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N° 176 Friday, September 21, 1711.

Parvula, pumilio, xagirax pía, tota merum fal.
Lucr. iv. 1155+

"A little pretty, witty, charming She!"

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HERE are in the following letter matters, which I, a bachelor, cannot be fuppofed to be acquainted with; therefore fhall not pretend to explain upon it until farther confideration, but leave the author of the epiftle to exprefs. his condition his own way.

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• Mr. SPECTATOR,

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Do not deny but you appear pers to understand human life pretty well; but ⚫ there are very many things which you cannot poffibly ⚫ have a true notion of, in a fingle life; these are such as refpect the married ftate; otherwise I cannot account for your having overlooked a very good fort of peo ple, which are commonly called in fcorn the HENPECKT. You are to understand that I am one of those innocent mortals who fuffer derifion under that word, for being governed by the beft of wives. It would be worth your confideration to enter into the nature • of affection itself, and tell us, according to your philofophy, why it is that our Dears fhould do what they will with us, fhall be froward, ill-natured, af fuming, fometimes whine, at others rail, then fwoon away, then come to life, have the ufe of fpeech to the greateft fluency imaginable, and then fink away again, and all because they fear we do not love them enough; that is, the poor things love us fo heartily, that they cannot think it poffible we fhould be able ⚫ to love them in fo great a degree, which makes them take on fo. I fay, Sir, a true good-natured man, ⚫ whom rakes and libertines call HEN-PECKT, fhall • fall into all these different moods with his dear life, < and

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and at the fame time fee they are wholly put on ; ⚫ and yet not be hard hearted enough to tell the dear good creature that he is a hypocrite.

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This fort of good men is very frequent in the populous and wealthy city of London, and is the true HEN-PECKT man; the kind creature cannot break through his kindneffes fo far as to come to an explanation with the tender foul, and therefore goes on to ' comfort her when nothing ails her, to appeafe her ⚫ when she is not angry, and to give her his cafh when • he knows the does not want it; rather than be uneafy ⚫ for a whole month, which is computed by hard-hearted men the fpace of time which a froward woman takes to come to herself, if you have courage to ftand out. • There are indeed feveral other fpecies of the HENPECKT, and in my opinion they are certainly the best fubjects the queen has; and for that reafon I take it to be your duty to keep us above contempt.

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I do not know whether I make myself understood in the reprefentation of a Hen-peckt life, but I fhall take leave to give you an account of myself, and my own fpoufe. You are to know that I am reckoned no fool, have on feveral occafions been tried whether I will take ill-ufage, and the event has been to my advantage; and yet there is not fuch a flave in Turkey as I am to my dear. She has a good fhare of wit, and is what you call a very pretty agreeable woman. I perfectly doat on her, and my affection to her gives me all the anxieties imaginable but that of jealousy. My being thus confident of her, I take, as much as 'I can judge of my heart, to be the reafon, that whatever she does, though it be never fo much against my inclination, there is still left fomething in her manner that is amiable. She will fometimes look at nie with an affumed grandeur, and pretend to refent that I have not had respect enough for her opinion in fuch an inftance in company. I cannot but fmile at the pretty anger he is in, and then the pretends fhe is ufed like a child. In a word, our great debate is, which has the fuperiority in point of understanding. She is eternally forming an argument of debate; to which I very indolently anfwer, Thou art mighty ⚫ pretty.

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pretty. To this fhe answers, All the world but you think I have as much fenfe as yourself. I repeat to her, Indeed you are pretty. Upon this there is no patience; the will throw down any thing about her, ftamp and pull off her head-clothes. Fy, my dear, fay I; how can a woman of your fenfe fall into fuch an intemperate rage? This is an argument that never fails. Indeed, my dear, fays fhe, you make me ⚫ mad fometimes, fo you do, with the filly way you have of treating me like a pretty idiot. Well, what have I got by putting her into good humour? Nothing, but that I must convince her of my good opinion by my practice; and then I am to give her poffeffion of my little ready money, and, for a day and a half following, diflike all the diflikes, and extol every thing the approves. I am fo exquifitely fond of this darling, that I feldom fee any of my friends, • am uneafy in all companies until I fee her again; and when I come home she is in the dumps, because the fays fhe is fure I came fo foon only because I think ⚫her handfome. I dare not upon this occafion laugh; • but though I am one of the warmest churchmen in the kingdom, I am forced to rail at the times, because she is a violent whig. Upon this we talk politics fo long, ⚫ that she is convinced I kifs her for her wisdom.

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a common practice with me to ask her fome queftion concerning the constitution, which the answers me in ⚫ general out of Harrington's OCEANA *. Then I com⚫ mend her ftrange memory, and her arm is immediately ⚫ locked in mine. While I keep her in this temper fhe plays before me, fometimes dancing in the midft of the room, fometimes ftriking an air at her spinnet, varying her pofture and her charms in fuch a manner that I am in continual pleasure. She will play the • fool, if I allow her to be wife; but if she suspects I like ⚫ her for her trifling, the immediately grows grave.

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Thefe are the toils in which I am taken, and I carry off my fervitude as well as most men; but my The Commonwealth of Oceana," first published in 1656, fol.- A famous political romance, wherein the author exhibits a compleat model of Republican government, and opposes it to every other form of civil polity. P.

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' application to you is in behalf of the HEN-PECKT in general, and I defire a differtation from you in de-` fence of us. You have, as I am informed, very good ⚫ authorities in our favour, and hope you will not omit the mention of the renowned Socrates, and his philo'fophic refignation to his wife Xantippe. This would be a very good office to the world in general, for the Hen-peckt are powerful in their quality and numbers, not only in cities but in courts; in the latter they are ་ ever the moft obfequious, in the former the most wealthy of all men.. When you have confidered wed'lock thoroughly, you ought to enter into the fuburbs ' of matrimony, and give us an account of the thral'dom of kind keepers, and irrefolute lovers; the keepers who cannot quit their fair ones, though they 'fee their approaching ruin; the lovers who dare not marry, though they know they never shall be happy without the mistreffes whom they cannot purchase on ⚫ other terms.

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What will be a great embellishment to your difcourfe will be, that you may find inftances of the haughty, the proud, the frolick, the ftubborn, who are each of them in fecret downright flaves to their ' wives or miftreffes. I muft beg of you in the last place to dwell upon this, That the wife and valiant ⚫ in all ages have been HEN-PECKT; and that the sturdy tempers who are not flaves to affection, owe that exemption to their being inthralled by ambition, avarice, or fome meaner paffion. I have ten thoufand 'thousand things more to fay, but my wife fees me writing, and will, according to custom, be confulted, if I do not feal this immediately.

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• Yours,

NATHANIEL HENROOST.'

* By STEELE.

+++ At Drury-Lane, Saturday, Sept. 22, "The Amorous Wi"L dow," or "Wanton Wife." Lovemore by Mr. Wilks; the Wanton Wife by Mrs. Oldfield; Barnaby Brittle by Mr. Dogget; Sir P. Pride, by Mr. Johnson; Cunningham, by Mr. Mills; Merryman, by Mr. Pinkethman; Clodpole, by Mr. Bullock; Jeffery, by Mr. Pack; L. Pride, by Mrs. Willis; Amorous Widow, by Mrs. Powell; Philadelphia, by Mrs. Porter; Damaris, by Mrs. Bicknell and Prudence, by Mrs. Saunders. SPECT. in folio.

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N° 177 Saturday, September 22, 1711.

-Quis enim bonus, aut face dignus

Arcana, qualem Cereris vult effe facerdos,
Ulla aliena fibi credat mala?

-Juv. Sat. xv. 140%

"Who can all fenfe of others ills efcape,

"Is but a brute, at belt, in human fhape." TATE. N one of my last week's Papers* I treated of Goodnature, as it is the effect of conftitution; I shall now fpeak of it as it is a moral virtue. The first may make a man easy in himself and agreeable to others, but implies no merit in him that is poffeffed of it. A man is no more to be praised upon this account, than because he has a regular pulfe, or a good digeftion. This Goodnature however in the conftitution, which Mr. Dryden fomewhere calls a MILKINESS OF BLOOD, is an admirable groundwork for the other. In order therefore to try our Good-nature, whether it arifes from the body or the mind, whether it be founded in the animal or rational part of our nature; in a word, whether it be fuch as is intitled to any other reward,.besides that fecret fatisfaction and contentment of mind which is effential to it, and the kind reception it procures us in the world, we muft examine it by the following rules.

First, whether it acts with steadiness and uniformity in fickness and in health, in profperity and in adverfity; if otherwife, it is to be looked upon as nothing elfe but an irradiation of the mind from fome new fupply of fpirits, or a more kindly circulation of the blood. Sir Francis Bacon mentions a cunning folicitor, who would never afk a favour of a great man before dinner: but took care to prefer his petition at a time when the party petitioned had his mind free from care, and his appetites in good humour. Such a tranfient temporary GoodN° 169. fee Vol. II.

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