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No. 440.] FRIDAY, JULY 25, 1712. Vivere si recte nescis, decede peritis.-HOR. 2. Ep. ii. 213. Learn to live well, or fairly make your will.-POPE.

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I HAVE already given my reader an account of set of merry fellows who are passing their summer together in the country, being provided of a great house, where there is not only a convenient apart ment for every particular person, but a large infirmary for the reception of such of them as are any way indisposed or out of humor. Having lately received a letter from the secretary of this society: by order of the whole fraternity, which acquaints me with their behavior during the last week, I shall here make a present of it to the public.

"MR. SPECTATOR,

solent manner, what he did there then? This in sensibly grew into some warm words, so that thes president, in order to keep the peace, gave directions to take them both from the table, and lodge: the company telling us he knew, by a pain in his them in the infirmary. Not long after, another of shoulder, that we should have some rain, the president ordered him to be removed, and placed as a weather-glass in the apartment above-mentioned.

"On Wednesday, a gentleman, having received a letter written in a woman's hand, and changing color twice or thrice as he read it, desired leave to retire into the infirmary. The president consented, but denied him the use of pen, ink, and paper,. till such time as he had slept upon it. One of the company being seated at the lower end of the ta ble, and discovering his secret discontent, by finding fault with every dish that was served up, and refusing to laugh at anything that was said, the

uneasy seat, and desired him to accommodate himself better in the infirmary. After dinner, a very honest fellow chancing to let a pun fall from him; his neighbor cried out, To the infirmary;' at the same time pretending to be sick at it, as having the same natural antipathy to a pun which some have to a cat. This produced a long debate. Upon the whole, the punster was acquitted, and his neighbor sent off.

"We are glad to find that you approve the establishment which we have here made for the retriev-president told him, that he found he was in an ing of good manners and agreeable conversation, and shall use our best endeavors so to improve ourselves in this our summer retirement, that we may next winter serve as patterns to the town. But to the end that this our institution may be no less advantageous to the public than to ourselves, we shall communicate to you one week of our proceedings, desiring you at the same time, if you see anything faulty in them, to favor us with your admonitions; for you must know, Sir, that it has ben proposed among us to choose you for our visitor to which I must further add, that one of the college having declared last week he did not like the Spectator of the day, and not being able to assign any just reasons for such his dislike, he was sent to the infirmary nemine contradicente.

"On Monday the assembly was in a very good humor, having received some recruits of French claret that morning; when, unluckily, toward the middle of the dinner, one of the company swore at his servant in a very rough manner for having put too much water in his wine. Upon which the president of the day, who is always the mouth of the company, after having convinced him of the impertinence of his passion, and the insult it had made upon the company, ordered his man to take him from the table, and convey him to the infirmary. There was but one more sent away that day; this was a gentleman, who is reckoned by some persons one of the greatest wits, and by others one of the greatest boobies about town. This you wil! say is a strange character: but what makes it stranger yet, it is a very true one, for he is perpetually the reverse of himself, being always merry or dull to excess. We brought him hither to divert us, which he did very well upon the road, having lavished away as much wit and laughter upon the hackney-coachmat, as might have served him during his whole stay here, had it been duly managed. He had been lumpish for two or three days, but was so far connived at, in hopes of recovery, that we dispatched one of the briskest fellows among the brotherhood into the infirmary for having told him at table he was not merry. But our president observing that he indulged himself in this long fit of stupidity, and construing it as a contempt of the college, ordered him to retire into the place prepared for such companions. He was no sooner got into it, but his wit and mirth returned upon him in so violent a manner, that he shook the whole infirmary with the noise of it, and had so good an effect upon the rest of the patients, that he brought them all out to dinner with him the next day.

"On Tuesday we were no sooner sat down, but one of the company complained that his head hed; upon which another asked him, in an in

"On Thursday, there was but one delinquent. This was a gentleman of strong voice, but weak understanding. He had unluckily engaged himself in dispute with a man of excellent sense, but of a modest elocution. The man of heat replied to every answer of his antagonist with a louder note than ordinary, and only raised his voice when he should have enforced his argument. Finding himself at length driven to an absurdity, he still reasoned in a more clamorous and confused man. ner; and, to make the greater impression upon his hearers, concluded with a loud thump upon the table. The president immediately ordered. him to be carried off, and dieted with water-gruel, till such time as he should be sufficiently weakened for conversation.

"On Friday there passed very little remarkable, saving only, that several petitions were read of the persons in custody, desiring to be released from their confinement, and vouching for one another's good behavior for the future.

"On Saturday we received many excuses from persons who had found themselves in an unsociable temper, and had voluntarily shut themselves up. The infirmary was, indeed, never so full as on this day, which I was at some loss to account for, till, upon my going abroad, I observed that it was an easterly wind. The retirement of most of my friends has given me opportunity and leisure of writing you this letter, which I must not conclude without assuring you, that all the members of our college, as well those who are under confinement as those who are at liberty, are your very humble servants, though none more than," etc.-C.

[No. 441. SATURDAY, JULY 26, 1712. Si fractus illabatur orbis,

Imp avidum ferient ruinæ.-HOR. 3 Od. iii. 7. Should the whole frame of nature round him break, In ruin and confusion hurl'd,

He, unconcern'd, would hear the mighty crack,

And stand secure amidst a falling world.-ANON. MAN, considered in himself, is a very helpless and a very wretched being. He is subject every moment to the greatest calamities and misfortunes. He is beset with dangers on all sides; and may

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It is our comfort, while we are obnoxious to so many accidents, that we are under the care of One who directs contingencies, and has in his hands the management of everything that is capable of annoying or offending us; who knows the assistance we stand in need of, and is always ready to bestow it on those who ask it of him.

The natural homage which such a creature bears to so infinitely wise and good a Being, is a firm reliance on him for the blessings and conveniences of life, and a habitual trust in him for deliverance out of all such dangers and difficulties as may befall us.

The man who always lives in this disposition of mind, has not the same dark and melancholy views of human nature, as he who considers himself abstractedly from this relation to the Supreme Being. At the same time that he reflects upon his own weakness and imperfection, he comforts himself with the contemplation of those divine attributes which are employed for his safety and his welfare. He finds his want of foresight made up by the Omniscience of him who is his support. He is not sensible of his own want of strength; when he knows that his helper is almighty. In short, the person who has a firm trust on the Supreme Being, is powerful in his power, wise by his wisdom, happy by his happiness. He reaps the benefit of every divine attribute, and loses his own insufficiency in the fullness of infinite perfection.

To make our lives more easy to us, we are commanded to put our trust in him, who is thus able to relieve and succor us: the divine goodness having made such a reliance a duty, notwithstanding we should have been miserable had it been forbidden us.

Among several motives which might be made use of to recommend this duty to us, I shall only take notice of these that follow:

The first and strongest is, that we are promised he will not fail those who put their trust in him. But, without considering the supernatural blessing which accompanies this duty, we may observe that it has a natural tendency to its own reward, or, in other words, that this firm trust and confidence in the great Disposer of all things, contributes very much to the getting clear of any affliction, or to the bearing it manfully. A person who believes he has his succor at hand, and that he acts in the sight of his friend, often exerts himself beyond his abilities, and does wonders that are not to be matched by one who is not animated with such a confidence of success. I could produce instances from history, of generals, who, out of a belief that they were under the protection of some invisible assistant, did not only encourage their soldiers to do their utmost, but have acted themselves beyond what they would have done had they not been inspired by such a belief. I might in the same manner show how such a trust in the assistance of an Almighty Being naturally produces patience, hope, cheerfulness, and all other dispositions of the mind that alleviate those calamities which we are not able to remove..

The practice of this virt e administers great comfort to the mind of man in times of poverty and affliction, but most of all in the hour of death. When the soul is hovering in the last moments of its separation, when it is just entering on another state of existence, to converse with scenes, and objects, and companions, that are altogether new, -what can support her under such tremblings of thought, such fears, such anxiety, such apprehensions, but the casting of all her cares upon him

who first gave her being, who has conducted her through one stage of it, and will be always with her, to guide and comfort her in her progress through eternity?

David has very beautifully represented this steady reliance on God Almighty in his twentythird psalm, which is a kind of pastoral hymn, and filled with those allusions which are sual in that kind of writing. As the poetry i very ex quisite, I shall present my reader with t follow ing translation of it:

I.

The Lord my pasture shall prepare, And feed me with suephora's car. His presence shal! m weutr supply, And guard me with a rathfulere My noon-day walks he shall attin', And all my midnight hours d fea

II.

When in the sultry glebe I fairt,
Or on the thirsty mountain pant;
To fertile vales and dewy meads
My weary, wand'ring steps he leade,
Where peaceful rivers, soft and slov
Amid the verdant landscape flow.

III.

Though in the paths of death I tread,
With gloomy horrors overspread,
My steadfast heart shall know no ill,
For thou, O Lord. art with me still;
Thy friendly crook shall give me aid,
And guide me through the dreadful sha
JV.

Though in a bare and rugged way,
Through devious, lonely wilds I stray,
Thy bounty shall my pains beguile;
The barren wilderness shall smile
With sudden greens and herbage crown'd,
And streams shall murmur all around.

No. 442.] MONDAY, JULY 28, 1712 Scribimus indocti doctique- HOR. 2 Ep. i. 117

Those who cannot write. and those who can, All rhyme, and scrawl, and scribble, to a man.-POPE.

I Do not know whether I enough explained my self to the world, when I invited all men to be assistant to me in this my work of speculation for I have not yet acquainted my readers, that beside the letters and valuable hints I have from time to time received from my correspondents, I have by me several curious and extraordinary papers sent with a design (as no one will doubt when they are published) that they might be printed entire, and without any alteration, by way of Spectator. I must acknowledge also, that I myself, being the first projector of the paper, thought I had a right to make them my own, by dressing them in my own style, by leaving out what would not appear like mine, and by adding whatever might be proper to adapt them to the character and genius of my paper, with which it was almost impossible these could exactly correspond, it being certain that hardly two men think alike; and, therefore, so many men so many Spec tators. Beside, I must own my weakness fot glory is such, that, if I consulted that only, I might be so far swayed by it, as almost to wish that no one could write a Spectator beside my. self; nor can I deny, but upon the first perusal of those papers, I felt some secret inclinations of illwill toward the persons who wrote them. This was the impression I had upon the first reading them; but upon a late review (more for the sake of entertainment than use), regarding them with another eye than I had done at first (for by converting them as well as I could to my own use, I thought I had utterly disabled them from ever offending me again as Spectators), I found myself

moved by a passion very different from that of envy; sensibly touched with pity, the softest and most generous of all passions, when I reflected what a cruel disappointment the neglect of those papers must needs have been to the writers who impatiently longed to see them appear in print, and who, no doubt, triumphed to themselves in the hopes of having a share with me in the applause of the public; a pleasure so great, that none but those who have experienced it can have a sense of it. In this manner of viewing those papers, I really found I had not done them justice, there being something so extremely natural and peculiarly good in some of them, that I will appeal to the world whether it was possible to alter a word in them without doing them a manifest hurt and violence; and whether they can ever appear rightly, and as they ought, but in their own native dress and colors. And therefore I think I should not only wrong them, but deprive the world of a consider able satisfaction, should I any longer delay the making them public.

After I have published a few of these Spectators, I doubt not but I shall find the success of them to equal, if not surpass, that of the best of my own. An author should take all methods to humble himself in the opinion he has of his own performances. When those papers appear to the world, I doubt not but they will be followed by many others; and I shall not repine, though I myself shall have left me but a very few days to appear in public; but, preferring the general weal and advantage to any considerations of myself, I am resolved for the future to publish any Spectator that deserves it entire, and without any alteration; assuring the world (if there can he need of it) that it is none of mine; and if the authors think fit to subscribe their names, I will add

them.

to the end they may receive the inexpressible and
irresistible pleasure of seeing their essays allowed
of and relished by the rest of mankind.
I will not prepossess the reader with too great
expectation of the extraordinary advantages which
must redound to the public by these essays, when
the different thoughts and observations of all sorts
of persons, according to their quality, age, sex,
education, professions, humors, manners, and con-
ditions, etc. shall be set out by themselves in the
clearest and most genuine light, and as they
themselves would wish to have them appear to
the world.

The thesis proposed for the present exercise of the adventurers to write Spectators is Money; on which subject all persons are desired to send in their thoughts within ten days after the date hereof.-T.

No. 443.] TUESDAY, JULY 29, 1712.
Sublatum ex oculis quærimus invidi.-HOR. 3 Od. xxiv. 32
Snatch'd from our sight, we eagerly pursue,
And fondly would recall her to our view.

CAMILLA TO THE SPECTATOR.

MR. SPECTAOR,

The wo

Venice, July 10, N. S. "I TAKE it extremely ill, that you do not reckon conspicuous persons of your nation are within your cognizance, though out of the dominions of Great Britain. I little thought, in the green years of my life, that I should ever call it a happiness to be out of dear England; but as I grew to woman, I found myself less acceptable in proportion to the increase of my merit. Their ears in Italy are so differently formed from the make of yours in England, that I never come upon the stage, but a general satisfaction appears in every counteI think the best way of promoting this gene-nance of the whole people. When I dwell upon rous and useful design will be by giving out sub- a note, I behold all the men accompanying me jects or themes of all kinds whatsoever, on which with heads inclining, and falling of their persons (with a preamble of the extraordinary benefit and on one side, as dying away with me. advantage that may accrue thereby to the public) men too do justice to my merit, and no ill-naI will invite all manner of persons, whether tured worthless creature cries, The vain thing,' scholars, citizens, courtiers, gentlemen of the when I am wrapt up in the performance of my town or country, and all beaus, rakes, smarts, part, and sensibly touched with the effect my prudes, coquettes, housewives, and all sorts of voice has upon all who hear me. I live here diswits, whether male or female, and however distinguished as one whom nature has been liberal to tinguished, whether they be true wits, whole or in a graceful person, and exalted mien, and heavenhalf wits, or whether arch, dry, natural, acquired, genuine, or depraved wits; and persons of all sorts of tempers and complexions, whether the severe, the delightful, the impertinent, the agreeable, the thoughtful, busy or careless, the serene or cloudy, jovial or melancholy, untowardly or easy, the cold, temperate, or sanguine; and of what manners or dispositions soever, whether the ambitious or humble-minded, the proud or pitiful, ingenuous or base-minded, good or ill-natured, public-spirited or selfish; and under what fortune or circumstance soever, whether the contented or miserable, happy or unfortunate, high or low, rich or poor (whether so through want of money, or desire of more), healthy or sickly, married or single; nay, whether tall or short, fat or lean; and of what trade, occupation, profession, station, country, faction, party, persuasion, quality, age, or condition soever: who have ever made thinking a part of their business or diversion, and have anything worthy to impart on these subjects to the world according to their several and respective talents or geniuses; and, as the subjects given out hit their tempers, humors, or circumstances, or may be made profitable to the public by their particular knowledge or experience in the matter proposed, to do their utmost on them by such a tíme,

ly voice. These particularities, in this strange country, are arguments for respect and generosity to her who is possessed of them. The Italians see a thousand beauties I am sensible I have no pretense to, and abundantly make up to me the injustice I received in my own country, of disallowing me what I really had. The humor of hissing, which you have among you, I do not know anything of; and their applauses are uttered in sighs, and bearing a part at the cadences of voice with the persons who are performing. I am often put in mind of those complaisant lines of my own countryman,+ when he is calling all his faculties together to hear Arabella.

of

Let all be hush'd, each softest motion cease,
Be ev'ry loud tumultuous thought at peace;
And ev'ry ruder gasp of breath,

Be calm as in the arms of death:
And thou, most fickle, most uneasy part,
Thou restless wanderer, my heart,
Be still; gently, ah! gently leave
Thou busy, idle thing, to heave:
Stir not a pulse; and let my blood,
That turbulent, unruly flood,

Be softly staid;

Let me be all, but my attention, dead.

Mrs. Tofts, who played the part of Camilla in the opera

that name.

† Mr. Congreve.

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The whole city of Venice is as still when I am singing as this polite hearer was to Mrs. Hunt. But when they break that silence, did you know the pleasure I am in, when every man utters his applause by calling me aloud. The dear crea ture! The angel! The Venus! What attitude she moves with-Hush, she sings again!' We have no boisterous wits who dare disturb an audience, and break the public peace merely to show they dare. Mr. Spectator, I write this to you thus in haste, to tell you I am so very much at ease here, that I know nothing but joy; and I will not return, but leave you in England to hiss all merit of your owr growth off the stage. I know, Sir, you were always my admirer, and therefore I am yours,

CAMILLA."

"P. S. I am ten times better dressed than ever I was in England."

"MR. SPECTATOR,

"The project in yours of the 11th instant, of furthering the correspondence and knowledge of that considerable part of mankind, the trading world, cannot but be highly commendable. Good lectures to young traders may have very good effects on their conduct: but beware you propagate no false notions of trade: let none of your corre

spondents impose on the world by putting forth base methods in a good light, and glazing them over with improper terms. I would have no means of profit set for copies to others, but such as are laudable in themselves. Let not noise be called industry, nor impudence courage. Let not good fortune be imposed on the world for good management, nor poverty be called folly; impute not always bankruptcy to extravagance, nor an estate to foresight. Niggardliness is not good husbandry, nor generosity profusion.

"Honestus is a well-meaning and judicious trader, hath substantial goods, and trades with his own stock, husbands his money to the best advantage, without taking all the advantages of the necessities of his workmen, or grinding the face of the poor. Fortunatus is stocked with ignorance, and consequently with self-opinion; the quality of his goods cannot but be suitable to that of his judgment. Honestus pleases discerning people, and keeps their custom by good usage; nakes modest profit by modest means, to the decent support of his family; while Fortunatus, blustering always, pushes on, promising much and performing little; with obsequiousness offensive to people of sense, strikes at all, catches much the greater part, and raises a considerable fortune by imposition on others, to the discouragement and ruin of those who trade in the same way. "I give here but loose hints, and beg you to be very circumspect in the province you have now undertaken : if you perform it successfully, it will be a very great good; for nothing is more wanting than that mechanic industry were set forth with the freedom and greatness of mind which ought always to accompany a man of a liberal education. Your humble Servant,

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once for all, to let these gentlemen know, that there is neither mirth nor good-humor in hooting a young fellow out of countenance; nor that it will ever constitute a wit, to conclude a tart piece of buffoonery with a What makes you blush?' Pray please to inform them again, that to speak what they know is shocking proceeds from illnature and a sterility of brain; especially when the subject will not admit of raillery, and their discourse has no pretension to satire but what is in their design to disoblige. I should be very glad, too, if you would take notice, that a daily repetition of the same overbearing insolence is yet more insupportable, and a confirmation of very extraordinary dullness. The sudden publication of this may have an effect upon a notorious of fender of this kind, whose reformation would redound very much to the satisfaction and quiet of Your most humble Servant, "F. B."

T.

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forming the world by my speculations, when I Ir gives me much despair in the design of refind there always arise, from one generation to another, successive cheats and bubbles, as naturally as beasts of prey, and those which are to be their food. There is hardly a man in the world, one would think, so ignorant, as not to know that the ordinary quack doctors who publish their great abilities in little brown billets, distributed to all who pass by, are to a man impostors and murderers; yet such is the credulity of the vulgar, affair still goes on, and new promises, of what and the impudence of those professors, that the was never done before, are made every day. What aggravates the jest is, that even this promise has been made as long as the memory of man can trace it, yet nothing performed, and yet still prevails. As I was passing along to-day, a paper tells us as follows what good news is come to given into my hand, by a fellow without a nose, town, to wit, that there is now a certain cure fot the French disease, by a gentleman just come from

his travels.

"In Russel-court, over-against the Cannon-ball, from his travels, a surgeon who hath practiced at the Surgeon's-arms in Drury-lane, is lately come surgery and physic both by sea and land, these yellow-jaundice, green-sickness, scurvy, dropsy, He (by the blessing) cures the twenty-four years. surfeits, long sea-voyages, campaigns, and women's miscarriages, lying in, etc., as some people that has been lame these thirty years can testify; in short, he cureth all diseases incident to men, women, cr children."

this havoc of the human species, which is made If a man could be so indolent as to look upon by vice and ignorance, it would be a good ridicu lous work to comment upon the declaration of this countably taking among the vulgar in those who accomplished traveler. There is something unaccome from a great way off. Ignorant people of quality, as many there are of such, dote excessively this way; many instances of which every man will suggest to himself, without any enumer ation of them. The ignorants of lower order, who cannot, like the upper ones, be profuse of their

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money to those recommended by coming from a distance, are no less complaisant than the others, for they venture their lives from the same admiration.

"The doctor is lately come from his travels," and has "practiced both by sea and land," and therefore cures "the green-sickness, long sea-voyages, campaigns, and lying-in." Both by sea and land! I will not answer for the distempers called sea-voyages and campaigns; but I dare say those of green-sickness and lying-in might be as well taken care of if the doctor staid ashore. But the art of managing mankind is only to make them stare a little, to keep up their astonishment, to let nothing be familiar to them, but ever to have something in their sleeve, in which they must think you are deeper than they are. There is an ingenious fellow, a barber of my acquaintance, who, beside his broken fiddle and a dried seamonster, has a twine-cord, strained with two nails at each end, over his window, and the words "rainy, dry, wet," and so forth, written to denote the weather, according to the rising or falling of the cord. We very great scholars are not apt to wonder at this: but I observed a very honest fellow, a chance customer, who sat in the chair

twelve, and from two till six, he attends, for the good of the public, to bleed for threepence."-T

No. 445] THURSDAY, JUI 7 31, 1712. Tanti non es, ais. Sapis, Luperce.-MART. Epig. i, 118. You say, Lupercus, what I write

I'n't worth so much: you're in the right.

THIS is the day on which many eminent authors
will probably publish their last words. I am
afraid that few of our weekly historians, who are
men that above all others delight in war, will be
able to subsist under the weight of a stamp, aud
an approaching peace. A sheet of blank paper
that must have this new imprimatur clapped upon
it, before it is qualified to communicate anything
to the public, will make its way in the world but
very heavily. In short, the necessity of carrying
bloody battle, will, I am afraid, both concur to the
a stamp, and the improbability of notifying a
sinking of those thin folios, which have every
other day retailed to us the history of Europe for
several years last past. A facetious friend of
mine, who loves a pun, calls this present mortality
among the authors, "The fall of the leaf."
I remember, upon Mr. Baxter's death, there was
published a sheet of very good sayings, inscribed,
The last words of Mr. Baxter." The title sold
week after there came out a second sheet, inscribed,
so great a number of these papers, that about a

66 More last words of Mr. Baxter." In the same
manner, I have reason to think that several inge-
nious writers, who have taken their leave of the
public in farewell papers, will not give over so,
but intend to appear again, though perhaps under
another form, and with a different title. Be that
as it will, it is my business, in this place, to give
an account of my own intentions, and to acquaint
my reader with the motives by which I act, in this
great crisis of the republic of letters.
whether I should throw up my pen, as an author
I have been long debating in my own heart,
that is cashiered by the act of parliament which
is to operate within this four-and-twenty hours, or
whether I should still persist in laying my specu-
lations, from day to day, before the public. The
argument which prevails with me most on the first
side of the question is, that I am informed by my
bookseller he must raise the price of every single
paper to two-pence, or that he shall not be able to
pay the duty of it. Now, as I am very desirous
my readers should have their learning as cheap as
possible, it is with great difficulty that I comply
with him in this particular.

before me to be shaved, fix his eye upon this miraculous performance during the operation upon his chin and face. When those and his head also were cleared of all incumbrances and excrescences, he looked at the fish, then at the fiddle, still grubbing in his pockets, and casting his eye again at the twine, and the words written on each side; then altered his mind as to farthings, and gave my friend a silver sixpence. The business, as I said, is to keep up the amazement; and if my friend had had only the skeleton and kit, he must have been contented with a less payment. But the doctor we were talking of adds to his long voy ages the testimony of some people "that has been thirty years lame." When I received my paper, a sagacious fellow took one at the same time, and read till he came to the thirty years' confinement of his friends, and went off very well convinced of the doctor's sufficiency. You have many of those prodigious persons, who have had some extraordinary accident at their birth, or a great disaster in some part of their lives. Anything, however foreign from the business the people want of you, will convince them of your ability in that you profess. There is a doctor in Mouse-alley, near Wapping, who sets up for curing cataracts, upon the credit of having, as his bill sets forth, lost an eye in the emperor's service. His patients come in upon this, and he shows the muster-roll, which confirms that he was in his imperial majesty's troops; and he puts out their eyes with great success. Who would believe that a man should be a doctor for the cure of bursten children, by declaring that his father and grandfather were both bursten? But Charles Ingolston, next door to the Harp, in Barbican, has made a pretty penny by that asseveration. The generality go upon their first conception, and think no further; all the rest is granted. They take it, that there is something uncommon in you, and give you credit for the rest. You may be sure it is upon that I go, when sometimes, let it be to the purpose or not, I keep a Latin sentence in my front; and I was not a little pleased, when I observed one of my readers say, casting his eye upon my twentieth paper, "More Latin still? What a prodigious scholar is this man!" But as I have here taken much liberty with this and every single half sheet paid a halfpenny to the queen. Aug. 1, 1712, the stamp-duty here alluded to took place, learned doctor, I must make up all I have said by "Have you seen the red stamp? Methinks the stamping is repeating what he seems to be in earnest in, and worth a halfpenny. The Observator is fallen; the Medleys honestly to promise to those who will not receive deadly sick. The Spectator keeps up, and doubles its price." are jumbled together with the Flying-Post; the Examiner is him as a great man-to wit, "that from eight to-Swift's Works, cr. 8vo. vol. xix, p. 173.

the balance, I find that those who plead for the
However, upon laying my reasons together in
continuance of this work have much the greater
weight. For, in the first place, in recompense for
the expense to which this will put my readers, it
is to be hoped they may receive from every paper
so much instruction as will be a very good equiv
alent. And, in order to this, I would not advise
any one to take it in, who, after the perusal of it,
does not find himself two-pence the wiser, or the
better man for it, or who, upon examination, does
mirth or instruction for his money.
not believe that he has had two-pennyworth of

But I must confess there is another motive

which prevails with me more than the former. I

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