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⚫ced to comply with her Demands while fhe is in her prefent Condition, being very willing to have more of the fame Breed. I do not know what she may produce me, but provided it be a Show I fhall be very well fatisfied. Such Novelties fhould not, I think, be coucealed from the British Spectator; for which Reason I hope you will excufe this Prefumption in

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Virg.

HE Occafion of this Letter is of fo great Impor tance, and the Circumstances of it fuch, that I know you will but think it just to insert it, in • Preference of all other Matters that can present themfelves to your Confideration. I need not, after I have faid this, tell you that I am in Love. The Circum⚫ftances of my Paffion I fhall let you understand as well

as a difordered Mind will admit. That curfed Pickthank Mrs. Jane! Alas, I am railing at one to you by her Name as familiarly as if you were acquainted with her as well as my felf: But I will tell you all, as faft as the alternate Interruptions of Love and Anger will give me Leave. There is a most agreeable young Woman in the ⚫ World whom I am paffionately in Love with, and from ⚫ whom I have for fome Space of Time received as great • Marks of Favour as were fit for her to give, or me to

defire. The fuccefsful Progrefs of the Affair of all o⚫thers the moft effential towards a Man's Happiness, gave a new Life and Spirit not only to my Behaviour and difcourfe, but also a certain Grace to all my Actions

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⚫ in the Commerce of Life in all Things tho' never fo remote from Love. You know the predominant Paffion fpreads it felf thro' all a Man's Transactions, and exalts or depreffes him according to the Nature of fuch Paffion. • But alas, I have not yet begun my Story, and what is making Sentences and Obfervations when a Man is pleading for his Life? To begin then: This Lady has correfponded with me under Names of Love, fhe my Belinda, I her Cleanthes. Tho' I am thus well got into the 'Account of my Affair, I cannot keep in the Thread of it fo much as to give you the Character of Mrs. Jane, whom I will not hide under a borrowed Name; but

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• let you know that this Creature has been fince I knew ⚫ her very handfom, (tho' I will not allow her even she ' has been for the future) and during the Time of her ⚫ Bloom and Beauty was fo great a Tyrant to her Lovers, fo over-valued her felf and under-rated all her Pretenders, that they have deferted her to a Man; and the knows no Comfort but that common one to all in her Condition, the Pleasure of interrupting the Amours of ⚫ others. It is impoffible but you must have seen several ' of these Volunteers in Malice, who pafs their whole • Time in the most laborious Way of Life, in getting Intelligence, running from Place to Place with new Whispers, without reaping any other Benefit but the Hopes of making others as unhappy as themfelves. Mrs. Jane happened to be at a Place where I, with many others well acquainted with my Paffion for Belinda, paffed a Christmas-Evening. There was among the rest young Lady fo free in Mirth, fo amiable in a just Referve that accompanied it, I wrong her to call it a • Reserve, but there appeared in her a Mirth or Chear⚫fulness which was not a Forbearance of more immoderate Joy, but the natural Appearance of all which could flow from a Mind poffeffed of an Habit of Innocence ⚫ and Purity. I must have utterly forgot Belinda to have 'taken no notice of one who was growing up to the fame ' womanly Virtues which fhine to Perfection in her, had • I not distinguished one who feemed to promife to the • World the fame Life and Conduct with my faithful and • lovely Belinda. When the Company broke up, the ⚫ fine young Thing permitted me to take care of her • Home.

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Home. Mrs. Jane faw my particular Regard to her, ⚫ and was informed of my attending her to her Father's House. She came early to Belinda the next Morning, ⚫ and asked her if Mrs. Such a one had been with her? No. . If Mr. Such a one's Lady? No. Nor your Coufin Such • a one? No. Lord, fays Mrs. Jane, what is the Friendship of Women Nay, they may well laugh at it. And did no one tell you any thing of the Behaviour of ⚫ your Lover Mr. What d'ye call laft Night? But perhaps it is nothing to you that he is to be married to young ⚫ Mrs. on Tuesday next? Belinda was here ready to die with Rage and Jealoufy. Then Mrs. Jane goes on: I have a young Kinfman who is Clerk to a great . Conveyancer, who fhall fhew you the rough Draught of the Marriage Settlement. The World fays her Father • gives him Two Thousand Pounds more than he could have with you. I went innocently to wait on Belinda as ufual, but was not admitted; I writ to her, and my Letter was fent back unopened. Poor Betty her Maid, who is on my Side, has been here juft now blubbering, and told me the whole Matter. She fays fhe did not think I could be fo bafe; and that she is now odious to her Mistress for having fo often spoke well of me, that fhe dare not mention me more. All our Hopes are placed in having these Circumftances fairly reprefented in the SPECTATOR, which Betty fays the dare not but bring up as foon as it is brought in; and has promifed when you have broke the Ice to own this was laid between us: And when I can come to an Hearing, the young Lady will fupport what we fay by her Teftimony, that I never faw her but that once in my whole Life. Dear Sir, do not omit this true Relation, nor think it too particular; for there are Crowds of forlorn Coquettes who intermingle themselves with other Ladies, and • contract Familiarities out of Malice, and with no other Design but to blaft the Hopes of Lovers, the Expecta⚫tion of Parents, and the Benevolence of Kindred. I • doubt not but I shall be,

SIR,

Your most obliged humble Servant,

CLEANTHES.

SIR,

Will's Coffee-houfe, Jan. 10.

THE other Day entering a Room adorned with the

Fair Sex, I offered, after the usual Manner, to ⚫ each of them a Kifs; but one, more fcornful than the reft, turned her Cheek. I did not think it to take any notice of it till I had asked your Advice. Your humble Servant,

proper to

E. S.

THE Correfpondent is defir'd to fay which Cheek the Offender turned to him.

ADVERTISEMENT.
From the Parish-Veftry, January 9.

All Ladies who come to Church in the New-fashioned Hoods, are defired to be there before Divine Service begins, left they divert the Attention of the Congregation. T RALPH.

No 273. Saturday, January 12.

H

Notandi funt tibi Mores.

Hor.

AVING examined the Action of Paradife Loft, let us in the next place confider the Actors. This is Ariftotle's Method of confidering, first the Fable, and fecondly the Manners; or, as we generally call them in English, the Fable and the Characters.

HOMER has excelled all the Heroick Poets that ever wrote in the Multitude and Variety of his Characters. Every God that is admitted into his Poem, acts a Part which would have been fuitable to no other Deity. His Princes are as much distinguished by their Manners as by their Dominions; and even thofe among them, whofe Characters feem wholly made up of Courage, differ from one another as to the particular kinds of Courage in which they excel. In fhort, there is scarce a Speech or Action

in the Iliad, which the Reader may not ascribe to the Perfon that speaks or acts, without feeing his Name at the Head of it.

HOME R does not only outfhine all other Poets in the Variety, but also in the Novelty of his Characters. He has introduced among his Grecian Princes a Person who had lived thrice the Age of Man, and converfed with Thefeus, Hercules, Polyphemus, and the firft Race of Heroes. His principal Actor is the Son of a Goddess, not to mention the Offspring of other Deities, who have likewife a Place in his Poem, and the venerable Trojan Prince, who was the Father of fo many Kings and Heroes. There is in these feveral Characters of Homer, a certain Dignity as well as Novelty, which adapts them in a more peculiar manner to the Nature of an Heroic Poem. Tho' at the fame time, to give them the greater Variety, he has defcribed a Vulcan, that is a Buffoon among his Gods, and a Therfites among his Mortals.

VIRGIL falls infinitely short of Homer in the Characters of his Poem, both as to their Variety and Novelty. Eneas is indeed a perfect Character, but as for Achates, tho' he's ftiled the Hero's Friend, he does nothing in the whole Poem which may deserve that Title. Gyas, Mneheus, Sergeftus and Cloanthus, are all of them Men of the fame Stamp and Character,

Fortemque Gyan, fortemque Cloanthum. Virg.

There are indeed feveral very Natural Incidents in the Part of Afcanius; as that of Dido cannot be fufficiently admired. I do not fee any thing new or particular in Turnus. Pallas and Evander are remote Copies of Hector and Priam, as Laufus and Mezentius are almoft Parallels to Pallas and Evander. The Characters of Nisus and Eurialus are beautiful, but common. We must not forget the Parts of Sinon, Camilla, and fome few others, which are fine Improvements on the Greek Poet. In fhort, there is neither that Variety nor Novelty in the Perfons of the Eneid, which we meet with in thofe of the Iliad.

IF we look into the Characters of Milton, we shall find that he has introduced all the Variety his Fable was capable of receiving. The whole Species of Mankind was in two Perfons at the Time to which the Subject of

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