and pastimes not only merry but innocent; for which reason I have not mentioned either whisk or lanterloo, nor indeed so much as one-and-thirty. After having communicated to you my request upon this subject, I will be so free as to tell you how my wife pass away these tedious winter evenings with a great deal of pleasure. Though she be young and handsome, and good-humoured to a miracle, she does not care for gadding abroad like others of her sex. There is a very friendly man, a colonel in the and No. 245.] TUESDAY, DECEMBER 11, 1711. army, whom I am mightily obliged to for his civiliFicta voluptatis causa sint proxima veris. HOR. Ars. Poet. v. 338. Fictions, to please, should wear the face of truth. THERE is nothing which one regards so much with an eye of mirth and pity as innocence, when it has in it a dash of folly. At the same time that one esteems the virtue, one is tempted to laugh at the simplicity which accompanies it. When a man is made up wholly of the dove, without the least grain of the serpent in his composition, he becomes ridiculous in many circumstances of life, and very often discredits his best actions. The Cordeliers tell a story of their founder St. Francis, that as he passed the streets in the dusk of the evening, he discovered a young fellow with a maid in a corner; upon which the good man, say they, lifted up his hands to heaven with secret thanksgiving, that there was still so much Christian charity in the world. The innocence of the saint made him mistake the kiss of the lover for a salute of charity. heartily concerned when I see a virtuous man without a competent knowledge of the world; and if there be any use in these my papers, it is this, that without representing vice under any false alluring notions, they give my reader an insight into the ways of men, and represent human nature in all its changeable colours. The man who has not been engaged in any of the follies of the world, or, as Shakspeare expresses it, "hackney'd in the ways of men," may here find a picture of its follies and extravagances. The virtuous and the innocent may know in speculation what they could never arrive at by practice, and by this means avoid the snares of the crafty, the corruptions of the vicious, and the reasonings of the prejudiced. Their minds may be opened without being vitiated. I am It is with an eye to my following correspondent, Mr. Timothy Doodle, who seems a very well-meaning man, that I have written this short preface, to which I shall subjoin a letter from the said Mr. Doodle. "SIR, ties, that comes to see me almost every night; for "Your ever loving Friend, The following letter was occasioned by my last Thursday's paper upon the absence of lovers, and the methods therein mentioned of making such absence supportable : "SIR, Among the several ways of consolation which absent lovers make use of while their souls are in that state of departure, which you say is death in love, there are some very material ones that have escaped your notice. Among these, the first and most received is a crooked shilling, which has administered great comfort to our forefathers, and is still made use of on this occasion with very good effect in most part of her majesty's dominions, There are some, I know, who think a crown piece cut into two equal parts, and preserved by the distant lovers, is of more sovereign virtue than the former. But since opinions are divided in this particular, why may not the same persons make use of both? The figure of a heart, whether cut in stone or cast in metal, whether bleeding upon an altar, stuck with darts, or held in the hand of a Cupid, has always been looked upon as talismanic in disI am acquainted with many tresses of this nature. "I could heartily wish that you would let us know your opinion upon several innocent diversions which are in use among us, and which are very proper to pass away a winter night for those who a brave fellow, who carries his mistress in the lid of do not care to throw away their time at an opera, himself under the absence of a whole campaign. his snuff-box, and by that expedient has supported or at the play-house. I would gladly know, in par- For my own part I have tried all these remedies, ticular, what notion you have of hot-cockles; as also, but never found so much benefit from any as from a whether you think that questions and commands, mottos, similes, and cross-purposes, have not more ring, in which my mistress's hair is plaited together mirth and wit in them than those public diversions very artificially in a kind of true-lover's knot. As which are grown so very fashionable among us. If I have received great benefit from this secret, I you would recommend to our wives and daughters, who read your papers with a great deal of pleasure, some of those sports and pastimes that may be practised within doors, and by the fire-side, we, who are masters of families, should be hugely obliged to you. I need not tell you that I would have these sports think myself obliged to communicate it to the public will add this letter as an appendix to your consolafor the good of my fellow-subjects. I desire you tions upon absence, and am 64 Your very humble Servant, "TB' I shall conclude this paper with a letter from a university gentleman, occasioned by my last Tuesday's paper, wherein I gave some account of the great feuds which happened formerly in those learned bodies, between the modern Greeks and Trojans. "SIR, "This will give you to understand, that there is at present, in the society whereof I am a member, a very considerable body of Trojans, who, upon a proper occasion, would not fail to declare ourselves. In the mean while we do all we can to annoy our enemies by stratagem, and are resolved by the first opportunity to attack Mr. Joshua Barnes, whom we look upon as the Achilles of the opposite party. As for myself, I have had the reputation ever since I came from school of being a trusty Trojan, and am resolved never to give quarter to the smallest particle of Greek, wherever I chance to meet it. It is for this reason I take it very ill of you, that you sometimes hang out Greek colours at the head of your paper, and sometimes give a word of the enemy even in the body of it. When I meet with any thing of this nature, I throw down your speculations upon the table, with that form of words which we make use of when we declare war upon an author, Græcum est, non potest legi by reason that plant was not of its own production. them. 66 Many instances may be produced from good authorities and daily experience, that children actually suck in the several passions and depraved inclinations of their nurses, as anger, malice, fear, melancholy, sadness, desire, and aversion. This Diodorus, lib. 2. witnesses, when he speaks, saying, that Nero the emperor's nurse had been very much addicted to drinking; which habit Nero received from his nurse, and was so very particular in this, that the people took so much notice of it, as instead of Ti No. 246 ] WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1711. berius Nero, they called him Biberius Mero. The No amorous hero ever gave thee birth, So rough thy manners, so untam'd thy mind.-POPK "MR. SPECTATOR, same Diodorus also relates of Caligula, predecessor to Nero, that his nurse used to moisten the nipples of her breast frequently with blood, to make Caligula take the better hold of them: which, says Diodorus, was the cause that made him so bloodthirsty and cruel all his lifetime after, that he not only committed frequent murder by his own hand, "As your paper is part of the equipage of the but likewise wished that all human kind wore but tea-table, I conjure you to print what I now write to one neck, that he might have the pleasure to cut it you; for I have no other way to communicate what off. Such-like degeneracies astonish the parents, I have to say to the fair sex on the most important who not knowing after whom the child can take, see circumstances of life, even the care of children.' I one incline to stealing, another to drinking, cruelty, do not understand that you profess your paper is al- stupidity; yet all these are not minded. Nay, it is ways to consist of matters which are only to enter-easy to demonstrate, that a child, although it be tain the learned and polite, but that it may agree born from the best of parents, may be corrupted by with your design to publish some which may tend an ill-tempered nurse. How many children do we to the information of mankind in general: and when see daily brought into fits, consumptions, rickets, it does so, you do more than writing wit and hu- &c. merely by sucking their nurses when in a pasmour. Give me leave then to tell you, that of all sion or fury? but indeed almost any disorder of the the abuses that ever you have as yet endeavoured nurse is a disorder to the child, and few nurses can to reform, certainly not one wanted so much your be found in this town but what labour under some assistance as the abuse in the nursing of children. distemper or other. The first question that is geneIt is unmerciful to see, that a woman endowed with rally asked a young woman that wants to be a nurse, all the perfections and blessings of nature can, as why she should be a nurse to other people's children, soon as she is delivered, turn off her innocent, ten-is answered, by her having an ill husband, and that der, and helpless infant, and give it up to a woman that is (ten thousand to one) neither in health nor good condition, neither sound in mind nor body, that has neither honour nor reputation, neither love nor pity for the poor babe, but more regard for the money than for the whole child, and never will take further care of it than what by all the encourage. ment of money and presents she is forced to; like Æsop's earth, which would not nurse the plant of another ground, although never so much improved, The noted Greek professor of the university of Cambridge. she must make shift to live. I think now this very answer is enough to give any body a shock, if duly considered; for an ill husband may, or ten to one if he does not, bring home to his wife an ill distemper, or at least vexation and disturbance. Besides, as she takes the child out of mere necessity, her food will be accordingly, or else very coarse at best; whence proceeds an ill-concocted and coarse food for the child; for as the blood, so is the milk; and hence I am very well assured proceeds the scurvy, the evil, and many other distempers. I beg of you, for the sake of the many poor infants that may and will be saved by weighing this case seriously cature, I am pe aed they would carry the eloto exhort the people with the utmost vehemence, to quence of the bar to greater heights than it has yet let the children suck their own mothers, both for the arrived at. If any one doubt this, let him but be benefit of mother and child. For the general argu-present at those debates which frequently arise ment, that a mother is weakened by giving suck to among the ladies of the British fishery. her children, is vain and simple. I will maintain The first kind, therefore, of female orators which that the mother grows stronger by it, and will have I shall take notice of, are those who are employed her health better than she would have otherwise. in stirring up the passions; a part of rhetoric in She will find it the greatest cure and preservative which Socrates' wife had perhaps made a greater for the vapours and future miscarriages, much be proficiency than his above-mentioned teacher. yond any other remedy whatsoever. Her children will be like giants, whereas otherwise they are but living shadows, and like unripe fruit; and certainly if a woman is strong enough to bring forth a child, she is beyond all doubt strong enough to nurse it afterward. It grieves me to observe and consider how many poor children are daily ruined by careless nurses; and yet how tender ought they to be to a poor infant, since the least hurt or blow, especially upon the head, may make it senseless, stupid, or otherwise miserable for ever! "But I cannot well leave this subject as yet; for it seems to me very unnatural, that a woman that has fed a child as part of herself for nine months, should have no desire to nurse it further, when brought to light and before her eyes, and when by its cry it implores her assistance and the office of a mother. Do not the very cruellest of brutes tend their young ones with all the care and delight imaginable! How can she be called a mother that will not nurse her young ones? The earth is called the mother of all things, not because she produces, but because she maintains and nurses what she produces. The generation of the infant is the effect of desire, but the care of it argues virtue and choice. I am not ignorant but that there are some cases of necessity, where a mother cannot give suck, and then out of two evils the least must be chosen; but there are so very few, that I am sure in a thousand there is hardly one real instance; for if a woman does but know that her husband can spare about three or six shillings a week extraordinary (although this is but seldom considered), she certainly, with the assistance of her gossips, will soon persuade the good man to send the child to nurse, and easily impose upon him by pretending indisposition. This cruelty is supported by fashion, and nature gives place to custom. T. "Sir, your humble Servant." No. 247.] THURSDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1711. It has been said in the praise of some men, that they could talk whole hours together upon any thing; but it must be owned to the honour of the other sex, that there are many among them who can talk whole hours together upon nothing. I have known a woman branch out into a long extempore dissertation upon the edging of a petticoat, and chide her servant for breaking a china cup, in all the figures of rhetoric. The second kind of female orators are those who deal in invectives, and who are commonly known by the name of the censorious. The imagination and elocution of this set of rhetoricians is wonderful. With what a fluency of invention, and copiousness of expression, will they enlarge upon every little slip in the behaviour of another! With how many different circumstances, and with what variety of phrases, will they tell over the same story! Í have known an old lady make an unhappy marriage the subject of a month's conversation. She blamed the bride in one place; pitied her in another; laughed at her in a third; wondered at her in a fourth; was angry with her in a fifth; and, in short, wore out a pair of coach-horses in expressing her concern for her. At length, after having quite exhausted the subject on this side, she made a visit to the new-married pair, praised the wife for the prudent choice she had made, told her the unreasonable reflections which some malicious people had cast upon her, and desired that they might be better acquainted. The censure and approbation of this kind of women are therefore only to be considered as helps to discourse A third kind of female orators may be compre hended under the word gossips. Mrs. FiddleFaddle is perfectly accomplished in this sort of eloquence; she launches out into descriptions of christenings, runs divisions upon a head-dress, knows every dish of meat that is served up in our neighbourhood, and entertains her company a whole afternoon together with the wit of her little boy, before he is able to speak. all The coquette may be looked upon as a fourth kind of female orator. To give herself the larger field for discourse, she hates and loves in the same breath, talks to her lap-dog or parrot, is uneasy in all kinds of weather, and in every part of the room. She has false quarrels and feigned obligations the men of her acquaintance; sighs when she is not sad, and laughs when she is not merry. The coquette is in particular a great mistress of that part of oratory which is called action, and indeed seems to speak for no other purpose, but as it gives her an opportunity of stirring a limb, or varying a feature, of glaucing her eyes, or playing with her fan. As for newsmongers, politicians, mimics, storytellers, with other characters of that nature which gave birth to loquacity, they are as commonly found among the men as the women: for which reason I shall pass them over in silence. I have often been puzzled to assign a cause why women should have this talent of a ready utterance in so much greater perfection than men. I have sometimes fancied that they have not a retentive power, or the faculty of suppressing their thoughts, as men have, but that they are necessitated to speak every thing they think; and if so, it would perhaps furnish a very strong argument to the Cartesians for the supporting of their doctrine that the Were women permitted to plead in courts of judi- | soul always thinks. But as several are of opinion that the fair sex are not altogether strangers to the art of dissembling and concealing their thoughts, I have been forced to relinquish that opinion, and have therefore endeavoured to seek after some better reason. In order to it, a friend of mine, who is an excellent anatomist, has promised me by the first opportunity to dissect a woman's tongue, and to examine whether there may not be in it certain juices which render it so wonderfully voluble or flippant, or whether the fibres of it may not be made up of a finer or more pliant thread; or whether there are not in it some particular muscles which dart it up and down by such sudden glances and vibrations; or whether, in the last place, there may not be certain undiscovered channels running from the head and the heart to this little instrument of loquacity, and conveying into it a perpetual affluency of animal spirits. Nor must I omit the reason which Hudibras has given, why those who can talk on trifles speak with the greatest fluency; namely, that the tongue is like a race-horse, which runs the faster the lesser weight it carries. Which of these reasons soever may be looked upon as the most probable, I think the Irishman's thought was very natural, who, after some hours' conversation with a female orator, told her, that he believed her tongue was very glad when she was asleep, for that it had not a moment's rest all the while she was awake. That excellent old ballad of The Wanton Wife of I think, quoth Thomas, women's tongues And Ovid, though in the description of a very barbarous circumstance, tells us, that when the tongue of a beautiful female was cut out, and thrown upon the ground, it could not fo:bear muttering even in that posture : Comprensam forcipe linguam Abstulit ense fero, radix micat ultima linguæ. The blade had cut Her tongue sheer off, close to the trembling root, If a tongue would be talking without a mouth, what could have done when it had all its organs of speech, and accomplices of sound about it? I might here mention the story of the Pippin Woman, had I not some reason to look upon it as fabulous.* I must confess I am so wonderfully charmed with the music of this little instrument, that I would by no means discourage it. All that I aim at by this dissertation is, to cure it of several disagreeable notes, and in particular of those little jarrings and dissonances which arise from anger, censoriousness, gossiping and coquetry. In short, I would always have it tuned by good-nature, truth, discretion, and sincerity.-C. The crackling crystal yields, she sinks, she dies; No. 248. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1711. ei potissimum opitulari-TULL.. Off. i. 16. It is a principal point of duty, to assist another most when he stands most in need of assistance. over THERE are none who deserve superiority ov others in the esteem of mankind, who do not make it their endeavour to be beneficial to society; and who upon all occasions which their circumstances of life can administer, do not take a certain unfeigned pleasure in conferring benefits of one kind or other. Those whose great talents and high birth have placed them in conspicuous stations of life are in dispensably obliged to exert some noble inclinations for the service of the world, or else such advantages become misfortunes, and shade and privacy are a more eligible portion. Where opportunities and inclinations are given to the same person, we sometimes see sublime instances of virtue, which so dazzle our imaginations, that we look with scorn on all which in lower scenes of life we may ourselves be able to practise. But this is a vicious way of thinking and it bears some spice of romantic madness, for a man to imagine that he must grow ambitious, or seek adventures, to be able to do great actions. It is in every man's power in the world who is above mere poverty, not only to do things worthy, but heroic. The great foundation of civil virtue is self-denial; and there is no one above the necessities of life, but has opportunities of exercising that noble quality, and doing as much. as his circumstances will bear for the ease and convenience of other men; and he who does more than ordinary men practise upon such occasions as occur in his life, deserves the value of nis friends, as if he had done enterprises which are usually attended with the highest glory. Men of public spirit differ rather in their circumstances than their virtue; and the man who does all he can, in a low station, is more a hero than he who omits any worthy action he is able to accomplish in a great one. It is not many years ago since Lapirius, in wrong of his elder brother, came to a great estate by gift of his father, by reason of the dissolute behaviour of the first-born. Shame and contrition reformed the life of the disinherited youth, and he became as remarkable for his good qualities as formerly for his errors. Lapirius, who observed his brother's amendment, sent him on a new-year's day in the morning the following letter: As great and exalted spirits undertake the pursuit of hazardous actions for the good of others, at the same time gratifying their passion for glory; so do worthy minds in the domestic way of life deny themselves many advantages, to satisfy a generous benevolence, which they bear to their friends oppressed with distresses and calamities. Such natures one may call stories of Providence, which are ac tuated by a secret celestial influence to undervalue the ordinary gratifications of wealth, to give comfort to a heart loaded with affliction, to save a falling family, to preserve a branch of trade in their neigh flections on it without any order or method, so that they may appear rather in the looseness and freedom of an essay, than in the regularity of a set discourse. It is after this manner that I shall consider laughter and ridicule in my present paper. bourhood, to give work to the industrious, preserve the portion of the helpless infant, and raise the head of the mourning father. People whose hearts are wholly bent towards pleasure, or intent upon gain, never hear of the noble occurrences among men of industry and humanity. It would look like a city romance, to tell them of the generous merchant, who the other day sent his billet to an eminent trader, under difficulties to support himself, in whose fall many hundreds besides himself had perished; but because I think there is more spirit and true gallantry in it than in any letter I have ever read from Strephon to Phillis, I shall insert it even in the mer-be capable of receiving joy from what is no real cantile honest style in which it was sent: "I have heard of the casualties which have in volved you in extreme distress at this time; and knowing you to be a man of great good-nature, industry, and probity, have resolved to stand by you. Be of good cheer; the bearer brings with him five thousand pounds, and has my order to answer your drawing as much more on my account. I did this in haste, for fear I should come too late for your relief; but you may value yourself with me to the sum of fifty thousand pounds; for I can very cheerfully run the hazard of being so much less rich than I am now, to save an honest man whom I love. "Your Friend and Servant, "W. S."* Man is the merriest species of the creation; all above and below him are serious. He sees things in a different light from other beings, and finds his mirth arising from objects that perhaps cause something like pity or displeasure in higher natures. Laughter is indeed a very good counterpoise to the spleen; and it seems but reasonable that we should good to us, since we can receive grief from what is no real evil. I have in my forty-seventh paper raised a speculation on the notion of a modern philosopher, who describes the first motive of laughter to be a secret comparison which we make between ourselves and the persons we laugh at; or, in other words, that satisfaction which we receive from the opinion of some pre-eminence in ourselves, when we see the absurdities of another, or when we reflect on any past absurdities of our own. most cases, and we may observe that the vainest part of mankind are the most addicted to this passion. This seems to hold in I have read a sermon of a conventual in the church of Rome, on those words of the wise man, does it ?" Upon which he laid it down as a point 'I said of Laughter, it is mad; and of mirth, what sin, and that Adam could not laugh before the tall. of doctrine, that laughter was the effect of original the mind, weakens the faculties, and causes a kind Laughter, while it lasts, slackens and unbraces of remissness and dissolution in all the powers of the soul; and thus far it may be looked upon as a I think there is somewhere in Montaigne mention made of a family-book, wherein all the occurrences that happened from one generation of that house to another were recorded. Were there such a method in the families which are concerned in this generosity, it would be a hard task for the greatest in Europe to give in their own, an instance of a benefit better placed, or conferred with a more graceful air. It has been heretofore urged how barbarous weakness in the composition of human nature. But and inhuman is any unjust step made to the dis-if we consider the frequent reliefs we receive from it, and how often it breaks the gloom which is apt advantage of a trader; and by how much such an act towards him is detestable, by so much an act of to depress the mind and damp our spirits, with transient unexpected gleams of joy, one would take kindness towards him is laudable. I remember to care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure have heard a bencher of the Temple tell a story of a of life. tradition in their house, where they had formerly a custom of choosing kings for such a season, and allowing him his expenses at the charge of the society. One of our kings,† said my friend, carried his royal inclination a little too far, and there was a committee ordered to look into the management of his treasury. Among other things it appeared, that his majesty walking incog. in the cloister, had overheard a poor man say to another, "Such a small sum would make me the happiest man in the world." The king, out of his royal compassion, privately inquired into his character, and finding him a proper object of charity, sent him the money. When the committee read the report, the house passed his accounts with a plaudite without further examination, upon the recital of this article in them: For making a man happy T. £10 0 0 No. 219.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1711. Mirth out of season is a grievous ill.-Frag. Vet. Poet. WHEN I make choice of a subject that has not been treated on by others, I throw together my reThe merchant involved in distress by casualties was one Mr. Moreton, a linen-draper; and the generous merchant, here so jastly celebrated, was Sir William Scawen. This king, it is said, was beau Nash, director of the public aversions at Bath, who was in King William's t.me a student In the Temple. The talent of turning men into ridicule, and ex Posing to laughter those one converses with, is the qualification of little ungenerous tempers. A young man with this cast of mind cuts himself off from all and weaknesses; nay, the greatest blemishes are manner of improvement. Every one has his flaws often found in the most shining characters; but what an absurd thing is it to pass over all the valuinfirmities? to observe his imperfections more than able parts of a man, and fix our attention on his his virtues? and to make use of him for the sport of others, rather than for our own improvement? We therefore very often find, that persons the most accomplished in ridicule are those that are very shrewd at hitting a blot, without exerting any thing masterly in themselves. As there are many eminent critics who never urit a good line, there are many admirable buffoons that animadvert upon every single defect in another, without ever discoBy this vering the least beauty of their own. If the talent of ridicule were employed to laugh inen out of voice and folly, it might be of some us? • Hobbes |
