worship. I have a very angry letter from a lady, who tells me of one of her acquaintance, who, out of mere pride and a pretence to be rude, takes upon her to return no civilities done to her in time of divine fervice, and is the most religious woman for no other reafon but to appear a woman of the beft quality in the church. This abfurd cuftom had better be abolished than retained, if it were but to prevent evils of no higher a nature than this is; but I am informed of objections much more confiderable; a diffenter of rank and diftinction was lately prevailed upon by a friend of his to come to one of the greatest congregations of the church of England about town; after the service was over, he declared he was very well fatisfied with the little ceremony which was used towards God Almighty; but at the fame time he feared he should not be able to go through thofe required towards one another: as to this point he was in a state of despair, and feared he was not

well-bred enough to be a convert. There have been many fcandals of this kind given to our proteftant diffenters from the outward pomp and refpect we take to ourselves in our religious affemblies. A Quaker who came one day into a church, fixed his eye upon an old lady with a carpet larger than that from the pulpit before her, expecting when the would hold forth. An Anabaptift who defigns to come over himself, and all his family, within few months, is fenfible they want breeding enough for our congregations, and has fent his two eldest daughters to learn to dance, that they may not misbehave themselves at church: it is worth confidering whether, in regard to aukward people with ferupulous confciences, a good Chriftian of the beft air in the world ought, not rather to deny herself the opportunity of fhewing fo many graces, than keep a bashful profelyte without the pale of the church.

HOR. EP. 11. L. 2. VER. 55+

MR. SPECTATOR,

Am now in the fixty-fifth year of

POPE.

T

writing love-letters to the beauties that have been long fince in their graves.

memory of delights which were once agreeable to me; but how much happier would my life have been now, if I could have looked back on any worthy action done for my country? If I had laid out that which I profufed in luxury and wantonnefs, in acts of generofity or charity? I have lived a bachelor to this day; and inftead of a numerous offspring, with which, in the regular ways of life, Imight poffibly have delighted myself, I have only to amufe myself with the repetition of old stories and intrigues which no one will believe I ever was concerned in. I do not know whether you have ever treated of it or not; but you cannot fall on a better fubject, than that of the art of growing old. In fuch a lecture you must propofe, that no one fet his heart upon what is tranfient; the beauty grows wrinkled while we are yet gazing at her. The witty man finks into an humourift

humourist imperceptibly, for want of reflecting that all things around him are in a flux, and continually changing: thus he is in the space of ten or fifteen years furrounded by a new fet of people, whofe manners are as natural to them as his delights, method of thinking, and mode of living, were formerly to him and his friends. But the mifchief is, he looks upon the fame kind of errors which he himself was guilty of with an eye of fcorn, and with that fort of ill-will which men entertain against each other for different opinions: thus a crazy conftitution, and an uneafy mind, is fretted with vexatious paffions for young men's doing foolishly what it is folly to do at all. Dear Sir, this is my prefent state of mind; I hate those I should laugh at, and envy thofe I contemn. The time of youth and vigorous manhood, paffed the way in which I have difpofed of it, is attended with thefe confequences; but to those who live and pafs away life as they ought, all parts of it are equally pleafant; only the memory of good and worthy actions is a feaft which must give a quicker relifh to the foul than ever it could poffibly tafte in the highest enjoyments or jollities of youth. As for me, if I fit down in my great chair and begin to ponder, the vagaries of a child are not more ridiculous than the circumstances which are heaped up in my memory; fine gowns, country dances, ends of tunes, interrupted conversations, and midnight quarrels, are what must neceffarily compofe my foliloquy. I beg of you to print this, that fome ladies of my acquaintance, and my years, may perfuaded to wear warm night-caps this cold feafon: and that my old friend Jack Tawdry may buy him a cane, and not creep with the air of a ftrut. I muft add to all this, that if it were not for one pleasure, which I thought a very mean one until of very late years, I fhould have no great fatisfaction left; but if I live to the 10th of March, 1714, and all my fecurities are good, I fhall be worth fifty thousand pound. I am, Sir, your moit humble fervant,

MR. SPECTATOR,

be

JACK AFTERDAY.

You will infinitely oblige a diftreffed lover, if you will infert in your very next paper, the following letter to my mif

trefs. You must know, I am not a perfon apt to defpair, but the has got an odd humour of topping fhort unac countably, and, as the herfelf told a confident of her's, the has cold fits. Thefe fits fhall laft her a month or fix weeks together; and as the falls into them without provocation, fo it is to be hoped fhe will return from them with out the merit of new fervices. But life and love will not admit of fuch intervals, therefore pray let her be admonished as follows.

I

MADAM,

Love you, and I honour you; therefore pray do not tell me of waiting till decencies, till forms, till humours,.. are confulted and gratified. If you have that happy conftitution as to be indolent for ten weeks together, you should confider that all that while I burn with impatiences and fevers; but ftill you fay it will be time enough, though I and you too grow older while we are yet talking. Which do you think the more reasonable, that you fhould alter a ftate of indifference for happiness, and that to oblige me; or I live in torment, and that to lay no manner of obligation uponyou? While I indulge your infenfibility, I am doing nothing; if you favour my paffion, you are bestowing bright defires, gay hopes, generous cares, noble refolutions, and transporting raptures, upon, Madam,

Your most devoted humble fervant.

N° CCLXI CCL

Y father, whom I mentioned in

FRAG. VET. POET.

paffion fhould ftrike root, and gather

my

I must always name with honour and gratitude, has very frequently talked to me upon the fubject of marriage. I was in my younger years engaged, partly by his advice, and partly by my own inclinations, in the courtship of a perfon who had a great deal of beauty, and did not at my firit approaches feem to have any averfion to me; but as my natural taciturnity hindered me from fhewing myfelf to the beft advantage, fhe by degrees began to look upon me as a very lly fellow, and being refoived to regard merit more than any thing else in the pertons who made their applications to her, he married a captain of dragoons who happened to be beating up for reIcruits in thofe parts.

This unlucky accident has given me an aversion to pretty fellows ever fince, and difcouraged me from trying my fortune with the fair-fex. The obfervations which I made in this conjuncture, and the repeated advices which I received at that time from the good old man above-mentioned, have produced the following effay upon Love and Marriage.

The pleasanteft part of a man's life is generally that which paffes in courtship, provided his paffion be fincere, and the party beloved kind with difcretion, Love, defire, hope, all the pleafing mo tions of the foul, rife in the purfuit.

It is easier for an artful man who is not in love, to perfuade his mistress he has a paffion for her, and to fucceed in his pursuits, than for one who loves with the greatest violence. True love has ten thousand griefs, impatiences, and refentments, that render a man unamiable in the eyes of the perfon whofe affection he folicits; befides, that it finks his figure, gives him fears, apprehenfions, and poornefs of fpirit, and often makes him appear ridiculous where he has a mind to recommend himself.

Thole marriages generally abound moft with love and conftancy, that are preceded by a long courtship. The

it. A long courte of hopes and expectations fixes the idea in our minds, and habituates us to a fondness of the perfon beloved.

There is nothing of fo great importance to us, as the good qualities of one to whom we join ourfelves for life; they do not only make our prefent ftate agreeable, but often determine our happiness to all eternity. Where the choice is left to friends, the chief point under confideration is an eftate: where the parties chufe for themfelves, their thoughts turn most upon the perfon. They have both their reafons. The firft would procure many conveniencies and pleatures of life to the 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 feat. A good perfon does not only raife, but continue love, and breeds a fecret pleafure 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 ftrangers, and generally fills the family with a healthy and beautiful race of children.

I should 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 tafte 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 fenfe, 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 interefts; and, as I have elfewhere 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 ourselves fo. Of all difparities, that in humour makes the most unhappy marriages, yet fcarce 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 pleased 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 dimfighted 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 ac

quaintance, which you never difcovered, or perhaps fufpected. Here therefore discretion and good-nature are to fhew their ftrength; the firft 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 degrees foften thofe very imperfections into beauties.

Marriage enlarges the fcene of our happinefs and miferies. 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 friendfhip, all the enjoyments of fenfe and reafon, and indeed all the fweets of life. Nothing is a greater mark of a degenerate and vicious age, than the common ridicule which paffes on this ftate of life. It is, indeed, only happy in those who can look down with icorn or neglect on the impieties of the times, and tread the paths of life together in a constant uniform courfe of virtue.

felf

public for their kind acceptance of a paper which vifits them every morning, and has in it none of those feafonings that recommend fo many of the writings which are in vogue among us.

As, on the one fide, my paper has not -in it a fingle word of news, a reflection in politics, nor a stroke of party; so on the other, there are no fashionable touches of infidelity, no obscene ideas, no fatires upon priesthood, marriage, and the like popular topics of ridicule; no private scandal, nor any thing that may tend to the defamation of particular perfons, families, or focieties.

There is not one of thofe above-mentioned fubjects that would not sell a very indifferent paper, could I think of gratifying the public by fuch mean and bafe 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 uneafinefs in the minds of particular perfons, I find that the demand for my papers has increased every month

OVID. TRIST. L. 2. v. 566.

the world.

This does not perhaps reflect so much honour upon myfelf, 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 loofe from that great body of writers who have employed their wit and parts in propagating vice and irreligion, I did not queftion 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 thofe men of parts who have been employed in vitiating the age had endeavoured to rectify and amend it, they needed not have fa crificed their good fenfe and virtue to their fame and reputation. No man is fo funk in vice and ignorance, but there are ftill fome hidden feeds of goodnets and knowledge in him; which give him a relifh of fuch reflections and fpeculations as have an aptness 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 thofe perfons to whom the malice of the world may poffibly apply it, and take care to dafh it with fuch particular circumftances as may prevent all fuch illnatured applications. If I write any thing on a black man, I run over in my mind all the eminent perfons in the nas tion who are of that complexion: when I place an imaginary name at the head of a character, I examine every fyllable 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 pain ful it is to be expofed to the mirth and derifion of the public, and should 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, so I have taken more than ordinary care not to give offence to thofe who appear in the higher figures of life. I would not make mylelf merry even with a piece of pafteboard that is invefted with a public character; for which reafon I have never glanced upon the late defigned proceffion of his holiness and his attendants, notwithstanding it might have afforded matter to many ludicrous fpeculations. Among thofe advantages which the public may reap from this paper, it is not the leaft, that it draws men's minds off from the bitternefs of party, and furnifies them with fubje&ts of difcourfe that may be treated without warmth or paffion. This is faid to have been the firit defign of thofe gentlemen who fet on foot the Roval Society; and bad then a very good effect, as it turned many of the greateft geniuses of that age to the difquifitions of natural knowledge, who, if they had engaged in politics with the fame parts and application, might have fet their country in a flame. The airpump, the barometer, the quadrant, and the like inventions, were thrown out to thofe bufy fpirits, as tubs and barrels are to a whale, that he may let the fhip fail on without disturbance, while

he diverts himself with thofe innocent amufements.

I have been fo very fcrupulous in this particular of not hurting any man's reputation, that I have forborne mentioning even fuch authors as I could not name with honour. This I muft confefs to have been a piece of very great felf-denial for as the public relithes 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 reafon I am aftonifhed that thofe 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 discover beauties and excellencies in the writers of my own time, than to publish any of their faults and imperfections. In the meani while, I should take it for a very great favour from fome of my underhand detractors, if they would break all meafures with me fo far, as to give me a pretence for examining their performances with an impartial eye: nor shall I look upon it as any breach of charity to criticile the author, fo long as I keep clear of the perfon.

In the mean while, until I am provoked to fuch hoftilities, I fhall from time to time endeavour to do justice to those who have diftinguifhed 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 shall enter into a regular criticifm upon his Paradise Loft, which I fhall publifh every Saturday until 1 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 deliver it as my private opinion. Criticifm is of a very large extent, and every particular mafter in this art has his favourite paffages in an author, which do not equally ftrike the belt judges. It will be fufficient for me if I difcover many beauties or imperfec

tions