to any oftentatious arts of setting to fhow those great fervices which you have done the public, has not likewife a little contributed to that univerfal acknowledgement which is paid you by your country.

The confideration of this part of your character, is that which hinders me from enlarging on those extraordinary talents, which have given you fo great a figure in the British fenate, as well as in that elegance and politenefs which appear in your more retired converfation. I fhould be unpardonable if, after what I have faid, I fhould longer detain you with an addrefs of this nature: I cannot, however, conclude it without acknowledging thofe great obligations which you have laid upon,

SIR,

Your most obedient,

humble fervant,

THE SPECTATOR.

THE

1

THE

SPECTATOR.

N° 170

Friday, September 14, 1711.

In amore hæc omnia infunt vitia: injuriæ,
Sufpiciones, inimicitia, inducia,
Bellum, pax rurfum

Ter. Eun. A&i. Sc. 1.

"In love are all thefe ills: fufpicions, quarrels, "Wrongs, reconcilements, war, and peace again." COLMAN.

U

PON looking over the letters of my female correfpondents, I find feveral from women complaining of Jealous Hufbands, and at the fame time protesting their own innocence; and defiring my advice on this occafion. I fhall therefore take this fubject into my confideration; and the more willingly, because I find that the marquis of Hallifax, who, in his "Advice to a Daughter," has inftructed a wife how to behave herself towards a falfe, an intemperate, a choleric, a fullen, a covetous, or a filly husband, has not fpoken one word of a Jealous Hufband *.

* ADDISON has particularly pointed out this third volume, as containing Papers of humour, and alfo refers to other ufeful Specuatio ns in it. See SPICIATOR, Vol. VII. N° 547, and 548.

* JEA

B 2

<< JEALOUSY is that pain which a man feels from the apprehenfion that he is not equally beloved by the per"fon whom he intirely loves." Now because our inward paffions and inclinations can never make themselves vifible, it is impoffible for a jealous man to be thoroughly cured of his fufpicions. His thoughts hang at beft in a ftate of doubtfulness and uncertainty; and are never capable of receiving any fatisfaction on the advantageous fide; fo that his inquiries are moft fuccefsful when they difcover nothing. His pleafure arifes from his disappointments, and his life is spent in pursuit of a fecret that deftroys his happiness if he chance to find it.

An ardent love is always a ftrong ingredient in this paffion; for the fame affection which ftirs up the jealous man's defires, and gives the party beloved fo beautiful a figure in his imagination, makes him believe the kindles the fame paffion in others, and appears as amiable to all beholders. And as jealousy thus arifes from an extraordinary love, it is of fo delicate a nature, that it fcorns to take up with any thing lefs than an equal return of love. Not the warmest expreffions of affection, the foftest and moft tender hypocrify, are able to give any fatisfaction, where we are not perfuaded that the affection is real and the fatisfaction mutual. For the jealous man wishes himfelf a kind of deity to the perfon he loves. He would be the only pleasure of her fenfes, the employment of her thoughts; and is angry at every thing the admires, or takes delight in, befides himfelf.

PHEDRIA's request to his miftrefs, upon his leaving her for three days, is inimitably beautiful and natural.

Cum milite ifto præfens, abfens ut fies:
Dies noctefque me ames: me defideres :
Me fomnies: me expectes: de me cogites:
Me Speres me te obletes: mecum tota fis:
Meus fac fis poftremò animus, quando ego fum tuus.
'T'er. Eun. A&t i. Sc. 2.

"Be with yon foldier prefent, as if absent: "All night and day love me: ftill long for me: "Dream, ponder ftillon' me; with, hope for me;

"Delight

"Delight in me; be all in all with me; "Give your whole heart, for mine's all your's, to me.” COLMAN.

The jealous man's difeafe is of fo malignant a na-ture, that it converts all it takes into its own nourishment. A cool behaviour fets him on the rack, and is interpreted as an inftance of averfion or indifference; a fond one raises his fufpicions, and looks too much like diffimulation and artifice. If the perfon he loves be chearful, her thoughts must be employed on another; and if fad, she is certainly thinking on himself. In fhort, there is no word or gesture fo infignificant, but it gives him new hints, feeds his fufpicions, and furnishes him with fresh matters of discovery: fo that if we confider the effects of this paffion, one would rather think it proceeded from an inveterate hatred, than an exceffive love; for certainly none can meet with more difquietude and uneafinefs than a fufpected wife, if we except the jealous husband.

But the great unhappiness of this paffion is, that it naturally tends to alienate the affection which it is fo folicitous to ingrofs; and that for thefe two reasons, because it lays too great a constraint on the words and actions of the fufpected perfon, and at the fame time fhews you have no honourable opinion of her; both of which are strong motives to averfion.

Nor is this the worst effect of jealoufy; for it often draws after it a more fatal train of confequences, and makes the perfon you fufpect guilty of the very crimes you are fo much afraid of. It is very natural for fuch who are treated ill and upbraided falfly, to find out an intimate friend that will hear their complaints, condole their fufferings, and endeavour to footh and affuage their fecret refentments. Befides, jealoufy puts a woman often in mind of an ill thing that he would not otherwife perhaps have thought of, and fills her ima gination with fuch an unlucky idea, as in time grows familiar, excites defire, and lofes all the fhame and horror which might at firft attend it. Nor is it a wonder if the who fuffers wrongfully in a man's opinion of her, and has therefore nothing to forfeit in his esteem, B 3

refolves

refolves to give him reafon for his fufpicions, and to enjoy the pleasure of the crime, fince the muft undergo the ignominy. Such probably were the confiderations that directed the wife-man in his advice to hufbands; "Be not jealous over the wife of thy bofom, and teach

s;

her not an evil leffon against thyself *."

And here, among the other torments which this paffion produces, we may ufually obferve that none are greater mourners than jealous men, when the perfon who provoked their jealoufy is taken from them. Then it is that their love breaks out furioufly, and throws off all the mixtures of fufpicion which choked and fmothered it before, The beautiful parts of the character rise uppermoft in the jealous hufband's memory, and up. braid him with the ill ufage of fo divine a creature as was once in his poffeffion; whilft all the little imperfections, that were before fo uneafy to him, wear off from his remembrance, and fhew themselves no more.

We may fee by what has been faid, that jealousy takes the deepeft root in men of amorous difpofitions and of these we may find three kinds who are most over. run with it.

The First are thofe who are confcious to themselves of an infirmity, whether it be weakness, old age, deformity, ignorance, or the like. Thefe men are so well acquainted with the unamiable part of themfelves, that they have not the confidence to think they are really be loved; and are fo distrustful of their own merits, that all fondness towards them puts them out of countenance, and looks like a jeft upon their perfons. They grow fufpicious on their first looking in a glafs, and are ftung with jealoufy at the fight of a wrinkle. A handfome fellow immediately alarms them, and every thing that locks young or gay turns their thoughts upon their wives.

A Second fort of men, who are most liable to this paf- ́ fion, are thofe of cunning, wary, and distrustful tempers. It is a fault very justly found in hiftories compofed by politicians, that they leave nothing to chance or humour, but are ftill for deriving every action from fome plot and contrivance, for drawing up a perpetual fcheme of * Ecclefiafticus ix. 1.

caufes