sex must have suffered by an affectation of this nature, at least as much as the other. The ill effect of it is in none so confpicuous as in the two opposite characters of Cælia and Iras: Cælia has all the charms of person, together with an abundant sweetness of Nature, but wante wit, and has a very ill voice; Iras is ugly and ungenteel, but has wit and good sense. If Cælia would be filent, her beholders would adore her; if Iras would talk, her hearers would admire her; but Cælia's: tongue runs incessantly, while Iras gives herself filent airs and soft languors, so that 'tis difficult to perfuade one's self that Cælia has beauty, and Iras wit: each neglects her own excellence, and is ambitious of the other's character; Iras would be thought to have as much beauty as Cælia, and Cælia as much wit as Iras.

The great misfortune of this affectation is, that men not only lose a good quality, but also contract a bad. one. They not only are unfit for what they were defigned, but they assign themselves to what they are not fit for; and instead of making a very good figure one way, make a very ridiculous one another. If Semanthe would have been fatisfied with her natural complexion, fhe might still have been celebrated by the name of the olive beauty; but Semanthe has taken up an affectation to white and red, and is now diftinguished by the character of the lady that paints so well. In a word,. could the world be reformed to the obedience of that famed dictate, "Follow Nature," which the oracle of Delphos pronounced to Cicero when he consulted. what course of studies he should pursue, we should fee almost every man as eminent in his proper sphere as Tully was in his, and should in a very short time find impertinence and affectation banished from among the women, and coxcombs and false characters from among the men. For my part, I could never confider this prepofterous repugnancy to Nature any otherwife, than not only as the greatest folly, but alfo one of the most heinous crimes, fince it is a direct oppofition to the difpofition of Providence, and (as Tully expresses it) like the fin of the giants, an actual rebellion against heaven.

* The author unknown. See No 408, 425, and 467. See Ne 408, ad finem Note.&

N° 405 Saturday, June 14, 1712.

I

Οἱ δὲ πανημέριοι μολπῆ Θεὸν ἱλάσκονλο,
Καλὸν ἀείδανλες Παιήονα κῦροι ̓Αχαιών,
Μέλπονιες Ἑκάεργον· ὁ δὲ φρένα τέρπετ ̓ ἀκύων.

Hom. Iliad. i. 472.

With hymns divine the joyous banquet ends;
The pæans lengthen'd till the fun descends;
The Greeks restor'd the grateful notes prolong;
Apollo liftens, and approves the fong.

POPE.

AM very forry to find, by the opera bills for this day, that we are likely to lose the greatest performer in dramatic music that is now living, or that perhaps ever appeared upon a stage. I need not acquaint my reader, that I am speaking of Signior Nicolini *. The town is highly obliged to that excellent artist, for having shewn us the Italian music in its perfection, as well as for that generous approbation he lately gave to an opera of our own country, in which the composer endeavoured to do justice to the beauty of the words, by following that noble example, which has been set him by the greatest foreign masters in that art.

I could heartily wish there was the same application and endeavours to cultivate and improve our churchmufic, as have been lately bestowed on that of the stage. Our composers have one very great incitement to it. They are sure to meet with excellent words, and at the fame time, a wonderful variety of them. There in no passion that is not finely expressed in those parts of the inspired writings, which are proper for divine fongs and anthems.

* See TAT. with Notes, Vol. III. N° 115, p. 379 and 380 There is a certain coldness and indifference in the

phrafes of our European languages, when they are compared with the oriental forms of speech; and it happens very luckily, that the Hebrew idioms run into the English tongue with a particular grace and beauty. Our language has received innumerable elegancies and improvements, from that infusion of Hebraifms, which are derived to it out of the poetical passages in Holy Writ. They give a force and energy to our expreffion, warm and animate our language, and convey our thoughts in more ardent and intense phrases, than any that are to be met with in our own tongue. There is fomething so-pathetic in this kind of diction, that it often fets the mind in a flame, and makes our hearts burn within us. How cold and dead does a prayer appear, that is composed in the most elegant and polite forms of speech, which are natural to our tongue. when it is not heightened by that folemnity of phrafe, which may be drawn from the Sacred Writings. It has been faid by some of the ancients, that if the Gods were to talk with men, they would certainly speak in Plato's stile; but I think we may say, with justice, that when mortals converse with their Creator, they cannot do it in so proper a stile as in that of the Holy Scriptures.

If any one would judge of the beauties of poetry that are to be met with in the divine writings, and examine how kindly the Hebrew manners of speech mix and incorporate with the English language; after having perused the book of Pfalms, let him read a literal tranflation of Horace or Pindar. He will find in these two last such an abfurdity and confufion of stile, with fuch a comparative poverty of imagination, as will make him very fenfible of what I have been here advancing.

Since we have therefore such a treasury of words, fo beautiful in themselves, and so proper for the airs of music, I cannot but wonder that persons of distinction should give so little attention and encouragement to that kind of music, which would have its foundation in reason, and which would improve our virtue in proportion as it raised our delight. The passions that are excited by ordinary compositions generally flow from fuch

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such filly and absurd occafions, that a man is ashamed to reflect upon them seriously; but the fear, the love, the forrow, the indignation that are awakened in the mind by hymns and anthems, make the heart better, and proceed from such causes as are altogether reasonable and praife-worthy. Pleasure and duty go hand in hand, and the greater our fatisfaction is, the greater is our religion.

Music among those who were stiled the chosen people was a religious art. The fongs of Sion, which we have reason to believe were in high repute among the courts of the eastern monarchs, were nothing else but pfalms and pieces of poetry that adored or celebrated the Supreme Being. The greatest conqueror in this holy nation, after the manner of the old Grecian lyrics, did not only compose the words of his divine odes, but generally set them to music himself: after which, his works, though they were confecrated to the tabernacle, became the national entertainment, as well as the devotion of his people.

1

The first original of the drama was a religious worship confilting only of a chorus, which was nothing else but a hymn to a deity. As luxury and voluptuoufnefs prevailed over innocence and religion, this form of worship degenerated into tragedies; in which however the chorus so far remembered its first office, as to brand every thing that was vicious, and recommend every thing that was laudable, to intercede with Heaven for the innocent, and to implore its vengeance on the criminal.

مة

Homer and Hefiod intimate to us how this art should be applied, when they represent the muses as furrounding Jupiter, and warbling their hymns about his throne. I might shew from innumerable passages in ancient writers, not only that vocal and instrumental mufic were made use of in their religious worship, but that their: most favourite diversions were filled with fongs and hymns to their respective deities. Had we frequent entertainments of this nature among us, they would not a little purify and exalt our paffions, give our thoughts a proper turn, and cherish those divine impulses

impulses in the foul, which every one feels that has not ftifled them by sensual and immoral pleasures.

Music, when thus applied, raises noble hints in the mind of the hearer, and fills it with great conceptions. It strengthens devotion, and advances praise into rapture, lengthens out every act of worship, and produces more lasting and permanent impressions in the mind, than those which accompany any tranfient form of words that are uttered in ered in the ordinary method of religious worship.

* By ADDISON, dated, as the fignature feems to intimate, from his Office. See SPECT. Vol. VII. No 555.

N° 406 Monday, June 16, 1712.

Hæc ftudia adolefcentiam alunt, fenectutem oblectant, fecundas res ornant, adverfis folatium & perfugium præbent; delectant domi, non impediunt foris; pernoctant nobifcum, peregrinantur, rufticantur. Tull.

• These studies nourish youth; delight old age; are ⚫ the ornament of prosperity; the solacement and • the refuge of adversity; they are delectable at • home, and not burthensome abroad; they gladden us at nights, and on our journies, and in the • country.'

T

HE following letters bear a pleasing image of the joys and fatisfactions of a private life. The

first is from a gentleman to a friend, for whom he has a very great respect, and to whom he communicates the fatisfaction he takes in retirement; the other is a letter to me occafioned by an ode written by my Lapland lover†; this correspondent is so kind as

† See Vol. V. No 366, and note.

to