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cept those who, you fay, are our conftant vifitants. I was upon the occafion commiffioned by the company to write to you, and tell you, that we thall not part with the men that we have at prefent, until the men of fenfe think fit to relieve them, and give us their-company in their stead. You cannot imagine but that we love to hear reafon and good fenfe better than the ribaldry we are at prefent entertained with; but we must have company, and among us, very inconfiderable is better than none at all. We are made for the cements of fociety, and came into the world to create relations among mankind; and folitude is an unnatural being to us. If the men of good underftanding would forget a little of their feverity, they would find their account in it; and their wisdom would have a pleasure in it, to which they are now ftrangers. It is natural among us when men have a true relifh of our company and our value, to fay every thing with a better grace; and there is without defigning it fome thing ornamental in what men utter be fore women, which is loft or neglected in converfations of men only. Give me leave to tell you, Sir, it would do you no great harm if you yourfelf came a little more into our company; it would certainly cure you of a certain politive and determining manner in which you, talk fometimes. In hopes of your mendment,

I am, Sir, your gentle reader.

MR. SPECTATOR,

YOUR profeffed regard to the fairfex, may perhaps make them value, your admonitions when they will not. thofe of other men. I defire you, Sir,. to repeat fome lectures upon fubjects which you have now and then in a, curfory manner only juft touched. I would have a Spectator wholly writ, upon good-breeding; and after you have, afferted that time and place are to be

very much confidered in all our actions, it will be proper to dwell upon behaviour at church. On Sunday laft a grave and reverend man preached at our church: there was fomething particular in his accent, but without any manner of affectation. This particularity a fet of giglers thought the most neceffary thing to be taken notice of in his whole difcourfe, and made it an occasion of mirth during the whole time of fermon: you should fee one of them ready to burft behind a fan, another pointing to a companion in another feat, and a third with an arch compofure, as if she would if poffible ftifle her laughter. There were many gentlemen who looked at them ftedfaftly, but this they took for ogling and admiring them: there was one of the merry ones in particular, that found out but just then that the had five fingers, for the fell a reckoning the pretty pieces of ivory over and over again, to find herfelf employment and not laugh out. Would it not be expedient, Mr. Spectator, that the churchwarden fhould held up his wand on these occafions, and keep the decency of the place as a magiftrate does the peace in a tumult cliewhere?

MR. SPECTATOR,

I Am a woman's man, and read with

a very fine lady your paper, wherein you fall upon us whom you envy: what do you think I did? You must know fhe was dreffing, I read the Spectator to her, and the laughed at the places where the thought I was touched; I threw away your moral, and taking up her girdle, cried out

Give me but what this ribbon bound,
Take all the reft the fun goes round.

She fmiled, Sir, and faid you were a pedant; fo fay of me what you please, read Seneca, and quote him against me if you think fit. T

I am, Sir, your humble fervant,

N° CLIX.

W

N° CLIX. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 1.

-OMNEM, QUÆ NUNC OBDUCTA TUENTI
MORTALES HEBETAT VISUS TIBI, ET HUMIDA CIRCUM
CALIGAT, NUBEM ZRIPIAM-

VIRG. EN. II. v. 604.

THE CLOUD, WHICH, INTERCEPTING THE CLEAR LIGHT,
HANGS O'ER THE EYES, AND BLUNTS THY MORTAL SIGHT,
I WILL REMOVE

ma

HEN I was at Grand Cairo, I picked up feveral oriental nufcripts, which I have ftill by me. Among others I met with one entitled, The Vifions of Mirzah,' which I have read over with great pleasure. I intend to give it to the public when I have no other entertainment for them; and I fhall begin with the firft vifion, which I have tranflated word for word as follows.

ON the fifth day of the moon, which according to the custom of my forefathers I always keep holy, after having washed myfelf, and offered up my morning devotions, I afcended the high hills of Bagdat, in order to pass the rest of the day in meditation and prayer. As I was bere airing myself on the tops of the mountains, I fell into a profound contemplation on the vanity of human life; and paffing from one thought to another-Surely,' faid I, man is but

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a thadow, and life a dream. Whilft I was thus mufing, I caft my eyes towards the fummit of a rock that was not far from me, where I discovered one in the habit of a fhepherd, with a little mufical inftrument in his hand. As I looked upon him he applied it to his lips, and began to play upon it. The found of it was exceeding sweet, and wrought into a variety of tunes that were inexpreffibly melodious, and altogether different from any thing I had ever heard: they put me in mind of those heavenly airs that are played to the departed fouls of good men upon their first arrival in paradife, to wear out the impreflions of the laft agonies, and qualify them for the pleafures of that happy place. My heart melted away in fecret raptures.

I had been often told that the rock before me was the haunt of a genius; and that feveral had been entertained

with mufic who had paffed by it, but never heard that the musician had before made himself vifible. When he had raised my thoughts by thofe transporting airs which he played, to tafte the pleasures of his converfation, as I looked upon him like one astonished, he beckoned to me, and by the waving of his hand directed me to approach the place where he fat. I drew near with that reverence which is due to a fupe.. rior nature; and as my heart was entire

ly fubdued by the captivating ftrains I had heard, I fell down at his feet and wept. The genius fmiled upon me with a look of compaffion and affability that familiarized him to my imagination, and at once difpelled all the fears and apprehenfions with which I approached him. He lifted me from the ground, and taking me by the hand—' Mirzah,' faid he, I have heard thee in thy soliloquies; follow me.'

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He then led me to the highest pinnacle of the rock, and placing me on the top of it- Caft thy eyes eastward,” said he, and tell me what thou feeft. '—' I fee,' faid I, a huge valley, and a prodigious tide of water rolling through it. The valley that thou feeft,' faid he, is the vale of mifery, and the tide of water that thou feeft is part of the great tide of eternity. What is the reafon,' faid I, that the tide I fee rifes out of a thick mist at one end, and again lofes itself in a thick mit at the other? What thou feeft,' faid he, is that portion of eternity which

is called Time, meafured out by the • fun, and reaching from the beginning of the world to it's confummation. Examine now,' faid he, this fea that is thus bounded with darkness at both ends, and tell me what thou difcoveret in it. I fee a bridge,' faid I, ftanding in the midft of the tide." -The bridge thou seeft,' faid he, 'is

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• human

SPECTATOR.

1 XVI.

Publifhed as the Art directs, by Harrifon & Co April 6.17

Heath scalp.

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human life, confider it attentively.' Upon a more leifurely furvey of it, I found that it confifted of threefcore and ten entire arches, with feveral broken arches, which, added to those that were intire, made up the number about an hundred. As I was counting the arches, the genius told me that this bridge confifted at first of a thousand arches; but that a great flood swept away the rest, and left the bridge in the ruinous condition I now beheld it. But tell me further, faid he, what thou difco' vereft on it. I fee multitudes of people paffing over it,' faid I, and

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' a black cloud hanging on each end of 'it.' As I looked more attentively, I faw feveral of the paffengers dropping through the bridge, into the great tide that flowed underneath it; and upon farther examination, perceived there were innumerable trap-doors that lay concealed in the bridge, which the paffengers no fooner trod upon, but they fell through them into the tide and immediately difappeared. Thefe hidden pit-falls were fet very thick at the entrance of the bridge, fo that throngs of people no fooner broke through the cloud, but many of them fell into them. They grew thinner towards the middle, but multiplied and lay closer together towards the end of the arches that were intire.

There were indeed fome perfons, but their number was very small, that continued a kind of hobbling march on the broken arches, but fell through one after another, being quite tired and spent with fo long a walk.

I paffed fome time in the contemplation of this wonderful structure, and the great variety of objects which it prefented. My heart was filled with a deep melancholy to fee feveral dropping unexpectedly in the midst of mirth and jollity, and catching at every thing that ftood by them to fave themselves. Some were looking up towards the heavens in a thoughtful pofture, and in the midst of a fpeculation ftumbled and fell out of fight. Multitudes were very bufy in the purfuit of bubbles that glittered in their eyes and danced before them; but often when they thought themselves within the reach of them, their footing failed and down they funk. In this confufion of objects, I obferved fome with feymitars in their hands, and others with urinals, who ran to and fro upon

the bridge, thrusting feveral perfons on trap-doors which did not feem to lie in their way, and which they might have escaped had they not been thus forced upon them.

The genius feeing me indulge myself in this melancholy profpect, told me I had dwelt long enough upon it: 'Take thine eyes off the bridge,' faid he,' and tell me if thou yet feeft any thing thou dost not comprehend. Upon looking up- What mean,' faid I, thofe great flights of birds that are perpetually hovering about the bridge, and fettling upon it from time to time? I fee vultures, harpies, ravens, cormorants, and among many other feathered creatures, feveral little winged boys, that perch in great numbers upon the 'middle arches.' Thefe,' faid the genius, are envy, avarice, fuperftition, defpair, love, with the like cares and paffions that infeft human life.'

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I here fetched a deep figh; 'Alas," faid I, man was made in vain! How is he given away to mifery and mor

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tality? tortured in life, and fwallowed up in death! The genius being moved with compaffion towards me, bid me quit fo uncomfortable a prospect. Look no more,' faid he, on man in the first stage of his existence, in his fetting out for eternity; but caft thine eye on that thick mift into which the tide bears the feveral generations of mortals that fall into it.' I directed my fight as I was ordered, and, whether or no the good genius ftrengthened it with any fupernatural force, or diffipated part of the mift that was before too thick for the eye to penetrate, I saw the valley opening at the farther end, and spreading forth into an immense ocean, that had a huge rock of adamant running through the midft of it, and dividing it into two equal parts. The clouds ftill refted on one half of it, infomuch that I could discover nothing in it; but the other appeared to me a vast ocean planted with innumerable islands, that were covered with fruits and flowers, and interwoven with a thousand little fhining feas that ran among them. I could fee perfons dreffed in glorious habits with garlands upon their heads, paffing among the trees, lying down by the fides of fountains, or refting on beds of flowers; and could hear a confused harmony of finging birds, falling waters, human voices, and mufical initru

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