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by an old poet, whose system will not afford many reasonable motives to content. "It is," says he, "pleasing to look from shore upon the tumults of a storm, and to see a ship struggling with the billows; it is pleasing, not because the pain of another can give us delight, but because we have a stronger impression of the happiness of safety." Thus, when we look abroad, and behold the multitudes that are groaning under evils heavier than those which we have experienced, we shrink back to our own state, and stead of repining that so much must be felt, learn to rejoice that we have not more to feel.

Against other evils the heart is often hardened by true or by false notions of dignity and reputation; thus we see dangers of every kind faced with willingness, because bravery in a good or bad cause is never without its encomiasts and admirers. But in the prospect of poverty, there is nothing but gloom and melancholy; the mind and body suffer together; its miseries bring no alleviations; it is a state in which every virtue is obscured, and in which no conduct can avoid rein-proach; a state in which cheerfulness is insensibility, and dejection sullenness, of which the hardships are without honour, and the labours without reward.

By this observation of the miseries of others, fortitude is strengthened, and the mind brought to a more extensive knowledge of her own powers. As the heroes of action catch the flame from one to another, so they, to whom Providence has allotted the harder task of suffering with calmness and dignity, may animate themselves by the remembrance of those evils which have been laid on others, perhaps naturally as weak as themselves, and bear up with vigour and resolution against their own oppressions, when they see it possible that more severe afflictions may be borne.

Of these calamities there seems not to be wanting a general conviction; we hear on every side the noise of trade, and see the streets thronged with numberless multitudes, whose faces are clouded with anxiety, and whose steps are hurried by precipitation, from no other motive than the hope of gain; and the whole world is put in motion, by the desire of that wealth, which is chiefly to be valued as it secures us from poverty; for it is more useful for defence than acquisition, and is not so much able to procure good as to exclude evil.

seem to rush upon poverty with the same eagerness with which others avoid it, who see their revenues hourly lessened, and the estates which they inherit from their ancestors mouldering away, without resolution to change their course of life; who persevere against all remonstrances, and go forward with full career, though they see before them the precipice of destruction.

There is still another reason why, to many minds, the relation of other men's infelicity may Yet there are always some whose passions or give a lasting and continual relief. Some, not follies lead them to a conduct opposite to the gewell instructed in the measures by which Provi-neral maxims and practice of mankind; some who dence distributes happiness, are perhaps misled by divines, who, as Bellarmine makes temporal prosperity one of the characters of the true church, have represented wealth and ease as the certain concomitants of virtue, and the unfailing result of the Divine approbation. Such sufferers are dejected in their misfortunes, not so much for what they feel, as for what they dread; not because they cannot support the sorrows, or endure the wants, of their present condition, but because they consider them as only the beginnings of more sharp and more lasting pains. To these mourners it is an act of the highest charity to represent the calamities which not only virtue has suffered, but virtue has incurred; to inform them that one evidence of a future state, is the uncertainty of any present reward for goodness; and to remind them, from the highest authority, of the distresses and penury of men of whom the world was not worthy.

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THERE is scarcely among the evils of human life any so generally dreaded as poverty. Every other species of misery, those, who are not much accustomed to disturb the present moment with reflection, can easily forget, because it is not always forced upon their regard; but it is impossible to pass a day or an hour in the confluxes of men, without seeing how much indigence is exposed to contumely, neglect, and insult; and, in its lowest state, to hunger and nakedness; to injuries against which every passion is in arms, and to wants which nature cannot sustain.

Lucretius.-C.

It is not my purpose in this paper, to expostulate with such as ruin their fortunes by expensive schemes of buildings and gardens, which they carry on with the same vanity that prompted them to begin, choosing, as it happens in a thousand other cases, the remote evil before the lighter, and deferring the shame of repentance till they incur the miseries of distress. Those for whom I intend my present admonitions, are the thoughtless, the negligent, and the dissolute, who having, by the viciousness of their own inclinations, or the seducements of alluring companions, been engaged in habits of expense, and accustomed to move in a certain round of pleasures disproportioned to their condition, are without power to extricate themselves from the enchantments of customs, avoid the thought because they know it will be painful, and continue from day to day, and from month to month, to anticipate their revenues, and sink every hour deeper into the gulfs of usury and extortion.

This folly has less claim to pity, because it cannot be imputed to the vehemence of sudden passion; nor can the mischief which it produces be extenuated as the effect of any single act, which rage, or desire, might execute before there could be time for an appeal to reason. These men are advancing towards misery by soft approaches, and destroying themselves, not by the violence of a blow, which when once given, can never be recalled, but by a slow poison, hourly repeated, and obstinately continued.

This conduct is so absurd when it is examined by the unprejudiced eye of rational judgment, that nothing but experience could evince its pos

sibility; yet absurd as it is, the sudden fall of some | families, and the sudden rise of others, prove it to be common; and every year sees many wretches reduced to contempt and want, by their costly sacrifices to pleasure and vanity.

It is the fate of almost every passion, when it nas passed the bounds which nature prescribes, to counteract its own purpose. Too much rage hinders the warrior from circumspection, too much eagerness of profit hurts the credit of the trader, too much ardour takes away from the lover that easiness of address with which ladies are delight ed. Thus extravagance, though dictated by vanity, and incited by voluptuousness, seldom procures ultimately either applause or pleasure.

If praise be justly estimated by the character of those from whom it is received, little satisfaction will be given to the spendthrift by the encomiums which he purchases. For who are they that animate him in his pursuits, but young men, thoughtless and abandoned like himself, unacquainted with all on which the wisdom of nations has impressed the stamp of excellence, and devoid alike of knowledge and of virtue! By whom is his profusion praised, but by wretches who consider him as subservient to their purposes, sirens that entice him to shipwreck, and Cyclops that are gaping to devour him?

excesses, wantoned in greater abundance, and
indulged his appetites with more profuseness?
It appears evident that frugality is necessary
even to complete the pleasure of expense; for it
may be generally remarked of those who squan-
der what they know their fortune not sufficient
to allow, that in their most jovial expense, there
always breaks out some proof of discontent and
impatience; they either scatter with a kind of wild
desperation, and affected lavishness, as criminals
brave the gallows when they cannot escape it,
or pay their money with a peevish anxiety, and
endeavour at once to spend idly, and to save
meanly: having neither firmness to deny their
passions, nor courage to gratify them, they mur-
mur at their own enjoyments, and poison the
bowl of pleasure by reflection on the cost.

Among these men there is often the vociferation of merriment, but very seldom the tranquillity of cheerfulness; they inflame their imaginations to a kind of momentary jollity, by the help of wine and riot, and consider it as the first business of the night to stupify recollection, and lay that reason asleep which disturbs their gayety and calls upon them to retreat from ruin."

But this poor broken satisfaction is of short continuance, and must be expiated by a long series of misery and regret. In a short time the creditor grows impatient, the last acre is sold, the passions and appetites still continue their tyranny, with incessant calls for their usual gratifications, and the remainder of life passes away in vain re

Every man whose knowledge, or whose virtue, can give value to his opinion, looks with scorn, or pity, neither of which can afford much gratification to pride, on him whom the panders of luxury have drawn into the circle of their influ-pentance, or impotent desire. ence, and whom he sees parcelled out among the different ministers of folly, and about to be torn

Truditur dies die,

to pieces by tailors and jockeys, vintners and No. 54.] SATURDAY, SEPT. 22, 1750.
attorneys, who at once rob and ridicule him, and
who are secretly triumphing over his weakness,
when they present new incitements to his appe-
tite, and heighten his desires by counterfeited
applause.

Such is the praise that is purchased by prodigality. Even when it is yet not discovered to be false, it is the praise only of those whom it is reproachful to please, and whose sincerity is corrupted by their interest; men who live by the riots which they encourage, and who know that whenever their pupil grows wise, they shall lose their power. Yet with such flatteries, if they could last, might the cravings of vanity, which is seldom very delicate, be satisfied; but the time is always hastening forward when this triumph, poor as it is, shall vanish, and when those who now surround him with obsequiousness and compliments, fawn among his equipage, and animate his riots, shall turn upon him with insolence, and reproach him with the vices promoted by themselves.

And as little pretensions has the man who squanders his estate, by vain or vicious expenses to greater degrees of pleasure than are obtained by others. To make any happiness sincere, it is necessary that we believe it to be lasting; since whatever we suppose ourselves in danger of losing, must be enjoyed with solicitude and uneasiness, and the more value we set upon it, the more must the present possession be embittered. How can he then be envied for his felicity, who knows that its continuance cannot be expected, and who is conscious that a very short time will give him up to the gripe of poverty, which will be harder to be borne, as he has given way to more

Novaque pergunt interire luna
Tu secanda marmora
Locas sub ipsum furus; et sepulchri
Immemor, struis domos.

HOR.

Day presses on the heels of day,
And moons increase to their decay;
But you, with thoughtless pride elate,
Unconscious of impending fate,
Command the pillar'd dome to rise,
When lo! thy tomb forgotten lies.-FRANCIS

TO THE RAMBLER

SIR, I HAVE lately been called, from a mingied life of business and amusement, to attend the last hours of an old friend; an office which has filled me, if not with melancholy, at least with serious reflections, and turned my thoughts towards the contemplation of those subjects, which though of the utmost importance, and of indubitable certainty, are generally secluded from our regard, by the jollity of health, the hurry of employment, and even by the calmer diversions of study and speculation; or if they become accidental topics of conversation and argument, yet rarely sink deep into the heart, but give occasion only to some subtilties of reasoning, or elegances of declamation, which are heard, applauded, and forgotten.

It is, indeed, not hard to conceive how a man accustomed to extend his views through a long concatenation of causes and effects, to trace things from their origin to their period, and com pare means with ends, may discover the weakness of human schemes; detery, the fallacies by

which mortals are deluded; show the insufficiency of wealth, honours, and power, to real happiness; and please himself, and his auditors, with learned lectures on the vanity of life.

upon another, authority which shall this night expire for ever, and praise which, however merited, or however sincere, shall, after a few moments, be heard no more.

In those hours of seriousness and wisdom, nothing appeared to raise his spirits, or gladden his heart, but the recollection of acts of goodness; nor to excite his attention, but some opportunity for the exercise of the duties of religion. Every thing that terminated on this side of the grave was received with coldness and indifference, and regarded rather in consequence of the habit of valuing it, than from any opinion that it deserved value; it had little more prevalence over his mind than a bubble that was now broken, a dream from which he was awake. His whole powers were engrossed by the consideration of another state, and all conversation was tedious, that had not some tendency to disengage him from human affairs, and open his prospects into futurity.

But though the speculatist may see and show the folly of terrestrial hopes, fears, and desires, every hour will give proofs that he never felt it. Trace him through the day or year, and you will find him acting upon principles which he has in common with the illiterate and unenlightened, angry and pleased, like the lowest of the vulgar, pursuing with the same ardour, the same designs, grasping, with all the eagerness of transport, those riches which he knows he cannot keep, and swelling with the applause which he has gained by proving that applause is of no value. The only conviction that rushes upon the soul, and takes away from our appetites and passions the power of resistance, is to be found, where I have received it, at the bed of a dying friend. To enter this school of wisdom is not the peculiar privilege of geometricians; the most sublime and important precepts require no uncommon opportunities, nor laborious preparations; they are enforced without the aid of eloquence, and understood without skill in analytic science. Every tongue can utter them, and every understanding can conceive them. He that wishes in earnest to obtain just sentiments concerning his condition, and would be intimately acquainted with the world, may find instructions on every side. He that desires to enter behind the scene, which I have from that time frequently revolved in every art has been employed to decorate, and my mind the effects which the observation of every passion labours to illuminate, and wishes death produces, in those who are not wholly to see life stripped of those ornaments which without the power and use of reflection; for by make it glitter on the stage, and exposed in its far the greater part it is wholly unregarded. natural meanness, impotence, and nakedness, Their friends and their enemies sink into the may find all the delusion laid open in the cham-grave without raising any uncommon emotion, ber of disease: he will there find vanity divested of her robes, power deprived of her sceptre, and hypocrisy without her mask.

It is now past; we have closed his eyes, and heard him breathe the groan of expiration. At the sight of this last conflict, I felt a sensation never known to me before; a confusion of passions, an awful stillness of sorrow, a gloomy terror without a name. The thoughts that entered my soul were too strong to be diverted, and too piercing to be endured; but such violence cannot be lasting, the storm subsided in a short time, I wept, retired, and grew calm.

or reminding them that they are themselves on the edge of the precipice, and that they must soon plunge into the gulf of eternity.

our own, can now no longer obstruct our reputation, and we have therefore no interest to sup press their praise. That wickedness, which we feared for its malignity, is now become impotent, and the man whose name filled us with alarm, and rage, and indignation, can at last be considered only with pity or contempt.

The friend whom I have lost was a man emi- It seems to me remarkable that death increases nent for genius, and, like others of the same our veneration for the good, and extenuates our class, sufficiently pleased with acceptance and ap-hatred of the bad. Those virtues which once we plause. Being caressed by those who have pre-envied, as Horace observes,because they eclipsed ferments and riches in their disposal, he considered himself as in the direct road of advancement, and had caught the flame of ambition by approaches to its object. But in the midst of his hopes, his projects, and his gayeties, he was seized by a lingering disease, which, from its first stage, he knew to be incurable. Here was an end of all his visions of greatness and happiness; from the first hour that his health declined, all his former pleasures grew tasteless. His friends expected to please him by those accounts of the growth of his reputation, which were formerly certain of being well received; but they soon found how little he was now affected by compliments, and how vainly they attempted, by flattery, to exhilarate the languor of weakness, and relieve the solicitude of approaching death. Whoever would know how much piety and virtue surpass all external goods, might here have seen them weighed against each other, where all that gives motion to the active, and elevation to the eminent, all that sparkles in the eye of hope, and pants in the bosom of suspicion, at once became dust in the balance, without weight and without regard. Riches, authority, and praise, lose all their influence when they are considered as riches which to-morrow shall be bestowed

When a friend is carried to his grave, we at once find excuses for every weakness, and palli ations of every fault; we recollect a thousand en dearments, which before glided off our minds without impression, a thousand favours unrepaid, a thousand duties unperformed, and wish, vainly wish, for his return, not so much that we may receive, as that we may bestow, happiness, and recompense that kindness which before we never understood.

There is not, perhaps, to a mind well instructed, a more painful occurrence than the death of one whom we have injured without reparation. Our crime seems now irretrievable, it is indelibly recorded, and the stamp of fate is fixed upon it. We consider, with the most afflictive anguish, the pain which we have given, and now cannot alleviate, and the losses which we have caused, and now cannot repair.

Of the same kind are the emotions which the

death of an emulator or competitor produces. I expect, at least that you will divest yourself of Whoever had qualities to alarm our jealousy, partiality, and that whatever your age or solemnihad excellence to deserve our fondness; and to ty may be, you will not, with the dotard's inso whatever ardour of opposition interest may in- lence, pronounce me ignorant and foolish, perflame us, no man ever outlived an enemy, whom verse and refractory, only because you perceive he did not then wish to have made a friend. that I am young. Those who are versed in literary history know, that the elder Scaliger was the redoubted antagonist of Cardan and Erasmus; yet at the death of each of his great rivals he relented, and complained that they were snatched away from him before their reconciliation was completed.

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Now near to death that comes but slow,
Now thou art stepping down below;
Sport not amongst the blooming maids,
But think on ghosts and empty shades:
What suits with Pholoe in her bloom,
Gray Chloris, will not thee become;
A bed is different from a tomb.

SIR,

TO THE RAMBLER.

HOR.

CREECH.

My father dying when I was but ten years old, left me, and a brother two years younger than myself, to the care of my mother, a woman of birth and education, whose prudence or virtue he had no reason to distrust. She felt, for some time, all the sorrow which nature calls forth, upon the final separation of persons dear to one another; and as her grief was exhausted by its own violence, it subsided into tenderness for me and my brother, and the year of mourning was spent in caresses, consolations, and instruction, in celebration of my father's virtues, in professions of perpetual regard to his memory, and hourly instances of such fondness as gratitude will not easily suffer me to forget.

But when the term of this mournful felicity was expired, and my mother appeared again without the ensigns of sorrow, the ladies of her acquaintance began to tell her, upon whatever motives, that it was time to live like the rest of the world; a powerful argument, which is seldom used to a woman without effect. Lady Giddy was incessantly relating the occurrences of the town, and Mrs. Gravely told her privately, with great ten derness, that it began to be publicly observed how much she overacted her part, and that most of her acquaintance suspected her hope of procuring another husband to be the true ground of all that appearance of tenderness and piety.

All the officiousness of kindness and folly was busied to change her conduct. She was at one time alarmed with censure, and at another fired with praise. She was told of balls, where others shone only because she was absent; of new comedies, to which all the town was crowding; and of many ingenious ironies, by which domestic diligence was made contemptible.

It is difficult for virtue to stand alone against fear on one side, and pleasure on the other; especially when no actual crime is proposed, and prudence itself can suggest many reasons for relaxation and indulgence. My mamma was at last persuaded to accompany Miss Giddy to a play. She was received with a boundless profusion of compliments, and attended home by a I HAVE been but a little time conversant in the very fine gentleman. Next day she was with less world, yet I have already had frequent oppor- difficulty prevailed on to play at Mrs. Gravely's, tunities of observing the little efficacy of remon- and came home gay and lively; for the distincstrance and complaint, which, however extorted tions that had been paid her awakened her vaniby oppression, or supported by reason, are de-ty, and good luck had kept her principles of frutested by one part of the world as rebellion, cen-gality from giving her disturbance. She now sured by another as peevishness, by some heard made her second entrance into the world, and with an appearance of compassion, only to be- her friends were sufficiently industrious to pretray any of those sallies of vehemence and re- vent any return to her former life; every morning sentment, which are apt to break out upon en- brought messages of invitation, and every evencouragement, and by others passed over with in- ing was passed in places of diversion, from which difference and neglect, as matters in which they she for some time complained that she had rather have no concern, and which, if they should endea-be absent. In a short time she began to feel the vour to examine or regulate, they might draw mischief upon themselves.

happiness of acting without control, of being unaccountable for her hours, her expenses, and her Yet since it is no less natural for those who company; and learned by degrees to drop an think themselves injured to complain, than for expression of contempt, or pity, at the mention others to neglect their complaints, I shall venture of ladies whose husbands were suspected of re to lay my case before you, in hopes that you will straining their pleasures, or their play, and conenforce my opinion, if you think it just, or endea-fessed that she loved to go and come as she pleased vour to rectify my sentiments, if I am mistaken.

I was still favoured with some incidental pre

concerts.

cepts and transient endearments, and was now | picion, you will readily believe that it is difficult and then fondly kissed for smiling like my papa: to please. Every word and look is an offence. but most part of her morning was spent in com- I never speak, but I pretend to some qualities paring the opinion of her maid and milliner, con- and excellences, which it is criminal to possess; triving some variation in her dress, visiting shops, if I am gay, she thinks it early enough to coand sending compliments; and the rest of the quette; if I am grave, she hates a prude in bibs; day was too short for visits, cards, plays, and if I venture into company, I am in haste for a husband; if I retire to my chamber, such matronShe now began to discover that it was impos-like ladies are lovers of contemplation. I am on sible to educate children properly at home. Pa- one pretence or other generally excluded from rents could not have them always in their sight; her assemblies, nor am I ever suffered to visit at the society of servants was contagious; company the same place with my mamma. Every one produced boldness and spirit; emulation excited wonders why she does not bring Miss more into industry; and a large school was naturally the the world, and when she comes home in vapours, first step into the open world. A thousand other I am certain that she has heard either of my reasons she alleged, some of little force in them- beauty or my wit, and expect nothing for the enselves, but so well seconded by pleasure, vanity, suing week but taunts and menaces, contradicand idleness, that they soon overcame all the re- tion and reproaches. maining principles of kindness and piety, and Thus I live in a state of continual persecution, both I and my brother were despatched to board-only because I was born ten years too soon, and ing schools.

cannot stop the course of nature or of time, but How my mamma spent her time when she was am unhappily a woman before my mother can thus disburdened I am not able to inform you, willingly cease to be a girl. I believe you would but I have reason to believe that trifles and amuse- contribute to the happiness of many families, it, ments took still faster hold of her heart. At by any arguments or persuasions, you could first, she visited me at school, and afterwards make mothers ashamed of rivalling their children; wrote to me; but, in a short time, both her visits if you could show them, that though they may reand her letters were at an end, and no other no-fuse to grow wise, they must inevitably grow old; tice was taken of me than to remit money for my support.

When I came home at the vacation, I found myself coldly received, with an observation, "that this girl will presently be a woman." I was, after the usual stay, sent to school again, and overheard my mother say, as I was a-going, “Well, now I shall recover."

In six months more I came again, and with the usual childish alacrity, was running to my

and that the proper solaces of age are not music and compliments, but wisdom and devotion; that those who are so unwilling to quit the world will soon be driven from it; and that it is therefore their interest to retire while there yet remain a few hours for nobler employments.

Valeat res ludicra, si me

I am, &c.

Palma negata macrum, donata reducit opimum.

mother's embrace, when she stopped me with ex- No. 56.] SATURDAY, Sept. 29, 1750.
clamations at the suddenness and enormity of my
growth, having, she said, never seen any body
shoot up so much at my age. She was sure no
other girls spread at that rate, and she hated to
have children to look like women before their
time. I was disconcerted, and retired without
hearing any thing more than, "Nay, if you are
angry, Madam Steeple, you may walk off."

When once the forms of civility are violated, there remains little hope of return to kindness or decency. My mamma made this appearance of resentment a reason for continuing her malignity; and poor Miss Maypole, for that was my appellation, was never mentioned or spoken to but with some expression of anger or dislike.

She had yet the pleasure of dressing me like a child, and I know not when I should have been thought fit to change my habit, had I not been rescued by a maiden sister of my father, who could not bear to see women in hanging sleeves, and therefore presented me with brocade for a gown, for which I should have thought myself under great obligations, had she not accompanied her favour with some hints that my mamma might now consider her age, and give me her ear-rings, which she had shown long enough in public places.

I now left the school, and came to live with my mamma, who considered me as a usurper that had seized the rights of a woman before they were due, and was pushing down the precipice of age, that I might reign without a superior. While I am thus beheld with jealousy and sus

Farewell the stage; for humbly I disclaim
Such fond pursuits of pleasure, or of fame,
If I must sink in shame, or swell with pride,
As the gay palm is granted or denied."

HOR

FRANCIS

NOTHING is more unpleasing than to find that offence has been received when none was intend ed, and that pain has been given to those who were not guilty of any provocation. As the great end of society is mutual beneficence, a good man is always uneasy when he finds himself acting in opposition to the purposes of life; because, though his conscience may easily acquit him of malice prepense, of settled hatred or contrivances of mischief, yet he seldom can be certain, that he has not failed by negligence or indolence; that he has not been hindered from consulting the common interest by too much regard to his own ease, or too much indifference to the happiness of others.

Nor is it necessary, that, to feel this uneasiness, the mind should be extended to any great diffusion of generosity, or melted by uncommon warmth of benevolence; for that prudence which the world teaches, and a quick sensibility of private interest, will direct us to shun needless enmities; since there is no man whose kindness we may not some time want, or by whose malice we may not some time suffer.

I have therefore frequently looked with won

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