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No. 446.] FRIDAY, AUGUST 1, 1712.
Quid deceat, quid non; quo virtus, quo ferat error.
HOR. Ars. Poet. ver. 308.

consider that the tax on paper was given for the| support of the government; and as I have enemies who are apt to pervert everything I do or say, I fear they would ascribe the laying down my paper on such an occasion, to a spirit of malcontentedWhat fit, what not; what excellent, or ill.-RoSCOMMON. ness, which I am resolved none shall ever justly SINCE two or three writers of comedy, who are upbraid me with. No, I shall glory in contributing now living, have taken their farewell of the stage, my utmost to the public weal; and, if my country those who succeed them, finding themselves incareceives five or six pounds a day by my labors, Ipable of rising up to their wit, humor, and good shall be very well pleased to find myself so useful

a member.

It is a received maxim, that no honest man should enrich himself by methods that are prejudicial to the community in which he lives; and by the same rule I think we may pronounce the person to deserve very well of his countrymen, whose labors bring more into the public coffers than into his own pocket.

Since I have mentioned the word enemies, I must explain myself so far as to acquaint my reader, that I mean only the insignificant party zealots on both sides; men of such poor, narrow souls, that they are not capable of thinking on anything but with an eye to whig or tory. During the course of this paper I have been accused by these despicable wretches of trimming, time-serving, personal reflection, secret satire, and the like. Now, though, in these my compositions, it is visible to any reader of common sense, that I consider nothing but my subject, which is always of an indifferent nature, how is it possible for me to write so clear of party, as not to lie open to the censures of those who will be applying every sentence, and finding out persons and things in it, which it has no regard to?

Several paltry scribblers and declaimers have done me the honor to be dull upon me in reflections of this nature; but, notwithstanding my name has been sometimes traduced by this contemptible tribe of men, I have hitherto avoided all animadversions upon them. The truth of it is, I am afraid of making them appear considerable by taking notice of them; for they are like those imperceptible insects which are discovered by the microscope, and cannot be made the subject of observation without being magnified.

Having mentioned those few who have shown themselves the enemies of this paper, I should be very ungrateful to the public did I not at the same time testify my gratitude to those who are its friends, in which number I may reckon many of the most distinguished persons, of all conditions, parties, and professions, in the isle of Great Britain. I am not so vain as to think this approbation is so much due to the performance as to the design. There is, and ever will be, justice enough in the world to afford patronage and protection for those who endeavor to advance truth and virtue, without regard to the passions and prejudices of any particular cause or faction. If I have any other merit in me, it is that I have new pointed all the batteries of ridicule. They have been generally planted against persons who have appeared serious rather than absurd; or at best, have aimed rather at what is unfashionable than what is vicious. For my own part, I have endeavored to make nothing ridiculous that is not in some measure criminal. I have set up the immoral man as the object of derision. In short, if I have not formed a new weapon against vice and irreligion, I have at least shown how that weapon may be put to a right use, which has so often fought the battles of impiety and profaneness.-C.

sense, have only imitated them in some of those loose unguarded strokes, in which they complied with the corrupt taste of the more vicious part of their audience. When persons of a low genius attempt this kind of writing, they know no differ ence between being merry and being lewd. It is with an eye to some of these degenerate compositions that I have written the following discourse. Were our English stage but half so virtuous as that of the Greeks or Romans, we should quickly see the influence of it in the behavior of all the politer part of mankind. It would not be fashionable to ridicule religion, or its professors: the man of pleasure would not be the complete gentleman; vanity would be out of countenance; and every quality which is ornamental to human nature would meet with that esteem which is due to it.

If the English stage were under the same regulations the Athenian was formerly, it would have the same effect that had, in recommending the religion, the government, and public worship, of its country. Were our plays subject to proper inspections and limitations, we might not only pass away several of our vacant hours in the highest entertainments, but should always rise from them wiser and better than we sat down to them.

It is one of the most unaccountable things in our age, that the lewdness of our theater should be so much complained of, so well exposed, and so little redressed. It is to be hoped, that some time or other we may be at leisure to restrain the licentiousness of the theater, and make it contribute its assistance to the advancement of morality, and to the reformation of the age. As matters stand at present, multitudes are shut out from this noble diversion, by reason of those abuses and corruptions that accompany it. A father is often afraid that his daughter should be ruined by those entertainments which were invented for the accomplishment and refining of human nature. The Athenian and Roman plays were written with such a regard to morality, that Socrates used to frequent the one, and Cicero the other.

It happened once, indeed, that Cato dropped into the Roman theater when the Floralia were to be represented; and as, in that performance, which was a kind of religious ceremony, there were several indecent parts to be acted, the people refused to see them while Cato was present. Martial, on this hint, made the following epigram which we must suppose was applied to some grave friend of his, that had been accidentally present at some such entertainment:

Nosses jocosa dulce cum sacrum Floræ,
Festosque lusus, et licentiam vulgi,
Cur in theatrum, Cato severe, venisti?
An ideo tantum veneras, ut exires?-1 Epig. 3.
Why dost thou come, great censor of thy age,
To see the loose diversions of the stage?
With awful countenance, and brow severe,
What in the name of goodness dost thou here?
See the mix'd crowd! how giddy, lewd, and vain!
Didst thou come in but to go out again?

An accident of this nature might happen once in an age among the Greeks or Romans, but they were too wise and good to let the constant nightly entertainment be of such a nature, that people of

the most sense and virtue could not be at it. in the mouths of the vulgar, that "custom is Whatever vices are represented upon the stage, they ought to be so marked and branded by the poet, as not to appear either laudable or amiable in the person who is tainted with them. But if we look into the English comedies above-mentioned, we would think they were formed upon a quite contrary maxim, and that this rule, though it held good upon the heathen stage, was not to be regarded in Christian theaters. There is another rule, likewise, which was observed by authors of antiquity, and which these modern geniuses have no regard to, and that was, never to choose an improper subject for ridicule. Now, a subject is improper for ridicule, if it is apt to stir up horror and commiseration rather than laughter. For this reason, we do not find any comedy, in so polite an author as Terence, raised upon the violations of the marriage-bed. The falsehood of the wife or husband has given occasion to noble tragedies; but a Scipio or a Lælius would not have looked upon incest or murder to have been as proper subjects for comedy. On the contrary, cuckoldom is the basis of most of our modern plays. If an alderman appears upon the stage, you may be sure it is in order to be cuckolded. A husband that is a little grave, or elderly, generally meets with the same fate. Knights and baronets, country 'squires, and justices of the quorum, come up to town for no other purpose. I have seen poor Dogget cuckolded in all these capacities. In short, our English writers are as frequently severe upon this innocent, unhappy creature, commonly known by the name of a cuckold, as the ancient comic writers were upon an eating parasite, or vain-glorious soldier.

second nature." It is indeed able to form the man anew, and to give him inclinations and capac ities altogether different from those he was born with. Dr. Plot, in his History of Staffordshire, tells us of an idiot, that chancing to live within the sound of a clock, and always amusing himself with counting the hour of the day whenever the clock struck, the clock being spoiled by some accident, the idiot continued to strike and count the hour without the help of it, in the same manner as he had done when it was entire. Though I dare not vouch for the truth of this story, it is very certain that custom has a mechanical effect upon the body, at the same time that it has a very extraordinary influence upon the mind.

At the same time, the poet so contrives matters that the two criminals are the favorites of the audience. We sit still, and wish well to them through the whole play, are pleased when they meet with proper opportunities, and out of humor when they are disappointed. The truth of it is, the accomplished gentleman upon the English stage, is the person that is familiar with other men's wives, and indifferent to his own; as the Sine woman is generally a composition of sprightliness and falsehood. I do not know whether it proceeds from barrenness of invention, depravation of manners, or ignorance of mankind, but I have often wondered that our ordinary poets cannot frame to themselves the idea of a fine man who is not a whoremaster, or of a fine woman that is not a jilt.

I have sometimes thought of compiling a system of ethics out of the writings of those corrupt poets, under the title of Stage Morality. But I have been diverted from this thought by a project which has been executed by an ingenious gentleman of my acquaintance. He has composed, it seems, the history of a young fellow who has taken all his notions of the world from the stage, and who has directed himself in every circumstance of his life and conversation, by the maxims and examples of the fine gentleman in English comedies. If I can prevail upon him to give me a copy of this newfashioned novel, I will bestow on it a place in my works, and question not but it may have as good an effect upon the drama, as Don Quixote had upon romance.-C.

No. 447. SATURDAY, AUGUST 2, 1712.
Long exercise, my friend, inures the mind:
And what we once dislik'd we pleasing find.
THERE is not a common saying which has a
better turn of sense in it, than what we often hear

I shall, in this paper, consider one very remarkable effect which custom has upon human nature, and which, if rightly observed, may lead us into very useful rules of life. What I shall here take notice of in custom, is its wonderful efficacy in making everything pleasant to us. A person who is addicted to play or gaming, though he took but little delight in it at first, by degrees contracts so strong an inclination toward it, and gives himself up so entirely to it, that it seems the only end of his being. The love of a retired or busy life will grow upon a man insensibly, as he is conversant in the one or the other, till he is utterly unqualified for relishing that to which he has been for some time disused. Nay, a man may smoke, or drink, or take snuff, till he is unable to pass away his time without it; not to mention how our delight in any particular study, art, or science, rises and improves, in proportion to the application which we bestow upon it. Thus, what was at first an exercise, becomes at length an entertainment. Our employments are changed into our diversions. The mind grows fond of those actions she is accustomed to, and is drawn with reluctancy from those paths in which she has been used to walk.

Not only such actions as were at first indifferent to us, but even such as were painful, will by custom and practice become pleasant. Sir Francis Bacon observes, in his Natural Philosophy, that our taste is never pleased better than with those things which at first created a disgust in it. He gives particular instances, of claret, coffee, and other liquors, which the palate seldom approves upon the first taste, but, when it has once got a relish of them, generally retains it for life. The mind is constituted after the same manner, and after having habituated herself to any particular exercise or employment, not only loses her first aversion toward it, but conceives a certain fondness and affection for it. I have heard one of the greatest geniuses this age has produced, who had been trained up in all the polite studies of antiquity, assure me, upon his being obliged to search into several rolls and records, that notwithstanding such an employment was at first very dry and irksome to him, he at last took an incredible pleasure in it, and preferred it even to the reading of Virgil or Cicero. The reader will observe, that I have not here considered custom as it makes things easy, but as it renders them delightful; and though. others have often made the same reflections, it is possible they may not have drawn those uses from it, with which I intend to fill the remaining part. of this paper.

If we consider attentively this property of human nature, it may instruct us in very fine moralities.. In the first place, I would have no man discouraged with that kind of life, or series of action, im

* Dr. Atterbury.

which the choice of others, or his own necessities, may have engaged him. It may perhaps be very disagreeable to him at first; but use and application will certainly render it not only less painful, but pleasing and satisfactory.

In the second place, I would recommend to every one that admirable precept which Pythagoras is said to have given to his disciples, and which that philosopher must have drawn the observation I have enlarged upou, Optimum vitæ genus eligito, nam consuetudo faciet jucundissimum: "Pitch upon that course of life which is the most excellent, and custom will render it the most delightful." Men whose circumstances will permit them to choose their own way of life, are inexcusable if they do not pursue that which their judgment tells them is the most laudable. The voice of reason is more to be regarded than the bent of any present inclination, since, by the rule above-mentioned, inclination will at length come over to reason, though we can never force reason to comply with inclination.

In the third place, this observation may teach the most sensual and irreligious man to overlook those hardships and difficulties which are apt to discourage him from the prosecution of a virtuous life. The gods,” said Hesiod, have placed labor before virtue; the way to her is at first rough and difficult, but grows more smooth and easy the further you advance in it." The man who proceeds in it with steadiness and resolution, will, in a little time, find that "her ways are ways of pleasantness, and that all her paths are peace."

To enforce this consideration, we may further observe, that the practice of religion will not only be attended with that pleasure which naturally accompanies those actions to which we are habituated, but with those supernumerary joys of heart that rise from the consciousness of such a pleasure, from the satisfaction of acting up to the dictates of reason, and from the prospect of a happy immortality.

In the fourth place, we may learn from this observation which we have made onethe mind of man, to take particular care when we are once settled in a regular course of life, how we too frequently indulge ourselves in any of the most innocent diversions and entertainments; since the mind may insensibly fall off from the relish of virtuous actions, and, by degrees, exchange that pleasure which it takes in the performance of its auty, for delights of a much more inferior and unprofitable nature.

The last use which I shall make of this remarkable property in human nature, of being delighted with those actions to which it is accustomed, is to show how absolutely necessary it is for us to gain habits of virtue in this life, if we would enjoy the pleasures of the next. The state of bliss we call heaven will not be capable of affecting those minds which are not thus qualified for it; we must, in this world, gain a relish of truth and virtue, if we would be able to taste that knowledge and perfection, which are to make us happy in the next. The seeds of those spiritual joys and raptures, which are to rise up and flourish in the soul to all eternity, must be planted in her during this her present state of probation. In short, heaven is not to be looked upon only as the reward, but as the natural effect of a religious life.

On the other hand, those evil spirits, who, by long custom, have contracted in the body habits of lust and sensuality, malice and revenge, and aversion to everything that is good, just, or laudable, are naturally seasoned and prepared for pain and misery. Their torments have already taken root in them; they cannot be happy when divested of the

body, unless we may suppose that Providence will in a manner create them anew, and work a miracle in the rectification of their faculties. They may, indeed, taste a kind of malignant pleasure in those actions to which they are accustomed, while in this life; but when they are removed from all those objects which are here apt to gratify them, they will naturally become their own tormentors, and cherish in themselves those painful habits of mind which are called, in Scripture phrase, “the worm which never dies." This notion of heaven and hell is so very conformable to the light of nature, that it was discovered by several of the most exalted heathens. It has been finely improved by many eminent divines of the last age, as in particular by Archbishop Tillotson and Dr. Sherlock: but there is none who has raised such noble speculations upon it as Dr. Scott, in the first book of his Christian Life, which is one of the finest and most rational schemes of divinity that is written in our tongue, or in any other. That excellent author has shown how every particular custom and habit of virtue will, in its own nature, produce the heaven, or a state of happiness, in him who shall hereafter practice it; as, on the contrary, how every custom or habit of vice will be the natural hell of him in whom it subsists.-C.

No. 448.] MONDAY, AUGUST 4, 1712. Foedius hoc aliquid quandoque audebis.-Juv. Sat. ii. 82. In time to greater baseness you proceed.

THE first steps toward ill are very carefully to be avoided, for men insensibly go on when they are once entered, and do not keep up a lively ab horrence of the least unworthiness. There is a certain frivolous falsehood that people indulge themselves in, which ought to be had in greater detestation than it commonly meets with. What I mean is a neglect of promises made on small and indifferent occasions, such as parties of pleasure, entertainments, and sometimes meetings out of curiosity, in men of like faculties, to be in each other's company. There are many causes to which one may assign this light infidelity. Jack Sippet never keeps the hour he has appointed to come to a friend's to dinner; but he is an insignificant fellow, who does it out of vanity. He could never, he knows, make any figure in company, but by giving a little disturbance at his entry, and therefore takes care to drop in when he thinks you are just seated. He takes his place after having discomposed everybody, and desires there may be no ceremony; then does he begin to call himself the saddest fellow, in disappointing so many places as he was invited to elsewhere. It is the fop's vanity to name houses of better cheer, and to acquaint you that he chose yours out of ten dinners which he was obliged to be at that day. The last time I had the fortune to eat with him, he was imagining how very fat he should have been, had he eaten all he had ever been invited to. But it is impertinent to dwell upon the manners of such a wretch as obliges all whom he disappoints, though his circumstances constrain the to be civil to him. But there are those that every one would be glad to see, who fall into the same de testable habit. It is a merciless thing that any one can be at ease, and suppose a set of people, who have a kindness for him, at that moment waiting out of respect to him, and refusing to taste their food or conversation with the utmost impatience One of these promisers sometimes shall make his excuses for not coming at all, so late that half the company have only to lament

that they have neglected matters of moment to meet him whom they find a trifler. They immediately repent of the value they had for him; and such treatment repeated, makes company never depend upon his promise any more; so that he often comes at the middle of a meal, where he is secretly slighted by the persons with whom he eats, and cursed by the servants, whose dinner is delayed by his prolonging their master's entertainment. It is wonderful that men guilty this way could never have observed, that the willing time, the gathering together, and waiting a little before dinner, is the most awkwardly passed away of any part of the four-and-twenty hours. If they did think at all, they would reflect upon their guilt, in lengthening such a suspension of agreeaEle life. The constant offending in this way has, in a degree, an effect upon the honesty of his mind who is guilty of it, as common swearing is a kind of habitual perjury. It makes the soul inattentive to what an oath is, even while it utters it at the lips. Phocion beholding a wordy orator, while he was making a magnificent speech to the people, full of vain promises: Methinks," said he, "I am now fixing my eyes upon a cypress tree; it has all the pomp and beauty imaginable in its branches, leaves, and height; but, alas! it bears no fruit."

breach of a man's integrity are much more im portant than men are aware of. The man who scruples not breaking his word in little things, would not suffer in his own conscience so great pain for failures of consequence, as he who thinks every little offense against truth and justice a disparagement. We should not make anything we ourselves disapprove habitual to us, if we would be sure of our integrity.

I remember a falsehood of the trivial sort, though not in relation to assignations, that exposed a man to a very uneasy adventure. Will Trap and Jack Stint were chamber-fellows in the Inner Temple about twenty-five years ago. They one night sat in the pit together at a comedy, where they both observed and liked the same young woman in the boxes. Their kindness for her entered both hearts deeper than they imagined. Stint had a good faculty at writing letters of love, and made his addresses privately that way; while Trap proceeded in the ordinary course, by money and her waiting-maid. The lady gave them both encouragement, receiving Trap into the utmost favor, and answering at the same time Stint's letters, and giving him appointments at third places. Trap began to suspect the epistolary correspondence of his friend, and discovered also that Stint opened all his letters which came to their common Though the expectation which is raised by im- lodgings, in order to form his own assignations. pertinent promisers is thus barren, their confidence, After much anxiety and restlessness, Trap came even after failures, is so great, that they subsist to a resolution which he thought would break off by still promising on. I have heretofore dis- their commerce with one another without any coursed of the insignificant liar, the boaster, and hazardous explanation. He therefore wrote a letthe castle-builder, and treated them as no ill-ter in a feigned hand to Mr. Trap at his chambers designing men (though they are to be placed among the frivolously false ones), but persons who fall into that way purely to recommend themselves by their vivacities; but indeed I cannot let heedless promisers, though in the most minute circumstances, pass with so slight a censure. If a man should take a resolution to pay only sums above a hundred pounds, and yet contract with different people debts of five and ten, how long can we suppose he will keep his credit? This man will as long support his good name in business, as he will in conversation, who without difficulty makes assignations which he is indifferent whether he keeps or not.

I am the more severe upon this vice, because I have been so unfortunate as to be a very great criminal myself. Sir Andrew Freeport, and all other my friends who are scrupulous to promises of the meanest consideration imaginable, from a habit of virtue that way, have often upbraided me with it. I take shame upon myself for this crime, and more particularly for the greatest I ever committed of the sort, that when as agreeable a company of gentlemen and ladies as ever were got together, and I forsooth, Mr. Spectator, to be of the party with women of merit, like a booby as I was, mistook the time of meeting, and came the night following. I wish every fool who is negligeat in this kind may have as great a loss as I had in this; for the same company will never meet more, but are dispersed into various parts of the world, and I am left under the compunction that I deserve, in so many different places to be called a trifler.

This fault is sometimes to be accounted for, when desirable people are fearful of appearing precise and reserved by deniais; but they will find the apprehension of that imputation will betray them into a childish impotence of mind, and make them promise all who are so kind to ask it of them. This leads such soft creatures into the misfortune of seeming to return overtures of good will with ingratitude. The first steps in the

in the Temple. Stint, according to custom, seized and opened it, and was not a little surprised to find the inside directed to himself, when with great perturbation of spirit he read as follows:MR. STINT,

At the

"You have gained a slight satisfaction at the expense of doing a very heinous crime. price of a faithful friend you have obtained an inconstant mistress. I rejoice in this expedient I have thought of to break my mind to you, and tell you you are a base fellow, by a means which does not expose you to the affront except you deserve it. I know, Sir, as criminal as you are, you have still shame enough to avenge yourself against the hardiness of any one that should publicly tell you of it. 1, therefore, who have received so many secret hurts from you, shall take satisfaction with safety to myself. I call you base, and you must bear it, or acknowledge it; I triumph over you that you cannot come at nie; nor do I think it dishonorable to come in armor to assault him, who was in ambuscade when he wounded me.

"What need more be said to convince you of being guilty of the basest practice imaginable, than that it is such as has made you liable to be treated after this manner, while you yourself cannot in your own conscience but allow the justice of the upbraidings of

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"Your injured friend,
"RALPH TRAP."

No. 449.] TUESDAY, AUGUST 5, 1712. -Tibi scriptus, matrona, libellus.-MART. iii. 68. A book the chastest matron may peruse. WHEN I reflect upon my labors for the public, I cannot but observe, that part of the species, of which I profess myself a friend and guardian, is sometimes treated with severity; that is, there are in my writings many descriptions given of ill persons, and not yet any direct encomium made

on those who are good. When I was convinced man's pains, whose welfare depends upon my of this error, I could not but immediately call to assiduity about him, that I willingly exclude the mind several of the fair sex of my acquaintance, loose gratifications of passion for the solid reflecwhose characters deserve to be transmitted to pos-tions of duty. I know not whether any man's terity in writings which will long outlive mine. wife would be allowed, and (what I still more But I do not think that a reason why I should not fear) I know not whether I, a wife, should be give them their place in my diurnal as long as it willing to be as officious as I am at present about will last. For the service therefore of my female my parent." The happy father has her declarareaders, I shall single out some characters of tion that she will not marry during his life, and maids, wives and widows, which deserve the im- the pleasure of seeing that resolution not uneasy itation of the sex. She who shall lead this small to her. Were one to paint filial affection in its illustrious number of heroines shall be the amiable utmost beauty, he could not have a more lively Fidelia. idea of it than in beholding Fidelia serving her father at his hours of rising, meals, and rest.

Before I enter upon the particular parts of her character, it is necessary to preface, that she is the only child of a decrepid father, whose life is bound up in hers. This gentleman has used Fidelia from her cradle with all the tenderness imaginable, and has viewed her growing perfections with the partiality of a parent, that soon thought her accomplished above the children of all other men, but never thought she was come to the utmost improvement of which she herself was capable. This fondness has had very happy effects upon his own happiness; for she reads, she dances, she sings, uses her spinet and lute to the utmost perfection; and the lady's use of all these excellencies is to divert the old man in his easy chair, when he is out of the pangs of a chronical distemper. Fidelia is now in the twenty-third year of her age; but the application of many lovers, her vigorous time of life, her quick sense of all that is truly gallant and elegant in the enjoyment of a plentiful fortune, are not able to draw her from the side of her good old father. Certain it is, that there is no kind of affection so pure and angelic as that of a father to a daughter. He beholds her both with and without regard to her sex. In love to our wives there is desire, to our sons there is ambition; but in that to our daughters there is something which there are no words to express. Her life is designed wholly domestic, and she is so ready a friend and companion, that everything that passes about a man is accompanied with the idea of her presence. Her sex also is naturally so much exposed to hazard, both as to fortune and innocence, that there is perhaps a new cause of fondness arising from that consideration also. None but fathers can have a true sense of these sort of pleasures and sensations; but my familiarity with the father of Fidelia makes me fet drop the words which I have heard him speak, and observe upon

his tenderness toward her.

Fidelia, on her part, as I was going to say, as accomplished as she is, with all her beauty, wit, air, and mien, employs her whole time in care and attendance upon her father. How have I been charmed to see one of the most beauteous women the age has produced, on her knees, helping on an old man's slipper! Her filial regard to him is what she makes her diversion, her business, and her glory. When she was asked by a friend of her deceased mother, to admit of the courtship of her son, she answered that she had a great respect and gratitude to her for the overture in behalf of one so near to her, but that during her father's life she would admit into her heart no value for anything that should interfere with her endeavor to make his remains of life as happy and easy as could be expected in his circumstances. The lady admonished her of the prime of life with a smile; which Fidelia answered with a frankness that always attends unfeigned virtue: "It is true, Madam, there are to be sure very great satisfactions to be expected in the commerce of a man of honor, whom one tenderly loves; but I find so much satisfaction in the reflection how much I mitigate a good

When the general crowd of female youth are consulting their glasses, preparing for bails, assemblies, or plays; for a young lady who could be regarded among the foremost in those places, either for her person, wit, fortune or conversation, and yet contemn all these entertainments, to sweeten the heavy hours of a decrepid parent, is a resignation truly heroic. Fidelia performs the duty of a nurse with all the beauty of a bride; nor does she neglect her person, because of her attendance on him, when he is too ill to receive company, to whom she may make an appearance.

Fidelia, who gives him up her youth, does not think it any great sacrifice to add to it the spoiling of her dress. Her care and exactness in her habit convinces her father of the alacrity of her mind; and she has of all women the best foundation for affecting the praise of a seeming negli gence. What adds to the entertainment of the good old man is, that Fidelia, where merit and fortune cannot be overlooked by epistolary lovers, reads over the accounts of her conquests, plays on her spinet the gayest airs (and, while she is doing so, you would think her formed only for gallantry) to intimate to him the pleasures she despises for his sake.

Those who think themselves the patterns of good-breeding and gallantry would be astonished to hear that, in those intervals when the old gentleman is at ease, and can bear company, there are at his house, in the most regular order, assem blies of people of the highest merit; where there is conversation without mention of the faults of the absent, benevolence between men and women without passion, and the highest subjects of morality treated of as natural and accidental discourse; all of which is owing to the genius of Fidelia, who at once makes her father's way to another world easy, and herself capable of being an honor to his name in this.

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"I was the other day at the Bear-garden, in hopes to have seen your short face; but not being so fortunate, I must tell you by way of letter, that there is a mystery among the gladiators which has escaped your spectatorial penetration. For, being in a box at an alehouse near the renowned seat of honor above-mentioned, I overheard two masters of the science agreeing to quarrel on the next opportunity. This was to happen in the company of a set of the fraternity of basket-hilts, who were to meet that evening. When this was settled, one asked the other, Will you give cuta or receive?' The other answered, Receive.' It was replied, 'Are you a passionate man? No, provided you cut no more, nor no deeper than we agree. I thought it my duty to acquaint you with this, that the people may not pay their money for fighting, and be cheated.

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Your humble Servant, "SCABBARD RUSTY.'

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