Yes, you eat and drink, and run about upon it, that is, you enjoy it as a brute; but to enjoy it as a rational being, is to know it, to be sensible of its greatness and beauty, to be delighted with its harmony, and by these reflections to obtain just sentiments of the Almighty mind that framed it.

The man who, unembarrassed with vulgar cares, leisurely attends to the flux of things in heaven, and things on earth, and observes the laws by which they are governed, hath secured to himself an easy and convenient seat, where he beholds with pleasure all that passes on the stage of nature, while those about him are, some fast asleep, and others struggling for the highest places, or turning their eyes from the entertainment prepared by Providence, to play at push pin with one another.

Within this ample circumference of the world, the glorious lights that are hung on high, the meteors in the middle region, the various livery of the earth, and the profusion of good things that distinguish the seasons, yield a prospect which annihilates all human grandeur. But when we have seen frequent returns of the same things, when we have often viewed the heaven and the earth in all their various array, our attention flags, and our admiration ceases. All the art and magnificence in nature could not make us pleased with the same entertainment, presented a hundred years successively to our view.

I am led into this way of thinking by a question started the other night, viz. Whether it were possible that a man should be weary of a fortunate and healthy course of life? My opinion was that the bare repetition of the same objects, abstracted from all other inconveniencies, was sufficient to create in our minds a distaste of the world; and

that the abhorrence old men have of death, proceeds rather from a distrust of what may follow, than from the prospect of losing any present_enjoyments. For (as an ancient author somewhere expresses it) when a man has seen the vicissitudes of night and day, winter and summer, spring and autumn, the returning faces of several parts of nature, what is there further to detain his fancy here below?

The spectacle indeed is glorious, and may bear viewing several times. But in very few scenes of revolving years, we feel a satiety of the same images; the mind grows impatient to see the curtain drawn, and behold new scenes disclosed; and the imagination is in this life, filled with a confused idea of the next.

If

Death, considered in this light, is no more than passing from one entertainment to another. If the present objects are grown tiresome and distasteful, it is in order to prepare our minds for a more exquisite relish of those which are fresh and new. the good things we have hitherto enjoyed are transient, they will be succeeded by those which the inexhaustible power of the Deity will supply to eternal ages. If the pleasures of our present state are blended with pain and uneasiness, our future will consist of sincere unmixed delights. Blessed hope! the thought whereof turns the very imperfections of our nature into occasions of comfort and joy.

But what consolation is left to the man who hath no hope or prospect of these things? View him in that part of life, when the natural decay of his faculties concurs with the frequency of the same objects to make him weary of this world, when like a man who hangs upon a precipice, his

present situation is uneasy, and the moment that he quits his hold, he is sure of sinking into hell or annihilation.

There is not any character so hateful as his who invents racks and tortures for mankind. The freethinkers make it their business to introduce doubts, perplexities, and despair, into the minds of men, and, according to the poet's rule, are most justly punished by their own schemes.

N° 170. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1713.

Timeo Danaos, et dona ferentes.

VIRG. Æn. ii. 49.

I fear your Greeks, with presents in their hands.

London, Sept. 22.

" MOST VENERABLE NESTOR,

THE plan laid down in your first paper gives me a title and authority to apply to you in behalf of the trading world. According to the general scheme you proposed in your said first paper, you have not professed only to entertain men of wit and polite taste, but also to be useful to the trader and artificer. You cannot do your country greater service than by informing all ranks of men amongst us, that the greatest benefactor to

them all is the merchant. The merchant advances the gentleman's rent, gives the artificer food, and supplies the courtier's luxury. But give me leave to say, that neither you, nor all your clan of wits, can put together so useful and commodious a treatise for the welfare of your fellow-subjects as that which an eminent merchant of this city has lately written. It is called, General Maxims of Trade, particularly applied to the Commerce between Great Britain and France. I have made an extract of it, so as to bring it within the compass of your paper, which take as follows.

• I. That trade which exports manufactures made of the product of the country, is undoubtedly good; such is the sending abroad our Yorkshire cloth, Colchester bays, Exeter serges, Norwich stuffs, &c. Which being made purely of British wool, as much as those exports amount to, so much is the clear gain of the nation.

II. That trade which helps off the consumption of our superfluities, is also visibly advantageous; as the exporting of allum, copperas, leather, tin, lead, coals, &c. So much as the exported superfluities amount unto, so much also is the clear national profit.

III. The importing of foreign materials to be manufactured at home, especially when the goods, after they are manufactured, are mostly sent abroad, is also, without dispute, very beneficial; as for instance, Spanish wool, which for that reason is exempted from paying any duties.

IV. The importation of foreign materials, to be manufactured here, although the manufactured goods are chiefly consumed by us, may be also beneficial; especially when the said materials are procured in exchange for our commodities; as

raw silk, grogram-yarn, and other goods brought from Turkey.

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V. Foreign materials, wrought up here into such goods as would otherwise be imported ready manufactured, is a means of saving money to the nation: such is the importation of hemp, flax, and raw silk; it is therefore to be wondered at, that these commodities are not exempt from all duties, as well as Spanish wool.

VI. A trade may be called good which exchanges manufactures for manufactures, and commodities for commodities. Germany takes as much in value of our woollen and other goods, as we do of their linen: by this means numbers of people are employed on both sides, to their mutual advantage.

• VII. An importation of commodities, bought partly for money and partly for goods, may be of national advantage; if the greatest part of the commodities thus imported, are again exported, as in the case of East India goods, and generally all imports of goods which are re-exported, are beneficial to a nation.

VIII. The carrying of goods from one foreign country to another, is a profitable article in trade. Our ships are often thus employed between Portugal, Italy, and the Levant, and sometimes in the East Indies.

IX. When there is a necessity to import goods which a nation cannot be without, although such goods are chiefly purchased with money, it cannot be accounted a bad trade, as our trade to Norway and other parts, from whence are imported naval stores, and materials for building.

But a trade is disadvantageous to a nation: