to their body; I mean the players or actors of both sexes. Among these it is a standing and uncontroverted principle, that a tragedian always takes place of a comedian; and it is very well known the merry drolls who make us laugh are always placed at the lower end of the table, and in every entertainment give way to the dignity of the buskin. It is a stage maxim, "Once a king, and always a king." For this reason it would be thought very absurd in Mr. Bullock, notwithstanding the height and gracefulness of his person, to sit at the right hand of a hero, though he were but five foot high. The same distinction is observed among the ladies of the theater. Queens and heroines preserve their rank in private conversation, while those who are waiting women and maids of honor upon the stage, keep their distance also behind the scenes. I shall only add that, by a parity of reason, all writers of tragedy look upon it as their due to be seated, served, or saluted, before comic writers; those who deal in tragi-comedy usually taking their seats between the authors of either side. There has been a long dispute for precedency be tween the tragic and heroic poets. Aristotle would have the latter yield the pas to the former; but Mr. Dryden, and many others, would never subinit to this decision. Burlesque writers pay the same deference to the heroic, as comic writers to their serious brothers in the drama. By this short table of laws order is kept up, and distinction preserved, in the whole republic of letters.-O. Ir is very usual for those who have been severe upon marriage, in some part or other of their lives to enter into the fraternity which they have ridiculed, and to see their raillery return upon their own heads. I scarce ever knew a woman-hater that did not, sooner or later, pay for it. Marriage, which is a blessing to another man, falls upon such a one as a judgment. Mr. Congreve's Old Bachelor is set forth to us with much wit and humor, as an example of this kind. In short, those who have most distinguished themselves by railing at the sex in general, very often make an honorable amends, by choosing one of the most worth less persons of it for a companion and yokefellow. Hymen takes his revenge in kind on those who turn his mysteries into ridicule. My friend Will Honeycomb, who was so unmercifully witty upon the women, in a couple of letters which I lately communicated to the public, has given the ladies ample satisfaction by marry. ing a farmer's daughter; a piece of news which came to our club by the last post. The templar is very positive that he has married a dairy-maid; but Will, in his letter to me on this occasion, sets the best face upon the matter that he can, and gives a more tolerable account of his spouse. I must confess I suspected something more than ordinary, when upon opening the letter I found that Will was fallen off from his former gayety, having changed "Dear Spec.," which was his usual salute at the beginning of the letter, into "My worthy Friend," and subscribed himself, at the latter end of it, at full length, William Honeycomb. In short, the gay, the loud, the vain Will Honeycomb, who had made love to every great fortune that has appeared in town for about thirty years together, and boasted of favors from ladies whom he had never seen, is at length wedded to a plain country girl. His letter gives us the picture of a converted rake. The sober character of the husband is dashed with the man of the town, and enlivened with those little cant phrases, which have made my friend Will often thought very pretty company. But let us hear what he says for himself: "MY WORTHY FRIEND, "I question not but you, and the rest of my ac quaintance, wonder that I, who have lived in the smoke and gallantries of the town for thirty years together, should all on a sudden grow fond of a country life. Had not my dog of a steward run away as he did, without making up his accounts, I had still been immersed in sin and sea-coal. But since my late forced visit to my estate, I am so pleased with it, that I am resolved to live and die upon it. I am every day abroad among my acres, and can scarce forbear filling my letter with breezes, shades, flowers, meadows, and purling streams. The simplicity of manners, which I have heard you so often speak of, and which appears here in perfection, charms me wonderfully. As an instance of it I must acquaint you, and by your means the whole club, that I have lately married one of my tenant's daughters. She is born of honest parents; and though she has no portion, she has a great deal of virtue. The natural sweetness and innocence of her behavior, the freshness of her complexion, the unaffected turn of her shape and person, shot me through and through every time that I saw her, and did more execution upon me in grogram than the greatest beauty in town or court had ever done in brocade. In short, she is such a one as promises me a good heir to my estate: and if by her means I cannot leave to my children what are falsely called the gifts of birth, high titles, and alliances, I hope to convey to them the more real and valuable gifts of birth-strong bodies and healthy constitutions. As for your fine women, I need not tell thee that I know them. I have had my share in their graces; but no more of that. It shall be my business hereafter to live the life of an honest man, and to act as becomes the master of a family. I question not but I shall draw upon me the raillery of the town, and be treated to the tune of, Marriage-hater Matched;' but I am prepared for it. I have been as witty upon others in my time. To tell thee truly, I saw such a tribe of fashionable young fluttering coxcombs shot up, that I did not think my post of an homme de ruelle any longer tenable. I felt a certain stiffness in my limbs, which entirely destroyed the jauntiness of air I was master of. Beside, for I may now confess my age to thee, I have been eight-and-forty above these twelve years. Since my retirement into the country will make a vacancy in the club, I could wish you would fill up my place with my friend Tom Dapperwit. He has an infinite deal of fire, and knows the town. For my own part, as I have said before, I shall endeavor to live hereafter suitable to a man in my station, as a prudent head of a family, a good husband, a careful father (when it shall so happen), and as 0. "Your most sincere Friend, "WILLIAM HONEYCOMB." No. 531.] SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 1712. Qui mare et terras, variisque mundum Unde nil majus generatur ipso; Nec viget quicquam simile, aut secundum. Who guides below, and rules above, The great Disposer, and the mighty King: Supreme he singly fills the throne.-CREECH. SIMONIDES being asked by Dionysius the tyrant what God was, desired a day's time to consider of it before he made his reply. When the day was expired he desired two days; and afterward, instead of returning his answer, demanded still double the time to consider of it. This great poet and philosopher, the more he contemplated the nature of the Deity, found that he waded but the more out of his depth; and that he lost himself in the thought, instead of finding an end to it. If we consider the idea which wise men, by the light of reason, have framed of the Divine Being, it amounts to this; that he has in him all the perfection of a spiritual nature. And, since we have no notion of any kind of spiritual perfection but what we discover in our own souls, we join infinitude to each kind of these perfections, and what is a faculty in a human soul becomes an attribute in God. We exist in place and time; the Divine Being fills the immensity of space with his presence, and inhabits eternity. We are possessed of a little power and a little knowledge: The Divine Being is almighty and omniscient. In short, by adding infinity to any kind of perfection we enjoy, and by joining all these different kinds of perfection in one being, we form our idea of the great Sovereign of nature. Though every one who thinks must have made this observation, I shall produce Mr. Locke's authority to the same purpose, out of his Essay on Human Understanding: "If we examine the idea we have of the incomprehensible Supreme Being, we shall find that we come by it the same way: and that the complex ideas we have both of God and separate spirits, are made up of the simple ideas we receive from reflection; v. g., having, from what we experience in ourselves, got the ideas of existence and duration, of knowledge and power, of pleasure and happiness, and of several other qualities and powers which it is better to have than to be without; when we would frame an idea the most suitable we can to the Supreme Being, we enlarge every one of these with our own idea of infinity; and so putting them together make our complex idea of God." It is not impossible that there may be many kinds of spiritual perfection, beside those which are lodged in a human soul; but it is impossible that we should have ideas of any kinds of perfection, except those of which we have some small rays and short imperfect strokes in ourselves. It would therefore be a very high presumption to determine whether the Supreme Being has not many more attributes than those which enter into our conceptions of him. This is certain, that if there be any kind of spiritual perfection which is not marked out in the human soul, it belongs in its fullness to the divine nature. This, as I have said before, we ought to acquiesce in, that the Sovereign Being, the great Author of Nature, has in him all possible perfections, as well in kind as in degree: to speak according to our methods of conceiving, I shall only add under this head, that when we have raised our notion of this infinite Being as high as it is possible for the mind of man to go, it will fall infinitely short of what he really is. "There is no end of his great ness." The most exalted creature he has made is only capable of adoring it; none but himself can comprehend it. The advice of the son of Sirach is very just and sublime in this light. "By his word all things consist. We may speak much, and yet come short: wherefore in sum he is all. How shall we be able to magnify him? for he is great above all his works. The Lord is terrible and very great; and marvelous is his power. When you glorify the Lord, exalt him as much as you can: for even yet will he far exceed. And when you exalt him, put forth all your strength, and be not weary; for you can never go far enough. Who hath seen him, that he might tell us? and who can magtify him as he is? There are yet hid greater things than these be, for we have seen but a few of his works." I have here only considered the Supreme Being by the light of reason and philosophy. If we would see him in all the wonders of his mercy, we must have recourse to revelation, which represents him to us not only as infinitely great and glorious, but as infinitely good and just in his dispensa tions toward man. But as this is a theory which falls under every one's consideration, though indeed it can never be sufficiently considered, I shall here only take notice of that habitual wor ship and veneration which we ought to pay to this Almighty Being. We should often refresh our minds with the thought of him, and annihilate ourselves before him, in the contemplation of our own worthlessness, and of his transcendent excellency and perfection. This would imprint in our minds such a constant and uninterrupted awe and veneration as that which I am here recommending, and which is in reality a kind of incessant prayer, and reasonable humiliation of the soul before him who made it. This would effectually kill in us all the little seeds of pride, vanity, and self-conceit, which are apt to shoot up in the minds of such whose thoughts turn more on those comparative advan tages which they enjoy over some of their fellow creatures, than on that infinite distance which is placed between them and the supreme model of all perfection. It would likewise quicken our desires and endeavors of uniting ourselves to him by all the acts of religion and virtue. Such an habitual homage to the Supreme Being would, in a particular manner, banish from among us that prevailing impiety of using his name on the most trivial occasions. I find the following passage in an excellent ser mon, preached at the funeral of a gentleman,* who was an honor to his country, and a more diligent as well as successful inquirer into the works of nature than any other our nation has ever produced. "He had the profoundest veneration for the great God of heaven and earth that I have ever observed in any person. The very name of God was never mentioned by him with out a pause and a visible stop in his discourse; in which one that knew him most particularly abort twenty years, has told me that he was so exac Several eminent philosophers have imagined that the soul, in her separate state, may have new faculties springing up in her, which she is not capable of exerting during her present union with the body; and whether these faculties may not correspond with other attributes in the divine nature, and open to us hereafter new matter of er ignorant. the wonder and adoration, we ar * See B sermon, preached at the funeral of that he does not remember to have observed him once to fail in it." Every one knows the veneration which was paid by the Jews to a name so great, wonderful, and holy. They would not let it enter even into their religious discourses. What can we then think of those who make use of so tremendous a name in the ordinary expressions of their anger, mirth, and most impertinent passions? of those who admit it into the most familiar questions and assertions, ludicrous phrases, and works of humor? not to mention those who violate it by solemn perjuries! It would be an affront to reason to endeavor to set forth the horror and profaneness of such a practice. The very mention of it exposes it sufficiently to those in whom the light of nature, not to say religion, is not utterly extinguished.-O. No. 532.] MONDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1712. I play the whetstone; useless, and unfit To cut myself, I sharpen others' wit.-CREECH. Ir is a very honest action to be studious to produce other men's merit; and I make no scruple of saying, I have as much of this temper as any man in the world. It would not be a thing to be bragged of, but that it is what any man may be master of, who will take pains enough for it. Much observation of the unworthiness in being pained at the excellence of another, will bring you to a scorn of yourself for that unwillingness; and when you have got so far, you will find it a greater pleasure than you ever before knew to be zealous in promoting the fame and welfare of the praiseworthy. I do not speak this as pretending to be a mortified, self-denying man, but as one who has turned his ambition into a right channel. I claim to myself the merit of having extorted excellent productions from a person of the greatest abilities, who would not have let them appeared by any other means; to have animated a few young gentlemen into worthy pursuits, who will be a glory to our age; and at all times, and by all possible means in my power, undermined the interest of ignorance, vice, and folly, and attempted to substitute in their stead learning, piety, and good sense. It is from this honest heart that I find myself honored as a gentleman-usher to the arts and sciences. Mr. Tickell and Mr. Pope have, it seems, this idea of me. The former has written me an excellent paper of verses, in praise, forsooth, of myself; and the other inclosed for my perusal an admirable poem,+ which I hope will shortly see the light. In the meantime I cannot suppress any thought of his, but insert this sentiment about the dying words of Adrian. I will not determine in the case he mentions; but have thus much to say in favor of his argument, that many of his own works, which I have seen, convince me that very pretty and very sublime sentiments may be lodged in the same bosom without diminution to its greatness. that prince in those circumstances. I could not but dissent from this opinion. Methinks it was by no means a gay but a very serious soliloquy to his soul at the point of his departure; in which sense I naturally took the verses at my first reading them, when I was very young, and before I knew what interpretation the world generally put upon them. Animula vagula, blandula, Hospes comesque corporis, Quæ nunc abibis in loca? Pallidula, rigida, nudula, Nec (ut soles) dabis joca! "Alas, my soul; thou pleasing companion of this body, thou fleeting thing that art now deserting it, whither art thou flying? to what unknown region? Thou art all trembling, fearful, and pensive. Now what is become of thy former wit and humor? Thou shalt jest and be gay no more.' "I confess I cannot apprehend where lies the trifling in all this; it is the most natural and obvious reflection imaginable to a dying man: and, if we consider the emperor was a heathen, that doubt concerning the future fate of his soul will seem so far from being the effect of want of thought, that it was scarce reasonable he should think otherwise: not to mention that here is a plain confession included of his belief in its immortality. The diminutive epithets of vagula, blandula, and the rest, appear not to me as expressions of levity, but rather of endearment and concern: such as we find in Catullus, and the authors of Hendecasyllabi after him, where they are used to express the utmost love and tenderness for their mistresses. If you think me right in my notion of the last words of Adrian, be pleased to insert this in the Spectator; if not, to suppress it. "I am," etc. "TO THE SUPPOSED AUTHOR OF THE SPECTATOR. "In courts licentious, and a shameless stage, Our youth run headlong in the fatal snare; "Thy spotless thoughts unshocked the priest may hear, And the pure vestal in her bosom wear. To conscious blushes and diminished pride "The brainless stripling, who, expelled to town, "Such readers scorn'd, thou wing'st thy daring flight *Mr. Tickell here alludes to Steele's papers against the sharpers, etc., in the Tatler, and particularly to a letter in Tat. No. 73, signed Will Trusty, and written by Mr. John Hughes. † Viscount Bolingbroke. "Such hints alone could British Virgil* lend, "Permit these lines by thee to live-nor blame "So some weak shoot, which else would poorly rise, MR. JOHN SLY humbly showeth, "That upon reading the deputation given to the said Mr. John Sly, all persons passing by his observatory, behaved themselves with the same decorum as if your honor yourself had been present. "That your said officer is preparing, according to your honor's secret instructions, hats for the several kinds of heads that make figures in the realms of Great Britain, with cocks significant of their powers and faculties. "That your said officer has taken due notice of your instructions and admonitions concerning the internals of the head from the outward form of the same. His hats for men of the faculties of law and physic do but just turn up, to give a little life to their sagacity; his military hats glare full in the face; and he has prepared a familiar easy cock for all good companions between the above-mentioned extremes. For this end he has consulted the most learned of his acquaintance for the true form and dimensions of the lepidum caput, and made a hat fit for it. "Your said officer does further represent, that the young divines about town are many of them got into the cock military, and desires your instructions therein. "That the town has been for several days very well behaved, and further your said officer saith not." T. No. 533.] TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 1712. Immo duas dabo, inquit ille, unum si parum est; "SIR, "TO THE SPECTATOR. with one of a neighboring gentleman's daughters; for, out of their abundant generosity, they give me the choice of four. Jack,' begins my father, Mrs. Catharine is a fine woman.'- Yes, Sir, but she is rather too old.'-She will make the more discreet manager, boy.' Then my mother plays her part. Is not Mrs. Betty exceeding fair?Yes, Madam, but she is of no conversation; she has no fire, no agreeable vivacity; she neither speaks nor looks with spirit.'-True, son, but for those very reasons she will be an easy, soft, obliging, tractable creature.'-'After all,' eries an old aunt (who belongs to the class of those who read plays with spectacles on), what think you, nephew, of proper Mrs. Dorothy?'- What do Í think? why, I think she cannot be above six foot* two inches high.'-Well, well, you may banter as long as you please, but height of stature is commanding and majestic.'-Come, come,' says a cousin of mine in the family, I will fit him: Fidelia is yet behind-pretty Miss Fiddy must please you.'-Oh! your very humble servant, dear coz, she is as much too young as her eldest sister is too old.'-'Is it so indeed,' quoth she, good Mr. Pert? You who are but barely turned of twenty-two, and Miss Fiddy in half a year's time will be in her teens, and she is capable of learning anything. Then she will be so observant; she will cry perhaps now and then, but never be angry.' Thus they will think for me in this matter, wherein I am more particularly concerned than anybody else. If I name any woman in the world, one of these daughters has certainly the same qualities. You see by these few hints, Mr. Spectator, what a comfortable life I lead. To be still more open and free with you, I have been passionately fond of a young lady (whom give me leave to call Miranda) now for these three years. I have often urged the matter home to my parents with all the submission of a son, but the impatience of a lover. Pray, Sir, think of three years; what inexpressible scenes of inquietude, what variety of misery must I have gone through in three long whole years! Miranda's fortune is equal to those I have mentioned; but her relations are not intimates with mine. Ahí there's the rub! Miranda's person, wit, and humor, are what the nicest fancy could imagine; and, though we know you to be so elegant a judge of beauty, yet there is none among all your various characters of fine women preferable to Miranda. In a word, she is never guilty of doing anything but one amiss (if she can be thought to do amiss by me), in being as blind to my faults as she is to her own perfections. "I am, Sir, "Your very humble obedient Servant, "DUSTERERASTUS.” 'MR. SPECTATOR, "When you spent so much time as you did lately in censuring the ambitious young gentlemen who ride in triumph through town and country on "You have often given us very excellent dis- coach-boxes, I wished you had employed those courses against that unnatural custom of parents, moments in consideration of what passes somein forcing their children to marry contrary to their times within-side of those vehicles. I am sure I inclinations. My own case, without further pre- suffered sufficiently by the insolence and ill-breedface, I will lay before you, and leave you to judge ing of some persons who traveled lately with of it. My father and mother both being in de-me in a stage-coach out of Essex to London. I clining years, would fain see me, their eldest son, as they call it, settled. I am as much for that as they can be: but I must be settled, it seems, not according to my own, but their, liking. Upon this account I am teased every day, because I have not yet fallen in love, in spite of nature, *A compliment to Addison. † By Mr. Thomas Tickell. am sure, when you have heard what I have to say, you will think there are persons under the character of gentlemen, that are fit to be nowhere else but in the coach-box. Sir, I am a young wo man of a sober and religious education, and bare preserved that character; but on Monday was fort *Feet. night it was my misfortune to come to London. I was no sooner clapped in the coach, but, to my great surprise, two persons in the habit of gentlemen attacked me with such indecent discourse as I cannot repeat to you, so you may conclude not fit for me to hear. I had no relief but the hopes of a speedy end of my short journey. Sir, form to yourself what a persecution this must needs be to a virtuous and chaste mind; and, in order to your proper handling such a subject, fancy your wife or daughter, if you had any, in such circumstances, and what treatment you would then think due to such dragoons. One of them was called a captain, and entertained us with nothing but filthy stupid questions, or lewd songs, all the way. Ready to burst with shame and indignation, I repined that nature had not allowed us as easily to shut our ears as our eyes. But was not this a kind of rape? Why should not every contributor to the abuse of chastity suffer death? I am sure these shameless hell-hounds deserved it highly. Can you exert yourself better than on such an occasion? If you do not do it effectually, I will read no more of your papers. Has every impertinent fellow a privilege to torment me, who pay my coach-hire as well as he? Sir, pray consider us in this respect as the weakest sex, who have nothing to defend ourselves; and I think it as gentleman-like to challenge a woman to fight as to talk obscenely in her company, especially when she has not power to stir. Pray let me tell you a story which you can make fit for public view. I knew a gentleman, who having a very good opinion of the gentlemen of the army, invited ten or twelve of them to sup with him; and at the same time invited two or three friends who were very severe against the manners and morals of the gentlemen of that profession. It happened one of them brought two captains of his regiment newly come into the army, who at first onset engaged the company with very lewd healths and suitable discourse. You may easily imagine the confusion of the entertainer, who finding some of his friends very uneasy, desired to tell them the story of a great man, one Mr. Locke (whom I find you frequently mention), that having been invited to dine with the then Lords Halifax, Anglesey, and Shaftesbury, immediately after dinner, instead of conversation, the cards were called for, where the bad or good success produced the usual passions of gaming. Mr. Locke retiring to a window, and writing, my Lord Anglesey desired to know what he was writing: Why, my lords,' answered he, 'I could not sleep last night for the pleasure and improvement I expected from the conversation of the greatest men of the age. This so sensibly stung them, that they gladly compounded to throw their cards in the fire, if he would his paper, and so a conversation ensued fit for such persons. This story pressed so hard upon the young captains, together with the concurrence of their superior officers, that the young fellows left the company in confusion. Sir, I know you hate long things; but if you like it, you may contract it, or how you will; but I think it has a moral in it. "But, Sir, I am told you are a famous mechanic as well as a looker-on, and therefore humbly propose you would invent some padlock, with full power under your hand and seal, for all modest persons, either men or women, to clap upon the mouths of all such impertinent impudent fellows; and I wish you would publish a proclamation that no modest person, who has a value for her countenance, and consequently would not be put out of it, presume to travel after such a day without one of them in their pockets. I fancy a smart Spectator upon this subject would serve for such a padlock; and that public notice may be given in your paper where they may be had, with directions, price two-pence; and that part of the directions may be, when any person presumes to be guilty of the above-mentioned crime, the party aggrieved may produce it to his face, with a request to read it to the company. He must be very much hardened that could outface that rebuke; and his further punishment I leave you to prescribe. "Your humble Servant, "PENANCE CRUEL." T. No. 534.] WEDNESDAY, NOV. 12, 1712. Rarus enim ferme sensus communis in illa. -We seldom find Much sense with an exalted fortune join'd.—STEPNEY. "MR. SPECTATOR, "I AM a young woman of nineteen, the only daughter of very wealthy parents, and have my whole life been used with a tenderness which did me no great service in my education. I have perhaps an uncommon desire for knowledge of what is suitable to my sex and quality; but as far as I can remember, the whole dispute about me has been whether such a thing was proper for the child to do, or not? or whether such a food was the more wholesome for the young lady to eat? This was ill for my shape, that for my complexion, and the other for my eyes. I am not extravagant when I tell you I do not know that I have trod upon the very earth ever since I was ten years old. A coach or chair I am obliged to for all my motions from one place to another ever since I can remember. All who had to do to instruct me, have ever been bringing stories of the notable things I have said, and the womanly manner of my behaving myself upon such and such an occasion. This has been my state until I came toward years of womanhood; and ever since I grew toward the age of fifteen I have been abused after another manner. Now, forsooth, I am so killing, no one can safely speak to me. Our house is frequented by men of sense, and I love to ask questions when I fall into such conversation; but I am cut short with something or other about my bright eyes. There is, Sir, a language particular for talking to women in; and none but those of the very first good-breeding (who are very few, and who seldom come into my way) can speak to us without regard to our sex. Among the generality of those they call gentlemen, it is impossible for me to speak upon any subject whatsoever, without provoking somebody to say, Oh! to be sure, fine Mrs. Such-a-one must be very particularly acquainted with all that; all the world would contribute to her entertainment and information.' Thus, Sir, I am so handsome that I murder all who approach me; so wise that I want no new notices; and so well-bred that I am treated by all that know me like a fool, for no one will answer as if I were their friend or companion. Pray, Sir, be pleased to take the part of us beauties and fortunes into your consideration, and do not let us be thus flattered out of our senses. I have got a hussy of a maid who is most craftily given to this ill quality. I was at first diverted with a certain absurdity the creature was guilty of in everything she said. She is a country girl; and, in the dialect of the shire she was born in, would tell me that everybody reckoned her lady had the purest red and white in the world; then would tell me I was the most like one Sisly Dobson in their town, who made the miller make away with himself, and walked afterward in the corn-field where |