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pleasure, overhear one fay of me, That frange fellow ; and another answer, I have known the fellow's face these twelve years, and fo must you; but I believe you. are the firft ever asked who he was. There are, I must confefs, many to whom my perfon is as well known as that of their nearest relations, who give themselves no farther trouble about calling me by my name or quality, but speak of me very currently by Mr. What d'ye

call him.

To make up for thefe trivial difadvantages, I have the high fatisfaction of beholding all nature with an unprejudiced eye; and, having nothing to do with mens paffions or interefts, I can, with the greater fagacity, confider their talents, manners, failings, and merits.

IT is remarkable, that those who want any one fenfe, poffefs the others with greater force and vivacity. Thus my want of, or rather refignation, of fpeech, gives me all the advantages of a dumb man. I have, methinks, a more than ordinary penetration in seeing; and flatter myself that I have looked into the highest and loweft of mankind, and make fhrewd gueffes, without being admitted to their converfation, at the inmost thoughts and reflexions of all whom I behold. It is from hence that good or ill fortune has no manner of force towards affecting my judgment. I fee men flourifhing in courts, and languishing in jails, without being prejudiced from their circumftances to their favour or difadvantage; but from their inward manner of bearing their condition, often pity the profperous, and admire the unhappy.

THOSE who converfe with the dumb, know from the turn of their eyes, and the changes of their countenance, their fentiments of the objects before them. I have indulged my filence to fuch an extravagance, that the few who are intimate with me, anfwer my smiles with concurrent fentences, and argue to the very point I shaked my head at, without my fpeaking. WILL HONEYCOMB was very entertaining the other night at a play, to a gentleman who fat on his right hand, while I was at his left. The gentleman believed WILL was talking to himself, when upon my looking with great approbation at a young thing in a box before us,

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he faid, I am quite of another opinion. She has, I will allow, a very pleasing aspect, but methinks that fimplicity in her countenance is rather childish than innocent.' When I obferved her a second time, he faid, I grant her drefs is very becoming, but perhaps ⚫ the merit of that choice is owing to her mother; for though, continued he, I allow a beauty to be as much to be commended for the elegance of her drefs, as a wit for that of his language; yet if she has stolen the colour of her ribbands from another, or had ad⚫vice about her trimmings, I fhall not allow her the praise of dress, any more than I would call a plagiary an author.' When I threw my eye towards the next woman to her, WILL fpoke what I looked, according to his romantic imagination, in the following manner.

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BEHOLD, you who dare, that charming virgin; behold the beauty of her perfon chastised by the innocence of her thoughts. Chastity, good-nature, and affability, are the graces that play in her countenance; she knows fhe is handsome, but fhe knows fhe is good. Confcious beauty adorned with confcious virtue! what a fpirit is there in those eyes! ⚫ what a bloom in that perfon! how is the whole woman expreffed in her appearance! her air has the beauty of motion, and her look the force of language.' IT was prudence to turn away my eyes from this object, and therefore I turned them to the thoughtless creatures who make up the lump of that sex, and move a knowing eye no more than the portraitures of infignificant people by ordinary painters, which are but pictures of pictures.

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THUS the working of my own mind is, the general entertainment of my life; I never enter into the commerce of difcourfe with any but my particular friends, and not in public even with them. Such an habit has perhaps raised in me uncommon reflexions; but this effect I cannot communicate but by my writings. As my pleasures are almoft wholly confined to those of the fight, I take it for a peculiar happiness that I have always had an easy and familiar admittance to the fair fex. If I never praised or flattered, I never belied or contradicted them. As these compose half the world, VOL. I. C

and

and are, by the just complaifance and gallantry of our nation, the more powerful part of our people, I fhall dedicate a confiderable fhare of these my fpeculations to their service, and fhall lead the young through all the becoming duties of virginity, marriage, and widow-hood. When it is a woman's day in my works, I fhall endeavour at a ftyle and air fuitable to their understanding. When I fay this, I must be understood to mean, that I fhall not lower but exalt the subjects I treat upon. Difcourfe for their entertainment, is not to be debafed but refined. A man may appear learned without talking fentences, as in his ordinary gefture he discovers he can dance, though he does not cut capers. In a word, I fhall take it for the greatest glory of my work, if, among reasonable women, this paper may furnish tea-table talk. In order to it, I fhall treat on matters which relate to females, as they are concerned to approach or fly from the other fex, or as they are tied to them by blood, intereft, or affection. Upon this occafion I think it but reasonable to declare, that whatever skill I may have in fpeculation, I shall never betray what the eyes of lovers fay to each other in my prefence. At the fame time I shall not think myfelf obliged, by this promife, to conceal any falfe proteftations which I obferve made by glances in public affemblies; but endeavour to make both fexes appear in their conduct what they are in their hearts. By this means, love, during the time of my fpeculations, shall be carried on with the fame fincerity as any other affairs of lefs confideration. As this is the greatest concern, men fhall be from henceforth liable to the greatest reproach for misbehaviour in it. Falfhood in love shall hereafter bear a blacker aspect, than infidelity in friendship, or villany in business. For this great and good end, all breaches against that noble paffion, the cement of fociety, fhall be feverely examined. But this, and all other matters loosely hinted at now, and in my former papers, fhall have their proper place in my following difcourfes: the prefent writing is only to admonish the world, that they fhall not find me an idle but a bufy spectator.

3

Tuelday,

No 5.

Tuesday, MARCH 6.

Spectatum admiffi rifum teneatis?

Hor. Ars Poet. v. 5.

Admitted to the fight, wou'd you not laugh?

N opera may be allowed to be extravagantly lavifh in its decorations, as its only defign is to gratify the fenfes, and keep up an indolent attention in the audience. Common fenfe, however, requires, that there fhould be nothing in the fcenes and machines which may appear childish and abfurd. How would the wits of King Charles's time have laughed to have feen Nicolini expofed to a tempeft in robes of ermine, and failing in an open boat upon a fea of pafteboard? What a field of rallery would they have been let into, had they been entertained with painted dragons fpitting wild-fire, enchanted chariots drawn by Flanders mares, and real cafcades in artificial landskips? A little skill in criticism would inform us, that shadows and realities ought not to be mixed together in the fame piece; and that the scenes which are defigned as the representations of nature, fhould be filled with refemblances, and not with the things themselves. If one would reprefent a wide champaign country filled with herds and flocks, it would be ridiculous to draw the country only upon the scenes, and to croud feveral parts of the stage with fheep and oxen. This is joining together inconfiftencies, and making the decoration partly real, and partly imaginary. I would recommend what I have faid here, to the directors, as well as to the admirers of our modern opera.

As I was walking in the streets about a fortnight ago, I faw an ordinary fellow carrying a cage full of little birds upon his shoulder; and, as I was wondering with myself what use he would put them to, he was_met very luckily by an acquaintance, who had the fame curiofity.

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curiofity. Upon his asking him what he had upon his fhoulder, he told him that he had been buying fparrows for the opera. Sparrows for the opera, fays his friend, licking his lips, what, are they to be roafted? No, no, fays the other, they are to enter towards the end of the firit act, and to fly about the ftage.

THIS ftrange dialogue awakened my curiofity fo far, that I immediately bought the opera, by which means I perceived that the fparrows were to act the part of finging birds in a delightful grove; though, upon a nearer inquiry I found the fparrows put the fame trick upon the audience, that Sir Martin Mar-all practifed upon his mistress; for though they flew in fight, the mufic proceeded from a concert of flagelets and birdcalls which were planted behind the fcenes. At the fame time I made this difcovery, I found by the discourse of the actors, that there were great defigns on foot for the improvement of the opera; that it had been propofed to break down a part of the wall, and to furprise the audience with a party of an hundred horfe, and that there was actually a project of bringing the New-river into the house, to be employed in jetteaus and waterworks. This project, as I have fince heard, is postponed till the fummer-feafon; when it is thought the coolness that proceeds from fountains and cafcades will be more acceptable and refreshing to people of quality. In the mean time, to find out a more agreeable entertainment for the winter-feafon, the opera of Rinaldo is filled with thunder and lightning, illuminations and fire-works; which the audience may look upon without catching cold, and indeed without much danger of being burnt; for there are feveral engines filled with water, and ready to play at a minute's warning, in case any fuch accident should happen. However, as I have a very great friendship for the owner of this theatre, I hope that he has been wife enough to infure his houfe before he would let this opera be acted in it.

It is no wonder, that thofe fcenes fhould be very furprising, which were contrived by two poets of different nations, and raised by two magicians of different fexes. Armida, as we are told in the argu

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