Party whofe Interefts they efpoufe; and at the fame Time may hope that the Wealth of their Friend will turn to their own Credit and Advantage. The others are preparing for themselves a perpetual Feaft. A good Perfon does not only raife, but continue Love, and breeds a fecret Pleasure and Complacency in the Beholder, when the first Heats of Defire are extinguished. It puts the Wife or Husband in Countenance both among Friends and Strangers, and generally fills the Family with a healthy and beautiful Race of Children.

I fhould prefer a Woman that is agreeable in my own Eye, and not deformed in that of the World, to a celebrated Beauty. If you marry one remarkably beautiful, you must have a violent Paffion for her, or you have not the proper Taste of her Charms; and if you have fuch a Paffion for her, it is odds but it would be imbittered with Fears and Jealoufies.

GOOD Nature and Evenness of Temper, will give you an eafy Companion for Life; Virtue and good Senfe, an agreeable Friend; Love and Conftancy, a good Wife or Husband. Where we meet one Perfon with all these Accomplishments, we find an hundred without any one of them. The World, notwithstanding, is more intent on Trains and Equipages, and all the fhowy Parts of Life; we love rather to dazzle the Multitude, than confult our proper Interests; and, as I have elsewhere observed, it is one of the most unaccountable Paffions of human Nature, that we are at greater Pains to appear eafy and happy to others, than really to make our felves fo. Of all Difparities, that in Humour makes the most unhappy Marriages, yet scarce enters into our Thoughts at the contracting of them. Several that are in this Refpect unequally yoked, and uneafy for Life, with a Perfon of a particular Character, might have been pleafed and happy with a Perfon of a contrary one, notwithstanding they are both perhaps equally virtuous and laudable in their Kind.

BEFORE Marriage we cannot be too inquifitive and difcerning in the Faults of the Perfon beloved, nor after it too dim-fighted and fuperficial. However perfect and accomplished the Perfon appears to you at a Diftance, you will find many Blemishes and Imperfections in her Humour, upon a more intimate Acquaintance, which you

never discovered or perhaps fufpected. Here therefore Discretion and Good-nature are to fhew their Strength; the first will hinder your Thoughts from dwelling on what is difagreeable, the other will raife in you all the Tenderness of Compaffion and Humanity, and by de grees foften thofe very Imperfections into Beauties."

MARRIAGE enlarges the Scene of our Happinefs and Miseries. A Marriage of Love is pleafant; a Marriage of Intereft eafy; and a Marriage, where both meet, happy. A happy Marriage has in it all the Pleafures of Friendship, all the Enjoyments of Senfe and Rea fon, and indeed, all the Sweets of Life. Nothing is a greater Mark of a degenerate and vicious Age, than the common Ridicule which paffes on this State of Life. is, indeed, only happy in those who can look down with Scorn or Neglect on the Impieties of the Times, and tread the Paths of Life together in a constant uniform Course of Virtue.

It

N° 262. Monday, December 31.

Nulla venenato Littera mifta Joco eft.

Ovid,

Think my felf highly obliged to the Publick for their kind Acceptance of a Paper which vifits them every Morning, and has in it none of thofe Seafonings that recommend fo many of the Writings which are in Vogue among us.

AS, on the one Side, my Paper has not in it a fingle Word of News, a Reflexion in Politicks, nor a Stroke of Party; fo on the other, there are no Fashionable Touches of Infidelity, no obfcene Ideas, no Satyrs upon Priesthood, Marriage, and the like popular Topicks of Ridicule; no privare Scandal, nor any Thing that may tend to the Defamation of particular Perfons, Families, or Societies.

THERE is not one of thefe above-mentioned Subjects that would not fell a very indifferent Paper, could I think of gratifying the Publick by fuch mean and base Methods.

N® 226. Methods. But notwithstanding I have rejected every Thing that favours of Party, every Thing that is loofe and immoral, and every Thing that might create Uneafiness in the Minds of particular Perfons, I find that the Demand for my Papers has increased every Month fince their first Appearance in the World. This does not perhaps reflect fo much Honour upon my felf, as on my Readers, who give a much greater Attention to Difcourfes of Virtue and Morality, than ever I expected, or indeed could hope.

WHEN I broke loose from that great Body of Writers who have employed their Wit and Parts in propagating Vice and Irreligion, I did not question but I should be treated as an odd kind of Fellow that had a mind to appear fingular in my Way of Writing: But the general Reception I have found, convinces me that the World is not fo corrupt as we are apt to imagine; and that if those Men of Parts who have been employed in vitiating the Age had endeavour'd to rectify and amend it, they needed not have facrificed their good Senfe and Virtue to their Fame and Reputation. No Man is fo funk in Vice and Ignorance, but there are still fome hidden Seeds of Goodnefs and Knowledge in him; which give him a Relish of fuch Reflexions and Speculations as have an Aptnefs to improve the Mind, and make the Heart better.

I have fhewn in a former Paper, with how much Care I have avoided all fuch Thoughts as are loofe, obfcene or immoral; and I believe my Reader would ftill think the better of me, if he knew the Pains I am at in qualifying what I write after fuch a manner, that nothing may be interpreted as aimed at private Perfons. For this Reafon when I draw any faulty Character, I confider all those Perfons to whom the Malice of the World may poffibly apply it, and take care to dash it with fuch particular Cir cumftances as may prevent all fuch ill-natured Applications. If I write any Thing on a black Man, I run over in my Mind all the eminent Persons in the Nation who are of that Complexion: When I place an imaginary Name at the Head of a Character, I examine every Syllable and Letter of it, that it may not bear any Refemblance to one that is real. I know very well the Value which every Man fets upon his Reputation, and how painful it is to be expofed to the Mirth and Derifion of

the

the Publick, and fhould therefore fcorn to divert my Reader at the Expence of any private Man.

AS I have been thus tender of every particular Perfon's Reputation, fo I have taken more than ordinary Care not to give Offence to those who appear in the higher Figures of Life. I would not make my felf merry even with a Piece of Pafteboard that is invetted with a publick Character; for which Reason I have never glanced upon the late defigned Proceffion of his Holiness and his Attendants, notwithstanding it might have afforded Matter to many ludicrous Speculations. Among thofe Advantages, which the Publick may reap from this Paper, it is not the least, that it draws Mens Minds off from the Bitterness of Party, and furnishes them with Subjects of Discourse that may be treated without Warmth or Paffion. This is faid to have been the first Defign of those Gentlemen who fet on Foot the Royal Society; and had then a very good Effect, as it turned many of the greatest Genius's of that Age to the Difquifitions of natural Knowledge, who, if they had engaged in Politicks with the fame Parts and Application, might have fet their Country in a Flame. The Air-Pump, the Barometer, the Quadrant, and the like Inventions, were thrown out to thofe bufy Spirits, as Tubs and Barrels are to a Whale, that he may let the Ship fail on without Disturbance, while he diverts himfelf with those innocent Amusements.

I have been so very fcrupulous in this Particular of not hurting any Man's Reputation that I have forborn mentioning even fuch Authors as I could not name with Honour. This I must confefs to have been a Piece of very great Self-denial: For as the Publick relishes nothing better than the Ridicule which turns upon a Writer of any Eminence, fo there is nothing which a Man that has but a very ordinary Talent in Ridicule may execute with greater Eafe. One might raife Laughter for a Quarter of a Year together upon the Works of a Perfon who has published but a very few Volumes. For which Reason I am aftonifhed, that those who have appeared against this Paper have made fo very little of it. The Criticisms which I have hitherto published, have been made with an Intention rather to difcover Beauties and Excellencies in the Writers of my own Time, than to publish any of

their Faults and Imperfections. In the mean while I should take it for a very great Favour from fome of my underhand Detractors, if they would break all Measures with me fo far, as to give me a Pretence for examining their Performances with an impartial Eye: Nor fhall I look upon it as any Breach of Charity to criticise the Author, fo long as I keep clear of the Perfon.

IN the mean while, 'till I am provoked to fuch Hoftilities, I fhall from Time to Time endeavour to do Juftice to those who have diftinguished themselves in the politer Parts of Learning, and to point out fuch Beauties in their Works as may have efcaped the Obfervation of others.

AS the first Place among our English Poets is due to Milton; and as I have drawn more Quotations out of him than from any other, I fhall enter into a regular Criticifm upon his Paradife Loft, which I fhall publish every Saturday 'till I have given my Thoughts upon that Poem. I fhall not however prefume to impofe upon others my own particular Judgment on this Author, but only deli ver it as my private Opinion. Criticifm is of a very large Extent, and every particular Master in this Art has his favourite Paffages in an Author, which do not equally ftrike the beft Jedges. It will be fufficient for me if I difcover many Beauties or Imperfections which others have not attended to, and I fhould be very glad to fee any of our Eminent Writers publish their Discoveries on the fame Subject. In fhort, I would always be underftood to write my Papers of Criticism in the Spirit which Horace has expreffed in those two famous Lines;

Si quid novifti rectius iftis,

Candidus imperti; fi non, his utere mecum.

IF you have made any better Remarks of your own, communicate them with Candour; if not, make use of thefe I prefent you with.

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Tuesday,