them of the several1 persons that are engaged in this work. As the chief trouble of compiling, digesting, and correcting, will fall to my share, I must do myself the justice to open the work with my own history.2

I was born to a small hereditary estate, which, according to the tradition of the village where it lies, was bounded by the same hedges and ditches in William the Conqueror's time that it is at present, and has been delivered down from father to son whole and entire, without the loss or acquisition of a single field or meadow, during the space of six hundred years. There runs a story in the family, that [before I was born] my mother dreamt that she was [to bring forth] a judge; whether this might proceed from a lawsuit which was then depending in the family, or my father's being a justice of the peace, I cannot determine; for I am not so vain as to think it presaged any dignity that I should arrive at in my future life, though that was the interpretation which the neighborhood put upon it. The gravity of my behavior at my very first appearance in the world seemed to favor my mother's dream: for, as she has often told me, I threw away my rattle before I was two months old, and would not make use of my coral till they had taken away the bells from it.

1. Note that "several" is used in its specific meaning not of many, but of separate persons.

2. Addison is of course constructing an imaginary character and giving him a consistent history, but as Macaulay remarks in his essay on The Life and Writings of Addison, "It is not easy to doubt that the portrait was meant to be in some features a likeness of the painter." Especially may this be said of the humorously exaggerated characteristic of shyness.

3. Whole:

perfect.

with all its divisions; entire: = with each division

As for the rest of my infancy, there being nothing in it remarkable, I shall pass it over in silence. I find, that, during my nonage, I had the reputation of a very sullen youth, but was always a favorite of my schoolmaster, who used to say, that my parts were solid, and would wear well. I had not been long at the University, before I distinguished myself by a most profound silence; for, during the space of eight years, excepting in the public exercises of the college, I scarce uttered the quantity of an hundred words; and indeed do not remember that I ever spoke three sentences together in my whole life. Whilst I was in this learned body, I applied myself with so much diligence to my studies, that there are very few celebrated books, either in the learned or modern tongues, which I am not acquainted with.

Upon the death of my father, I was resolved to travel into foreign countries, and therefore left the University with the character of an odd unaccountable fellow, that had a great deal of learning, if I would but show it. An insatiable thirst after knowledge carried me into all the countries of Europe in which there was anything new or strange to be seen; nay, to such a degree was my curiosity raised, that having read the controversies 1 of some great men concerning the antiquities of Egypt, I made a voyage to Grand Cairo, on purpose to take the measure of a pyramid: and, as soon as I had set myself right in that particular, returned to my native country with great satisfaction.

1. In Addison's time, John Greaves, Professor of Astronomy at Oxford, had led in the discussion regarding the measurement of the pyramids, as in our day Piazzi Smyth, whose work, Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid, still excites interest and debate.

I have passed my latter years in this city, where I am frequently seen in most public places, though there are not above half a dozen of my select friends that know me: of whom my next paper shall give a more particular account. There is no place of general resort wherein I do not often make my appearance; sometimes I am seen thrusting my head into a round of politicians at Will's, and listening with great attention to the narratives that are made in those little circular audiences. Sometimes I smoke a pipe at Child's,2 and while I seem attentive to nothing but the Postman,3 overhear the conversation of every table in the room. I appear on Sunday nights at St. James's coffee-house, and sometimes join the little committee of politics in the inner room,5 as one who comes there to hear and improve. My face is likewise very well known at the Grecian,6 the Cocoa Tree, and in the theatres both of Drury Lane and

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1. "The father of the modern club." Will's Coffee House stood on the northwest corner of Russell and Bow Streets, Covent Garden. It took its name from the proprietor, William Urwin, and derived its greatest reputation from the poet Dryden's resort to it.

2. In St. Paul's churchyard. From its neighborhood to the cathedral, Doctor's Commons, the College of Physicians, and the Royal Society, it was frequented by clergy, lawyers, physicians, and men of science.

3. The Postman, a journal edited by a French Protestant, M. Fonvive, was marked by the prominence it gave to foreign correspondence.

4. The headquarters of Whig politicians.

5. For a more particular account of what went on in the inner room, see The Spectator, No. 403.

6. So called from being kept by a Greek named Constantine. Its nearness to the Temple led to its being the rendezvous of men of learning.

7. The Tory headquarters.

the Hay Market. I have been taken for a merchant upon the Exchange for above these ten years, and sometimes pass for a Jew in the assembly of stockjobbers at Jonathan's. In short, wherever I see a cluster of people, I always mix with them, though I never open my lips but in my own club.

Thus I live in the world rather as a spectator of mankind than as one of the species; by which means I have made myself a speculative statesman, soldier, merchant, and artisan, without ever meddling with any practical part in life. I am very well versed in the theory of a husband or a father, and can discern the errors in the economy,2 business, and diversion of others, better than those who are engaged in them as standers-by discover blots, which are apt to escape those who are in the game. I never espoused any party with violence, and am resolved to observe an exact neutrality between the Whigs and Tories, unless I shall be forced to declare myself by the hostilities of either side. In short, I have acted in all the parts of my life as a looker-on, which is the character I intend to preserve in this paper.

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I have given the reader just so much of my history and character, as to let him see I am not altogether unqualified for the business I have undertaken. As for other particulars in my life and adventures, I shall insert them in following papers, as I shall see

1. Jonathan's coffee-house was the resort of the more questionable sort of stock-jobbers.

2. In The Spectator as originally printed, the spelling of this word œconomy emphasized its meaning as derived from the Greek, the "management of the house."

3. In the game of backgammon, "to make a blot" was to leave a piece exposed.

occasion. In the mean time, when I consider how much I have seen, read, and heard, I begin to blame my own taciturnity; and since I have neither time nor inclination to communicate the fulness of my heart in speech, I am resolved to do it in writing, and to print myself out, if possible, before I die. I have been often told by my friends, that it is pity so many useful discoveries which I have made should be in the possession of a silent man. For this reason, therefore, I shall publish a sheet full of thoughts every morning, for the benefit of my contemporaries; and if I can any way contribute to the diversion or improvement of the country in which I live, I shall leave it when I am summoned out of it, with the secret satisfaction of thinking that I have not lived in vain.

There are three very material points which I have not spoken to1 in this paper, and which, for several important reasons, I must keep to myself, at least for some time: I mean, an account of my name, my age, and my lodgings. I must confess I would gratify my reader in anything that is reasonable; but as for these three particulars, though I am sensible they might tend very much to the embellishment of my paper, I cannot yet come to a resolution of communicating them to the public. They would indeed draw me out of that obscurity which I have enjoyed for many years, and expose me in public places to several salutes and civilities, which have been always very disagreeable to me; for the greatest pain I can suffer is the being talked to, and being stared at. It is for

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1. This phrase lingers in forensic terms, and "he speaks to the point," though used now to express pertinence of speech, once had the meaning of the text.