ed, that fhe had a great refpect and gratitude to her for the overture in behalf of one so near to her, but that during her father's life he would admit into her heart no value for any thing that fhould interfere with her endeavour to make his remains of life as happy and eafy as could be expected in his circumftances. The lady admonished her of the prime of life with a fimile; which Fidelia anfwered with a frankness that always attends unfeigned virtue- It is true, Madam, there is to be fure very great fatisfactions to be expected in the commerce of a man of honour, whom one tenderly loves; but I find fo much fatisfaction in the reflection, how much I mitigate a good man's pains, whofe welfare depends upon my affiduity about him, that I will ingly exclude the loofe gratifications of paffion for the folid reflections of duty. I know not whether any man's wife would be allowed, and (what I ftill more fear) I know not whether I, a wife, fhould be willing to be as of'ficious as I am at prefent about my parent. The happy father has her declaration that he will not marry during his life, and the pleasure of feeing that refolution not uneafy to her. Were one to paint filial affection in it's utmost beauty, he could not have a more lively idea of it than in beholding Fidelia ferving her father at his hours of rifing, meals, and rett.

When the general crowd of female youth are confulting their glaffes, preparing for balls, atfemblies, or plays; for a young lady, who could be regarded among the foremost in thofe places, either for her perfon, wit, fortune, or converfation, and yet contemn all thefe entertainments, to fweeten the heavy hours of a decrepid parent, is a refignation truly heroic. Fidelia performs the duty of a nurse, with all the beauty of a bride; nor does the neglect her perfon, because of her attendance on him, when he is too ill to receive company, to whom the may make an appearance. Fidelia, who gives him up her youth, does not think it any great facrifice to add to it the fpoiling of her drefs. Her çare and exactnefs in her habit, convince her father of the alacrity of her mind;

and he has of all women the best foun dation for affecting the praife of a feeming negligence. What adds to the entertainment of the good old man is, that Fidelia, where merit and fortune cannot be overlooked by epiftolary lovers, reads over the accounts of her conquests, plays on her fpinnet the gayeft airs, (and while fhe is doing fo, you would think her formed only for gallantry) to intimate to him the pleasures the defpifes for his fake.

Those who think themfeives the patterns of good breeding and gallantry, would be aftonished to hear that in thole intervals when the old gentleman is at eafe, and can bear company, there are at his houfe in the most regular order, affemblies of people of the highest merit; where there is converfation without mention of the faults of the abfent, benevolence between men and women without paffion, and the higheft fubje&ts of morality treated of as natural and accidental difcourfe; all which is owing to the genius of Fidelia, who at once makes her father's way to another world eaty, and herfelf capable of being an honour

to his name in this,

MR. SPECTATOR,

SCABBARD RUSTY.

N°

VIRTUS POST NUMMOS,

HOR. EP. L. I. v. 53.

MR. SPECTATOR,

A'

LL men, through different paths, make at the fame common thing, Money; and it is to her we owe the politician, the merchant, and the lawyer; nay, to be free with you, I believe to that alfo we are beholden for our Spectator. I am apt to think, that could we look into our own hearts, we fhould fee money engraved in them in more lively and moving characters than felf-prefervation; for who can reflect upon the merchant hoifting fail in a doubtful purfuit of her, and ali mankind facrificing their quiet to her, but muft perceive that the characters of felfprefervation (which were doubtlefs originally the brighteft) are fullied, if not wholly defaced; and that thofe of money (which at firft was only valuable as a mean to fecurity) are of late fo brightened, that the characters of felfprefervation, like a lefs light fet by a greater, are become almost imperceptible? Thus has money got the upperhand of what all mankind formerly thought molt dear, viz. fecurity; and I wish I could fay she had here put a stop to her victories; but, alas! common honefty fell a facrifice to her. This is the way fcholaftic men talk of the greateft good in the world: but I, a tradefman, fhall give you another account of this matter in the plain narrative of my own life. I think it proper, in the firit place, to acquaint my readers, that fince my fetting out in the world, which was in the year 1660, I never wanted money; having begun with an indifferent good stock in the tobacco-trade to which was bred; and by the continual fucceffes it has pleafed Providence to blefs my endeavours with, am at last arrived to what they call a Plumb. To uphold my difcourfe in the manner of your wits or philofophers, by fpeaking fine things, or drawing inferences, as they pretend, from the nature of the fubject, I account it vain; having never found any

POPE.

thing in the writings of fuch men, that did not favour more of the invention of the brain, or what is filed fpeculation, than of found judgment or profitable obfervation. I will readily grant, indeed, that there is what the wits call natural in their talk; which is the utmost thofe curious authors can affume to them, felves, and is indeed all they endeavour at, for they are but lamentable teachers, And what, I pray, is natural? That which is pleafing and easy: and what are pleafing and eafy? For footh a new thought or conceit dreffed up in smooth quaint language, to make you smile and wag your head, as being what you never imagined before, and yet wonder why you had not; mere frothy amusements! fit only for boys or filly women to be caught with.

It is not my present intention to inftruct my readers in the methods of acquiring riches; that may be the work of another efflay: but to exhibit the real and folid advantages I have found by them in my long and manifold experi ence; nor yet all the advantages of fo worthy and valuable a bleffing, (for who does not know or imagine the comforts of being warm or living at eafe? and that power and pre-eminence are their infeparable attendants?) but only to inftance the great fupports they afford us under the fevereft calamities and miffortunes; to fhew that the love of them is a fpecial antidote against immorality and vice, and that the fame does likewife naturally difpofe men to actions of piety and devotion: all which I can make out by my own experience, who think myfelf no ways particular from the reft of mankind, nor better nor worse by nature than generally other men are.

In the year 1665, when the fick nefs was, I loft by it my wife and two chil dren, which were all my ftock. Probably Imight have had more, confidering I was married between four and five

years;

fented in a large looking-glafs, threw it upon the ground in a paflion, and broke it into a thoufand pieces; but as the was afterwards furveying the fragments with a spiteful kind of pleafure, fhe could not forbear uttering herself in the following foliloquy. What have I got by this revengeful blow of mine? I have only multiplied my deformity, and fee an hundred ugly faces, where before I had but one.'

It has been proposed, to oblige every perfon that writes a book, or a paper, to fwear himself the author of it, and enter down in a public regifter his ' name and place of abode.'

This, indeed, would have effectually fuppreffed all printed fcandal, which generally appears under borrowed names or under none at all. But it is to be feared, that fuch an expedient would not only deftroy fcandal, but learning. It would operate promifcuously, and root up the corn and tares together. Not to mention fome of the most celebrated works of piety, which have proceeded from anonymous authors, who have made it their merit to convey to us fo great a charity in fecret; there are few works of genius that come out at firft with the author's name. The writer generally makes a trial of them in the world before he owns them; and, I believe, very few, who are capable of writing, would fet pen to paper, if they knew before-hand that they must not publish their productions but on fuch conditions. For my own part, I muft declare, the papers I prefent the public are like fairy favours, which fhall laft no longer than while the author is concealed.

reputation of a competitor, we should quickly fee an end put to this race of vermin, that are a scandal to government, and a reproach to human nature. Such a proceeding would make a minifter of itate fhine in hiftory, and would fill all mankind with a just abhorrence of perfons who fhould treat him unworthily, and employ against him thofe arms which he fcorned to make use of against his enemies,

I cannot think that any one will be fo unjust as to imagine what I have here faid is fpoken with refpect to any party or faction. Every one who has in him the fentiments either of a christian or gentleman, cannot but be highly offended at this wicked and ungenerous practice, which is fo much in ufe among us at prefent, that it is become a kind of national crime, and diftinguishes us from all the governments that lie about us. I cannot but look upon the finest strokes of fatire which are aimed at particular perfons, and which are supported even with the appearances of truth, to be the marks of an evil mind, and highly criminal in themselves. Infamy, like other punishments, is under the direction and diftribution of the magistrate, and not of any private perfon. Accordingly we learn from a fragment of Cicero, that though there were very few capital punishments in the twelve tables, a libel or lampoon which took away the good name of another, was to be punished by death. But this is far from being our cafe. Our fatire is nothing but vis baldry, and Billing gate. Scurrility paffes for wit; and he who can call names in the greatest variety of phrafes is looked upon to have the fhrewdeft pen. By this means the honour of families is ruined, the highest pofts and greatest titles are rendered cheap and vile in the fight of the people; the nobleft virtues, and maft exalted parts, expofed to the contempt of the vicious and the ignorant. Should a foreigner, who knows nothing of our private factions, or one who is to act his part in the world when our prefent heats and animofities are forgot fhould, I fay, fuch an one form to himfelf a notion of the greateft men of all fides in the British nation, who are now living, from the characters which are given them in fome or other of thofe abominable writings which are daily publifhed among us, what a nation of monsters must we appear! 5. X

That which makes it particularly difficult to retrain thefe fons of calumny and defamation is, that all fides are equally guilty of it, and that every dirty fcribbler is countenanced by great names, whofe interefl he propagates by fuch vile and infamous methods. I have never yet heard of a ministry, who have inflicted an exemplary punithinent on an author that has fupported their caufe with falfhood and fcandal, and treated, in a moft cruel manner, the names of those who have been looked upon as their rivals and antagonists. Would a government fet an everlasting mark of their difpleafure upon one of thofe infamous writers who makes his court to them by tearing to pieces the

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