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tion, at the inmost thoughts and reflections | perhaps raised in me uncommon reflecof all whom I behold. It is from hence tions; but this effect I cannot communicate that good or ill fortune has no manner of but by my writings. As my pleasures are force towards affecting my judgment. I almost wholly confined to those of the sight, see men flourishing in courts and languish- I take it for a peculiar happiness that I ing in jails, without being prejudiced, from have always had an easy and familiar adtheir circumstances, to their favour or dis-mittance to the fair sex. "If I never praised advantage; but from their inward manner or flattered, I never belied or contradicted of bearing their condition, often pity the them. As these compose half the world, prosperous, and admire the unhappy. and are, by the just complacence and galThose who converse with the dumb, lantry of our nation, the more powerful know from the turn of their eyes, and the part of our people, I shall dedicate a conchanges of their countenance, their_senti- siderable share of these my speculations to ments of the objects before them. I have their service, and shall lead the young indulged my silence to such an extrava- through all the becoming duties of virgigance, that the few who are intimate with nity, marriage, and widowhood. When it me, answer my smiles with concurrent sen- is a woman's day, in my works, I shall entences, and argue to the very point I shaked deavour at a style and air suitable to their my head at, without my speaking. Will understanding. When I say this, I must Honeycomb was very entertaining the other be understood to mean, that I shall not night at a play, to a gentleman who sat on lower, but exalt the subjects I treat upon. his right hand, while I was at his left. The Discourse for their entertainment is not to gentleman believed Will was talking to be debased but refined. A man may aphimself, when upon my looking with great pear learned without talking sentences, as approbation at a young thing in a box be-in his ordinary gesture he discovers he can fore us, he said, 'I am quite of another opinion. She has, I will allow, a very pleasing aspect, but, methinks that simplicity in her countenance is rather childish than innocent.' When I observed her a second time, he said, 'I grant her dress 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 commended for the elegance of her dress, as a wit for that of his language; yet if she has stolen the colour of her ribands from another, or had advice about her trimmings, I shall 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 spoke what I looked, according to his romantic imagination, in the following man

dance, though he does not cut capers. In a word, I shall 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 shall treat on matters which relate to females, as they are concerned to approach or fly from the other sex, or as they are tied to them by blood, interest or affection. Upon this occasion I think it is but reasonable to declare, that whatever skill I may have in speculation, I shall never betray what the eyes of lovers say to each other in my presence. At the same time I shall not think myself obliged, by this promise, to conceal any false protestations which I observe made by glances in public assemblies; but endeavour to make both sexes appear in their conduct what they are in their hearts. By this means, love, during the time of my speculations, shall 'Behold, you who dare, that charming be carried on with the same sincerity as virgin; behold the beauty of her person any other affair of less consideration. As chastised by the innocence of her thoughts. this is the greatest concern, men shall be Chastity, good-nature, and affability, are from henceforth liable to the greatest rethe graces that play in her countenance; proach for misbehaviour in it. Falsehood she knows she is handsome, but she knows in love shall hereafter bear a blacker asshe is good. Conscious beauty adorned with pect than infidelity in friendship, or villany conscious virtue! What a spirit is there in in business. For this great and good end, those eyes! What a bloom in that person! all breaches against that noble passion, the How is the whole woman expressed in her cement of society, shall be severely examappearance! Her air has the beauty of ined. But this, and other matters loosely motion, and her look the force of language.' hinted at now, and in my former papers, was prudence to turn away my eyes shall have their proper place in my followfrom this object, and therefore I turned ing discourses. The present writing is only them to the thoughtless creatures who to admonish the world, that they shall not make up the lump of that sex, and move a find me an idle but a busy Spectator, R. knowing eye no more than the portraiture

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of insignificant people by ordinary painters, No. 5.] Tuesday, March 6, 1710-11. which are but pictures of pictures.

Thus the working of my own mind is the general entertainment of my life; I never enter into the commerce of discourse with any but my particular friends, and not in public even with them. Such a habit has

Spectatum admissi risum teneatis?
Hor. Ars Poet. ver. 5.
Admitted to the sight, would you not laugh?
AN opera may be allowed to be extrava-
gantly lavish in its decorations, as its only

design is to gratify the senses, and keep up | horse, and that there was actually a proan indolent attention in the audience. Com-ject of bringing the New-river into the mon sense, however, requires, that there house, to be employed in jetteaus and washould be nothing in the scenes and ma-ter-works. This project, as I have since chines, which may appear childish and heard, is postponed till the summer season, absurd. How would the wits of King when it is thought the coolness that proCharles's time have laughed to have seen ceeds from fountains and cascades will be Nicolini exposed to a tempest in robes of more acceptable and refreshing to the peoermine, and sailing in an open boat upon ple of quality. In the mean time, to find a sea of pasteboard? What a field of rail- out a more agreeable entertainment for the lery would they have been let into, had winter season, the opera of Rinaldo‡ is fillthey been entertained with painted dra- ed with thunder and lightning, illumina gons spitting wildfire, enchanted chariots tions and fire-works; which the audience drawn by Flanders' mares, and real cas- may look upon without catching cold, cades in artificial landscapes? A little skill and indeed without much danger of being in criticism would inform us, that shadows | burnt; for there are several engines filled and realities ought not to be mixed together with water, and ready to play at a minute's in the same piece; and that the scenes warning, in case any such accident should which are designed as the representations of nature, should be filled with resemblances, and not with the things themselves. If one would represent a wide champaign country filled with herds and flocks, it would be ridiculous to draw the country only upon the scenes, and to crowd several parts of the stage with sheep and oxen. This is joining together inconsistencies, and making the decoration partly real, and partly imaginary. I would recommend what I have said 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 saw 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 same curiosity. Upon his asking what he had upon his shoulder, he told him that he had been buying sparrows for the opera. Sparrows for the opera,' says his friend, licking his lips, what, are they to be roasted ? No, no,' says the other, they are to enter towards the end of the first act, and to fly about the stage.' This strange dialogue awakened my curiosity so far, that I immediately bought the opera, by which means I perceived that the sparrows were to act the part of singing birds in a delightful grove; though upon a nearer inquiry I found the sparrows put the same trick upon the audience, that Sir Martin Mar-all practised upon his mistress: for though they flew in sight, the music proceeded from a concert of flagelets and bird-calls, which were planted behind the scenes. At the same time I made this discovery, I found by the discourse of the actors, that there were great designs on foot for the improvement of the opera; that it had been proposed to break down a part of the wall, and to surprise the audience with a party of an hundred

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happen. However, as I have a very great friendship for the owner of this theatre, I hope that he has been wise enough to insure his house before he would let this opera be acted in it.

1

It is no wonder that those scenes should be very surprising, which were contrived by two poets of different nations, and raised by two magicians of different sexes. Armida (as we are told in the argument) was an Amazonian enchantress, and poor Signior Cassani (as we learn from the persons represented) a Christian conjuror a_ (Mago Christiano.) I must confess I am very much puzzled to find out how an Amazon should be versed in the black art, or how a good Christian, for such is the part of the magician, should deal with the devil.

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To consider the poet after the conjurors. I shall give you a taste of the Italian from the first lines of the preface: Eccoti, benigno lettore, un parto di poche sere, che se ben nato di notte, non e pero aborto di tenebre, ma si fara conoscere figlio d'Apollo con qualche raggio di Parnasso.'--- Behold, gentle reader, the birth of a few evenings, which, though it be the offspring of the night, is not the abortive of darkness, but will make itself known to be the son of Apollo, with a certain ray of Parnassus. He afterwards proceeds to call Mynheer Handel the Orpheus of our age, and to ac quaint us, in the same sublimity of style, that he composed this opera in a fortnight. Such are the wits to whose tastes we so ambitiously conform ourselves. The truth of it is, the finest writers among the mo

† At the time this paper was written, it could have been little expected that what is here so happily ridi culed, would ever really take place; but, in our en lightened days, we have seen the New-river acting as no inconsiderable auxiliary, not only in a suburban theatre, but in Covent-garden itself: and if the ma nagers of our classical theatres' have not been able to bring an hundred horses on the stage, it certainly was not from a want of inclination, but because the stage

would not hold them.

‡ Rinaldo, an opera, 1711. The plan was laid by Aaron Hill, his outline filled up with Italian words by Sig. G. Rossi, and the music composed by Handel. The story is taken from Tasso, and the scene laid in and near Jerusalem.

No. 6.] Wednesday, March 7, 1710-11.
Credebant hoc grande nefas, et morte piandum,
Si juvenis vetulo non assurrexerat-
Juv. Sat. xiii. 54.

I KNOW no evil under the sun so great as the abuse of the understanding, and yet there is no one vice more common. It has diffused itself through both sexes, and all that person to be found, who is not more qualities of mankind; and there is hardly concerned for the reputation of wit and sense, than of honesty and virtue. But this unhappy affectation of being wise rather than honest, witty than good-natured, is the source of most of the ill habits of life. Such false impressions are owing to the abandoned writings of men of wit, and the awkward imitation of the rest of mankind.

dern Italians express themselves in such a floric! form of words, and such tedious circumlocutions, as are used by none but pedants in our own country; and at the same time fill their writings with such poor ima-Twas impious then (so much was age rever'd) ginations and conceits, as our youths are For youth to keep their seats when an old man appear'd. ashamed of before they have been two years at the university. Some may be apt to think that it is the difference of genius which produces the difference in the works of the two nations; but to show that there is nothing in this, if we look into the writis nothing in this, if we look into the writings of the old Italians, such as Cicero and Virgil, we shall find that the English writers, in their way of thinking and expressing themselves, resemble those authors much more than the modern Italians pretend to do. And as for the poet himself, from whom the dreams of this opera are taken, I must entirely agree with Monsieur Boileau, that one verse in Virgil is For this reason Sir Roger was saying last worth all the clinquant or tinsel of Tasso. But to return to the sparrows: there have night, that he was of opinion none but men of fine parts deserve to be hanged. The been so many flights of them let loose in reflections of such men are so delicate upon this opera, that it is feared the house will all occurrences which they are concerned never get rid of them; and that in other in, that they should be exposed to more plays they may make their entrance in than ordinary infamy and punishment, for very wrong and improper scenes, so as to offending against such quick admonitions as be seen flying in a lady's bed-chamber, their own souls give them, and blunting the or perching upon a king's throne; besides fine edge of their minds in such a manner, the inconveniences which the heads of the that they are no more shocked at vice and audience may sometimes suffer from them. folly than men of slower capacities. There I am credibly informed, that there was is no greater monster in being, than a very once a design of casting into an opera the ill man of great parts. He lives like a man story of Whittington and his cat, and that in a palsy, with one side of him dead. While in order to it, there had been got together perhaps he enjoys the satisfaction of luxury, a great quantity of mice; but Mr. Rich, the of wealth, of ambition, he has lost the taste proprietor of the play-house, very pru- of good-will, of friendship, of innocence. dently considered that it would be impos- Scarecrow, the beggar, in Lincoln's-innsible for the cat to kill them all, and that fields, who disabled himself in his right leg, consequently the princes of the stage might and asks alms all day to get himself a warm be as much infested with mice, as the prince of the island was before the cat's prince of the island was before the cat's supper and a trull at night, is not half so arrival upon it; for which reason he would despicable a wretch, as such a man of not permit it to be acted in his house. And indeed I cannot blame him; for, as he said very well upon that occasion, I do not hear that any of the performers in our opera pretend to equal the famous pied piper,* who made all the mice of a great town in Germany follow his music, and by that means cleared the place of those little noxious animals.

sense.

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sensations; he finds rest more agreeable The beggar has no relish above than motion; and while he has a warm fire and his doxy, never reflects that he deserves to be whipped. Every man who terminates his satisfactions and enjoyments within the supply of his own necessities and passions, is, says Sir Roger, in my eye, as poor a rogue as Scarecrow. • But,' continued he, for the loss of public and priBefore I dismiss this paper, I must in-vate virtue, we are beholden to your men form my reader, that I hear there is a of fine parts forsooth; it is with them no treaty on foot between London and Wiset matter what is done, so it be done with an (who will be appointed gardeners of the air. But to me, who am so whimsical play-house) to furnish the opera of Rinaldo in a corrupt age as to act according to na and Armida with an orange-grove: and ture and reason, a selfish man, in the most that the next time it is acted, the singing-shining circumstance and equipage, apbirds will be personated by tom-tits, the undertakers being resolved to spare neither Pears in the same condition with the fellow above mentioned, but more contemptible pains nor money for the gratification of the in proportion to what more he robs the

audience.

C.

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public of, and enjoys above him. I lay it down therefore for a rule, that the whole man is to move together; that every action of any importance, is to have a prospect of public good: and that the general tendency

of our indifferent actions ought to be agree- | any thing more common, than that we run able to the dictates of reason, of religion, in perfect contradiction to them? All which of good-breeding; without this, a man as I is supported by no other pretension, than have before hinted, is hopping instead of that it is done with what we call a good walking, he is not in his entire and proper grace.

motion.

Nothing ought to be held laudable or becoming, but what nature itself should prompt us to think so. Respect to all kinds of superiors is 'founded, I think, upon in stinct; and yet what is so ridiculous as age?

tion of this vice, more than any other, in order to introduce a little story, which I think a pretty instance that the most polite age is in danger of being the most vicious.

It happened at Athens, during a public representation of some play exhibited in honour of the commonwealth, that an old gentleman came too late for a place suitable to his age and quality. Many of the young gentlemen, who observed the difficulty and confusion he was in, made signs to him that they would accommodate him if he came where they sat. The good man bustled through the crowd accordingly; but when he came to the seats to which he was invited, the jest was to sit close and expose him, as he stood, out of countenance, to the whole audience. The frolic went round the Athenian benches. But on those occasions there were also particular places assigned for foreigners. When the good man skulked towards the boxes appointed for the Lacedæmonians, that honest people, more virtuous than polite, rose up all to a man, and with the greatest respect received him among them. The Athenians being suddenly touched with a sense of the Spartan virtue and their own degeneracy, gave a thunder of applause; and the old man cried out, "The Athenians understand what is good, but the Lacedæmonians practise it." R.

While the honest knight was thus bewildering himself in good starts, I looked attentively upon him, which made him, I thought, collect his mind a little. What I aim at,' says he, 'is to represent that II make this abrupt transition to the menam of opinion, to polish our understandings, and neglect our manners, is of all things the most inexcusable. Reason should govern passion, but instead of that, you see, it is often subservient to it; and, as unaccountable as one would think it, a wise man is not alway a good man.' This degeneracy is not only the guilt of particular persons, but also, at some times, of a whole people: and perhaps it may appear upon examination, that the most polite ages are the least virtuous. This may be attributed to the folly of admitting wit and learning as merit in themselves, without considering the application of them. By this means it becomes a rule, not so much to regard what we do, as how we do it. But this false beauty will not pass upon men of honest minds and true taste. Sir Richard Blackmore says, with as much good sense as virtue, 'It is a mighty shame and dishonour to employ excellent faculties and abundance of wit, to humour and please men in their vices and follies. The great enemy of mankind, notwithstanding his wit and angelic faculties, is the most odious being in the whole creation.' He goes on soon after to say, very generously, that he undertook the writing of his poem 'to rescue the Muses out of the hands of ravishers, to restore them to their sweet and chaste mansions, and to engage them in an employment suitable to their dignity.' This certainly ought to be the purpose of every man who appears in public, and whoever does not proceed upon that foundation, in-No. 7.] Thursday, March 8, 1710-11, jures his country as fast as he succeeds in his studies. When modesty ceases to be the chief ornament of one sex; and integrity of the other, society is upon a wrong basis, and we shall be ever after without rules to guide our judgment in what is really becoming and ornamental. Nature and reason direct one thing, passion and humour another. To follow the dictates of these two latter, is going into a road that is both endless and intricate; when we pursue the other, our passage is delightful, and what we aim at easily attainable.

I do not doubt but England is at present as polite a nation as any in the world; but any man who thinks, can easily see, that the affectation of being gay and in fashion, has very near eaten up our good sense and our religion. Is there any thing so just as that mode and gallantry should be built upon exerting ourselves in what is proper and agreeable to the institutions of justice and piety among us? And yet is there

Somnia, terrores magicos, miracula, sagas,
Nocturnos lemures, portentaque Thessala rides?
Hor. Lib. 2. Ep. ii. 208.

Visions, and magic spells, can you despise,
And laugh at witches, ghosts, and prodigies?
GOING yesterday to dine with an old ac
quaintance, I had the misfortune to find the
whole family very much dejected. Upon
asking him the occasion of it, he told me
that his wife had dreamt a strange dream
the night before, which they were afraid
portended some misfortune to themselves
or to their children. At her coming into
the room, I observed a settled melancholy
in her countenance, which I should have
been troubled for, had I not heard from
whence it proceeded. We were no sooner
sat down, but after having looked upon me
a little while, 'My dear,' says she, turning
to her husband, you may now see the
stranger that was in the candle last night.'
Soon after this, as they began to talk of

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family affairs, a little boy at the lower end of the table told her, that he was to go into join-hand on Thursday. Thursday!' says she, 'No, child, if it please God, you shall not begin upon Childermas-day; tell your writing-master that Friday will be soon enough.' I was reflecting with myself on the oddness of her fancy, and wondering that any body would establish it as a rule, to lose a day in every week. In the midst of these my musings, she desired me to reach her a little salt upon the point of my knife, which I did in such a trepidation and hurry of obedience, that I let it drop by the way; at which she immediately startled, and said it fell towards her. Upon this I looked very blank; and, observing the concern of the whole table, began to consider myself, with some confusion, as a person that had brought a disaster upon the family. The lady, however, recovering herself after a little space, said to her husband, with a sigh, My dear, misfortunes never come single.' My friend, I found, acted but an under part at his table, and being a man of more good-nature than understanding, thinks himself obliged to fall in with all the passions and humours of his yokefellow. 'Do not you remember, child,' says she, that the pigeon-house fell the very afternoon that our careless wench spilt the salt upon the table?" "Yes,' says he, "my dear, and the next post brought us an account of the battle of Almanza.' The reader may guess at the figure I made, after having done all this mischief. I despatched my dinner as soon as I could, with my usual taciturnity; when, to my utter confusion, the lady seeing me quitting my knife and fork, and laying them across one another upon my plate, desired me that I would humour her so far as to take them out of that figure, and place them side by side. What the absurdity was which I had committed I did not know, but I suppose there was some traditionary superstition in it; and therefore, in obedience to the lady of the house, I disposed of my knife and fork in two parallel lines, which is the figure I shall always lay them in for the future, though I do not know any reason for it.

It is not difficult for a man to see that a person has conceived an aversion to him. For my own part, I quickly found by the lady's looks, that she regarded me as a very odd kind of fellow, with an unfortunate aspect. For which reason I took my leave immediately after dinner and withdrew to my old lodgings. Upon my return home, I fell into a profound contemplation on the evils that attend these superstitious follies of mankind; how they subject us to imaginary afflictions, and additional sorrows, that do not properly come within our lot. As if the natural calamities of life were not sufficient for it, we turn the most indifferent circumstances into misfortunes, and suffer as much from trifling accidents,

as from real evils. I have known the shoot ing of a star spoil a night's rest; and have seen a man in love grow pale, and lose his appetite, upon the plucking of a merrythought. A screech-owl at midnight has alarmed a family more than a band of robbers; nay, the voice of a cricket hath struck more terror than the roaring of a lion. There is nothing so inconsiderable, which may not appear dreadful to an imagination that is filled with omens and prognostics. A rusty nail, or a crooked pin, shoot up prodigies.

into

I remember I was once in a mixt assembly, that was full of noise and mirth, when on a sudden an old woman unluckily observed there were thirteen of us in company. The remark struck a panic terror'into several who were present, insomuch that one or two of the ladies were going to leave the room; but a friend of mine taking notice that one of our female companions was big with child, affirmed there were fourteen in the room, and that instead of portending one of the company should die, it plainly foretold one of them should be born. "Had not my friend found this expedient to break the omen, I question not but half the women in the company would have fallen sick that very night.

An old maid, that is troubled with the vapours, produces infinite disturbances of this kind among her friends and neighbours. I know a maiden aunt, of a great family, who is one of these antiquated Sybils, that forebodes and prophesies from one end of the year to the other. She is always seeing apparitions and hearing death-watches; and was the other day almost frighted out of her wits by the great house-dog, that howled in the stable at the time when she lay ill of the tooth-ache. Such an extravagant cast of mind engages multitudes of people, not only in impertinent terrors, but in supernumerary duties of life; and arises from that fear and ignorance which are natural to the soul of man. The horror, with which we entertain the thoughts of death, (or indeed of any future evil) and the uncertainty of its approach, fill a melancholy mind with innumerable apprehensions and suspicions, and consequently dispose it to the observation of such groundless prodigies and predictions. For as it is the chief concern of wise men to retrench the evils of life by the reasonings of philosophy; it is the employment of fools to multiply them by the senti ments of superstition.

For my own part, I should be very much troubled were I endowed with this divining quality, though it should inform me truly of every thing that can befal me. I would not anticipate the relish of any happiness, nor feel the weight of any misery, before it actually arrives.

I know but one way of fortifying my soul against these gloomy presages and terrors of mind, and that is, by securing to myself the friendship and protection of that Being

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