others. Nor will it be an uninstructing school to the greatest masters of method and despatch, if such multiplicity can be preserved from embarrassment, and such tumult from inaccuracy. with a reply, but repeated his desire to be recorded a patron. Justice then offered to register his proposal on these conditions, that he should never suffer himself to be flattered; that he should never delay an audience when he had nothing to do; and that he should never encourage followers without intending to reward them. These terms were too hard to be accepted; for what, said he, is the end of patronage, but the pleasure of reading dedications, holding multitudes in suspense, and enjoying their hopes, their fears, and their anxiety, flattering them to assiduity, and, at last, dismissing them for impatience? Justice heard his confession, and ordered his name to be posted upon the gate among cheats and robbers, and public nuisances, which all were by that notice warned to avoid. While I was concerting this splendid project, and filling my thoughts with its regulations, its conveniences, its variety, and its consequences, I sunk gradually into slumber: but the same images, though less distinct, still continued to float upon my fancy. I perceived myself at the gate of an immense edifice, where innumerable multitudes were passing without confusion: every face on which I fixed my eyes, seemed settled in the contemplation of some important purpose, and every foot was hastened by eagerness and expectation. I followed the crowd without knowing whither I should be drawn, and remained a while in the unpleasing state of an idler, where all other beings were busy, giv- Another required to be made known as the ing place every moment to those who had more discoverer of a new art of education, by which importance in their looks. Ashamed to stand languages and sciences might be taught to all ignorant, and afraid to ask questions, at last I capacities, and all inclinations, without fear of saw a lady sweeping by me, whom, by the quick-punishment, pain of confinement, loss of any part ness of her eyes, the agility of her steps, and a mixture of levity and impatience, I knew to be my long-loved protectress, Curiosity. "Great goddess," said I, "may thy votary be permitted Justice and Truth did not trouble this great to implore thy favour; if thou hast been my di- adept with many inquiries; but finding his adrectress from the first dawn of reason; if I have dress awkward and his speech barbarous, or followed thee through the maze of life with inva-dered him to be registered as a tall fellow who riable fidelity; if I have turned to every new call, wanted employment, and might serve in any and quitted at thy nod one pursuit for another; post where the knowledge of reading and writing if I have never stopped at the invitations of for- was not required. tune, nor forgotten thy authority in the bowers of pleasure; inform me now whither Chance has conducted me." "Thou art now," replied the smiling power, "in the presence of Justice and of Truth, whom the father of gods and men has sent down to register the demands and pretensions of mankind, that the world may at last be reduced to order, and that none may complain hereafter of being doomed to tasks for which they are unqualified, of possessing faculties for which they cannot find employment, or virtues that languish unobserved for want of opportunities to exert them, of being encumbered with superfluities which they would willingly resign, or of wasting away in desires which ought to be satisfied. Justice is now to examine every man's wishes, and Truth is to record them; let us approach, and observe the progress of this great trans action." She then moved forward, and Truth, who knew her among the most faithful of her followers, beckoned her to advance, till we were placed near the seat of Justice. The first who required the assistance of the office, came forward with a slow pace, and tumour of dignity, and shaking a weighty purse in his hand, demanded to be registered by Truth, as the Mæcenas of the present age, the chief encourager of literary merit, to whom men of learning and wit might apply in any exigence or distress with certainty of succour. Justice very mildly inquired, whether he had calculated the expense of such a declaration? Whether he had been informed what number of petitioners would swarm about him? Whether he could distinguish idleness and negligence from calamity, ostentation from knowledge, or vivacity from wit? To these questions he seemed not well provided of the gay mein of ignorance, or any obstruction of the necessary progress in dress, dancing, or cards. A man of a very grave and philosophic aspect, required notice to be given of his intention to set out, a certain day, on a submarine voyage, and of his willingness to take in passengers for no more than double the price at which they might sail above water. His desire was granted, and he retired to a convenient stand, in expectation of filling his ship, and growing rich in a short time by the secrecy, safety, and expedition of the passage. Another desired to advertise the curious, that he had, for the advancement of true knowledge, contrived an optical instrument, by which those who laid out their industry on memorials of the changes of the wind, might observe the direction of the weathercocks on the hitherside of the lunar world. Another wished to be known as the author of an invention, by which cities or kingdoms might be made warm in winter by a single fire, a kettle, and pipe. Another had a vehicle by which a man might bid defiance to floods, and continue floating in an inundation, without any inconvenience, till the water should subside. Justice considered these projects as of no importance but to their authors, and therefore scarcely condescended to examine them; but Truth refused to admit them into the register. Twenty different pretenders came in one hour to give notice of a universal medicine, by which all diseases might be cured or prevented, and life protracted beyond the age of Nestor. But Justice informed them, that one universal medicine was sufficient, and she should delay the notification till she saw who could longest preserve his own life. A thousand other claims and offers were exhi bited and examined. I remarked, among this mighty multitude, that, of intellectual advan tages, many had great exuberance, and few confessed any want; of every art there were a hundred professors for a single pupil; but of other attainments, such as riches, honours, and preferments, I found none that had too much, but thousands and ten thousands that thought themselves entitled to a larger dividend. Non unquam dedit Documenta fors majora, quam fragili loco Insulting chance ne'er call'd with louder voice Of the innumerable authors whose perform It often happened, that old misers, and women married at the close of life, advertised their want of children; nor was it uncommon for those who had a numerous offspring, to give notice of a son or daughter to be spared; but, though appear ances promised well on both sides, the bargain seldom succeeded; for they soon lost their incliances are thus treasured up in magnificent obnation to adopted children, and proclaimed their intentions to promote some scheme of public charity; a thousand proposals were immediately made, among which they hesitated till death precluded the decision. As I stood looking on this scene of confusion, Truth condescended to ask me, what was my business at her office? I was struck with the unexpected question, and awaked by my efforts to answer it. No. 106.] SATURDAY, MARCH 23, 1751. scurity, most are forgotten, because they never deserved to be remembered, and owed the honours which they once obtained, not to judgment or to genius, to labour or to art, but to the prejudice of faction, the stratagem of intrigue, or the servility of adulation. Nothing is more common than to find men whose works are now totally neglected, mentioned with praises by their contemporaries, as the oracles of their age, and the legislators of science. Curiosity is naturally excited, their volumes after long inquiry are found, but seldom reward the labour of the search. Every period of time has produced these bubbles of artificial Opinionum commenta delet dies, natura judicia con fame, which are kept up awhile by the breath of firmat. CIC. fashion, and then break at once, and are annihilated. The learned often bewail the loss of ancient writers whose characters have survived their works; but, perhaps, if we could now retrieve them, we should find them only the Granvilles, Montagues, Stepneys, and Sheffields of their time, and wonder by what infatuation or caprice they could be raised to notice. It is necessary to the success of flattery, that it be accommodated to particular circumstances or characters, and enter the heart on that side where the passions stand ready to receive it. A lady seldom listens with attention to any praise but It cannot, however, be denied that many have that of her beauty; a merchant always expects sunk into oblivion, whom it were unjust to numto hear of his influence at the bank, his import-ber with this despicable class. Various kinds of ance on the exchange, the height of his credit, and the extent of his traffic: and the author will scarcely be pleased without lamentations of the neglect of learning, the conspiracies against genius, and the slow progress of merit, or some praises of the magnanimity of those who encounter poverty and contempt in the cause of knowledge, and trust for the reward of their labours to the judgment and gratitude of posterity. An assurance of unfading laurels, and immortal reputation is the settled reciprocation of civility between amicable writers. To raise monuments more durable than brass, and more conspicuous than pyramids, has been long the common boast of literature; but among the innumerable architects that erect columns to themselves, for the greater part, either for want of durable materials, or of art to dispose them, see their edifices perish as they are towering to completion, and those few that for a while attract the eye of mankind, are generally weak in the foundation, and soon sink by the saps of time. No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes, than a public library; for who can see the wall crowded on every side by mighty volumes, the works of laborious meditation and accurate inquiry, now scarcely known but by the catalogue, and preserved only to increase the pomp of learning, without considering how many hours have been wasted in vain endeavours, how often imagination has anticipated the praises of futurity, how many statues literary fame seem destined to various measures of duration. Some spread into exuberance with a very speedy growth, but soon wither and decay; some rise more slowly, but last long. Parnassus has its flowers of transient fragrance, as well as its oaks of towering height, and its laurels of eternal verdure. Among those whose reputation is exhausted in a short time by its own luxuriance, are the writers who take advantage of present incidents or characters which strongly interest the passions, and engage universal attention. It is not difficult to obtain readers, when we discuss a question which every one is desirous to under stand, which is debated in every assembly, and has divided the nation into parties; or when we display the faults or virtues of him whose public conduct has made almost every man his enemy or his friend. To the quick circulation of such productions all the motives of interest and vanity concur; the disputant enlarges his knowledge, the zealot animates his passion, and every man is desirous to inform himself concerning affairs so vehemently agitated and variously represented. It is scarcely to be imagined, through how many subordinations of interest the ardour of party is diffused; and what multitudes fancy themselves affected by every satire or panegyric on a man of eminence. Whoever has, at any time, taken occasion to mention him with praise or blame, whoever happens to love or hate any than the founder of their sect preserves his repu tation. of his adherents, as he wishes to confirm his opinion, and to strengthen his party, will diligently peruse every paper from which he can There are, indeed, few kinds of composition hope for sentiments like his own. An object, from which an author, however learned or inhowever small in itself, if placed near to the eye, genious, can hope a long continuance of fame. will engross all the rays of light; and a transac- He who has carefully studied human nature, tion, however trivial, swells into importance and can well describe it, may with most reason when it presses immediately on our attention. flatter his ambition. Bacon, among all his preHe that shall peruse the political pamphlets of tensions to the regard of posterity, seems to have any past reign, will wonder why they were so pleased himself chiefly with his Essays, which eagerly read, or so loudly praised. Many of come home to men's business and bosoms, and of the performances which had power to inflame which, therefore, he declares his expectation, factions, and fill a kingdom with confusion, have that they will live as long as books last. It may, now very little effect upon a frigid critic; and however, satisfy an honest and benevolent mind the time is coming, when the compositions of to have been useful, though less conspicuous; later hirelings shall lie equally despised. In nor will he that extends his hope to higher proportion as those who write on temporary sub-rewards be so much anxious to obtain praise, jects are exalted above their merit at first, they as to discharge the duty which Providence as are afterwards depressed below it; nor can the signs him. brightest elegance of diction, or most artful subtility of reasoning, hope for much esteem from those whose regard is no longer quickened by curiosity or pride. It is, indeed, the fate of controvertists, even when they contend for philosophical or theological truth, to be soon laid aside and slighted. Either the question is decided, and there is no more place for doubt and opposition: or mankind despair of understanding it, and grow weary of disturbance, content themselves with quiet ignorance, and refuse to be harassed with labours which they have no hopes of recompensing with knowledge. The authors of new discoveries may surely expect to be reckoned among those whose writings are secure of veneration: yet it often happens that the general reception of a doctrine obscures the books in which it was delivered. When any tenet is generally received and adopted as an incontrovertible principle, we seldom look back to the arguments upon which it was first established or can bear that tediousness of deduction, and multiplicity of evidence, by which its author was forced to reconcile it to prejudice, and fortify it in the weakness of novelty against obstinacy and envy. No. 107.] TUESDAY, March 26, 1751. Alternis igitur contendere versibus ambo On themes alternate now the swains recite; VIRG ELPHINSTON AMONG the various censures, which the unavoidable comparison of my performances with those of my predecessors has produced, there is none more general than that of uniformity. Many of my readers remark the want of those changes of colours, which formerly fed the at tention with unexhausted novelty, and of that in termixture of subjects, or alternation of manner, by which other writers relieved weariness, and awakened expectation. I have, indeed, hitherto avoided the practice of uniting gay and solemn subjects in the same paper, because it seems absurd for an author to counteract himself, to press at once with equa force upon both parts of the intellectual balance, or give medicines, which, like the double poison It is well known how much of our philosophy of Dryden, destroy the force of one another. I is derived from Boyle's discovery of the qualities have endeavoured sometimes to divert, and someof the air; yet of those who now adopt or en- times to elevate; but have imagined it a useless large his theory, very few have read the detail of attempt to disturb merriment by solemnity, or his experiments. His name is, indeed, reve-interrupt seriousness by drollery. Yet I shall renced; but his works are neglected: we are contented to know, that he conquered his opponents, without inquiring what cavils were produced against him, or by what proofs they were confuted. Some writers apply themselves to studies boundless and inexhaustible, as experiments and natural philosophy. These are always lost in successive compilations, as new advances are made, and former observations become more familiar. Others spend their lives in remarks on language, or explanations of antiquities, and only afford materials for lexicographers and commentators, who are themselves overwhelnied by subsequent collectors, that equally destroy the memory of their predecessors by amplification, transposition, or contraction. Every new system of nature gives birth to a swarm of expositors, whose business is to explain and illustrate it, and who can hope to exist no longer this day publish two letters of very different ten- TO THE RAMBLER. THOUGH, as my mamma tells me, I am too young to talk at the table, I have great pleasure in listening to the conversation of learned men, especially when they discourse of things which I do not understand; and have, therefore, been of late particularly delighted with many disputes about the alteration of the style, which, they say, i to be made by act of parliament. One day when my mamma was gone out of the room, I asked a very great scholar what the style was? He told me, he was afraid I should hardly understand him when he informed me, that it was the stated and established method of I am, Sir, Your humble Servant, computing time. It was not, indeed, likely that | tasks, and without account, and go out without I should understand him; for I never yet knew telling whither, and come home without regard time computed in my life, nor can imagine why to prescribed hours, or family-rules. we should be at so inuch trouble to count what we cannot keep. He did not tell me whether we are to count the time past, or the time to come; but I have considered them both by myself, and think it as foolish to count time that is gone, as money that is spent; and as for the time which is to come, it only seems farther off by counting; and, therefore, when any pleasure is promised me, I always think of the time as little as I can. I have since listened very attentively to every one that talked upon this subject, of whom the greater part seem not to understand it better than myself; for though they often hint how much the nation has been mistaken, and rejoice that we are at last growing wiser than our ancestors, I have never been able to discover from them, that any body has died sooner or been married later for counting time wrong; and, therefore, I began to fancy that there was a great bustle with little consequence. MR. RAMBLER, I WAS seized this morning with an unusual pensiveness, and finding that books only served to heighten it, took a ramble into the fields, in hopes of relief and invigoration from the keenness of the air and brightness of the sun. As I wandered wrapt up in thought, my eyes were struck with the hospital for the reception of deserted infants, which I surveyed with pleasure, till, by a natural train of sentiment, I began to reflect on the fate of the mothers. For to what shelter can they fly? Only to the arms of their betrayer, which perhaps are now no longer open to receive them; and then how quick must be the transition from deluded virtue to shameless guilt, and from shameless guilt to hopeless wretchedness! satisfy the most rigorous censor; and whose participation of our common nature might surely induce us to endeavour, at least, their preserva tion from eternal punishment. These were all once, if not virtuous, at least innocent; and might still have continued blameless and easy; but for the arts and insinuations of those whose rank, fortune, or education, furnished them with means to corrupt or to delude them. Let the libertine reflect a moment on the situation of that woman, who, being forsaken by her betrayer, is reduced to the necessity of turning prostitute for bread, and judge of the enormity of his guilt by the evils which it produces. At last two friends of my papa, Mr. Cycle and The anguish that I felt left me no rest, till I Mr. Starlight, being, it seems, both of high learn- had, by your means, addressed myself to the ing, and able to make an almanack, began to public on behalf of those forlorn creatures, the talk about the new style. Sweet Mr. Starlight-women of the town, whose misery here might I am sure I shall love his name as long as I live; for he told Cycle roundly, with a fierce look, that we should never be right without a year of confusion. Dear Mr. Rambler, did you ever hear any thing so charming? a whole year of confusion! When there has been a rout at mamma's, I have thought one night of confusion worth a thousand nights of rest; and if I can but see a year of confusion, a whole year, of cards in one room, and dancings in another, here a feast, and there a masquerade, and plays, and coaches, and hurries, and messages, and milliners, and raps at the door, and visits, and frolics, and new fashions, I shall not care what they do with the rest of the time, nor whether they count it by the old style or the new; for I am resolved to break loose It cannot be doubted but that numbers follow from the nursery in the tumult, and play my part this dreadful course of life, with shame, horror, among the rest; and it will be strange if I can- and regret; but where can they hope for refuge? not get a husband and a chariot in the year of "The world is not their friend, nor the world's confusion. law." Their sighs, and tears, and groans, are Cycle, who is neither so young nor so hand-criminal in the eye of their tyrants, the bully and some as Starlight, very gravely maintained, that all the perplexity may be avoided by leaping over eleven days in the reckoning: and, indeed, if it should come only to this, I think the new style is a delightful thing; for my mamma says I shall go to court when I am sixteen, and if they can but contrive often to leap over eleven days together, the months of restraint will soon be at an end. It is strange, that with all the plots that have been laid against time, they could never kill it by act of parliament before. Dear Sir, if you have any vote or interest, get them but for once to destroy eleven months, and then I shall be as old as some married ladies. But this is desired only if you think they will not comply with Mr. Starlight's scheme; for nothing surely could please me like a year of confusion, when I shall no longer be fixed this hour to my pen, and the next to my needle, or wait at home for the dancing-master one day, and the next for the music-master, but run from ball to ball, and from drum to drum; and spend all my time without W the bawd, who fatten on their misery, and threaten them with want or a gaol, if they show the least design of escaping from their bondage. "To wipe all tears from off all faces," is a task too hard for mortals; but to alleviate misfortunes is often within the most limited power yet the opportunities which every day affords of relieving the most wretched of human beings are overlooked and neglected, with equal disregard of policy and goodness. There are places, indeed, set apart, to which these unhappy creatures may resort, when the diseases of incontinence seize upon them; but if. they obtain a cure, to what are they reduced? Either to return with the small remains of beauty to their former guilt, or perish in the streets with nakedness and hunger. How frequently have the gay and thoughtless, in their evening frolics, seen a band of these miserable females, covered with rags, shivering with cold, and pining with hunger; and without either pitying their calamities, or reflecting upon the cruelty of those who perhaps first seduced | straitened by rocks and waters, is capable of prothem by caresses of fondness, or magnificence ducing more than all its inhabitants are able to of promises, go on to reduce others to the same consume, our lives, though much contracted by wretchedness by the same means? incidental distraction, would yet afford us a large To stop the increase of this deplorable multi-space vacant to the exercise of reason and vir tude, is undoubtedly the first and most pressing tue; that we want not time, but diligence, for consideration. To prevent evil is the great end great performances; and that we squander much of government, the end for which vigilance and of our allowance, even while we think it sparing severity are properly employed. But surely and insufficient. those whom passion or interest have already This natural and necessary comminution of depraved, have some claim to compassion, from our lives, perhaps, often makes us insensible of beings equally frail and fallible with themselves. the negligence with which we suffer them to slide Nor will they long groan in their present afflic-away. We never consider ourselves as postions, if none were to refuse them relief, but those that owe their exemption from the same distress only to their wisdom and their virtue. No. 108.] I am, &c. AMICUS. SATURDAY, MARCH 30, 1751. Sapere aude, Incipe. Vivendi recte qui prorogat horam, Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise: He who defers this work from day to day, HOR. sessed at once of time sufficient for any great design, and therefore indulge ourselves in fortuitous amusements. We think it unnecessary to take an account of a few supernumerary moments, which, however employed, could have produced little advantage, and which were exposed to a thousand chances of disturbance and interruption. It is observable that, either by nature, or by habit, our faculties are fitted to images of a certain extent, to which we adjust great things by division, and little things by accumulation. Of extensive surfaces we can only take a survey, as the parts succeed one another; and atoms we cannot perceive till they are united into masses. Thus we break the vast periods of time into centuries and years; and thus, if we would know Till the whole stream, which stopp'd him, should be the amount of moments, we must agglomerate AN ancient poet unreasonably discontented at the present state of things, which the system of opinions obliged him to represent in its worst form, has observed of the earth," that its greater part is covered by the uninhabitable ocean; that of the rest some is encumbered with naked mountains, and some lost under barren sands; some scorched with unintermitted heat, and some petrified with perpetual frost; so that only a few regions remain for the production of fruits, the pasture of cattle, and the accommodation of man.' them into days and weeks. The proverbial oracles of our parsimonious ancestors have informed us, that the fatal waste of fortune is by small expenses, by the profusions of sums too little singly to alarm our caution, and which we never suffer ourselves to consider together. Of the same kind is the prodigality of life; he that hopes to look back hereafter with satisfaction upon past years, must learn to know the present value of single minutes, and endeavour to let no particle of time fall useless to the ground. It is usual for those who are advised to the attainment of any new qualification, to look upon themselves as required to change the general The same observation may be transferred to course of their conduct, to dismiss business, and the time allotted us in our present state. When exclude pleasure, and to devote their days and we have deducted all that is absorbed in sleep, nights to a particular attention. But all comall that is inevitably appropriated to the demands mon degrees of excellence are attainable at a of nature, or irresistibly engrossed by the tyranny lower price; he that should steadily and reso of custom; all that passes in regulating the su-lutely assign to any science or language those perficial decorations of life, or is given up in the reciprocations of civility to the disposal of others; all that is torn from us by the violence of disease, or stolen imperceptibly away by lassitude and languor; we shall find that part of our duration very small of which we can truly call ourselves masters, or which we can spend wholly at our own choice. Many of our hours are lost in a rotation of petty cares, in a constant recurrence of the same employments; many of our provisions for ease or happiness are always exhausted by the present day; and a great part of our existence serves no other purpose, than that of enabling us to enjoy the rest. interstitial vacancies which intervene in the most crowded variety of diversion or employment, would find every day new irradiations of knowledge, and discover how much more is to be hoped from frequency and perseverance, than from violent efforts and sudden desires; efforts which are soon remitted when they encounter difficulty, and desires, which if they are indulged too often, will shake off the authority of reason, and range capriciously from one object to another. The disposition to defer every important design to a time of leisure, and a state of settled uniformity, proceeds generally from a false estiOf the few moments which are left in our dis-mate of the human powers. If we except those posal, it may reasonably be expected, that we should be so frugal, as to let none of them slip from us without some equivalent: and perhaps it might be found, that as the earth, however gigantic and stupendous intelligences who are said to grasp a system by intuition, and bound forward from one series of conclusions to another, without regular steps through intermediate |