No More Learning

Yet as every step in the progression of existence changes our position
with respect to the things about us, so as to lay us open to new assaults
and particular dangers, and subjects us to inconveniences from which any
other situation is exempt; as a publick or a private life, youth and age,
wealth and poverty, have all some evil closely adherent, which cannot
wholly be escaped but by quitting the state to which it is annexed, and
submitting to the incumbrances of some other condition; so it cannot
be denied that every difference in the structure of the mind has its
advantages and its wants; and that failures and defects being inseparable
from humanity, however the powers of understanding be extended or
contracted, there will on one side or the other always be an avenue to
errour and miscarriage.

There seem to be some souls suited to great, and others to little
employments; some formed to soar aloft, and take in wide views, and
others to grovel on the ground, and confine their regard to a narrow
sphere. Of these the one is always in danger of becoming useless by a
daring negligence, the other by a scrupulous solicitude; the one collects
many ideas, but confused and indistinct; the other is busied in minute
accuracy, but without compass and without dignity.

The general errour of those who possess powerful and elevated
understandings, is, that they form schemes of too great extent, and
flatter themselves too hastily with success; they feel their own force
to be great, and by the complacency with which every man surveys himself,
imagine it still greater: they therefore look out for undertakings worthy
of their abilities, and engage in them with very little precaution, for
they imagine that without premeditated measures, they shall be able to
find expedients in all difficulties. They are naturally apt to consider
all prudential maxims as below their regard, to treat with contempt those
securities and resources which others know themselves obliged to provide,
and disdain to accomplish their purposes by established means, and common
gradations.

Precipitation thus incited by the pride of intellectual superiority,
is very fatal to great designs. The resolution of the combat is seldom
equal to the vehemence of the charge. He that meets with an opposition
which he did not expect, loses his courage. The violence of his first
onset is succeeded by a lasting and unconquerable languor; miscarriage
makes him fearful of giving way to new hopes; and the contemplation of an
attempt in which he has fallen below his own expectations is painful and
vexatious; he therefore naturally turns his attention to more pleasing
objects, and habituates his imagination to other entertainments, till, by
slow degrees, he quits his first pursuit, and suffers some other project
to take possession of his thoughts, in which the same ardour of mind
promises him again certain success, and which disappointments of the same
kind compel him to abandon.

Thus too much vigour in the beginning of an undertaking, often intercepts
and prevents the steadiness and perseverance always necessary in the
conduct of a complicated scheme, where many interests are to be connected,
many movements to be adjusted, and the joint effort of distinct and
independent powers to be directed to a single point. In all important
events which have been suddenly brought to pass, chance has been the
agent rather than reason; and, therefore, however those who seemed to
preside in the transaction, may have been celebrated by such as loved or
feared them, succeeding times have commonly considered them as fortunate
rather than prudent. Every design in which the connexion is regularly
traced from the first motion to the last, must be formed and executed by
calm intrepidity, and requires not only courage which danger cannot turn
aside, but constancy which fatigues cannot weary, and contrivance which
impediments cannot exhaust.

All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise or wonder,
are instances of the resistless force of perseverance: it is by this
that the quarry becomes a pyramid, and that distant countries are united
with canals. If a man was to compare the effect of a single stroke of the
pick-axe, or of one impression of the spade, with the general design and
last result, he would be overwhelmed by the sense of their disproportion;
yet those petty operations, incessantly continued, in time surmount the
greatest difficulties, and mountains are levelled, and oceans bounded, by
the slender force of human beings.

It is therefore of the utmost importance that those, who have any intention
of deviating from the beaten roads of life, and acquiring a reputation
superior to names hourly swept away by time among the refuse of fame,
should add to their reason, and their spirit, the power of persisting in
their purposes; acquire the art of sapping what they cannot batter, and
the habit of vanquishing obstinate resistance by obstinate attacks.

The student who would build his knowledge on solid foundations, and
proceed by just degrees to the pinnacles of truth, is directed by the
great philosopher of France to begin by doubting of his own existence.
In like manner, whoever would complete any arduous and intricate
enterprise, should, as soon as his imagination can cool after the first
blaze of hope, place before his own eyes every possible embarrassment
that may retard or defeat him. He should first question the probability
of success, and then endeavour to remove the objections that he has
raised. It is proper, says old Markham[43], to exercise your horse on the
more inconvenient side of the course, that if he should, in the race,
be forced upon it, he may not be discouraged; and Horace advises his
poetical friend to consider every day as the last which he shall enjoy,
because that will always give pleasure which we receive beyond our hopes.
If we alarm ourselves beforehand with more difficulties than we really
find, we shall be animated by unexpected facility with double spirit;
and if we find our cautions and fears justified by the consequence, there
will however happen nothing against which provision has not been made, no
sudden shock will be received, nor will the main scheme be disconcerted.

There is, indeed, some danger lest he that too scrupulously balances
probabilities, and too perspicaciously foresees obstacles, should
remain always in a state of inaction, without venturing upon attempts
on which he may perhaps spend his labour without advantage. But previous
despondence is not the fault of those for whom this essay is designed;
they who require to be warned against precipitation, will not suffer more
fear to intrude into their contemplations than is necessary to allay the
effervescence of an agitated fancy. As Des Cartes has kindly shewn how a
man may prove to himself his own existence, if once he can be prevailed
upon to question it, so the ardent and adventurous will not be long
without finding some plausible extenuation of the greatest difficulties.
Such, indeed, is the uncertainty of all human affairs, that security
and despair are equal follies; and as it is presumption and arrogance
to anticipate triumphs, it is weakness and cowardice to prognosticate
miscarriages. The numbers that have been stopped in their career of
happiness are sufficient to shew the uncertainty of human foresight; but
there are not wanting contrary instances of such success obtained against
all appearances, as may warrant the boldest flights of genius, if they
are supported by unshaken perseverance.

[Footnote 43: Gervase Markham, in his book entitled "Perfect Horsemanship,"
12mo. 1671. He was a dramatic poet, and a voluminous writer on various
subjects. ]




No. 44. SATURDAY, AUGUST 18, 1750.


Ὁναρ εκ Διος εστιν.
HOMER, Il. lib. i. 63.

----Dreams descend from Jove.
POPE.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

I had lately a very remarkable dream, which made so strong an impression
on me, that I remember it every word; and if you are not better employed,
you may read the relation of it as follows:

Methought I was in the midst of a very entertaining set of company,
and extremely delighted in attending to a lively conversation, when
on a sudden I perceived one of the most shocking figures imagination
can frame, advancing towards me. She was drest in black, her skin was
contracted into a thousand wrinkles, her eyes sunk deep in her head,
and her complexion pale and livid as the countenance of death. Her looks
were filled with terrour and unrelenting severity, and her hands armed
with whips and scorpions. As soon as she came near, with a horrid frown,
and a voice that chilled my very blood, she bid me follow her. I obeyed,
and she led me through rugged paths, beset with briars and thorns,
into a deep solitary valley. Wherever she passed, the fading verdure
withered beneath her steps; her pestilential breath infected the air with
malignant vapours, obscured the lustre of the sun, and involved the fair
face of Heaven in universal gloom. Dismal howlings resounded through the
forest, from every baleful tree the night raven uttered his dreadful note,
and the prospect was filled with desolation and horrour. In the midst of
this tremendous scene my execrable guide addressed me in the following
manner:

"Retire with me, O rash unthinking mortal, from the vain allurements of
a deceitful world, and learn that pleasure was not designed the portion
of human life. Man was born to mourn and to be wretched; this is the
condition of all below the stars, and whoever endeavours to oppose
it, acts in contradiction to the will of Heaven. Fly then from the
fatal enchantments of youth, and social delight, and here consecrate
the solitary hours to lamentation and woe. Misery is the duty of all
sublunary beings, and every enjoyment is an offence to the Deity, who is
to be worshipped only by the mortification of every sense of pleasure,
and the everlasting exercise of sighs and tears. "

This melancholy picture of life quite sunk my spirits, and seemed to
annihilate every principle of joy within me. I threw myself beneath a
blasted yew, where the winds blew cold and dismal round my head, and
dreadful apprehensions chilled my heart. Here I resolved to lie till
the hand of death, which I impatiently invoked, should put an end to
the miseries of a life so deplorably wretched. In this sad situation I
espied on one hand of me a deep muddy river, whose heavy waves rolled on
in slow sullen murmurs. Here I determined to plunge, and was just upon
the brink, when I found myself suddenly drawn back. I turned about, and
was surprised by the sight of the loveliest object I had ever beheld.
The most engaging charms of youth and beauty appeared in all her form;
effulgent glories sparkled in her eyes, and their awful splendours were
softened by the gentlest looks of compassion and peace. At her approach
the frightful spectre who had before tormented me, vanished away, and
with her all the horrours she had caused. The gloomy clouds brightened
into cheerful sunshine, the groves recovered their verdure, and the
whole region looked gay and blooming as the garden of Eden. I was quite
transported at this unexpected change, and reviving pleasure began to glad
my thoughts, when, with a look of inexpressible sweetness my beauteous
deliverer thus uttered her divine instructions:

"My name is Religion. I am the offspring of Truth and Love, and the parent
of Benevolence, Hope, and Joy. That monster from whose power I have
freed you is called Superstition; she is the child of Discontent, and her
followers are Fear and Sorrow. Thus different as we are, she has often
the insolence to assume my name and character, and seduces unhappy mortals
to think us the same, till she, at length, drives them to the borders of
Despair, that dreadful abyss into which you were just going to sink.

"Look round and survey the various beauties of the globe, which heaven has
destined for the seat of the human race, and consider whether a world
thus exquisitely framed could be meant for the abode of misery and pain.
For what end has the lavish hand of Providence diffused such innumerable
objects of delight, but that all might rejoice in the privilege of
existence, and be filled with gratitude to the beneficent author of it?
Thus to enjoy the blessings he has sent, is virtue and obedience; and to
reject them merely as means of pleasure, is pitiable ignorance or absurd
perverseness. Infinite goodness is the source of created existence;
the proper tendency of every rational being, from the highest order of
raptured seraphs, to the meanest rank of men, is to rise incessantly
from the lower degrees of happiness to higher. They have each faculties
assigned them for various orders of delights. "

"What," cried I, "is this the language of Religion? Does she lead her
votaries through flowery paths, and bid them pass an unlaborious life?
Where are the painful toils of virtue, the mortifications of penitents,
the self-denying exercises of saints and heroes? "

"The true enjoyments of a reasonable being," answered she mildly, "do not
consist in unbounded indulgence, or luxurious ease, in the tumult of
passions, the languor of indolence, or the flutter of light amusements.
Yielding to immoral pleasure corrupts the mind, living to animal and
trifling ones debases it; both in their degree disqualify it for its
genuine good, and consign it over to wretchedness. Whoever would be really
happy, must make the diligent and regular exercise of his superior powers
his chief attention, adoring the perfections of his Maker, expressing
good-will to his fellow-creatures, cultivating inward rectitude. To his
lower faculties he must allow such gratifications as will, by refreshing
him, invigorate his nobler pursuits. In the regions inhabited by angelic
natures, unmingled felicity for ever blooms, joy flows there with a
perpetual and abundant stream, nor needs there any mound to check its
course. Beings conscious of a frame of mind originally diseased, as
all the human race has cause to be, must use the regimen of a stricter
self-government. Whoever has been guilty of voluntary excesses must
patiently submit both to the painful workings of nature and needful
severities of medicine, in order to his cure. Still he is entitled to a
moderate share of whatever alleviating accommodations this fair mansion
of his merciful Parent affords, consistent with his recovery. And in
proportion as this recovery advances, the liveliest joy will spring
from his secret sense of an amended and improving heart. --So far from
the horrours of despair is the condition even of the guilty. --Shudder,
poor mortal, at the thought of the gulf into which thou wast but now
going to plunge.

"While the most faulty have every encouragement to amend, the more
innocent soul will be supported with still sweeter consolations under
all its experience of human infirmities; supported by the gladdening
assurances that every sincere endeavour to outgrow them shall be assisted,
accepted, and rewarded. To such a one the lowliest self-abasement is
but a deep-laid foundation for the most elevated hopes; since they who
faithfully examine and acknowledge what they are, shall be enabled under
my conduct to become what they desire. The christian and the hero are
inseparable; and to aspirings of unassuming trust, and filial confidence,
are set no bounds. To him who is animated with a view of obtaining
approbation from the Sovereign of the universe, no difficulty
is insurmountable. Secure in this pursuit of every needful aid, his
conflict with the severest pains and trials, is little more than the
vigorous exercises of a mind in health. His patient dependence on that
Providence which looks through all eternity, his silent resignation,
his ready accommodation of his thoughts and behaviour to its inscrutable
ways, is at once the most excellent sort of self-denial, and a source
of the most exalted transports. Society is the true sphere of human
virtue. In social, active life, difficulties will perpetually be met
with; restraints of many kinds will be necessary; and studying to behave
right in respect of these is a discipline of the human heart, useful to
others, and improving to itself. Suffering is no duty, but where it is
necessary to avoid guilt, or to do good; nor pleasure a crime, but where
it strengthens the influence of bad inclinations, or lessens the generous
activity of virtue. The happiness allotted to man in his present state,
is indeed faint and low, compared with his immortal prospects and noble
capacities; but yet whatever portion of it the distributing hand of
heaven offers to each individual, is a needful support and refreshment
for the present moment, so far as it may not hinder the attaining of
his final destination.

"Return then with me from continual misery to moderate enjoyment and
grateful alacrity. Return from the contracted views of solitude to the
proper duties of a relative and dependent being. Religion is not confined
to cells and closets, nor restrained to sullen retirement. These are
the gloomy doctrines of Superstition, by which she endeavours to break
those chains of benevolence and social affection, that link the welfare
of every particular with that of the whole. Remember that the greatest
honour you can pay to the Author of your being is by such a cheerful
behaviour, as discovers a mind satisfied with his dispensations. "

Here my preceptress paused, and I was going to express my acknowledgments
for her discourse, when a ring of bells from the neighbouring village,
and a new-risen sun darting his beams through my windows, awaked me[44].

I am, Yours, &c.

[Footnote 44: This paper, and No. 100, were written by the late Mrs.
Elizabeth Carter, of Deal in Kent, who died Feb. 19, 1806. ]




No. 45. TUESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1750.


Hηπερ μεγιστη γιγνεται σωτηρια,
Ὁταν γυνη πρως ανδρα μη διχοστατη.
Νυν δ' εχθρα παντα.
EURIP. Med. 14.

This is the chief felicity of life,
That concord smile on the connubial bed;
But now 'tis hatred all.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

Though, in the dissertations which you have given us on marriage, very
just cautions are laid down against the common causes of infelicity,
and the necessity of having, in that important choice, the first regard
to virtue, is carefully inculcated; yet I cannot think the subject so
much exhausted, but that a little reflection would present to the mind
many questions, in the discussion of which great numbers are interested,
and many precepts which deserve to be more particularly and forcibly
impressed.

You seem, like most of the writers that have gone before you, to have
allowed as an uncontested principle, that _marriage is generally unhappy_:
but I know not whether a man who professes to think for himself, and
concludes from his own observations, does not depart from his character
when he follows the crowd thus implicitly, and receives maxims without
recalling them to a new examination, especially when they comprise so
wide a circuit of life, and include such a variety of circumstances. As
I have an equal right with others to give my opinion of the objects about
me, and a better title to determine concerning that state which I have
tried, than many who talk of it without experience, I am unwilling to be
restrained by mere authority from advancing what, I believe, an accurate
view of the world will confirm, that marriage is not commonly unhappy,
otherwise than as life is unhappy; and that most of those who complain of
connubial miseries, have as much satisfaction as their nature would have
admitted, or their conduct procured, in any other condition.

It is, indeed, common to hear both sexes repine at their change, relate
the happiness of their earlier years, blame the folly and rashness
of their own choice, and warn those whom they see coming into the
world against the same precipitance and infatuation. But it is to be
remembered, that the days which they so much wish to call back, are
the days not only of celibacy but of youth, the days of novelty and
improvement, of ardour and of hope, of health and vigour of body, of
gaiety and lightness of heart. It is not easy to surround life with any
circumstances in which youth will not be delightful; and I am afraid that
whether married or unmarried, we shall find the vesture of terrestrial
existence more heavy and cumbrous, the longer it is worn.

That they censure themselves for the indiscretion of their choice, is
not a sufficient proof that they have chosen ill, since we see the same
discontent at every other part of life which we cannot change. Converse
with almost any man, grown old in a profession, and you will find him
regretting that he did not enter into some different course, to which
he too late finds his genius better adapted, or in which he discovers
that wealth and honour are more easily attained. "The merchant," says
Horace, "envies the soldier, and the soldier recounts the felicity of the
merchant; the lawyer, when his clients harass him, calls out for the quiet
of the countryman; and the countryman, when business calls him to town,
proclaims that there is no happiness but amidst opulence and crowds. "
Every man recounts the inconveniences of his own station, and thinks
those of any other less, because he has not felt them. Thus the married
praise the ease and freedom of a single state, and the single fly to
marriage from the weariness of solitude. From all our observations we
may collect with certainty, that misery is the lot of man, but cannot
discover in what particular condition it will find most alleviations;
or whether all external appendages are not, as we use them, the causes
either of good or ill.

Whoever feels great pain, naturally hopes for ease from change of posture;
he changes it, and finds himself equally tormented: and of the same
kind are the expedients by which we endeavour to obviate or elude those
uneasinesses, to which mortality will always be subject. It is not likely
that the married state is eminently miserable, since we see such numbers,
whom the death of their partners has set free from it, entering it again.

Wives and husbands are, indeed, incessantly complaining of each other; and
there would be reason for imagining that almost every house was infested
with perverseness or oppression beyond human sufferance, did we not know
upon how small occasions some minds bursts out, into lamentations and
reproaches, and how naturally every animal revenges his pain upon those
who happen to be near, without any nice examination of its cause. We are
always willing to fancy ourselves within a little of happiness, and when,
with repeated efforts, we cannot reach it, persuade ourselves that it
is intercepted by an ill-paired mate, since, if we could find any other
obstacle, it would be our own fault that it was not removed.

Anatomists have often remarked, that though our diseases are sufficiently
numerous and severe, yet when we inquire into the structure of the body,
the tenderness of some parts, the minuteness of others, and the immense
multiplicity of animal functions that must concur to the healthful and
vigorous exercise of all our powers, there appears reason to wonder rather
that we are preserved so long, than that we perish so soon, and that our
frame subsists for a single day, or hour, without disorder, rather than
that it should be broken or obstructed by violence of accidents, or length
of time.

The same reflection arises in my mind, upon observation of the manner in
which marriage is frequently contracted. When I see the avaricious and
crafty, taking companions to their tables and their beds without any
inquiry, but after farms and money; or the giddy and thoughtless uniting
themselves for life to those whom they have only seen by the light of
tapers at a ball; when parents make articles for their children, without
inquiring after their consent; when some marry for heirs to disappoint
their brothers, and others throw themselves into the arms of those whom
they do not love, because they have found themselves rejected where they
were most solicitous to please; when some marry because their servants
cheat them, some because they squander their own money, some because
their houses are pestered with company, some because they will live like
other people, and some only because they are sick in themselves, I am not
so much inclined to wonder that marriage is sometimes unhappy, as that
it appears so little loaded with calamity; and cannot but conclude that
society has something in itself eminently agreeable to human nature, when
I find its pleasures so great, that even the ill choice of a companion
can hardly overbalance them.

By the ancient customs of the Muscovites, the men and women never saw
each other till they were joined beyond the power of parting. It may be
suspected that by this method many unsuitable matches were produced, and
many tempers associated that were not qualified to give pleasure to each
other. Yet, perhaps, among a people so little delicate, where the paucity
of gratifications, and the uniformity of life, gave no opportunity for
imagination to interpose its objections, there was not much danger of
capricious dislike; and while they felt neither cold nor hunger they might
live quietly together, without any thought of the defects of one another.

Amongst us, whom knowledge has made nice and affluence wanton, there are,
indeed, more cautions requisite to secure tranquillity; and yet if we
observe the manner in which those converse, who have singled out each
other for marriage, we shall, perhaps, not think that the Russians
lost much by their restraint. For the whole endeavour of both parties,
during the time of courtship, is to hinder themselves from being known,
and to disguise their natural temper, and real desires, in hypocritical
imitation, studied compliance, and continual affectation. From the time
that their love is avowed, neither sees the other but in a mask, and the
cheat is managed often on both sides with so much art, and discovered
afterwards with so much abruptness, that each has reason to suspect
that some transformation has happened on the wedding night, and that,
by a strange imposture, one has been courted, and another married.

I desire you, therefore, Mr. Rambler, to question all who shall hereafter
come to you with matrimonial complaints, concerning their behaviour in
the time of courtship, and inform them that they are neither to wonder
nor repine, when a contract begun with fraud has ended in disappointment.

I am, &c.




No. 46. SATURDAY, AUGUST 25, 1750.


_----Genus, et proavos, et quæ non fecimus ipsi,_
_Via ea nostra voco. _
OVID, Metam. xiii. 140.

Nought from my birth or ancestors I claim;
All is my own, my honour and my shame.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

Since I find that you have paid so much regard to my complaints as to
publish them, I am inclined by vanity, or gratitude, to continue our
correspondence; and indeed, without either of these motives, am glad of an
opportunity to write, for I am not accustomed to keep in any thing that
swells my heart, and have here none with whom I can freely converse. While
I am thus employed, some tedious hours will slip away, and when I return
to watch the clock, I shall find that I have disburdened myself of part
of the day.

You perceive that I do not pretend to write with much consideration
of any thing but my own convenience; and, not to conceal from you my
real sentiments, the little time which I have spent, against my will,
in solitary meditation, has not much contributed to my veneration for
authors. I have now sufficient reason to suspect, that, with all your
splendid professions of wisdom, and seeming regard for truth, you have
very little sincerity; that you either write what you do not think, and
willingly impose upon mankind, or that you take no care to think right,
but while you set up yourselves as guides, mislead your followers by
credulity or negligence; that you produce to the publick whatever notions
you can speciously maintain, or elegantly express, without enquiring
whether they are just, and transcribe hereditary falsehoods from old
authors perhaps as ignorant and careless as yourselves.

You may perhaps wonder that I express myself with so much acrimony on a
question in which women are supposed to have very little interest; and
you are likely enough, for I have seen many instances of the sauciness
of scholars, to tell me, that I am more properly employed in playing with
my kittens, than in giving myself airs of criticism, and censuring the
learned. But you are mistaken, if you imagine that I am to be intimidated
by your contempt, or silenced by your reproofs. As I read, I have a
right to judge; as I am injured, I have a right to complain; and these
privileges, which I have purchased at so dear a rate, I shall not easily
be persuaded to resign.

To read has, indeed, never been my business, but as there are hours of
leisure in the most active life, I have passed the superfluities of
time, which the diversions of the town left upon my hands, in turning
over a large collection of tragedies and romances, where, amongst other
sentiments common to all authors of this class, I have found almost every
page filled with the charms and happiness of a country life; that life
to which every statesman in the highest elevation of his prosperity is
contriving to retire; that life to which every tragic heroine in some
scene or other wishes to have been born, and which is represented as a
certain refuge from folly, from anxiety, from passion, and from guilt.

It was impossible to read so many passionate exclamations, and soothing
descriptions, without feeling some desire to enjoy the state in which all
this felicity was to be enjoyed; and therefore I received with raptures
the invitation of my good aunt, and expected that by some unknown
influence I should find all hopes and fears, jealousies and competitions,
vanish from my heart upon my first arrival at the seats of innocence
and tranquillity; that I should sleep in halcyon bowers, and wander in
elysian gardens, where I should meet with nothing but the softness of
benevolence, the candour of simplicity, and the cheerfulness of content;
where I should see reason exerting her sovereignty over life, without any
interruption from envy, avarice, or ambition, and every day passing in
such a manner as the severest wisdom should approve.

This, Mr. Rambler, I tell you I expected, and this I had by an hundred
authors been taught to expect. By this expectation I was led hither, and
here I live in perpetual uneasiness, without any other comfort than that
of hoping to return to London.

Having, since I wrote my former letter, been driven by the mere necessity
of escaping from absolute inactivity, to make myself more acquainted
with the affairs and inhabitants of this place, I am now no longer an
absolute stranger to rural conversation and employments, but am far from
discovering in them more innocence or wisdom, than in the sentiments
or conduct of those with whom I have passed more cheerful and more
fashionable hours.

It is common to reproach the tea-table, and the park, with given
opportunities and encouragement to scandal. I cannot wholly clear them
from the charge; but must, however, observe in favour of the modish
prattlers, that if not by principle, we are at least by accident, less
guilty of defamation than the country ladies. For having greater numbers
to observe and censure, we are commonly content to charge them only with
their own faults or follies, and seldom give way to malevolence, but
such as arises from some injury or affront, real or imaginary, offered
to ourselves. But in these distant provinces, where the same families
inhabit the same houses from age to age, they transmit and recount the
faults of a whole succession. I have been informed how every estate
in the neighbourhood was originally got, and find, if I may credit the
accounts given me, that there is not a single acre in the hands of the
right owner. I have been told of intrigues between beaux and toasts
that have been now three centuries in their quiet graves, and am often
entertained with traditional scandal on persons of whose names there
would have been no remembrance, had they not committed somewhat that
might disgrace their descendants.

In one of my visits I happened to commend the air and dignity of a young
lady, who had just left the company; upon which two grave matrons looked
with great sliness at each other, and the elder asked me whether I had
ever seen the picture of Henry the eighth. You may imagine that I did
not immediately perceive the propriety of the question: but after having
waited awhile for information, I was told that the lady's grandmother
had a great-great-grandmother that was an attendant on Anna Bullen, and
supposed to have been too much a favourite of the king.

If once there happens a quarrel between the principal persons of two
families, the malignity is continued without end, and it is common for
old maids to fall out about some election, in which their grandfathers
were competitors; the heart-burnings of the civil war are not yet
extinguished; there are two families in the neighbourhood who have
destroyed each other's game from the time of Philip and Mary; and when
an account came of an inundation, which had injured the plantations of
a worthy gentleman, one of the hearers remarked, with exultation, that
he might now have some notion of the ravages committed by his ancestors
in their retreat from Bosworth.

Thus malice and hatred descend here with an inheritance, and it is
necessary to be well versed in history, that the various factions of
this county may be understood. You cannot expect to be on good terms with
families who are resolved to love nothing in common; and, in selecting
your intimates, you are perhaps to consider which party you most favour
in the barons' wars. I have often lost the good opinion of my aunt's
visitants by confounding the interests of York and Lancaster, and was
once censured for sitting silent when William Rufus was called a tyrant.
I have, however, now thrown aside all pretences to circumspection, for
I find it impossible in less than seven years to learn all the requisite
cautions. At London, if you know your company, and their parents,
you are safe; but you are here suspected of alluding to the slips of
great-grandmothers, and of reviving contests which were decided in armour
by the redoubted knights of ancient times. I hope, therefore, that you
will not condemn my impatience, if I am weary of attending where nothing
can be learned, and of quarrelling where there is nothing to contest, and
that you will contribute to divert me while I stay here by some facetious
performance.

I am, sir,

EUPHELIA.




No. 47. TUESDAY, AUGUST 28, 1750.


_Quamquam his solatiis acquiescam, debilitor et frangor eadem
illa humanitate quæ me, ut hoc ipsum permitterem, induxit. Non
ideo tamen velim durior fieri: nec ignoro alios hujusmodi casus
nihil amplius vocare quam damnum; eoque sibi magnos homines
et sapientes videri. Qui an magni sapientesque sint, nescio;
homines non sunt. Hominis est enim affici dolore, sentire:
resistere tamen, et solatia admittere. _
PLIN. Epist. viii. 16.

These proceedings have afforded me some comfort in my distress;
notwithstanding which, I am still dispirited and unhinged
by the same motives of humanity that induced me to grant such
indulgences. However, I by no means wish to become less susceptible
of tenderness. I know these kind of misfortunes would be estimated
by other persons only as common losses, and from such sensations
they would conceive themselves great and wise men. I shall not
determine either their greatness or their wisdom; but I am certain
they have no humanity. It is the part of a man to be affected with
grief; to feel sorrow, at the same time that he is to resist it,
and to admit of comfort.
Earl of ORRERY.


Of the passions with which the mind of man is agitated, it may be
observed, that they naturally hasten towards their own extinction, by
inciting and quickening the attainment of their objects. Thus fear urges
our flight, and desire animates our progress; and if there are some which
perhaps may be indulged till they outgrow the good appropriated to their
satisfaction, as it is frequently observed of avarice and ambition, yet
their immediate tendency is to some means of happiness really existing,
and generally within the prospect. The miser always imagines that
there is a certain sum that will fill his heart to the brim; and every
ambitious man, like king Pyrrhus, has an acquisition in his thoughts that
is to terminate his labours, after which he shall pass the rest of his
life in ease or gaiety, in repose or devotion.

Sorrow is perhaps the only affection of the breast that can be expected
from this general remark, and it therefore deserves the particular
attention of those who have assumed the arduous province of preserving
the balance of the mental constitution.
The other passions are diseases
indeed, but they necessarily direct us to their proper cure. A man at
once feels the pain and knows the medicine, to which he is carried with
greater haste as the evil which requires it is more excruciating,
and cures himself by unerring instinct, as the wounded stags of Crete
are related by Ælian to have recourse to vulnerary herbs. But for
sorrow there is no remedy provided by nature; it is often occasioned by
accidents irreparable, and dwells upon objects that have lost or changed
their existence; it required what it cannot hope, that the laws of the
universe should be repealed; that the dead should return, or the past
should be recalled.

Sorrow is not that regret for negligence or errour which may animate us to
future care or activity, or that repentance of crimes for which, however
irrevocable, our Creator has promised to accept it as an atonement; the
pain which arises from these causes has very salutary effects, and is
every hour extenuating itself by the reparation of those miscarriages
that produce it. Sorrow is properly that state of the mind in which our
desires are fixed upon the past, without looking forward to the future,
an incessant wish that something were otherwise than it has been, a
tormenting and harassing want of some enjoyment or possession which
we have lost, and which no endeavours can possibly regain. Into such
anguish many have sunk upon some sudden diminution of their fortune,
an unexpected blast of their reputation, or the loss of children or of
friends. They have suffered all sensibility of pleasure to be destroyed
by a single blow, have given up for ever the hopes of substituting any
other object in the room of that which they lament, resigned their lives
to gloom and despondency, and worn themselves out in unavailing misery.

Yet so much is this passion the natural consequence of tenderness and
endearment, that, however painful and however useless, it is justly
reproachful not to feel it on some occasions; and so widely and
constantly has it always prevailed, that the laws of some nations, and
the customs of others, have limited a time for the external appearances
of grief caused by the dissolution of close alliances, and the breach of
domestick union.

It seems determined by the general suffrage of mankind, that sorrow
is to a certain point laudable, as the offspring of love, or at least
pardonable, as the effect of weakness; but that it ought not to be
suffered to increase by indulgence, but must give way, after a stated
time, to social duties, and the common avocations of life. It is at
first unavoidable, and therefore must be allowed, whether with or without
our choice; it may afterwards be admitted as a decent and affectionate
testimony of kindness and esteem; something will be extorted by nature,
and something may be given to the world. But all beyond the bursts of
passion, or the forms of solemnity, is not only useless, but culpable;
for we have no right to sacrifice, to the vain longings of affection,
that time which Providence allows us for the task of our station.

Yet it too often happens that sorrow, thus lawfully entering, gains such
a firm possession of the mind, that it is not afterwards to be ejected;
the mournful ideas, first violently impressed and afterwards willingly
received, so much engross the attention, as to predominate in every
thought, to darken gaiety, and perplex ratiocination. An habitual sadness
seizes upon the soul, and the faculties are chained to a single object,
which can never be contemplated but with hopeless uneasiness.

From this state of dejection it is very difficult to rise to cheerfulness
and alacrity; and therefore many who have laid down rules of intellectual
health, think preservatives easier than remedies, and teach us not to
trust ourselves with favourite enjoyments, not to indulge the luxury of
fondness, but to keep our minds always suspended in such indifference,
that we may change the objects about us without emotion.

An exact compliance with this rule might, perhaps, contribute to
tranquillity, but surely it would never produce happiness. He that
regards none so much as to be afraid of losing them, must live for ever
without the gentle pleasures of sympathy and confidence; he must feel no
melting fondness, no warmth of benevolence, nor any of those honest joys
which nature annexes to the power of pleasing. And as no man can justly
claim more tenderness than he pays, he must forfeit his share in that
officious and watchful kindness which love only can dictate, and those
lenient endearments by which love only can soften life. He may justly
be overlooked and neglected by such as have more warmth in their heart;
for who would be the friend of him, whom, with whatever assiduity he may
be courted, and with whatever services obliged, his principles will not
suffer to make equal returns, and who, when you have exhausted all the
instances of good-will, can only be prevailed on not to be an enemy?

An attempt to preserve life in a state of neutrality and indifference, is
unreasonable and vain. If by excluding joy we could shut out grief, the
scheme would deserve very serious attention; but since, however we may
debar ourselves from happiness, misery will find its way at many inlets,
and the assaults of pain will force our regard, though we may withhold it
from the invitations of pleasure, we may surely endeavour to raise life
above the middle point of apathy at one time, since it will necessarily
sink below it at another.

But though it cannot be reasonable not to gain happiness for fear of
losing it, yet it must be confessed, that in proportion to the pleasure
of possession, will be for some time our sorrow for the loss; it is
therefore the province of the moralist to enquire whether such pains
may not quickly give way to mitigation. Some have thought that the most
certain way to clear the heart from its embarrassment is to drag it by
force into scenes of merriment. Others imagine, that such a transition
is too violent, and recommend rather to sooth it into tranquillity, by
making it acquainted with miseries more dreadful and afflictive, and
diverting to the calamities of others the regards which we are inclined
to fix too closely upon our own misfortunes.

It may be doubted whether either of those remedies will be sufficiently
powerful. The efficacy of mirth it is not always easy to try, and the
indulgence of melancholy may be suspected to be one of those medicines,
which will destroy, if it happens not to cure.

The safe and general antidote against sorrow is employment. It is commonly
observed, that among soldiers and seamen, though there is much kindness,
there is little grief; they see their friend fall without any of that
lamentation which is indulged in security and idleness, because they
have no leisure to spare from the care of themselves; and whoever shall
keep his thoughts equally busy, will find himself equally unaffected with
irretrievable losses.

Time is observed generally to wear out sorrow, and its effects might
doubtless be accelerated by quickening the succession, and enlarging the
variety of objects.

_----Si tempore reddi_
_Pax animo tranquilla potest, tu sperne morari:_
_Qui sapiet, sibi tempus erit. ----_
GROTIUS, Consol. ad Patrem.

'Tis long ere time can mitigate your grief;
To wisdom fly, she quickly brings relief.
F. LEWIS.

Sorrow is a kind of rust of the soul, which every new idea contributes in
its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life, and
is remedied by exercise and motion.




No. 48. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1750.


_Non est vivere, sed valere, vita. _
MART. Lib. vi. Ep, 70. 15.

For life is not to live, but to be well.
ELPHINSTON.


Among the innumerable follies, by which we lay up in our youth repentance
and remorse for the succeeding part of our lives, there is scarce any
against which warnings are of less efficacy, than the neglect of health.
When the springs of motion are yet elastick, when the heart bounds with
vigour, and the eye sparkles with spirit, it is with difficulty that we
are taught to conceive the imbecility that every hour is bringing upon
us, or to imagine that the nerves which are now braced with so much
strength, and the limbs which play with so much activity, will lose all
their power under the gripe of time, relax with numbness, and totter with
debility.

To the arguments which have been used against complaints under the
miseries of life, the philosophers have, I think, forgot to add the
incredulity of those to whom we recount our sufferings. But if the
purpose of lamentation be to excite pity, it is surely superfluous for
age and weakness to tell their plaintive stories; for pity pre-supposes
sympathy, and a little attention will shew them, that those who do not
feel pain, seldom think that it is felt; and a short recollection will
inform almost every man, that he is only repaid the insult which he has
given, since he may remember how often he has mocked infirmity, laughed
at its cautions, and censured its impatience.

The valetudinarian race have made the care of health ridiculous by
suffering it to prevail over all other considerations, as the miser has
brought frugality into contempt, by permitting the love of money not to
share, but to engross his mind: they both err alike, by confounding the
means with the end; they grasp at health only to be well, as at money
only to be rich; and forget that every terrestrial advantage is chiefly
valuable, as it furnishes abilities for the exercise of virtue.

Health is indeed so necessary to all the duties, as well as pleasures of
life, that the crime of squandering it is equal to the folly; and he that
for a short gratification brings weakness and diseases upon himself, and
for the pleasure of a very few years passed in the tumults of diversion,
and clamours of merriment, condemns the maturer and more experienced
part of his life to the chamber and the couch, may be justly reproached,
not only as a spendthrift of his own happiness, but as a robber of the
publick; as a wretch that has voluntarily disqualified himself for the
business of his station, and refused that part which Providence assigns
him in the general task of human nature.

There are perhaps very few conditions more to be pitied than that of an
active and elevated mind, labouring under the weight of a distempered
body. The time of such a man is always spent in forming schemes, which
a change of wind hinders him from executing, his powers fume away in
projects and in hope, and the day of action never arrives. He lies down
delighted with the thoughts of to-morrow, pleases his ambition with
the fame he shall acquire, or his benevolence with the good he shall
confer. But in the night the skies are overcast, the temper of the air
is changed, he wakes in langour, impatience, and distraction, and has
no longer any wish but for ease, nor any attention but to misery. It
may be said that disease generally begins that equality which death
completes; the distinctions which set one man so much above another are
very little perceived in the gloom of a sick chamber, where it will be
vain to expect entertainment from the gay, or instruction from the wise;
where all human glory is obliterated, the wit is clouded, the reasoner
perplexed, and the hero subdued; where the highest and brightest of
mortal beings finds nothing left him but the consciousness of innocence.

There is among the fragments of the Greek poets a short Hymn to Health,
in which her power of exalting the happiness of life, of heightening the
gifts of fortune, and adding enjoyment to possession, is inculcated with
so much force and beauty, that no one, who has ever languished under the
discomforts and infirmities of a lingering disease, can read it without
feeling the images dance in his heart, and adding from his own experience
new vigour to the wish, and from his own imagination new colours to
the picture. The particular occasion of this little composition is not
known, but it is probable that the author had been sick, and in the first
raptures of returning vigour addressed Health in the following manner:

Ὑγιεια πρεσβιστα Μακαρων,
Μετα σου ναιοιμι
Το λειπομενον βιοτας·
Συ δε μοι προφρων συνοικος ειης.
Ει γαρ τις η πλουτου χαρις η τεκεων,
Τας ευδαιμονος τ' ανθρωποις
Βασιληιδος αρχας, η ποθων,
Ους κρυφιοις Αφροδιτης αρκυσιν θηρευομεν,
Η ει τις αλλα θεοθεν ανθρωποις τερψις,
Η πονων αμπνοα πεφανται·
Μετα σειο, μακαιρα, Ὑγιεια,
Τεθηλε παντα, και λαμπει χαριτων εαρ·
Σεθεν δε χωρις, ουδεις ευδαιμων πελει.


Health, most venerable of the powers of heaven! with thee may
the remaining part of my life be passed, nor do thou refuse to
bless me with thy residence. For whatever there is of beauty or
of pleasure in wealth, in descendants, or in sovereign command,
the highest summit of human enjoyment, or in those objects of
desire which we endeavour to chase into the toils of love; whatever
delight, or whatever solace is granted by the celestials, to
soften our fatigues, in thy presence, thou parent of happiness,
all those joys spread out and flourish; in thy presence blooms
the spring of pleasure, and without thee no man is happy.

Such is the power of health, that without its co-operation every other
comfort is torpid and lifeless as the powers of vegetation without
the sun. And yet this bliss is commonly thrown away in thoughtless
negligence, or in foolish experiments on our own strength; we let it
perish without remembering its value, or waste it to show how much we
have to spare; it is sometimes given up to the management of levity and
chance, and sometimes sold for the applause of jollity and debauchery.

Health is equally neglected, and with equal impropriety, by the votaries
of business and the followers of pleasure. Some men ruin the fabrick
of their bodies by incessant revels, and others by intemperate studies;
some batter it by excess, and others sap it by inactivity. To the noisy
route of bacchanalian rioters, it will be to little purpose that advice
is offered, though it requires no great abilities to prove, that he loses
pleasure who loses health; their clamours are too loud for the whispers
of caution, and they run the course of life with too much precipitance
to stop at the call of wisdom. Nor perhaps will they that are busied in
adding thousands to thousands, pay much regard to him that shall direct
them to hasten more slowly to their wishes. Yet since lovers of money are
generally cool, deliberate, and thoughtful, they might surely consider,
that the greater good ought not to be sacrificed to the less. Health is
certainly more valuable than money, because it is by health that money
is procured; but thousands and millions are of small avail to alleviate
the protracted tortures of the gout, to repair the broken organs of sense,
or resuscitate the powers of digestion. Poverty is, indeed, an evil from
which we naturally fly; but let us not run from one enemy to another,
nor take shelter in the arms of sickness.

_----Projecere animam! quàm vellent æthere in alto_
_Nunc et pauperiem, et duros tolerare labores! _

For healthful indigence in vain they pray,
In quest of wealth who throw their lives away.

Those who lose their health in an irregular and impetuous pursuit of
literary accomplishments are yet less to be excused; for they ought to
know that the body is not forced beyond its strength, but with the loss
of more vigour than is proportionate to the effect produced. Whoever
takes up life beforehand, by depriving himself of rest and refreshment,
must not only pay back the hours, but pay them back with usury: and
for the gain of a few months but half enjoyed, must give up years to
the listlessness of languor, and the implacability of pain. They whose
endeavour is mental excellence, will learn, perhaps too late, how much it
is endangered by diseases of the body, and find that knowledge may easily
be lost in the starts of melancholy, the flights of impatience, and the
peevishness of decrepitude.




No. 49. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 1750.


_Non omnis moriar; multaque pars mei_
_Vitabit Libitinam, usque ego posterâ_
_Crescum lande recens. _
HOR. Lib. iii. Ode xxx. 6.

Whole Horace shall not die; his songs shall save
The greatest portion from the greedy grave
CREECH.


The first motives of human actions are those appetites which Providence
has given to man in common with the rest of the inhabitants of the earth.
Immediately after our birth, thirst and hunger incline us to the breast,
which we draw by instinct, like other young creatures, and when we are
satisfied, we express our uneasiness by importunate and incessant cries,
till we have obtained a place or posture proper for repose.

The next call that rouses us from a state of inactivity, is that of our
passions; we quickly begin to be sensible of hope and fear, love and
hatred, desire and aversion; these arising from the power of comparison
and reflection, extend their range wider, as our reason strengthens, and
our knowledge enlarges. At first we have no thought of pain, but when
we actually feel it; we afterwards begin to fear it, yet not before it
approaches us very nearly; but by degrees we discover it at a greater
distance, and find it lurking in remote consequences. Our terrour in
time improves into caution, and we learn to look round with vigilance
and solicitude, to stop all the avenues at which misery can enter, and
to perform or endure many things in themselves toilsome and unpleasing,
because we know by reason, or by experience, that our labour will be
overbalanced by the reward, that it will either procure some positive
good, or avert some evil greater than itself.

But as the soul advances to a fuller exercise of its powers, the animal
appetites, and the passions immediately arising from them, are not
sufficient to find it employment; the wants of nature are soon supplied,
the fear of their return is easily precluded, and something more is
necessary to relieve the long intervals of inactivity, and to give
those faculties, which cannot lie wholly quiescent, some particular
direction. For this reason, new desires and artificial passions are by
degrees produced; and, from having wishes only in consequence of our
wants, we begin to feel wants in consequence of our wishes; we persuade
ourselves to set a value upon things which are of no use, but because
we have agreed to value them; things which can neither satisfy hunger,
nor mitigate pain, nor secure us from any real calamity, and which,
therefore, we find of no esteem among those nations whose artless and
barbarous manners keep them always anxious for the necessaries of life.

This is the original of avarice, vanity, ambition, and generally of all
those desires which arise from the comparison of our condition with that
of others. He that thinks himself poor because his neighbour is richer;
he that, like Cæsar, would rather be the first man of a village, than
the second in the capital of the world, has apparently kindled in himself
desires which he never received from nature, and acts upon principles
established only by the authority of custom.

Of these adscititious passions, some, as avarice and envy, are universally
condemned; some, as friendship and curiosity, generally praised; but
there are others about which the suffrages of the wise are divided, and
of which it is doubted, whether they tend most to promote the happiness,
or increase the miseries of mankind.

Of this ambiguous and disputable kind is the love of fame, a desire of
filling the minds of others with admiration, and of being celebrated by
generations to come with praises which we shall not hear. This ardour
has been considered by some as nothing better than splendid madness,
as a flame kindled by pride, and fanned by folly; for what, say they,
can be more remote from wisdom, than to direct all our actions by the
hope of that which is not to exist till we ourselves are in the grave?
To pant after that which can never be possessed, and of which the value
thus wildly put upon it, arises from this particular condition, that,
during life, it is not to be obtained? To gain the favour, and hear the
applauses of our contemporaries, is indeed equally desirable with any
other prerogative of superiority, because fame may be of use to smooth
the paths of life, to terrify opposition, and fortify tranquillity; but
to what end shall we be the darlings of mankind, when we can no longer
receive any benefits from their favour? It is more reasonable to wish
for reputation, while it may yet be enjoyed, as Anacreon calls upon his
companions to give him for present use the wine and garlands which they
purpose to bestow upon his tomb.

The advocates for the love of fame allege in its vindication, that it
is a passion natural and universal; a flame lighted by Heaven, and
always burning with greatest vigour in the most enlarged and elevated
minds. That the desire of being praised by posterity implies a resolution
to deserve their praises, and that the folly charged upon it, is only a
noble and disinterested generosity, which is not felt, and therefore not
understood, by those who have been always accustomed to refer every thing
to themselves, and whose selfishness has contracted their understandings.
That the soul of man, formed for eternal life, naturally springs forward
beyond the limits of corporeal existence, and rejoices to consider
herself as co-operating with future ages, and as co-extended with endless
duration. That the reproach urged with so much petulance, the reproach
of labouring for what cannot be enjoyed, is founded on an opinion which
may with great probability be doubted; for since we suppose the powers
of the soul to be enlarged by its separation, why should we conclude that
its knowledge of sublunary transactions is contracted or extinguished?

Upon an attentive and impartial review of the argument, it will appear that
the love of fame is to be regulated rather than extinguished: and that
men should be taught not to be wholly careless about their memory, but to
endeavour that they may be remembered chiefly for their virtues, since no
other reputation will be able to transmit any pleasure beyond the grave.

It is evident that fame, considered merely as the immortality of a name,
is not less likely to be the reward of bad actions than of good; he
therefore has no certain principle for the regulation of his conduct,
whose single aim is not to be forgotten. And history will inform us,
that this blind and undistinguishing appetite of renown has always
been uncertain in its effects, and directed by accident or opportunity,
indifferently to the benefit or devastation of the world. When
Themistocles complained that the trophies of Miltiades hindered him from
sleep, he was animated by them to perform the same services in the same
cause. But Cæsar, when he wept at the sight of Alexander's picture, having
no honest opportunities of action, let his ambition break out to the
ruin of his country.

If, therefore, the love of fame is so far indulged by the mind as to
become independent and predominant, it is dangerous and irregular; but
it may be usefully employed as an inferior and secondary motive, and will
serve sometimes to revive our activity, when we begin to languish and
lose sight of that more certain, more valuable, and more durable reward,
which ought always to be our first hope and our last. But it must be
strongly impressed upon our minds that virtue is not to be pursued as
one of the means to fame, but fame to be accepted as the only recompence
which mortals can bestow on virtue; to be accepted with complacence, but
not sought with eagerness. Simply to be remembered is no advantage; it
is a privilege which satire as well as penegyrick can confer, and is not
more enjoyed by Titus or Constantine, than by Timocreon of Rhodes, of
whom we only know from his epitaph, _that he had eaten many a meal, drunk
many a flaggon, and uttered many a reproach_.

Πολλα φαγων, και πολλα πιων, και πολλα κακ' ειπων
Ανθρωπους, κειμαι Τιμοκρεων Ρὁδιος.

The true satisfaction which is to be drawn from the consciousness that we
shall share the attention of future times, must arise from the hope, that
with our name, our virtues will be propagated; and that those whom we
cannot benefit in our lives, may receive instruction from our examples,
and incitement from our renown.




No. 50. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1750.


_Credebant hoc grande nefas, et morte piandum,_
_Si juvenis vetulo non assurrexerat, atque_
_Barbato cuicunque puer, licet ipse videret_
_Plura domi fraga, et majores glandis acervos. _
JUV. Sat. xiii. 54.

And had not men the hoary head rever'd,
And boys paid rev'rence when a man appear'd,
Both must have died, though richer skins they wore,
And saw more heaps of acorns in their store
CREECH.


I have always thought it the business of those who turn their speculations
upon the living world, to commend the virtues, as well as to expose the
faults of their contemporaries, and to confute a false as well as to
support a just accusation; not only because it is peculiarly the business
of a monitor to keep his own reputation untainted, lest those who can
once charge him with partiality, should indulge themselves afterwards
in disbelieving him at pleasure; but because he may find real crimes
sufficient to give full employment to caution or repentance, without
distracting the mind by needless scruples and vain solicitudes.

There are certain fixed and stated reproaches that one part of mankind
has in all ages thrown upon another, which are regularly transmitted
through continued successions, and which he that has once suffered them
is certain to use with the same undistinguishing vehemence, when he has
changed his station, and gained the prescriptive right of inflicting on
others what he had formerly endured himself.

To these hereditary imputations, of which no man sees the justice, till it
becomes his interest to see it, very little regard is to be shewn; since
it does not appear that they are produced by ratiocination or inquiry, but
received implicitly, or caught by a kind of instantaneous contagion, and
supported rather by willingness to credit, than ability to prove, them.

It has been always the practice of those who are desirous to believe
themselves made venerable by length of time, to censure the new comers
into life, for want of respect to grey hairs and sage experience, for
heady confidence in their own understandings, for hasty conclusions
upon partial views, for disregard of counsels, which their fathers and
grandsires are ready to afford them, and a rebellious impatience of that
subordination to which youth is condemned by nature, as necessary to
its security from evils into which it would be otherwise precipitated,
by the rashness of passion, and the blindness of ignorance.

Every old man complains of the growing depravity of the world, of the
petulance and insolence of the rising generation. He recounts the
decency and regularity of former times, and celebrates the discipline and
sobriety of the age in which his youth was passed; a happy age, which is
now no more to be expected, since confusion has broken in upon the world,
and thrown down all the boundaries of civility and reverence.

It is not sufficiently considered how much he assumes who dares to claim
the privilege of complaining; for as every man has, in his own opinion,
a full share of the miseries of life, he is inclined to consider all
clamorous uneasiness, as a proof of impatience rather than of affliction,
and to ask, what merit has this man to show, by which he has acquired a
right to repine at the distributions of nature? Or, why does he imagine
that exemptions should be granted him from the general condition of man?
We find ourselves excited rather to captiousness than pity, and instead
of being in haste to soothe his complaints by sympathy and tenderness,
we enquire, whether the pain be proportionate to the lamentation; and
whether, supposing the affliction real, it is not the effect of vice and
folly, rather than calamity.

The querulousness and indignation which is observed so often to disfigure
the last scene of life, naturally leads us to enquiries like these. For
surely it will be thought at the first view of things, that if age be
thus contemned and ridiculed, insulted and neglected, the crime must
at least be equal on either part. They who have had opportunities of
establishing their authority over minds ductile and unresisting, they
who have been the protectors of helplessness, and the instructors of
ignorance, and who yet retain in their own hands the power of wealth,
and the dignity of command, must defeat their influence by their own
misconduct, and make use of all these advantages with very little skill,
if they cannot secure to themselves an appearance of respect, and ward
off open mockery, and declared contempt.

The general story of mankind will evince, that lawful and settled
authority is very seldom resisted when it is well employed. Gross
corruption, or evident imbecility, is necessary to the suppression
of that reverence with which the majority of mankind look upon their
governors, and on those whom they see surrounded by splendour, and
fortified by power. For though men are drawn by their passions into
forgetfulness of invisible rewards and punishments, yet they are easily
kept obedient to those who have temporal dominion in their hands, till
their veneration is dissipated by such wickedness and folly as can
neither be defended nor concealed.

It may, therefore, very reasonably be suspected that the old draw upon
themselves the greatest part of those insults which they so much lament,
and that age is rarely despised but when it is contemptible. If men
imagine that excess of debauchery can be made reverend by time, that
knowledge is the consequence of long life, however idly or thoughtlessly
employed, that priority of birth will supply the want of steadiness or
honesty, can it raise much wonder that their hopes are disappointed, and
that they see their posterity rather willing to trust their own eyes in
their progress into life, than enlist themselves under guides who have
lost their way?

There are, indeed, many truths which time necessarily and certainly
teaches, and which might, by those who have learned them from experience,
be communicated to their successors at a cheaper rate: but dictates,
though liberally enough bestowed, are generally without effect, the
teacher gains few proselytes by instruction which his own behaviour
contradicts; and young men miss the benefit of counsel, because they are
not very ready to believe that those who fell below them in practice, can
much excel them in theory. Thus the progress of knowledge is retarded,
the world is kept long in the same state, and every new race is to
gain the prudence of their predecessors by committing and redressing
the same miscarriages.

To secure to the old that influence which they are willing to claim, and
which might so much contribute to the improvement of the arts of life,
it is absolutely necessary that they give themselves up to the duties
of declining years; and contentedly resign to youth its levity, its
pleasures, its frolicks, and its fopperies. It is a hopeless endeavour
to unite the contrarieties of spring and winter; it is unjust to claim
the privileges of age, and retain the playthings of childhood. The young
always form magnificent ideas of the wisdom and gravity of men, whom they
consider as placed at a distance from them in the ranks of existence, and
naturally look on those whom they find trifling with long beards, with
contempt and indignation, like that which women feel at the effeminacy
of men. If dotards will contend with boys in those performances in
which boys must always excel them; if they will dress crippled limbs
in embroidery, endeavour at gaiety with faultering voices, and darken
assemblies of pleasure with the ghastliness of disease, they may well
expect those who find their diversions obstructed will hoot them away;
and that if they descend to competition with youth, they must bear the
insolence of successful rivals.

_Lusisti satis, edisti satis atque bibisti:_
_Tempus abire tibi est. _

You've had your share of mirth, of meat and drink;
'Tis time to quit the scene--'tis time to think.
ELPHINSTON.

Another vice of age, by which the rising generation may be alienated
from it, is severity and censoriousness, that gives no allowance to
the failings of early life, that expects artfulness from childhood, and
constancy from youth, that is peremptory in every command, and inexorable
to every failure. There are many who live merely to hinder happiness, and
whose descendants can only tell of long life, that it produces suspicion,
malignity, peevishness, and persecution: and yet even these tyrants can
talk of the ingratitude of the age, curse their heirs for impatience,
and wonder that young men cannot take pleasure in their father's company.

He that would pass the latter part of life with honour and decency, must,
when he is young, consider that he shall one day be old; and remember,
when he is old, that he has once been young. In youth, he must lay up
knowledge for his support, when his powers of acting shall forsake him;
and in age forbear to animadvert with rigour on faults which experience
only can correct.




No. 51. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1750.


_----Stultus labor est ineptiarum. _
MART. Lib. ii. Ep. lxxxvi. 10.

How foolish is the toil of trifling cares!
ELPHINSTON.


TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

As you have allowed a place in your paper to Euphelia's letters from
the country, and appear to think no form of human life unworthy of
your attention, I have resolved, after many struggles with idleness and
diffidence, to give you some account of my entertainment in this sober
season of universal retreat, and to describe to you the employments of
those who look with contempt on the pleasures and diversions of polite
life, and employ all their powers of censure and invective upon the
uselessness, vanity, and folly, of dress, visits, and conversation.

When a tiresome and vexatious journey of four days had brought me to the
house, where invitation, regularly sent for seven years together, had at
last induced me to pass the summer, I was surprised, after the civilities
of my first reception, to find, instead of the leisure and tranquillity,
which a rural life always promises, and, if well conducted, might always
afford, a confused wildness of care, and a tumultuous hurry of diligence,
by which every face was clouded, and every motion agitated. The old lady,
who was my father's relation, was, indeed, very full of the happiness
which she received from my visit, and, according to the forms of obsolete
breeding, insisted that I should recompense the long delay of my company
with a promise not to leave her till winter. But, amidst all her kindness
and caresses, she very frequently turned her head aside, and whispered,
with anxious earnestness, some order to her daughters, which never failed
to send them out with unpolite precipitation. Sometimes her impatience
would not suffer her to stay behind; she begged my pardon, she must
leave me for a moment; she went, and returned and sat down again, but
was again disturbed by some new care, dismissed her daughters with the
same trepidation, and followed them with the same countenance of business
and solicitude.

However I was alarmed at this show of eagerness and disturbance, and
however my curiosity was excited by such busy preparations as naturally
promised some great event, I was yet too much a stranger to gratify myself
with enquiries; but finding none of the family in mourning, I pleased
myself with imagining that I should rather see a wedding than a funeral.

At last we sat down to supper, when I was informed that one of the young
ladies, after whom I thought myself obliged to enquire, was under a
necessity of attending some affair that could not be neglected. Soon
afterward my relation began to talk of the regularity of her family, and
the inconvenience of London hours; and at last let me know that they had
purposed that night to go to bed sooner than was usual, because they were
to rise early in the morning to make cheesecakes. This hint sent me to my
chamber, to which I was accompanied by all the ladies, who begged me to
excuse some large sieves of leaves and flowers that covered two-thirds
of the floor, for they intended to distil them when they were dry,
and they had no other room that so conveniently received the rising sun.

The scent of the plants hindered me from rest, and therefore I rose early
in the morning with a resolution to explore my new habitation. I stole
unperceived by my busy cousins into the garden, where I found nothing
either more great or elegant, than in the same number of acres cultivated
for the market. Of the gardener I soon learned that his lady was the
greatest manager in that part of the country, and that I was come hither
at the time in which I might learn to make more pickles and conserves,
than could be seen at any house a hundred miles round.

It was not long before her ladyship gave me sufficient opportunities
of knowing her character, for she was too much pleased with her own
accomplishments to conceal them, and took occasion, from some sweetmeats
which she set next day upon the table, to discourse for two long
hours upon robs and jellies; laid down the best methods of conserving,
reserving, and preserving all sorts of fruit; told us with great contempt
of the London lady in the neighbourhood, by whom these terms were very
often confounded; and hinted how much she should be ashamed to set before
company, at her own house, sweetmeats of so dark a colour as she had
often seen at mistress Sprightly's.

It is, indeed, the great business of her life, to watch the skillet on
the fire, to see it simmer with the due degree of heat, and to snatch
it off at the moment of projection; and the employments to which she has
bred her daughters, are to turn rose-leaves in the shade, to pick out the
seeds of currants with a quill, to gather fruit without brusing it, and
to extract bean-flower water for the skin. Such are the tasks with which
every day, since I came hither, has begun and ended, to which the early
hours of life are sacrificed, and in which that time is passing away
which never shall return.

But to reason or expostulate are hopeless attempts. The lady has settled
her opinions, and maintains the dignity of her own performances with all
the firmness of stupidity accustomed to be flattered. Her daughters,
having never seen any house but their own, believe their mother's
excellence on her own word. Her husband is a mere sportsman, who is
pleased to see his table well furnished, and thinks the day sufficiently
successful, in which he brings home a leash of hares to be potted by
his wife.

After a few days I pretended to want books, but my lady soon told me that
none of her books would suit my taste; for her part she never loved to
see young women give their minds to such follies, by which they would
only learn to use hard words; she bred up her daughters to understand
a house, and whoever should marry them, if they knew any thing of good
cookery, would never repent it.

There are, however, some things in the culinary sciences too sublime for
youthful intellects, mysteries into which they must not be initiated
till the years of serious maturity, and which are referred to the day of
marriage, as the supreme qualification for connubial life. She makes an
orange pudding, which is the envy of all the neighbourhood, and which she
has hitherto found means of mixing and baking with such secrecy, that the
ingredient to which it owes its flavour has never been discovered. She,
indeed, conducts this great affair with all the caution that human policy
can suggest. It is never known before-hand when this pudding will be
produced; she takes the ingredient privately into her own closet, employs
her maids and daughters in different parts of the house, orders the oven
to be heated for a pie, and places the pudding in it with her own hands,
the mouth of the oven is then stopped, and all enquiries are vain.

The composition of the pudding she has, however, promised Clarinda, that
if she pleases her in marriage, she shall be told without reserve. But
the art of making English capers she has not yet persuaded herself to
discover, but seems resolved that secret shall perish with her, as some
alchymists have obstinately suppressed the art of transmuting metals.

I once ventured to lay my fingers on her book of receipts, which she
left upon the table, having intelligence that a vessel of gooseberry
wine had burst the hoops. But though the importance of the event
sufficiently engrossed her care, to prevent any recollection of the
danger to which her secrets were exposed, I was not able to make use of
the golden moments; for this treasure of hereditary knowledge was so well
concealed by the manner of spelling used by her grandmother, her mother,
and herself, that I was totally unable to understand it, and lost the
opportunity of consulting the oracle, for want of knowing the language
in which its answers were returned.

It is, indeed, necessary, if I have any regard to her ladyship's esteem,
that I should apply myself to some of these economical accomplishments;
for I overheard her, two days ago, warning her daughters, by my mournful
example, against negligence of pastry, and ignorance in carving: for you
saw, said she, that, with all her pretensions to knowledge, she turned
the partridge the wrong way when she attempted to cut it, and, I believe,
scarcely knows the difference between paste raised, and paste in a dish.

The reason, Mr. Rambler, why I have laid Lady Bustle's character before
you, is a desire to be informed whether, in your opinion, it is worthy of
imitation, and whether I shall throw away the books which I have hitherto
thought it my duty to read, for _the lady's closet opened_, _the complete
servant maid_, and _the court cook_, and resign all curiosity after right
and wrong, for the art of scalding damascenes without bursting them, and
preserving the whiteness of pickled mushrooms.