то WILLIAM HONEYCOMB, Efq. THE HE feven former volumes of the Spectator having been dedicated to fome of the most celebrated perfons of the age, I take leave to infcribe this eighth and laft to You, as to a gentleman who hath ever been ambitious of appearing in the best company. You are now wholly retired from the bufy part of mankind, and at leisure to reflect upon your past atchievements; for which reafon I look upon You as a perfon very well qualified for a Dedication. I may poffibly disappoint my readers, and yourself too, if I do not endeavour on this occafion to make the world acquainted with your virtues. And here, Sir, I fhall not compliment You upon your birth, perfon, or fortune; nor any other the like perfections, which you poffefs whether you will or no: But fhall only touch upon thofe which are of your own acquiring, and in which every one must allow You have a real merit. Your janty air and eafy motion, the volubility of your difcourfe, the fuddennefs of your laugh, the management of your fnuff-box, with the whitenefs of your hands and teeth, (which have juftly gained You the envy of the most polite part of the male world, and the love of the greatest beauties in the female) are entirely to be afcribed to your own personal genius and application. You are formed for these accomplishments by a happy turn of nature, and have finished yourfelf in them by the utmost improvements of art. A man that is defective in either of thefe qualifications (whatever may be the fecret ambition of his heart) must never hope to make the figure You have done, among the fashionable part of his fpecies. It is therefore no, wonder, we fee fuch multitudes of afpiring young men fall short of You in all thefe beauties of your character, notwithftanding the ftudy and practice of them is the whole bufinefs of their lives. But I need not tell you that the free and difengaged behaviour of a fine gentleman makes as many aukward beaux, as the eafinefs of your favourite Waller hath made infipid poets. At charms at your At prefent You are content to aim all your own fpoufe, without farther thought of mischief to any others of the fex. I know You had formerly a very great contempt for that pedantic race of mortals, who call themselves philofophers; and yet, to your honour be it spoken, there is not a fage of them all could have better acted up to their precepts in one of the most important points of life: I mean in that generous difregard of popular opinion which You fhewed fome years ago, when You chofe for your wife an obfcure young woman, who doth not indeed pretend to an ancient family, but has certainly as many forefathers as any lady in the land, if fhe could but reckon up their names. I must own I conceived very extraordinary hopes of You from the moment that you confeffed your age, and from eight and forty (where you had fuck to many years) very ingenioufly stepped into your grand climacteric. Your deportment has fince been very venerable and becoming. If I am rightly informed, You make a regular appearance every quarterfeffions among your brothers of the quorum; and if things go on as they do, stand fair for being a colonel of the militia. I am told that your time paffes away as agreeably in the amusements of a country life, as it ever did in the gallantries of the town: and that You now take as much pleasure in the planting of young trees, as you did formerly in the cutting down your old ones. In fhort, we hear from all hands that You are thoroughly reconciled to your dirty acres, and have not too much wit to look into your own estate. of After having spoken thus much of my patron, I must take the priviledge of an author in saying fomething of myself. I fhall therefore beg leave to add, that I have purposely omitted fetting thofe marks to the end of every paper, which appeared in my former volumes, that You may have an opportunity of fhewing Mrs. Honeycomb the fhrewdness of your conjectures, by afcribing every fpeculation to its proper author: though you know how often many profound critics in ftile and fentiments have very judiciously erred in this particular, before they were let into the fecret, I am, Sir, Your moft faithful humble fervant, The SPECTATORI THE N° 556. FRIDAY, JUNE 18, 1714. Qualis ubi in lucem coluber mala gramina paftus, +2 SPECTATOR. So fhines, renew'd in youth, the crested snake, DRYDEN. UPON PON laying down the office of Spectator, I acquainted the world with my defign of electing a new club, and of opening my mouth in it after a moft folemn manner. Both the election and the ceremony are now paft; but not finding it fo eafy, as I at firft imagined, to break through a fifty years filence, I would not venture into the world under the chara&er of a man who pretends to talk like other people, until I had arrived at a full freedom of fpeech. I fhall reserve for another time the hory of fuch club or clubs of which I am now a talkative, but unworthy member; and thall here give an account of this furprifing change which has been produced in me, and which I look upon to be as remarkable an accident as any recorded in hiftory, fince that which happened to the fon of Creefus, after having been many years as much tongue-tied as myself. то Upon the first opening of my mouth, I made a fpeech, confifting of about half a dozen wellturned periods; but grew fo very hoarfe upon it, that for three days together, inftead of finding the ufe of my tongue, I was afraid that I G had quite loft it. Befides, the unufual extenfion of my mufcles, on this occafion, made my face ake on both fides to fuch a degree, that nothing but an invincible refolution and perfeverence could have prevented me from falling back to my monofyllabies. I afterwards made feveral effays towards speaking; and that I might not be startled at my own voice, which has happened to me more than once, I used to read aloud in my chamber, and have often flood in the middle of the ftreet to call a coach, when I knew there was none within hearing. When I was thus grown pretty well acquainted with my own voice, I laid hold of all opportunities to exert it. Not caring however to fpeak much by myself, and to draw upon me the whole attention of thofe I converfed with, I ufed, for fome time, to walk every morning in the Mall, and talk in charus with a parcel of Frenchmen. I found my modefty greatly relieved by the communicative temper of this nation, who are fo very fociable, as to think they are never better company, than when they are all opening at the fame time. I then fancied I might receive great benefit from female converfation, and that I fhould have a convenience of talking with the greater freedom, when I was not under any impediment of thinking: I therefore threw myfelf into an affembly of ladies, but could not for my life get in a word among them; and found that if I did not change my company, I was in danger of being reduced to my primitive tacitur nity. The coffee-houfes have ever fince been my chief places of refort, where I have made the greatest mprovements; in order to which I have taken a particular care never to be of the fame opinion with the man I converfed with. I was a tory at Button's, and a whig at Child's, a friend to the Englishman, or an advocate for the Examiner, as it beft ferved my turn; fme fancy Nil fair unquam Tam difpar fib HOR. Sat. 3. lib. 1. ver. 18. Nothing was ever fo unlike itself. My old acquaintance scarce know me; nay, I was asked the other day by a jew at Jonathan's whether I was not related to a dumb gentleman, who uted to come to that coffee-houfe? But I think I was never better pleafed in my life than about a week ago, when, as I was battling it acrots the table with a young templar, his companion gave him a uil by the fleeve, begging him to come away, for that the old prig would talk him to death. 1 Being now a very good proficient in difcourfe, I fhall appear in the world with this addition to my character, that my countrymen may reap the fruits of my new-acquired loquacity. Those who have been prefent at public dif putes in the university know that it is ufual to maintain herefies for argument fake. i have heard a man a moft impudent Socinian for half an hour, who has been an orthodox divine all his life after. I have taken the fame method to accomplish my felf in the Lift of utterance, having talked above a twelvemonth, not fo much for the benefit of my hearers, as of myfelf. But fince I have now gained the faculty I have been fo,long endeavouring after, I intend to make a right use of it, and shall think my if obliged, for the future, to fpeak always in truth and fincerity of heart. While a man is learning to fence, he practices both on friend and foe; but when he is a mafter in the art, he never exerts it but on what he thinks the right fide. That this laft illution may not give my reader a wrong idea of my defign in this paper, I muft here inform him, that the author of it is of no faction, that he is a friend to no interefts but thofe of truth and virtue, nor a foe to any but thofe of vice and folly. Tho' I make more noife in the world than i ufed to do, I am still refolved to act in it as an indifferent Spectator. It is not my ambition to increafe the number either of whigs or tories, but of wife and good men, and I could heartily with there were not faults common to both parties, which afford me flicient matter to work upon, without defcending to thofe which are peculiar to ei trary, it fhall be the chief tendency of my papers, to infpire my countrymen with a mutual good-will and benevolence. Whatever faults either party may be guilty of, they are rather inflamed than cured by thofe reproaches which they caft upon one another. The moft likely method of rectifying any man's conduct, is, by recommending to him the principles of truth and honour, religion and virtue; and fo long as he acts with an eye to thefe principles whatever party he is of, he cannot fail of being a good Englishman, and a lover of his country. As for the perfons concerned in this work, the names of all of them, or at leaft of fuch as defire it, fhall be published hereafter: until which time I must intreat the courteous reader to suspend his curiofity, and rather to confider what is written, than who they are that write it. ther. if in a multitude of counfellors there is fafety, we ought to think ourselves the fecureft nation in the world. Moft of our garrets are inhabited by ftatefinen, who watch over the lberties of their country, and make a fhift to keep themfeives from ftarving by toxing into ther care the properties of their fellow-fub-, jects. As thefe politicians of both fides have already worked the nation nto a moit unnatural crfunt, i fhall be io far from endeavouring to Fife it to a greater height, that, on the con Having thus adjusted all neceffary preliminaries with my reader, I fhall not trouble him with any more prefatory difcourfes, but proceed in my old method, and entertain him with fpeculations on every useful subject that falls in с my way. N° 557. MONDAY, JUNE 21. Quippe domum timet ambiguam, Tyriofque bilingues. VIRG. n. 1. ver. 665. He fears th' ambiguous race, and Tyrians dou̟ble-tongu'd. THH HERE is nothing," fays Plato, "fo delightful, as the hearing or the speaking "of truth." For this reafon there is no converfation fo agreeable as that of the man of integrity, who hears without any intention to betray, and fpeaks without any intention to deceive. Among all the accounts which are given of Cato, I do not remember one that more redounds to his honour than the following paffage related by Plutarch. As an advocate was pleading the caufe of his client befere one of the Prætors, he could only produce a tingle witnefs in a point where the law required the teftimony of two perfons; upon which the advocate infifted on the integrity of that perfon whom he had produced; but the Prætor told him, that where the law required two witnesses he would not accept of one, though it were Cato himfelf. Such a fpeech from a perfon who fat at the head of a of juftice, while Cato was ftill living, us, more than a thoutand examples, t igh reputation this great man had gained among his contemporaries upon the account of his fincerity. When fuch an inflexible integrity is a little foftned and qualified by the rules of converfation and good breeding, there is not a more fhining virtue in the whole catalogue of fecial duties. A man however ought to take great care not to polish himself out of his veracity, ncr to refine his behaviour to the prejudice of his virtue. This fubject is exquifitely treated in the most elegant fermon of the great British preacher. I fail beg leave to tranfcribe out of it two or three fentences, as a proper introduction to a *** very curious letter, which I fhall make the chief entertainment of this fpeculation. 6 The old English plainness and fincerity, that generous integrity of nature, and honesty of difpofition, which always argues true greatnefs of mind, and is ufually accompanied with undaunted courage and refolution, is in a great measure loft among us. < The dialect of converfation is now-a-days fo fwelled with vanity and compliment, and fo furfeited (as I may fay) of expreffions of kindness and respect, that if a man that fived an age or two ago fhould return into the world again, he would really want a dictionary to help him to understand his own language, and to know the true intrinfic value of the phrafe in fashion; and would hardly, at firft, believe at what a low rate the highest ftrains and expreffions of kindness imaginable do commonly pafs in current payment; • and when he fhould come to understand it, it would be a great while before he could bring himself with a good countenance, and a good < confcience, to converfe with men upon equal terms and in their own way.' I have by me a letter which I look upon as a great curiofity, and which may ferve as an exemplification to the foregoing paffage, cited out of this most excellent prelate. It is faid to have been written in king Charles the Second's reign by the ambaffador of Bantam, a little after his arrival in England, • Mafter, T • HE people, where I now am, have tongues further from their hearts than from London to Bantam, and thou knowest the inhabitants of one of thefe places do not know what is done in the other. They call thee and thy fubjects barbarians, because we speak what we mean; and account themfelves a civilized people, because they speak one thing and mean another: truth they call barbarity, and falihood politenefs. Upon my first landing, one who was fent from the king of this place to meet me, told me, "That he was extremely forry for the ftorm I had met with juft before my arrival." I was troubled to hear him grieve and afflict himfelf upon my account; but in lefs than a quarter of an hour he fmiled, and was as merry as if nothing had happened. Another who came with him, told me by my interpreter, "He fhould "be glad to do me any fervice that lay in his "power." Upon which I defired him to carry one of my portmanteaus for me; but inftead of ferving me according to his promife, he laughed, and bid another do it. I lodged the firft week, at the houfe of one who defired me ،، to think myfelf at home, "and to confider his house as my own." Accordingly, I the next morning began to knock down one of the walls of it, in order to let in the fresh air, and had packed up fome of the houfhold-goods, of which I intended to have made thee a prefent; but the falfe varlet no fooner faw me falling to work, but he fent word to defire me to give over, for that he would have no fuch doings in his houfe. I had not been long in this nation, before I was told by one, for whom I had afked a certain favour from the chief of the king's fervants, whom they here call the lord"treasurer, that I had eternally obliged him. I was fo furprized at his gratitude, that I could not forbear faying, What fervice is there 'which one man can do for another, that can oblige him to all eternity! However, I only asked him for my reward, that he would lend me his eldest daughter during my stay in this country; but I quickly found that he was as < treacherous as the reft of his countrymen. " " " At my first going to court, one of the great men almoft put me out of countenance, by afking ten thousand pardons of me for only treading by accident upon my toe. They call this kind of a lye a compliment; for when they are civil to a great man, they telf him untruths, for which thon wouldeft order any of thy officers of state to receive an hundred blows upon his foot. I do not know how I fhall negociate any thing with this people, fince there is fo little credit to be given to 'them. When I go to fee the king's fcribe, I am generally told that he is not at home, though perhaps I faw him go into his houfe almoft the very moment before. Thou wouldeft fancy that the whole nation are phyficians, for the first question they always ask me, is how I dɔ? I have this question put to, me ' above a hundred times a day. Nay, they are not only thus inquifitive after my health, but with it in a more folemn manner, with a full glafs in their hands, every time I fit with them at table, though at the fame time they would perfuade me to drink their liquors in 'fuch quantities as I have found by experience ' will make me fick. They often pretend to < pray for thy health alfo in the fame manner; but I have more reafon to expect it from the ⚫ goodness of thy conftitution, than the fincerity of their wishes. May thy flave escape in fafe⚫ty from this double-tongued race of men, and live to lay himfelf once more at thy feet in the royal city of Bantam,' O N° 558. WEDNESDAY, JUNE. 23. Qui fit, Maecenas, ut nemo, quam fibi fortem Ji Whence is't, Macenas, that fo few approve Hap |
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