to gratify the senses and imagination: In it a being capable of receiving so much very many places it intimates to us all the bliss. He would never have made such happiness which the understanding can faculties in vain, and have endowed us with possibly receive in that state, where all powers that were not to be exerted on such things shall be revealed to us, and we shall objects as are suited to them. It is very know even as we are known; the raptures manifest, by the inward frame and constitu of devotion, of divine love, the pleasure of tion of our minds, that he has adapted them conversing with our blessed Saviour, with to an infinite variety of pleasures and gratian innumerable host of angels, and with the fications which are not to be met with in spirits of just men made perfect, are like- this life. We should therefore at all times wise revealed to us in several parts of the take care that we do not disappoint this his holy writings. There are also mentioned gracious purpose and intention towards us, those hierarchies or governments in which and make those faculties, which he formed the blessed shall be ranged one above an- as so many qualifications for happiness and other, and in which we may be sure a great rewards, to be the instruments of pain and part of our happiness will likewise consist: punishment. for it will not be there as in this world, where every one is aiming at power and superiority; but, on the contrary, every one No. 601.] Friday, October 1, 1714. will find that station the most proper for him in which he is placed, and will probably think that he could not have been so happy in any other station. These, and many other particulars, are marked in divine revelation, as the several ingredients of our happiness in heaven, which all imply such a variety of joys, and such a gratification of the soul in all its different faculties, as I have been here mentioning.

Some of the rabbins tell us, that the cherubims are a set of angels who know most, and the seraphims a set of angels who love most. Whether this distinction be not altogether imaginary, I shall not here examine; but it is highly probable that, among the spirits of good men, there may be some who will be more pleased with the employment of one faculty than of another; and this perhaps according to those innocent and virtuous habits or inclinations which have here taken the deepest root.

«Ο άνθρωπος ευερνετος περυκώς.

Antonin. Lib. ir. Man is naturally a beneficent creature. THE following essay comes from a hand which has entertained my readers once before.

'Notwithstanding a narrow contracted temper be that which obtains most in the world, we must not therefore conclude this to be the genuine characteristic of mankind; because there are some who delight in nothing so much as in doing good, and receive more of their happiness at second hand, or by rebound from others, than by direct and immediate sensation. Now, though these heroic souls are but few, and to appearance so far advanced above the grovelling multitude as if they were of another order of beings, yet in reality their nature is the same; moved by the same springs, and enI might here apply this consideration to dowed with all the same essential qualities, the spirits of wicked men, with relation to only cleared, refined, and cultivated. Water the pain which they shall suffer in every is the same fluid body in winter and in sumone of their faculties, and the respective mer; when it stands stiffened in ice as when miseries which shall be appropriated to it flows along in gentle streams, gladdening each faculty in particular. But, leaving this a thousand fields in its progress. It is a to the reflection of my readers, I shall con- property of the heart of man to be diffusive: clude with observing how we ought to be its kind wishes spread abroad over the face thankful to our great Creator, and rejoice of the creation; and if there be those, as we in the being which he has bestowed upon may observe too many of them, who are all us, for having made the soul susceptible of wrapped up in their own dear selves, withpleasure by so many different ways. We out any visible concern for their species, let see by what a variety of passages joy and us suppose that their good nature is frozen, gladness may enter into the thoughts of and by the prevailing force of some conman; how wonderfully a human spirit is trary quality, restrained in its operation. I framed, to imbibe its proper satisfactions, shall therefore endeavour to assign some of and taste the goodness of its Creator. We the principal checks upon this generous may therefore look into ourselves with rap- propension of the human soul, which will ture and amazement, and cannot sufficiently enable us to judge whether, and by what express our gratitude to Him who has en- method, this most useful principle may be compassed us with such a profusion of bless-unfettered, and restored to its native freeings, and opened in us so many capacities dom of exercise. of enjoying them.

There cannot be a stronger argument that God has designed us for a state of future happiness, and for that heaven which he has revealed to us, than that he has thus naturally qualified the soul for it, and made

The first and leading cause is an unhappy complexion of body. The heathens, ignorant of the true source of moral evil, generally charged it on the obliquity of matter, which, being eternal and indepen dent, was incapable of change in any of its

duce a change in the body, which the others not doing, must be maintained the same way they are acquired, by the mere dint of industry, resolution, and vigilance.

"Homo qui erranti comiter monstrat viam, Quasi lumen de suo lumine accendat, facit, Nihilominus ipsi luceat, cum illi accenderit."

properties, even by the Almighty Mind, who, when he came to fashion it into a world of beings, must take it as he found it. This notion, as most others of theirs, is a composition of truth and error. That matter is 'Another thing which suspends the opeeternal, that, from the first union of a soul rations of benevolence, is the love of the to it, it perverted its inclinations, and that world; proceeding from a false notion men the ill influence it hath upon the mind is have taken up, that an abundance of the not to be corrected by God himself, are all world is an essential ingredient in the hapvery great errors, occasioned by a truth as piness of life. Worldly things are of such evident, that the capacities and dispositions a quality as to lessen upon dividing, so that of the soul depend, to a great degree, on the more partners there are the less must the bodily temper. As there are some fools, fall to every man's private share. The others are knaves by constitution; and par- consequence of this is, that they look upon ticularly it may be said of many, that they one another with an evil eye, each imaginare born with an illiberal cast of mind; the ing all the rest to be embarked in an inmatter that composes them is tenacious as terest that cannot take place but to his birdlime; and a kind of cramp draws their prejudice. Hence are those eager compehands and their hearts together, that they titions for wealth or power; hence one man's never care to open them, unless to grasp at success becomes another's disappointment; more. It is a melancholy lot this; but at- and, like pretenders to the same mistress, tended with one advantage above theirs, to they can seldom have common charity for whom it would be as painful to forbear good their rivals. Not that they are naturally offices as it is to these men to perform them; disposed to quarrel and fall out; but it is that whereas persons naturally beneficent natural for a man to prefer himself to all often mistake instinct for virtue, by reason others, and to secure his own interest first. of the difficulty of distinguishing when one If that which men esteem their happiness rules them and when the other, men of the were, like the light, the same sufficient and opposite character may be more certain of unconfined good, whether ten thousand enthe motive that predominates in every ac-joy the benefit of it or but one, we should tion. If they cannot confer a benefit with see men's good-will and kind endeavours that ease and frankness which are neces- would be as universal. sary to give it a grace in the eye of the world, in requital, the real merit of what they do is enhanced by the opposition they surmount in doing it. The strength of their virtue is seen in rising against the weight of nature; and every time they have the resolution to discharge their duty, they make a sacrifice of inclination to conscience, which is always too grateful to let its followers go without suitable marks of its approbation. Perhaps the entire cure of this ill quality is no more possible than of some distempers that descend by inheritance. However, a great deal may be done by a course of beneficence obstinately persisted in; this, if any thing, being a likely way of establishing a moral habit, which shall be somewhat of a counterpoise to the force of mechanism. Only it must be remembered that we do not intermit, upon any pretence whatsoever, the custom of doing good, in regard, if there be the least cessation, nature will watch the opportunity to return, and in a short time to recover the ground it was so long in quitting: for there is this difference between mental habits and such as have their foundation in the body; that these last are in their nature more forcible and violent; and, to gain upon us, need only not to be opposed; whereas the former must be continually reinforced with fresh supplies, or they will languish and die away. And this suggests the reason why good habits in general require longer time for their settlement than bad, and yet are sooner displaced; the reason is, that vicious habits, as drunkenness for instance, pro

another man's candle by one's own, which loses none "To direct a wanderer in the right way, is to light of its light by what the other gains."

'But, unluckily, mankind agree in making choice of objects which inevitably engage them in perpetual differences. Learn, therefore, like a wise man, the true estimate of things. Desire not more of the world than is necessary to accommodate you in passing through it; look upon every thing beyond, not as useless only, but burdensome. Place not your quiet in things which you cannot have without putting others beside them, and thereby making them your enemies; and which, when attained, will give you more trouble to keep than satisfaction in the enjoyment. Virtue is a good of a nobler kind; it grows by communication; and so little resembles earthly riches, that the more hands it is lodged in, the greater is every man's particular stock. So, by propagating and mingling their fires, not only all the lights of a branch together cast a more extensive brightness, but each single light burns with a stronger flame. And lastly, take this along with you, that if wealth be an instrument of pleasure, the greatest pleasure it can put into your power is that of doing good. It is worth considering, that the organs of sense act within a narrow compass, and the appetites will soon say they have enough. Which of the two therefore is the happier man-he who,

confining all his regard to the gratification | talked of, though it be for the particular of his appetites, is capable but of short fits cock of his hat, or for prating aloud in the of pleasure or the man who, reckoning boxes at a play, is in a fair way of being a himself a sharer in the satisfactions of others, favourite. I have known a young fellow especially those which come to them by his make his fortune by knocking down a conmeans, enlarges the sphere of his happi- stable; and may venture to say, though it ness? may seem a paradox, that many a fair one has died by a duel in which both the combatants have survived.

"The last enemy to benevolence I shall mention is uneasiness of any kind. A guilty or a discontented mind, a mind ruffled by 'About three winters ago, I took notice of ill-fortune, disconcerted by its own passions, a young lady at the theatre, who conceived soured by neglect, or fretting at disappoint- a passion for a notorious rake that headed ments, hath not leisure to attend to the ne-a party of catcalls; and am credibly incessity or unreasonableness of a kindness formed that the emperor of the Mohocks desired, nor a taste for those pleasures married a rich widow within three weeks which wait on beneficence, which demand after having rendered himself formidable in a calm and unpolluted heart to relish them. the cities of London and Westminster. The most miserable of all beings is the Scouring and breaking of windows have most envious; as, on the other hand, the done frequent execution upon the sex. But most communicative is the happiest. And there is no set of these male charmers who if you are in search of the seat of perfect make their way more successfully than love and friendship, you will not find it until those who have gained themselves a name you come to the region of the blessed, for intrigue, and have ruined the greatest where happiness, like a refreshing stream, number of reputations. There is a strange flows from heart to heart in an endless cir- curiosity in the female world to be acquaintculation, and is preserved sweet and un-ed with the dear man who has been loved tainted by the motion. It is old advice, if you have a favour to request of any one, to observe the softest times of address, when the soul, in a flash of good humour, takes a pleasure to show itself pleased. Persons conscious of their own integrity, satisfied with themselves and their condition, and full of confidence in a Supreme Being, and the hope of immortality, survey all about 'I was very sensible of the great advanthem with a flow of good-will; as trees tage of being a man of importance upon which, like their soil, shoot out in expres- these occasions on the day of the king's sions of kindness, and bend beneath their entry, when I was seated in a balcony beown precious load, to the hand of the ga-hind a cluster of very pretty country ladies, therer. Now, if the mind be not thus easy, it is an infallible sign that it is not in its natural state: place the mind in its right posture, it will immediately discover its innate propension to beneficence.'

by others, and to know what it is that makes him so agreeable. His reputation does more than half his business. Every one that is ambitious of being a woman of fashion, looks out for opportunities of being in his company; so that, to use the old proverb, "When his name is up he may lie a-bed."

who had one of these showy gentlemen in the midst of them. The first trick I caught him at was bowing to several persons of quality whom he did not know; nay, he had the impudence to hem at a blue garter who had a finer equipage than ordinary; and seemed a little concerned at the impertinent huzzas of the mob, that hindered his friend from taking notice of him. There was indeed one who pulled off his hat to him; and, upon the ladies asking who it was, he told them it was a foreign minister that he had been very merry with the night before; whereas in truth it was the city common hunt.

"He was never at a loss when he was asked any person's name, though he seldom knew any one under a peer. He found dukes and earls among the aldermen, very good-natured fellows among the privyCounsellors, with two or three agreeable old rakes among the bishops and judges.

'SIR,-In order to execute the office of the love casuist of Great Britain, with which I take myself to be invested by your paper of September 8, I shall make some farther observations upon the two sexes in general, beginning with that which always In short, I collected from his whole disought to have the upper hand. After hav-course, that he was acquainted with every ing observed, with much curiosity, the ac- body, and knew nobody. At the same time, complishments which are apt to captivate I am mistaken if he did not that day make female hearts, I find that there is no per- more advances in the affections of his misson so irresistible as one who is a man of tress, who sat near him, than he could have importance, provided it be in matters of no done in half a year's courtship. consequence. One who makes himself

'Ovid has finely touched this method of

making love, which I shall here give my | My fair one is gone, and my joys are all drown'd, And my heart-I am sure it weighs more than a pound. reader in Mr. Dryden's translation.

* Mr. John Byron, author of the two papers on dreaming, No. 586 and 593.

"It has been said, on good authority, that the Phoebe of this pastoral was Joanna, the daughter of Dr. Bentley, and that it was written, not so much from affection to the daughter, as with the aim of securing the interest of the doctor, in promoting the author's views with regard to the fellowship for which, at the period of its composition, he was a candidate."

Drake's Essays, vol. iii. p. 216. ↑ Ansty made a most happy parody of these two lines in his Bath Guide.

The fountain that wont to run swiftly along,
And dance to soft murmurs the pebbles among;
Thou know'st little Cupid, if Phoebe was there,
"Twas pleasure to look at, 'twas music to hear:
But now she is absent, I walk by its side,
And still as it murmurs do nothing but chide.
Must you be so cheerful, when I go in pain?

Peace there with your bubbling, and hear me complain.

THE desire of knowing future events, is one of the strongest inclinations in the mind of man. Indeed, an ability of foreseeing probable accidents is what, in the language of men, is called wisdom and prudence: but, not satisfied with the light that reason holds out, mankind hath endeavoured to penetrate more compendiously into futurity. Magic, oracles, omens, lucky hours, and the various arts of superstition, owe their rise to this powerful cause. As this principle is founded in self-love, every man is sure to be solicitous in the first place about his own fortune, the course of his life, and the time and manner of his death.

If we consider that we are free agents, we shall discover the absurdity of such inquiries. One of our actions, which we might have performed or neglected, is the cause of another that succeeds it, and so the whole chain of life is linked together. Pain, poverty, or infamy, are the natural product of vicious and imprudent acts; as the contrary blessings are of good ones; so that we cannot suppose our lot to be determined without impiety. A great enhancement of pleasure arises from its being unexpected; and pain is doubled by being foreseen. Upon all these, and several other accounts, we ought to rest satisfied in this portion bestowed on us; to adore the hand that hath fitted every thing to our nature, and hath not more displayed his goodness in our knowledge than in our ignorance.

along, and I found in myself a strong inclination to mingle in the train. My eyes quickly singled out some of the most splendid figures. Several in rich caftans and glittering turbans bustled through the throng, and trampled over the bodies of those they threw down; until, to my great surprise, I found that the great pace they went only hastened them to a scaffold or a bow-string. Many beautiful damsels on the other side moved forward with great gayety; some danced until they fell all along; and others painted their faces until they lost their noses. A tribe of creatures with busy looks falling into a fit of laughter at the misfortunes of the unhappy ladies, I turned my eyes upon them. They were each of them filling his pockets with gold and jewels, and when there was no room left for more, these wretches, looking round with fear and horror, pined away before my face with famine and discontent.

The prospect of human misery struck me dumb for some miles. Then it was, that to disburden my mind, I took pen and ink, and did every thing that has since happened under my office as Spectator. While I was employing myself for the good of mankind, I was surprised to meet with very unsuitable returns from my fellowcreatures. Never was poor author so beset by pamphleteers, who sometimes marched directly against me, but oftener shot at me from strong bulwarks, or rose up suddenly It is not unworthy observation, that super- in ambush. They were of all characters stitious inquiries into future events prevail and capacities, some with ensigns of digmore or less, in proportion to the improve-nity, and others in liveries;* but what most ment of liberal arts and useful knowledge surprised me was to see two or three in in the several parts of the world. Accord- black gowns among my enemies. It was no ingly, we find that magical incantations re-small trouble to me, sometimes to have a main in Lapland; in the more remote parts man come up to me with an angry face, of Scotland they have their second sight; and reproach me for having lampooned and several of our own countrymen have him, when I had never seen or heard of seen abundance of fairies. In Asia this cre- him in my life. With the ladies it was dulity is strong; and the greatest part of otherwise: many became my enemies for refined learning there consists in the know-not being particularly pointed out; as there ledge of amulets, talismans, occult numbers, and the like.

were others who resented the satire which they imagined I had directed against them. When I was at Grand Cairo, I fell into My great comfort was in the company of the acquaintance of good-natured mus- half a dozen friends, who, I found since, sulman, who promised me many good offices were the club which I have so often menwhich he designed to do me when he be- tioned in my papers. I laughed often at came the prime minister, which was a Sir Roger in my sleep, and was the more difortune bestowed on his imagination by a verted with Will Honeycomb's gallantries, doctor very deep in the curious sciences. (when we afterwards became acquainted,) At his repeated solicitations I went to learn because I had foreseen his marriage with a my destiny of this wonderful sage. For a farmer's daughter. The regret which arose small sum I had his promise, but was de-in my mind upon the death of my comsired to wait in a dark apartment until he panions, my anxieties for the public, and had run through the preparatory ceremo-the many calamities still fleeting before my nies. Having a strong propensity, even eyes, made me repent my curiosity; when then, to dreaming, I took a nap upon the the magician entered the room, and awakensofa where I was placed, and had the fol- ed me, by telling me (when it was too late,) lowing vision, the particulars whereof I that he was just going to begin. picked up the other day among my papers.

I found myself in an unbounded plain, where methought the whole world, in several habits and with different tongues, was assembled. The multitude glided swiftly

*This is pointed at the hirelings employed by the swift, Prior, Atterbury, Dr. Friend, Dr. King, Mr. Olde ministry in the last years of the queen's reign; Dr. worth, Mrs. Manley, &c