led after the same pageants, that they are about to engage in a course of life, in which they are to purchase, by a thousand miseries, the privilege of repentance.

_I am_, &c.

EUBULUS.

_What it is to see the World; the Story of Melissa._

RAMBLER, No. 75.

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

2. I was born to a large fortune, and bred to the knowledge of those arts which are supposed to accomplish the mind, and adorn the person of a woman. To these attainments, which custom and education almost forced upon me, I added some voluntary acquisitions by the use of books and the conversation of that species of men whom the ladies generally mention with terror and aversion under the name of scholars, but whom I have found a harmless and inoffensive order of beings, not no much wiser than ourselves, but that they may receive as well as communicate knowledge, and more inclined to degrade their own character by cowardly submission, than to overbear or oppress us with their learning or their wit.

3. From these men, however, if they are by kind treatment encouraged to talk, something may be gained, which, embelished with elegancy, and softened by modesty, will always add dignity and value to female conversation; and from my acquaintance with the bookish part of the world, I derived many principles of judgment and maxims of prudence, by which I was enabled to draw upon myself the general regard in every place of concourse or pleasure.

4. My opinion was the great rule of approbation, my remarks were remembered by those who desired the second degree of fame, my mein was studied, my dress imitated, my letters were handed from one family to another, and read by those who copied them as sent to themselves; my visits were solicited as honours, and multitudes boasted of an intimacy with Melissa, who had only seen me by accident, whose familiarity had never proceeded beyond the exchange of a compliment, or return of a courtesy.

5. I shall make no scruple of confessing that I was pleased with this universal veneration, because I always considered it as paid to my intrinsic qualities and inseparable merit, and very easily persuaded myself, that fortune had no part in my superiority.

6. When I looked upon my glass, I saw youth and beauty, with health that might give me reason to hope their continuance: when I examined my mind, I found some strength of judgment and fertility of fancy, and was told that every action was grace, and that every accent was persuasion.