taining his friends, a little before he drank the bowl of poison, with a discourse on the immortality of the soul, at his entering upon it says that he does not believe any, the most comic genius, can censure him for talking upon such a subject at such a time. This passage, I think, evidently glances upon Aristophanes, who wrote a comedy on purpose to ridicule the discourses of that divine philosopher. It has been observed by many writers, that Socrates was so little moved at this piece of buffoonery, that he was several times present on its being acted upon the stage, and never expressed the least resentment of it. But with submission, I think the remark I have here made shows us, that this unworthy treatment made an impression upon his mind, though he had been too wise to discover it. word or action; nay, a gooa, a temperate When Julius Cæsar was lampooned by Catullus, he invited him to supper, and treated him with such a generous civility, that he made the poet his friend ever after. Cardinal Mazarine gave the same kind of treatment to the learned Quillet, who had reflected upon his eminence in a famous Latin poem. The cardinal sent for him, and, after some kind expostulations upon what he had written, assured him of his esteem, and dismissed him with a promise of the next good abbey that should fall, which he accordingly conferred upon him in a few months after. This had so good an effect upon the author, that he dedicated the sec-cated to serious thoughts, I shall indulge ond edition of his book to the cardinal, after having expunged the passages which had given him offense. Sextus Quintus was not of so generous and forgiving a temper. Upon his being made pope, the statue of Pasquin was one night dressed in a very dirty shirt, with an excuse written under it, that he was forced to wear foul linen, because his laundress was made a princess. This was a reflection upon the pope's sister, who before the promotion of her brother, was in those mean circumstances that Pasquin represented her. As this pasquinade made a great noise in Rome, the pope offered a considerable sum of money to any person that should discover the author of it. The author, relying upon his holiness's generosity, as also some private overtures which he had received from him, made the discovery himself; upon which the pope gave him the reward he had promised, but at the same time to disable the satirist for the future, ordered his tongue to be cut out, and both his hands to be chopped off. Aretine* is too trite an instance. Every one knows that all the kings of Europe were his tributaries. Nay, there is a letter of his extant, in which he makes his boast that he laid the Sophi of Persia under contribution. Though, in the various examples which I have here drawn together, these several great men behaved themselves very differently toward the wits of the age who had reproached them; they all of them plainly showed that they were very sensible of their reproaches, and consequently that they received them as very great injuries. For my own part, I would never trust a man that I thought was capable of giving these secret wounds; and cannot but think that he would hurt the person whose reputation he thus assaults, in his body or in his fortune, could he do it with the same security. There is, indeed, something very barbarous and inhuman in the ordinary scribblers of lampoons. An innocent young lady shall be exposed for an unhappy feature; a father of a family turned to ridicule for some domestic calamity; a wife made uneasy all her life for a misrepresented *Peter Aretine, infamous for his writings, died in 1556. in such speculations as may not be altoget suitable to the season; and in the mean the settling in ourselves a charitable frame is a work very proper for the time, I have paper endeavored to expose that particula of charity which has been generally ove by divines, because they are but few who guilty of it.-C. No. 24.] WEDNESDAY, MARCH 28 Comes up a fop (I knew him but by fame), THERE are in this town a great numbe significant people, who are by no means fi better sort of conversation, and yet have pertinent ambition of appearing with t whom they are not welcome. If you wal park, one of them will certainly join w though you are in company with ladies drink a bottle, they will find your haunts makes such fellows the more burdensome fairly; and that done, I shall expect redress from your judicious pen. "I am, Sir, a bachelor of some standing, and a traveler; my business, to consult my own good humor, which I gratify without controlling other people's: I have a room and a whole bed to myself and I have a dog, a fiddle, and a gun: they please me, and injure no creature alive. My chief meal is a supper, which I always make at a tavern. I am constant to an hour, and not illhumored; for which reasons, though I invite nobody, I have no sooner supped, than I have a crowd about me of that sort of good company that know not whither else to go. It is true, every man pays his share; yet as they are intruders, I have an undoubted right to be the only speaker, or at least the loudest; which I maintain, and that to the great emolument of my audience. I sometimes tell them their own in pretty free language; and sometimes divert them with merry tales, according as I am in humor. I am one of those who live in taverns to a great age, by a sort of regular intemperance; I never go to bed drunk, but always flustered; I wear away very gently; am apt to be peevish, but never angry. Mr. Spectator, if you have kept various company, you know there is in every tavern in town some old humorist or other, who is master of the house as much as he that keeps it. The drawers are all in awe of him; and all the customers who frequent his company, yield him a sort of comical obedience. I do not know but I may be such a fellow as this myself. But I appeal to you, whether this is to be called a club, because so many impertinents will break in upon me, and come without appointment? Clinch of Barnet has a nightly meeting, and shows to every one that will come in and pay; but then he is the only actor. Why should people miscall things? If his is allowed to be a concert, why may not mine be a lecture? However, Sir, I submit it to you, and am, Sir, your most obedient servant, etc. "THOMAS KIMBOW." "GOOD SIB, "You and I were pressed against each other last winter in a crowd, in which uneasy posture we suffered together for almost half an hour. I thank you for all your civilities ever since, in being of my acquaintance wherever you meet me. But the other day you pulled your hat off to me in the Park, when I was walking with my mistress. She did not like your air, and said she wondered what strange fellows I was acquainted with. Dear Sir, consider it as much as my life is worth, if she should think we were intimate: therefore I earnestly entreat you for the future to take no manner of notice of, "Sir, your obliged, humble servant, " MADAM, "I take this way to acquaint you with what common rules and forms would never permit me to tell you otherwise; to wit, that you and I, though equals in quality ard fortune, are by no means suitable companions. You are, it is true, very pretty, can dance, and make a very good figure in a public assembly; but, alas, Madam, you must go no farther; distance and silence are your best recommendations; therefore let me beg of you never to make me any more visits. You come in a literal sense to see one, for you have nothing to say. I do not say this, that I would by any means lose your acquaintance; but I would keep it up with the strictest forms of good breeding. Let us pay visits, but never see one another. If you will be so good as to deny yourself always to me, I shall return the obligation by giving the same orders to my servants. When accident makes us meet at a third place, we may mutually lament the misfortune of never finding one another at home, go in the same party to a benefit play, and smile at each other, and put down glasses as we pass in our coaches. Thus we may enjoy as much of each other's friendship as we are capable of: for there are some people who are to be known only by sight, with which sort of friendship I hope you will always honor, Madam, "Your most obedient, humble servant, "MARY TUESDAY." "P. S. I suscribe myself by the name of the day I keep, that my supernumerary friends may know who I am." ADVERTISEMENT. To prevent all mistakes that may happen among gentlemen of the other end of the town, who come but once a week to St. James's coffee-house, either by miscalling the servants, or requiring such things from them as are not properly within their respective provinces; this is to give notice, that Kidney, keeper of the book-debts of the outlying customers, and observer of those who go off without paying, having resigned that employment, is succeeded by John Sowton; to whose place of enterer of messages and first coffee-grinder, William Bird is promoted; and Samuel Burdock comes as shoe-cleaner in the room of the said Bird.-R. "I am one of that sickly tribe who are commonly known by the name of valetudinarians; and do confess to you, that I first contracted this ill habit of body, or rather of mind, by the study of A like impertinence is also very troublesome to physic. I no sooner began to peruse books of this the superior and more intelligent part of the fair nature, but I found my pulse was irregular; and sex. It is, it seems, a great inconvenience, that scarce ever read the account of any disease that those of the meanest capacities will pretend to I did not fancy myself afflicted with. Dr. Symake visits, though indeed they are qualified denham's learned treatise of fever threw me into rather to add to the furniture of the house (by fill- a lingering hectic, which hung upon me all the ing an empty chair), than to the conversation they while I was reading that excellent piece. I then enter into when they visit. A friend of mine applied myself to the study of several authors hopes for redress in this case, by the publication who have written upon phthisical distempers, and of her letter in my paper; which she thinks those by that means fell into a consumption; till at she would be rid of will take to themselves. It seems to be written with an eye to one of those pert, giddy, unthinking girls; who, upon the recommendation only of an agreeable person and a fashionable air, take themselves to be upon a level with women of the greatest merit: length, growing very fat, I was in a manner shamed out of that imagination. Not long after this I found in myself all the symptoms of the Mr. Tickell, in his preface to Addison's Works, says, that "Addison never had a regular pulse," which Steele questions in bis dedication of The Drummer to Mr. Congreve. gout, except pain; but was cured of it by a treatise upon the gravel, written by a very ingenious author, who (as it is usual for physicians to convert one distemper into another) eased me of the gout by giving me the stone. I at length studied myself into a complication of distempers; but, accidentally taking into my hand that ingenious discourse written by Sanctorius, I was resolved to direct myself by a scheme of rules, which I had collected from his observations. The learned world are very well acquainted with that gentleman's invention; who, for the better carrying on his experiments, contrived a certain mathematical chair, which was so artificially hung upon springs, that it would weigh anything as well as a pair of scales. By this means he discovered how many ounces of his food passed by perspiration, what quantity of it was turned into nourishment, and how much went away by the other channels and distributions of nature. often proves mortal, and sets people on r I do not mean, by what I have here sai think any one to blame for taking due care health. On the contrary, as cheerfulness ‹ and capacity for business are in a great the effects of a well-tempered constitutior cannot be at too much pains to cultivate serve it. But this care, which we are pron not only by common sense, but by duty stinct, should never engage us in groundle melancholy apprehensions, and imagin tempers, which are natural to every ma more anxious to live, than how to live. the preservation of life should be only a s concern, and the direction of it our princ we have this frame of mind, we shall best means to preserve life, without bei solicitous about the event; and shall arriv point of felicity which Martial has ment the perfection of happiness, of neither fea wishing for death. "Having provided myself with this chair, I used to study, eat, drink, and sleep in it; insomuch that I may be said, for these last three years, to have lived in a pair of scales. I compute myself, when I am in full health, to be precisely two hundred weight, falling short of it about a pound after a day's fast, and exceeding it as much after a very full meal; so that it is my continual employment to trim the balance between these two volatile pounds in my constitution. In my ordinary meals I fetch myself up to two hundred weight and half a pound; and if, after having dined, I find my self fall short of it, I drink so much small beer, or eat such a quantity of bread, as is sufficient to make me weight. In my greatest excesses, I do not transgress more than the other half-pound; which, for my health's sake, I do the first Monday in every month. As soon as I find myself duly poised after dinner, I walk till I have perspired five ounces and four scruples; and when I discover, by my chair, that I am so far reduced, I fall to my books, and study away three ounces more. As for In answer to the gentleman, who tem the remaining parts of the pound, I keep no ac- health by ounces and by scruples, and in count of them. I do not dine and sup by the complying with those natural solicita clock, but by my chair; for when that informs me hunger and thirst, drowsiness, or love of my pound of food is exhausted, I conclude my-governs himself by the prescriptions of hi self to be hungry, and lay in another with all diligence. In my days of abstinence I lose a pound and a half, and on solemn fasts am two pounds lighter than on the other days of the year. shall tell him a short fable. Jupiter, says thologist, to reward the piety of a certain man, promised to give him whatever he w The countryman desired that he might "I allow myself, one night with another, a management of the weather in his ow quarter of a pound of sleep, within a few grains He obtained his request, and immedia more or less; and if, upon my rising, I find that I tributed rain, snow, and sunshine, an have not consumed my whole quantity, I take out several fields, as he thought the nature o the rest in my chair. Upon an exact calculation of required. At the end of the year, when h what I expended and received the last year, which ed to see a more than ordinary crop, hi I always register in a book, I find the medium to fell infinitely short of that of his n be two hundred weight, so that I cannot discover Upon which (says the fable) he desire that I am impaired one ounce in my health during to take the weather again into his own a whole twelvemonth. And yet, Sir, notwith- that otherwise he should utterly ruin hin standing this my great care to ballast myself equally every day, and to keep my body in its proper poise, so it is, that I find myself in a sick and languishing condition. My complexion is grown very sallow, my pulse low, and my body hydropical. Let me therefore beg you, Sir, to consider me as your patient, and to give me more certain rules to walk by than those I have already observed, and you will very much oblige Your humble servant." This letter puts me in mind of an Italian epitaph written on the monument of a valetudinarian: "Stavo hen, ma per star meglio, sto qui:" which it is impossible to translate. The fear of death No. 26.] FRIDAY, MARCH 30, reader some idea of the Italian epitaph: "I w *The following translation, however, may give an English trying to be better, I am here." gloominess of the place, and the use to which it was the distinguishing character of that plain, galis applied, with the solemnity of the building, lant man, he is represented on his tomb by the figure and the condition of the people who lie in it, are of a beau, dressed in a long periwig, and reposing apt to fill the mind with a kind of melancholy, or himself upon velvet cushions, under a canopy rather thoughtfulness that is not disagreeable. I of state. The inscription is answerable to the yesterday passed a whole afternoon in the church-monument; for instead of celebrating the many yard, the cloisters, and the church, amusing_my- remarkable actions he had performed in the service self with the tombstones and inscriptions that I met with in those several regions of the dead. Most of them recorded nothing else of the buried person, but that he was born upon one day, and died upon another; the whole history of his life being comprehended in those two circumstances that are common to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of existence, whether of brass or marble, as a kind of satire upon the departed persons; who had left no other memorial of them, but that they were born, and that they died. They put me in mind of several persons mentioned in the battles of heroic poems, who have sounding names given them, for no other reason but that they may be killed, and are celebrated for nothing but being knocked on the head. Glaucumque, Medontaque, Thersilochumque.-VIRG. of his country, it acquaints us only with the manner of his death, in which it was impossible for him to reap any honor. The Dutch, whom we are apt to despise for want of genius, show an infinitely greater taste of antiquity and politeness in their buildings and works of this nature than what we meet with in those of our own country. The monuments of their admirals, which have been erected at the public expense, represent them like themselves, and are adorned with rostral crowns and naval ornaments, with beautiful festoons of sea-weed, shells, and coral. But to return to our subject. I have left the repository of our English kings for the contemplation of another day, when I shall find my mind disposed for so serious an amusement. I know that entertainments of this nature are apt to raise dark and dismal thoughts in timorous minds and gloomy imaginations; but for my own part, though I am always serious, I do not know what The life of these men is finely described in holy writ by "the path of an arrow," which is imme-it is to be melancholy; and can therefore take a diately closed up and lost. Upon my going into the church, I entertained myself with the digging of a grave; and saw in every shovel-full of it that was thrown up, the fragment of a bone or skull intermixed with a kind of fresh mouldering earth that some time or other had a place in the composition of a human body. Upon this I began to consider with myself what innumerable multitudes of people lay confused together under the pavement of that ancient cathedral; how men and women, friends and enemies, priests and soldiers, monks and prebendaries, were crumbled among one another, and blended together in the same common mass; how beauty, strength, and youth, with old age, weakness, and deformity, lay undistinguished in the same promiscuous heap of matter. After having thus surveyed the great magazine of mortality, as it were, in the lump, I examined it more particularly by the accounts which I found on several of the monuments which are raised in every quarter of that ancient fabric. Some of them were covered with such extravagant epitaphs, that if it were possible for the dead person to be acquainted with them, he would blush at the praises which his friends have bestowed upon him. There are others so excessively modest, that they deliver the character of the person departed in Greek or Hebrew, and by that means are not understood once in a twelvemonth. In the poetical quarter, I found there were poets who had no monuments, and monuments which had no poets. I observed, indeed, that the present war has filled the church with many of these uninhabited monuments, which had been erected to the memory of persons whose bodies were perhaps buried in the plains of Blenheim, or in the bosom of the ocean. I could not but be very much delighted with several modern epitaphs, which are written with great elegance of expression and justness of thought, and therefore do honor to the living as well as the dead. As a foreigner is very apt to conceive an idea of the ignorance or politeness of a nation from the turn of their public monuments and inscriptions, they should be submitted to the perusal of men of learning and genius before they are put in execution. Sir Cloudesly Shovel's monument has very often given me great offense. Instead of the brave rough English admiral, which view of nature in her deep and solemn scenes with the same pleasure as in her most gay and delightful ones. By this means I can improve myself with those objects which others consider with terror. When I look upon the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies within me; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow. When I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be cotemporaries, and make our appearance together.— C. No. 27.] SATURDAY, MARCH 31, 1711. IMITATED. Long as to him, who works for debt, the day; Long as the night to her, whose love's away; Long as the year's dull circle seems to run When the brisk minor pants for twenty-one: So slow th' unprofitable moments roll, That lock up all the functions of my soul; That keep me from myself, and still delay Life's instant business to a future day: That task, which as we follow, or despise, The eldest is a fool, the youngest wise; Which done, the poorest can no wants endure, And which not done the richest must be poor.-POPE. THERE is scarce a thinking man in the world, who is involved in the business of it, but lives under a secret impatience of the hurry and fatigue he suffers, and has formed a resolution to fix himself, one time or other, in such a state as is suitable to the end of his being. You hear men every day in conversation profess, that all the honor, power, and riches, which they propose to themselves, cannot give satisfaction enough to reward them for half the anxiety they undergo in the pursuit or the possession of them. While men are in this temper (which happens very frequently), how inconsistent are they with themselves! They are wearied with the toil they bear, but cannot find in their hearts to relinquish it: retirement is what they want, but they cannot betake themselves to it. While they pant after shade and covert, they still affect to appear in the most glittering scenes of life. Sure this is but just as reasonable as if a man should call for more light, when he has a mind to go to sleep. Since then it is certain that our own hearts deceive us in the love of the world, and that we cannot command ourselves enough to resign it, though we every day wish ourselves disengaged from its allurements; let us not stand upon a formal taking of leave, but wean ourselves from them while we are in the midst of them. It is certainly the general intention of the greater part of mankind to accomplish this work, and live according to their own approbation, as soon as they possibly can. But since the duration of life is so uncertain (and that has been a common topic of discourse ever since there was such a thing as life itself), how is it possible that we should defer a moment the beginning to live according to the rules of reason? The man of business has ever some one point to carry, and then he tells himself he will bid adieu to all the vanity of ambition. The man of pleasure resolves to take his leave at least, and part civilly with his mistress; but the ambitious man is entangled every moment in a fresh pursuit, and the lover sees new charms in the object he fancied he could abandon. It is therefore a fantastical way of thinking, when we promise ourselves an alteration in our conduct from change of place and difference of circumstances; the same passions will attend us wherever we are, until they are conquered; and we can never live to our satisfaction in the deepest retirement, unless we are capable of living so, in some measure, amidst the noise and business of the world. I have ever thought men were better known by what could be observed of them from a perusal of their private letters, than any other way. My friend the clergyman, the other day, upon serious discourse with him concerning the danger of procrastination, gave me the following letters from persons with whom he lives in great friendship and intimacy, according to the good breeding and good sense of his character. The first is from a man of business, who is his convert: the second from one who is in no state at all, but carried one way and another by starts. SIR, "There is no state of life so anxious a man who does not live according to t of his own reason. It will seem odd to I assure you that my love of retiremen brought me to court; but this will b when I acquaint you, that I placed with a design of getting so much mon enable me to purchase a handsome ret country. At present my circumstances and my duty prompts me, to pass ay maining part of my life in such a reti at first proposed to myself; but to m fortune I have entirely lost the relis should now return to the country w reluctance than I at first came to cour unhappy, as to know that what I am trifles, and that what I neglect is of importance: in short, I find a contest mind between reason and fashion. you once told me, that I might live in and out of it, at the same time. Let m to explain this paradox more at large I may conform my life, if possible, duty and my inclination. R. I am you Letters are directed "For the Spec left at Mr. Buckley's, in Little Britain N. B. In the form of a direction, th figure in the last column of the Spect "I know not with what words to express to you the sense I have of the high obligation you have No. 28.] MONDAY, APRIL 2 laid upon me, in the penance you enjoined me, of Neque semper arcum doing some good or other to a person of worth Tendit Apollo.-HOR., 2 Od., x, every day I live. The station I am in furnishes Nor does Apollo always bend his me with daily opportunities of this kind; and the I SHALL here present my reader v noble principle with which you have inspired me, from a projector, concerning a new of of benevolence to all I have to deal with, quickens thinks may very much contribute to th my application in everything I undertake. When ments of the city, and to the driving I relieve merit from discountenance, when I assist of our streets. I consider it as a sati a friendless person, when I produce concealed jectors in general, and a lively picture worth, I am displeased with myself, for having art of modern criticism. designed to leave the world in order to be virtuous. I am sorry you decline the occasions which "SIR, the condition I am in might afford me of enlarging your fortunes; but know I contribute more to your "Observing that you have thought certain officers under you, for the in |