and too witty to be indifferent to any who converse with her, and therefore knows she does not lessen herself by familiarity, but gains occasions of admiration, by seeming ignorance of her perfections. Eudosia adds to the height of her stature a nobility of spirit which still distinguishes her above the rest of her sex. Beauty in others is lovely, in others agreeable, in others attractive; but in Eudosia it is commanding. Love towards Eudosia is a sentiment like the love of glory. The lovers of other women are softened into fondness, the admirers of Eudosia exalted into ambition. Eucratia presents herself to the imagination with a more kindly pleasure, and as she is woman, her praise is wholly feminine. If we were to form an image of dignity in a man, we should give him wisdom and valour, as being essential to the character of manhood. In like manner if you describe a right woman in a laudable sense, she should have gentle softness, tender fear, and all those parts of life which distinguish her from the other sex; with some subordination to it, but such an inferiority that makes her still more lovely. Eucratia is that creature, she is all over woman, kindness is all her art, and beauty all her arms. Her look, her voice, her gesture and whole behaviour is truly feminine. A goodness mixed with fear gives a tincture to all her behaviour. It would be savage to offend her, and cruelty to use art to gain her. Others are beautiful, but, Eucratia, thou art beauty! Omnamante is made for deceit; she has an aspect as innocent as the famed Lucrece, but a mind as wild as the more famed Cleopatra. Her face speaks a vestal, but her heart a Messalina. Who that beheld Omnamante's negligent unobserving air, would believe that she hid under that regardless manner the witty prostitute, the rapacious wench, the prodigal courtesan? She can, when she pleases, adorn those eyes with tears like an infant that is chid she can cast down that pretty face in confusion, while you rage with jealousy, and storm at her perfidiousness; she can wipe her eyes, tremble and look frighted, till you think yourself a brute for your rage, own yourself an offender, beg pardon, and make her new presents. 1 But I go too far in reporting only the dangers in beholding the beauteous, which I design for the instruction of the fair as well as their beholders; and shall end this rhapsody with mentioning what I thought was well enough said of an ancient sage2 to a beautiful youth, whom he saw admiring his own. figure in brass. What,' said the philosopher, ' could that image of yours say for itself if it could speak?' 'It might say,' answered the youth, 'that it is very beautiful.' 'And are not you ashamed,' replied the cynic, 'to value yourself upon that only of which a piece of brass is capable?' T. No. 145. Thursday, August 16, 1711 Stultitiam patiuntur opes [STEELE. -HOR., 1 Ep. xviii. 29. IF the following enormities are not amended from my correspondents : 1 See No. 172. 2 Antisthenes; quoted from Diogenes Laertius, Book vi. chap. i. 'Mr. SPECTATOR, 'I AM obliged to you for your discourse the other day1 upon frivolous disputants, who with great warmth, and enumeration of many circumstances and authorities, undertake to prove matters which nobody living denies. You cannot employ yourself more usefully than in adjusting the laws of disputation in coffee-houses and accidental companies, as well as in more formal debates. Among many other things which your own experience must suggest to you, it will be very obliging if you please to take notice of wagerers. I will not here repeat what Hudibras says of such disputants, which is so true that it is almost proverbial, but shall only acquaint you with a set of young fellows of the Inns of Court, whose fathers have provided for them so plentifully, that they need not be very anxious to get law into their heads for the service of their country at the Bar; but are of those who are sent (as the phrase of parents is) to the Temple to know how to keep their own. One of these gentlemen is very loud and captious at a coffee-house which I frequent, and being in his nature troubled with an humour of contradiction, though withal excessive ignorant, he has found a way to indulge this temper, go on in idleness and ignorance, and yet still give himself the air of a very learned and knowing man by the strength of his pocket. The misfortune of the thing is, I have, as it happens sometimes, a greater stock of learning than of money. The gentleman I am VOL. II. 1 No. 138. 2 I have heard old cunning stagers U speaking of takes advantage of the narrowness of my circumstances in such a manner, that he has read all that I can pretend to, and runs me down with such a positive air, and with such powerful arguments, that from a very learned person I am thought a mere pretender. Not long ago I was relating that I had read such a passage in Tacitus; up starts my young gentleman in a full company, and pulling out his purse offered to lay me ten guineas, to be staked immediately in that gentleman's hands (pointing to one smoking at another table), that I was utterly mistaken. I was dumb for want of ten guineas; he went on unmercifully to triumph over my ignorance how to take him up, and told the whole room he had read Tacitus twenty times over, and such a remarkable incident as that could not escape him. He has at this time three considerable wagers depending between him and some of his companions who are rich enough to hold an argument with him. He has five guineas upon questions in geography, two that the Isle of Wight is a peninsula, and three guineas to one that the world is round. We have a gentleman comes to our coffee-house who deals mightily in antique scandal; my disputant has laid him twenty pieces upon a point of history, to wit, that Cæsar never lay with Cato's sister, as is scandalously reported by some people. 'There are several of this sort of fellows in town, who wager themselves into statesmen, historians, geographers, mathematicians, and every other art, when the persons with whom they talk have not wealth equal to their learning. I beg of you to prevent, in these youngsters, this compendious way to wisdom, which costs other people so much time and pains, and you will oblige Your humble Servant.' Mr. SPECTATor, 'COFFEE-HOUSE NEAR THE TEMPLE, Aug. 12, 1711. 'HERE'S a young gentleman that sings opera tunes, or whistles in a full house. Pray let him know that he has no right to act here as if he were in an empty room. Be pleased to divide the spaces of a public room, and certify whistlers, singers, and common orators, that are heard further than their portion of the room comes to, that the law is open, and that there is an equity which will relieve us from such as interrupt us in our lawful discourse, as much as against such as stop us on the road. I take these persons, Mr. Spectator, to be such trespassers as the officer in your stage coach,' and am of the same sentiment with Councillor Ephraim. It is true the young man is rich, and, as the vulgar say, needs not care for anybody; but sure that is no authority for him to go whistle where he pleases. I am, SIR, Your most humble Servant. 'P.S.—I have chambers in the Temple, and here are students that learn upon the hautboy; pray desire the Benchers, that all lawyers who are proficients in wind-music may lodge to the Thames.' 'Mr. SPECTATOR, 'WE are a company of young women who pass our time very much together, and obliged by the mercenary humour of the men to be as mercenarily inclined as they are. There visits among us an old bachelor whom each of us has a mind to. 1 See No. 132. |