Class. Book. GopyriglitN". -A^ 0QPTRIGHT DEFOSm READINGS IN ENGLISH PROSE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY EDITED BY RAYMOND MACDONALD ALDEN n Professor of English in the Uni-versity of Illinoisy recently Associate Professor of English in Leland Stanford Junior Uni-versity BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY (3E{je RiVicriSitie presji Cambribge COPYRIGHT, 191 1, BY RAYMOND MACDONALD ALDEN ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ^'f h ©CI.A2;J7077 PREFACE The great Doctor Johnson, in one of the essays reprinted in this volume, condemns the multiplication of books undertaken by those who " have often no other task than to lay two books before them out of which they compile a third, without any new materials of their own." But if it be supposed on this ground that he would frown on the present undertaking, one might plead his own admission that there is an occasional compiler who, ■' though he exerts no great abilities in the work, facilitates the progress of others" and makes "that easy of attainment which is already written." Here, at any rate, are suggested the origin and purpose of this collection. For some time it has been possible for those studying periods of English literature to find in single volumes fairly representative selections from the poets of the several ages ; but to represent prose writings adequately is much more difficult, and those who have met this problem have found it one involving no little trouble and expense. Through the cooperation of the publishers, who have shown themselves ready to undertake the making of a volume suffi- ciently generous to accomplish for prose what relatively meagre books will do for poetry, it is hoped that the needs of students of eighteenth-century literature have been sufiiciently met. If this hope shall be justified by experience, similar volumes may be undertaken for the earlier and later periods. The principles governing the choice of selections may be briefly explained. In the first place, it was thought well to re- present the half-dozen (more or less) most important prose writers of the century by fairly generous and complete speci- mens of their work, approximating some twenty to thirty thou- sand words each. These selections cover, in the experience of the editor, the assignments of prescribed reading set for one or two weeks, in college courses dealing with the century as a whole. The authors thus largely represented are Defoe, Swift, Steele, Addison, Johnson, Boswell, and Burke. In the second place, it was desired to represent the lesser iv PREFACE writers of the age by briefer specimens of their work, to which students could be referred for the cursory illustration of mat- ters discussed in lectures or text-books. Such are the selec- tions from the philosophers, the epistolarians, the pamphlet- eers, and the novelists of the century. The last of these groups — the novelists — it was not at first proposed to include at all, since their work in its most important aspects can hardly be represented by extracts. But it was suggested by some of the friends who were good enough to criticise the first draft of the contents of the collection, that the novelists might be repre- sented as prose writers, in perhaps the same proportion that they would occupy in a course dealing with the period as a whole but without special attention to the novel or the drama; and this suggestion has been followed. The selections made from the novelists, then, must not be supposed to exhibit the authors as novelists; but they may serve to illustrate the far- cical humor of Fielding, the contrasting sentimentalism of Richardson and Sterne, and the romantic machinery of the " tales of terror." This is as far as the collection need go, for those concerned only with the intrinsic values of literature. But itwas desired to go further, and include specimens — sometimes of no consider- able literary quality — which are suggestive for what might be called the laboratory study of the history of literature, — passages exemplifying important critical doctrines or literary tendencies of the age. Such are the selections from Dennis, Gibber, the Wartons, and Hurd, the critical chapters from Fielding and the Prefaces of Richardson. In like manner the critical writings of Addison and Johnson have been repre- sented more largely than intrinsic interest might dictate, especially where they touch on poetry which the reader may be presumed to have been studying. The wise teacher or student will surely seek, where it is possible, to make one writer illus- trate another, and to find examples of contemporary judg- ments and aims which will make less mysterious for the modern reader literary fashions of an earlier age. So there is value, not only in Johnson's lastingly sound analyses of the poetry of Dryden and Pope, but also in the characteristic limitations of his appreciation of Milt( n. And there is real interest, even for those who have no desire to go deeply into literary theory, in PREFACE V the discussion of poetic justice by Dennis and Addison, in Johnson's final exposure of the fallacy in the doctrine of the unities, in Fielding's penetrating comments on his own art, and in the casual but significant remarks of Cowper and Gray on their work as poets. Those who care to do so may be enabled to go still further into the criticism of the century, making the acquaintance of its efforts in the direction of an aesthetic theory, through the selections from Addison's and Hume's essays on Taste, Reynolds's discussion of Beauty, and Burke's account of the Sublime and Beautiful. A similar attempt has been made to enable the student to illustrate for himself " the spirit of 1789," through the selections from Godwin, Paine, and The A n ti- Jacob in . Certain books, from which extracts would otherwise have been a matter of course, have been passed by because they are commonly familiar in more elementary reading: these include the first two parts of Gulliver^s Travels, Robinson Crusoe, the De Coverley papers. The Vicar of Wakefield, and Burke's writ- ings on the American Revolution. A place has been made for the dubious prose of Macpherson's Ossianic writings, on the purely practical ground that they should be known to the stu- dent of the period, but are not represented in any of the stand- ard collections of eighteenth-century poetry. Complete compositions have of course been preferred, other things being equal, especially from the more important writers. But where actual utility, or exigencies of space, demanded, the editor has freely excerpted, in the manner of one reading aloud under circumstances where it is desirable that the knowledge of the reader should save the time of the hearer. Omissions have been indicated scrupulously, and in most cases it is possible, by noting these indications, to discover whether any selection includes the beginning and the end of the chapter, essay, or letter from which it is taken. There are, however, a very few unnoted omissions pudoris causa, to which it seemed unneces- sary to call attention in a non-critical text. The geographical situation of the editor has made it impos- sible, regrettably, to present a verified text of a considerable number of the selections; in other words, in many cases it has been necessary to depend on the work of previous editors and pubhshers. In some cases one need have little fear of the re- VI PREFACE suits; in others there is too much reason to suspect that the text must be bettered hereafter, since for several of the writers repre- sented no good modern editing has been accomplished. It has fortunately been possible to give a sound text in certain cases where there has been conspicuous need of one : for example, the text of Defoe's essay on Academies and his Shortest Way with the Dissenters has been taken from original sources, and cor- rects errors which have been multiplied in earlier reprints. Spelling and punctuation have been everywhere modernized. Footnotes have been supplied according to a principle which cannot be followed with consistency, but which amounts to this: give only such information as may be assumed to be neces- sary for the apprehending of the general meaning of the text and not to be available in a convenient dictionary. Extended or un- common quotations from Latin writers, so beloved in our period, have been translated ; phrases which should be the property of every cultivated person have not. Perhaps an incidental result of the reading of this book may prove to be some mitigation of the heresy that it is possible to know English literature without understanding the Latin tongue. And now, if any one may be presumed to have read this Pre- face thus far, the editor may venture to ask the privilege, after setting forth impartially the words of so many other and better men, to do himself the pleasure of adding two remarks which follow from the repeated reading, in manuscript and proof, of the whole contents of the volume. The first remark is in noway a matter of literature, but tends toward cheerfulness of mind so clearly that it may be justifiable in any connection. Whoever dips far into these eighteenth-century authors will discover that in their age it was believed that men were more eager than in earlier times for the getting and the display of wealth; that the whole world was forsaking the country and making life wretched in cities; that old-fashioned honesty and simplicity of manners were becoming hard to find; that young persons were increas- ingly disrespectful of their elders; that books and periodicals were being multiplied to an alarming excess; and that church- going, with other practices of the Christian religion, was rapidly going out of use. These were some of the characteris- tic ills of the period. Perhaps, then, when the reader is next told that they are the characteristic ills of the early twentieth PREFACE vii century, he may suspect that they were equally so in the first, the fifth, and the fifteenth, and may derive some consolation thereby. The second remark, more germane to the purposes of the book, is that the repeated perusal of this corpus of eighteenth- century prose has tended always to increase, on the part of at least one reader, his respect for the person and works of Samuel Johnson. The space here accorded him is by no means due to mere tradition or literary orthodoxy, but to a genuine belief in the lasting worth of what he had to say. Granted certain of his pet foibles, — such as the habit of beginning every composition with a sonorous abstraction that gives no remotest clue to the subject in hand, and his willful unappreciativeness of arepubh- .can like Milton or a dilettante like Gray, — and where shall you find one who wrote on almost every thing and said so little, whether on attics, morals, or Shakespeare, which is not still true and still important? So let the Preface end with him, as it began; and it is to the memory of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., at once the most sturdy and the most pathetic figure among its contributors, that this book would be dedicated, were it not presumption thus lightly to seek to disturb so venerable a ghost. R. M. A. CONTENTS DANIEL DEFOE An Essay upon Projects (1697) .... The Shortest Way with the Dissenters (1702) . The Apparition of Mrs. Veal (1706) A Seasonable Warning and Caution (1712) . And What ir the Pretender should Come? (17 13) A Journal of the Plague Year (1722) I II 23 32 35 41 ^ JONATHAN SWIFT A Tale of a Tub (1704) 52 The Abolishing of Christianity (1708) . . . .76 A Proposal for Correcting the English Tongue (17 12) . 87 Gulliver's Travels (1726) 94 A Modest Proposal (1729) 114 RICHARD STEELE ^ The Tatler (1709-10) No. I [Prospectus] 123 No. 25 [Dueling] 125 No. 95 [Mr. Bickerstaff Visits a Friend] .... 127 No. 104 [Old Letters] 131 No. 181 [Memories of Sorrow] 133 No. 217 [Scolds] 13s No. 263 [Fashionable Hours] 138 The Spectator (1711-12) No. 4 [Character of the Spectator] 141 No. 49 [Coffee-House Characters] 145 No. 157 [Boys' Schools] 148 No. 324 [The Mohock Club. — A Love Letter] . . .151 The Guardian (1713) No. 34 [Character of a Gentleman] 154 Mr. Steele's Apology for Himself (1714) . . . .157 V JOSEPH ADDISON The Spectator (1711-12) No. 10 [Prospectus] 159 No. 16 [To his Correspondents] 162 X CONTENTS No. i8 [The Italian Opera] 165 No. 26 [Westminster Abbey] 168 No. 34 [The Spectator at the Club] 170 No. 40 [Tragedy] 1 74 No. 50 [The Indian Kings] 176 No. 62 [Wit] 180 No. 70 [The Ballad of Chevy Chase] 184 No. 81 [Party Patches] 189 No. 159 [The Vision of Mirzah] 192 No. 267 [Paradise Lost] ...'.... 197 No. 323 [Journal of a Lady] 201 No. 409 [Taste] 204 No. 419 [The Supernatural in Poetry] 208 V Jy( JOHN DENNIS The Genius and Writings of Shakespeare (1712) . . 211 Remarks upon Cato (1713) 215 ^ ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, EARL OF SHAFTESBURY Characteristics (171 i) 222 <^ GEORGE BERKELEY Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous (1713) . . 231 ./ BERNARD MANDEVILLE The Fable of the Bees (1714, 1723) 245 y LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU Letters (1717-55) 255 ^ ALEXANDER POPE Preface to Shakespeare (1725) ' . 265 COLLEY GIBBER Apology for the Life of Colley Gibber (1740) . .*:- — * 269 ^ HENRY ST. JOHN, VISCOUNT BOLINGBROKE Of the True Use of Retirement and Study (1752) . .273 Letter to Alexander Pope (1753) 277 SAMUEL RICHARDSON Clarissa Harlowe (1747-48) 281 "^ Sir Charles Grandison (1753) 287 t^ , J, CONTENTS xi HENRY FIELDING Joseph Andrews (1742) 293 Tom Jones (1749) ' . . . 304 / PHILIP STANHOPE, EARL OF CHESTERFIELD Letters to his Son (1747-49) 315 v' THOMAS GRAY Letters (1742-68) ' . . .324 t/ THOMAS WARTON Observations on the Fairy Queen (1754) . . . -331 ^ JOSEPH WARTON The Genius and Writings of Pope (1756, 1782) . . . 336 '- SAMUEL JOHNSON The Rambler (1751) No. 102 [The Voyage of Life] 341 No. 117 [Living in a Garret] 345 No. 161 [History of a Garret] 350 Preface to the Dictionary (1755) 354 The Idler (1758-59) No. 36 [The Bugbear Style] 363 No. 85 [The MultipHcation of Books] 365 No. 88 ["What have ye done?"] 367 Preface to Shakespeare (1765) 369 Lives of the English Poets (1779-S1) Milton 386 '4 Dryden 392 hi Addison 402 Pope 405 DAVID HUME Essay on the Standard of Taste (1757) .... 410 My Own Life (1777) 417 SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS Essay on the Idea of Beauty (1759) 421 LETTERS OF JUNIUS (1769-71) . . • ~ • • .425 xii CONTENTS \y OLIVER GOLDSMITH The Bee (1759) 435 The Citizen of the World (1762) Letter 4 [Character of the English] 440 Letter 13 [Westminster Abbey] 443 Letter 21 [At the Play] 446 Letter 41 [St. Paul's] 450 Letter 54 [Beau Tibbs] 452 Letter 55 [A Visit to Tibbs] *. .455 . Letter 98 [Courts of Justice] 458 ' RICHARD HURD Letters on Chivalry and Romance (1762) .... 462 : ,-UC HORACE WALPOLE Letters (1746-74) 467 The Castle of Otranto (1764) 476 / ^ */ LAURENCE STERNE Tristram Shandy (1759-67) 480 A Sentimental Journey (1768) 490 TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT Humphrey Clinker (1771) 502 FRANCES BURNEY (MADAME D'ARBLAY) Diary and Letters (1778-92) 511 WILLIAM COWPER Letters (1766-85) . . 525 THE MONTHLY REVIEW Review of Burns's Poems (1786) 534 , /EDWARD GIBBON The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776-88) . 537 Memoirs (1796) 542 GILBERT WHITE Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne (1789) . 550 / CONTENTS xiii EDMUND BURKE Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1756) . . 558 Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (1770) 570 Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) . . 576 Letter to a Noble Lord (1796) . . . . . . 592 THOMAS PAINE The Rights of Man (1791) 6x6 JAMES BOSWELL Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides (1786) . . .624 Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) 627 WILLIAM GODWIN Politica l Justice (1793) 667 ANN RADCLIFFE The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) 676 MATTHEW GREGORY LEWIS The Monk (1795) 684 THE ANTI-JACOBIN The Rovers (1798) 691 \p JAMES MACPHERSON APPENDIX iMES M^ The Poems of Ossian (1760, 1762) 697 BIOGRAPHICAL AND BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES . . 707 INDEX 725 DANIEL DEFOE AN ESSAY UPON PROJECTS 1697 [This essay, one of Defoe's earliest works, included a History of Projects and separate sections proposing plans for reform of the banking and bank- ruptcy laws, an insurance system, the development of public roads, the care of idiots, and various academies. The last-named section is here re- presented by two extracts.] OF ACADEMIES We have in England fewer of these than in any part of the world, at least where learning is in so much esteem. But to make amends, the two great seminaries we have are, without comparison, the greatest — I won't say the best — in the world ; and though much might be said here concerning univer- sities in general, and foreign academies in particular, I content myself with noting that part in which we seem defective. The French, who justly value themselves upon erecting the most celebrated Academy of Europe, owe the lustre of it very much to the great encouragement the kings of France have given to it. And one of the members, making a speech at his entrance, tells you that " 'tis not the least of the glories of their invincible monarch to have engrossed all the learning of the world in that sublime body." The peculiar study of the Academy of Paris has been to re- fine and correct their own language, which they have done to that happy degree that we see it now spoken in all the courts of Christendom as the language allowed to be most universal. I had the honor once to be a member of a small society who seemed to offer at this noble design in England ; but the great- ness of the work and the modesty of the gentlemen concerned prevailed with them to desist an enterprise which appeared too great for private hands to undertake. We want indeed a RicheHeu to commence such a work ; for I am persuaded were there such a genius in our kingdom to lead the way, there would 2 DANIEL DEFOE not want capacities who "could carry on the work to a glory equal to all that has gone before them. The English tongue is a subject not at all less worthy the labor of such a society than the French, and capable of a much greater perfection. The learned among the French will own that the comprehensive- ness of expression is a glory in which the English tongue not only equals, but excels its neighbors. Rapin, St. Evremont, and the most eminent French authors have acknowledged it; and my Lord Roscommon, who is allowed to be a good judge of English, because he wrote it as exactly as any ever did, expresses what I mean in these lines : — For who did ever in French authors see The comprehensive English energy? The weighty buUion of one sterUng line, Drawn to French wire, would through whole pages shine. "And if our neighbors will yield us, as their greatest critic has done, the preference for sublimity and nobleness of style, we will willingly quit all pretensions to their insignificant gaiety." 'Tis a great pity that a subject so noble should not have some as noble to attempt it; and for a method, what greater can be set before us than the Academy of Paris, which, to give the French their due, stands foremost among all the great attempts in the learned part of the world. The present King of England, of whom we have seen the whole world writing panegyrics and encomiums, and whom his enemies, when their interest does not silence them, are apt to say more of than ourselves ; as in the war he has given sur- prising instances of a greatness of spirit more than common, so in peace, I dare say, with submission, he shall never have an opportunity to illustrate his memory more than by such a foun- dation ; by which he shall have opportunity to darken the glory of the French King in peace, as he has by his daring attempts in the war. Nothing but pride loves to be flattered, and that only as 'tis a vice which blinds us to our own imperfections. I think princes are particularly unhappy in having their good actions magni- fied, as their evil actions covered. But King William, who has already won praise by the steps of dangerous virtue, seems re- AN ESSAY UPON PROJECTS 3 served for some actions which are above the touch of flattery, whose praise is in themselves. And such would this be; and because I am speaking of a work which seems to be proper only for the hand of the King himself, I shall not presume to carry on this chapter to the model as I have done in other subjects. Only thus far: — That a society be erected by the King himself, if his Majesty thought fit, and composed of none but persons of the first figure in learning; and 'twere to be wished our gentry were so much lovers of learning that birth might always be joined with capa- city. The work of this society should be to encourage polite learn- ing, to polish and refine the English tongue, and advance the so much neglected faculty of correct language, to establish purity and propriety of style, and to purge it from all the irregu- lar additions that ignorance and affectation have introduced; and all those innovations in speech, if I may call them such, which some dogmatic writers have the confidence to foster upon their native language, as if their authority were sufficient to make their own fancy legitimate. By such a society I dare say the true glory of our English style would appear, and among all the learned part of the world be esteemed, as it really is, the noblest and most comprehen- sive of all the vulgar languages in the world. Into this society should be admitted none but persons emi- nent for learning, and yet none, or but very few, whose business or trade was learning. For I may be allowed, I suppose, to say we have seen many great scholars, mere learned men, and gradu- ates in the last degree of study, whose Enghsh has been far from polite, full of stiffness and affectation, hard words, and long un- usual coupling of syllables and sentences, which sound harsh and untunable to the ear, and shock the reader both in expres- sion and understanding. In short, there should be room in this society for neither A clergyman, physician, or lawyer. Not that I would put an af- front upon the learning of any of those honorable employments, much less upon their persons. But if I do think that their sev- eral professions do naturally and severally prescribe habits of speech to them peculiar to their practice, and prejudicial to the study I speak of, I believe I do them no wrong. Nor do I 4 DANIEL DEFOE deny but there may be, and now are, among some of all those professions, men of style and language, great masters of Eng- lish, whom few men will undertake to correct; and where such do at any time appear, their extraordinary merit should find them a place in this society; but it should be rare, and upon very extraordinary occasions, that such be admitted. I would therefore have this society wholly composed of gen- tlemen, whereof twelve to be of the nobility, if possible, and twelve private gentlemen, and a class of twelve to be left open for mere merit, let it be found in who or what sort it would, which should lie as the crown of their study, who have done something eminent to deserve it. The voice of this society should be sufficient authority for the usage of words, and suffi- cient also to expose the innovations of other men's fancies; they should preside with a sort of judicature over the learning of the age, and have hberty to correct and censure the exorbi- tance of writers, especially of translators. The reputation of this society would be enough to make them the allowed judges of style and language; and no author would have the impu- dence to coin without their authority. Custom, which is now our best authority for words, would always have its original here, and not be allowed without it. There should be no more occasion to search for derivations and constructions, and 'twould be as criminal then to coin words as money. The exercises of this society would be lectures on the English tongue, essays on the nature, original, usage, authorities, and differences of words, on the propriety, purity, and cadence of style, and of the politeness and manner in writing, reflections upon irregular usages, and corrections of erroneous customs in words; and, in short, everything that would appear necessary to the bringing our English tongue to a due perfection, and our gentlemen to a capacity of writing like themselves; to banish pride and pedantry, and silence the impudence and imperti- nence of young authors, whose ambition is to be known, though it be by their folly. ... ^ Under this head of Academies I might bring in a project for — >JkjL- -U AN ESSAY UPON PROJECTS AN ACADEMY FOR WOMEN I have often thought of it as one of the most barbarous cus- toms in the world, considering us as a civilized and a Christian country, that we deny the advantages of learning to women. We reproach the sex every day with folly and impertinence, while I am confident, had they the advantages of education equal to us, they would be guilty of less than ourselves. One would wonder, indeed, how it should happen that wo- men are conversible at all, since they are only beholding to nat- ural parts for all their knowledge. Their youth is spent to teach them to stitch and sew or make baubles. They are taught to read, indeed, and perhaps to write their names or so, and that is the height of a woman's education. And I would but ask any who slight the sex for their understanding, what is a man (a gen- tleman, I mean) good for that is taught no more? I need not give instances, or examine the character of a gen- tleman with a good estate, and of a good family, and with tolerable parts, and examine what figure he makes for want of education. The soul is placed in the body like a rough diamond ^ and must be polished, or the lustre of it will never appear: and 'tis manifest that as the rational soul distinguishes us from brutes, so education carries on the distinction and makes some less brutish than others. This is too evident to need any demonstra- tion. But why then should women be denied the benefit of in- struction? If knowledge and understanding had been useless additions to the sex, God Almighty would never have given them capacities, for He made nothing needless. Besides, I would ask such what they can see in ignorance that they should think it a necessary ornament to a woman? or how much worse is a wise woman than a fool? or what has the woman done to for- feit the privilege of being taught? Does she plague us with her pride and im.j iLmence? Why did we not let her learn, that she might have had more wit? Shall we upbraid women with folly, when 'tis only the error of this inhuman custom that hin- dered them being made wiser? The capacities of women are supposed to be greater and their senses quicker than those of the men; and what they might be capable of being bred to is plain from some instances of female 6 DANIEL DEFOE wit, which this age is not without; which upbraids us with in- justice, and looks as if we denied women the advantages of education for fear they should vie with the men in their im- provements. To remove this objection, and that women might have at least a needful opportunity of education in all sorts of useful learning, I propose the draught of an Academy for that pur- pose. I know 'tis dangerous to make public appearances of the sex. They are not either to be confined or exposed ; the first will dis- agree with their inclinations, and the last with their reputa- tions, and therefore it is somewhat difficult; and I doubt a method proposed by an ingenious lady in a little book called Advice to the Ladies would be found impracticable, for, saving my respect to the sex, the levity, which perhaps is a little pecu- liar to them, at least in their youth, will not bear the restraint; and I am satisfied nothing but the height of bigotry can keep up a nunnery. Women are extravagantly desirous of going to heaven, and will punish their pretty bodies to get thither; but nothing else will do it, and even in that case sometimes it falls out that nature will prevail. When I talk, therefore, of an academy for women, I mean both the model, the teaching, and the government different from what is proposed by that ingenious lady, for whose pro- posal I have a very great esteem, and also a great opinion of her wit; different, too, from all sorts of reHgious confinement, and, above all, from vows of celibacy. Wherefore the academy I propose should differ but little from public schools, wherein such ladies as were wilHng to study should have all the advantages of learning suitable to their genius. But since some severities of discipline more than ordinary would be absolutely necessary to preserve the reputation of the house, that persons of quality and fortune might not be afraid to venture their children thither, I shall venture to make a small scheme by way of essay. The house I would have built in a form by itself, as well as in a place by itself. The building should be of three plain fronts, without any jettings or bearing-work, that the eye might at a glance see from one coin to the other; the gardens walled in AN ESSAY UPON PROJECTS 7 the same triangular figure, with a large moat, and but one en- trance. • When this every part of the situation was contrived as well as might be for discovery, and to render intriguing dangerous, I would have no guards, no eyes, no spies set over the ladies, but shall expect them to be tried by the principles of honor and strict virtue. . . . In this house, the persons who enter should be taught all sorts of breeding suitable to both their genius and their quality; and in particular music and dancing, which it would be cruelty to bar the sex of, because they are their darlings; but besides this, they should be taught languages, as particularly French and Itahan; and I would venture the injury of giving a woman more tongues than one. They should, as a particular study, be taught all the graces of speech and all the necessary air of conversation, which our common education is so defective in that I need not expose it. They should be brought to read books, and especially history, and so to read as to make them understand the world, and be able to know and judge of things when they hear of them. To such whose genius would lead them to it I would deny no sort of learning; but the chief thing in general is to cultivate the understandings of the sex, that they may be capable of all sorts of conversation; that, their parts and judgments being im- proved, they may be as profitable in their conversation as they are pleasant. Women, in my observation, have little or no difference in them, but as they are or are not distinguished by education. Tempers indeed may in some degree influence them, but the main distinguishing part is their breeding. The whole sex are generally quick and sharp. I believe I may be allowed to say generally so, for you rarely see them lumpish and heavy when they are children, as boys will often be. If a woman be well bred, and taught the proper manage- ment of her natural wit, she proves generally very sensible and retentive; and without partiality, a woman of sense and man- ners is the finest and most delicate part of God's creation, the glory of her Maker, and the great instance of His singular re- gard to man. His darling creature, to whom He gave the best gift either God could bestow or man receive. And 'tis the sor- -^ 8 DANIEL DEFOE didest piece of folly and ingratitude in the world to withhold from the s^ the due lustre which the advantages of education gives to the natural beauty of their minds. ^ A woman well bred and well taught, furnished with the additional accomplishments of knowledge and behavior, is a creature without comparison; her society is the emblem of sublimer enjoyments; her person is angelic and her conversa- tion heavenly; she is all softness and sweetness, peace, love, wit, and delight. She is every way suitable to the sublimest wish, and the man that has such a one to his portion has no- thing to do but to rejoice in her and be thankful. On the other hand, suppose her to be the very same woman, and rob her of the benefit of education, and it follows thus: — If her temper be good, want of education makes her soft and easy. Her wit, for want of teaching, makes her impertinent and talkative. Her knowledge, for want of judgment and ex- perience, makes her fanciful and whimsical. If her temper be bad, want of breeding makes her worse, and she grows haughty, insolent, and loud. If she be passionate, want of manners makes her termagant and a scold, which is much at one with lunatic. If she be proud, want of discretion (which still is breed- ing) makes her conceited, fantastic, and ridiculous. And from these she degenerates to be turbulent, clangorous, noisy, nasty, and the devil. Methinks mankind for their own sakes — since, say what we will of the women, we all think fit at one time or other to be concerned with them — should take some care to breed them up to be suitable and serviceable, if they expected no such thing as delight from them. Bless us! what care do we take to breed up a good horse and to break him well ! and what a value do we put upon him when it is done, and all because he should be fit for our use! and why not a woman? Since all her orna- ments and beauty without suitable behavior is a cheat in na- ture, like the false tradesman, who puts the best of his goods uppermost, that the buyer may think the rest are of the same goodness. Beauty of the body, which is the women's glory, seems to be now unequally bestowed, and Nature, or rather Providence, to lie under some scandal about it, as if 'twas given a woman for a snare to men, and so made a kind of a she-devil of her; be- AN ESSAY UPON PROJECTS 9 cause, they say, exquisite beauty is rarely given with wit, more rarely with goodness of temper, and never at all with modesty. And some, pretending to justify the equity of such a distribu- tion, will tell us 'tis the effect of the justice of Providence in di- viding particular excellencies among all His creatures, share and share alike, as it were, that all might for something or other be acceptable to one another, else some would be despised. I think both these notions false, and yet the last, which has the show of respect to Providence, is the worst, for it supposes Providence to be indigent and empty, as if it had not where- with to furnish all the creatures it had made, but was fain to be parsimonious in its gifts, and distribute them by piecemeal for fear of being exhausted. If I might venture my opinion against an almost universal notion, I would say most men mistake the proceedings of Provi- dence in this case, and all the world at this day are mistaken in their practice about it. And because the assertion is very bold, I desire to explain myself. That Almighty First Cause which made us all is certainly the fountain of excellence, as it is of being, and by an invisible influence could have diffused equal qualities and perfections to all the creatures it has made, as the sun does its light, without the least ebb or diminution to Himself, and has given indeed to every individual sufficient to the figure His providence had de- signed him in the world. I believe it might be defended if I should say that I do sup- pose God has given to all mankind equal gifts and capacities in that He has given them all souls equally capable, and that the whole difference in mankind proceeds either from accidental difference in the make of their bodies or from the foolish differ- ence of education. I. From Accidental Diference in Bodies. I would avoid dis- coursing here of the philosophical position of the soul in the body. But if it be true, as philosophers do affirm, that the un- derstanding and memory is dilated or contracted according to the accidental dimensions of the organ through which 'tis con- veyed, then, though God has given a soul as capable to me as another, yet if I have any natural defect in those parts of the body by which the soul should act, I may have the same soul infused as another man, and yet he be a wise man and I a very lo DANIEL DEFOE fool. For example, if a child naturally have a defect in the organ of hearing, so that he could never distinguish any sound, that child shall never be able to speak or read, though it have a soul capable of all the accomplishments in the world. The brain is the centre of all the soul's actings, where all the distin- guishing faculties of it reside; and 'tis observable a man who has a narrow contracted head, in which there is not room for the due and necessary operations of nature by the brain, is never a man of very great judgment; and that proverb, ''A great head and little wit," is not meant by nature, but is a re- proof upon sloth, as if one should, by way of wonder, say, "Fie, fie! you that have a great head have but little wit; that's strange ! that must certainly be your own fault." From this no- tion I do believe there is a great matter in the breed of men and women — not that wise men shall always get wise children, but I believe strong and healthy bodies have the wisest children, and sickly, weakly bodies affect the wits as well as the bodies of their children. We are easily persuaded to believe this in the breeds of horses, cocks, dogs, and other creatures, and I be- lieve 'tis as visible in men. "^ But to come closer to the business, the great distinguishing difference which is seen in the world between men and women is in their education, and this is manifested by comparing it with the difference between one man or woman and another. And herein it is that I take upon me to make such a bold as- sertion that all the world are mistaken in their practice about women ; for I cannot think that God Almighty ever made them so delicate, so glorious creatures, and furnished them with such charms, so agreeable and so delightful to mankind, with souls capable of the same accomplishments with men, and all to be only stewards of our houses, cooks, and slaves. Not that I am for exalting the female government in the least; but, in short, I would have men take women for compan- ions, and educate them to be fit for it. A woman of sense and breeding wiU scorn as much to encroach upon the prerogative of the man as a man of sense will scorn to oppress the weakness of the woman. But if the women's souls were refined and im- proved by teaching, that word would be lost; to say, the weak- ness of the sex as to judgment, would be nonsense, for ignor- ance and folly would be no more found among women than men. THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS ii I remember a passage which I heard from a very fine woman ; she had wit and capacity enough, an extraordinary shape and face, and a great fortune, but had been cloistered up all her time, and, for fear of being stolen, had not had the hberty of be- ing taught the common necessary knowledge of women's affairs; and when she came to converse in the world, her natural wit made her so sensible of the want of education, that she gave this short reflection on herself: — "I am ashamed to talk with my very maids," says she, "for I don't know when they do right or wrong. I had more need go to school than be mar- ried." I need not enlarge on the loss the defect of education is to the sex, nor argue the benefit of the contrary practice; 'tis a thing will be more easily granted than remedied. This chapter is but an essay at the thing, and I refer the practice to those happy days, if ever they shall be, when men shall be wise enough to mend it. THE SHORTEST WAY WITH THE DISSENTERS . .,V>--^>. ^ ^«-^ VyA/NA^ t 1702 [This pamphlet was written while a bill was pending in ParHament on the subject of "occasional conformity," a practice by which members of the Dissenting denominations preserved their poUtical rights by occasion- ally attending service at the Church of England. Defoe, a Dissenter, as- sumed the position of a violent Tory and High Churchman, his mock at- tack on his fellow-religionists being so skilfully devised that it was taken seriously and approved by some Tories. When its real character was understood, the author was prosecuted for libeling the Church, and the book was ordered burned by the House of Commons.] Sir Roger L'Estrange tells us a story in his collection of fables, of the cock and the horses. The cock was gotten to roost in the stable among the horses, and there being no racks or other conveniences for him, it seems he was forced to roost upon the ground. The horses jostling about for room, and put- ting the cock in danger of his life, he gives them this grave ad- vice, "Pray, gentlefolks, let us stand still, for fear we should tread upon one another." There are some people in the world, who, now they are un- 12 DANIEL DEFOE perched, and reduced to an equality with other people, and under strong and very just apprehensions of being further treated as they deserve, begin, with i^sop's cock, to preach up peace and union, and the Christian duties of moderation, for- getting that, when they had the power in their hands, these graces were strangers in their gates. It is now near fourteen years that the glory and peace of the purest and most flourishing Church in the world has been eclipsed, buffeted, and disturbed by a sort of men whom God in His providence has suffered to insult over her and bring her down. These have been the days of her humiliation and tribu- lation. She has borne with invincible patience the reproach of the wicked, and God has at last heard her prayers, and delivered her from the oppression of the stranger. And now they find their day is over, their power gone, and the throne of this nation possessed by a royal, English, true, and ever constant member of, and friend to, the Church of England. Now they find that they are in danger of the Church of England's just resentments; now they cry out Peace, Union, Forbearance, and Charity, as if the Church had not too long harbored her enemies under her wing, and nourished the viper- ous brood till they hiss and fly in the face of the mother that cherished them! No, gentlemen, the time of mercy is past, your day of grace is over; you should have practiced peace, and moderation, and charity, if you expected any yourselves. We have heard none of this lesson for fourteen years past. We have been huffed and bullied with your Act of Toleration; you have told us, that you are the Church established by law, as well as others ; have set up your canting synagogues at our church doors, and the Church and members have been loaded with re- proaches, with oaths, associations, abjurations, and what not. Where has been the mercy, the forbearance, the charity, you have shown to tender consciences of the Church of England, that could not take oaths as fast as you made them? that, having sworn allegiance to their lawful and rightful King, could not dispense with their oath, their King being still alive, and swear to your new hodge-podge of a Dutch Government? These have been turned out of their livings, and they and their families left to starve; their estates double taxed to carry on a war they had THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS 13 no hand in, and you got nothing by. What account can you give of the multitudes you have forced to comply, against their consciences, with your new sophistical pohtics, who, like new converts in France, sin because they cannot starve? And now the tables are turned upon you; you must not be persecuted; it is not a Christian spirit! You have butchered one king, deposed another king, and made a mock king of a third, and yet you could have the face to expect to be employed and trusted by the fourth. Anybody that did not know the temper of your party would stand amazed at the impudence, as well as folly, to think of it. Your management of your Dutch monarch, whom you re- duced to a mere King of CI — s, is enough to give any future princes such an idea of your principles as to warn them suffi- ciently from coming into your clutches; and God be thanked the Queen is out of your hands, knows you, and will have a care of you. There is no doubt but the supreme authority of a nation has in itself a power, and a right to that power, to execute the laws upon any part of that nation it governs. The execution of the known laws of the land, and that with but a gentle hand neither, was all that the fanatical party of this land have ever called persecution; this they have magnified to a height, that the suf- ferings of the Huguenots in France were not to be compared with. Now, to execute the known laws of a nation upon those who transgress them, after voluntarily consenting to the mak- ing those laws, can never be called persecution, but justice. But justice is always violence to the party offending, for every man is innocent in his own eyes. The first execution of the laws against Dissenters in England was in the days of King James the First; and what did it amount to? Truly the worst they suf- fered was at their own request : to let them go to New England and erect a new colony, and give them great privileges, grants, and suitable powers, keep them under protection, and defend them against all invaders, and receive no taxes or revenue from them. This was the cruelty of the Church of England. Fatal lenity ! It was the ruin of that excellent prince. King Charles the First. Had King James sent all the Puritans in England away to the West Indies, we had been a national, unmixed Church; the Church of England had been kept undivided and entire. 14 DANIEL DEFOE To requite the lenity of the father, they take up arms against the son; conquer, pursue, take, imprison, and at last put to death the anointed of God, and destroy the very being and na- ture of government, setting up a sordid impostor, who had nei- ther title to govern nor understanding to manage, but supplied that want with power, bloody and desperate counsels, and craft without conscience. Had not King James the First withheld the full execution of the laws, had he given them strict justice, he had cleared the nation of them, and the consequences had been plain: his son had never been murdered by them nor the monarchy over- whelmed. It was too much mercy shown them was the ruin of his posterity and the ruin of the nation's peace. One would think the Dissenters should not have the face to believe that we are to be wheedled and canted into peace and toleration, when they know that they have once requited us with a civil war, and once with an intolerable and unrighteous persecution, for our former civility. Nay, to encourage us to be easy with them, it is apparent that they never had the upper hand of the Church, but they treated her with all the severity, with all the reproach and contempt as was possible. What peace and what mercy did they show the loyal gentry of the Church of England in the time of their triumphant Commonwealth? How did they put all the gentry of England to ransom, whether they were actually in arms for the King or not, making people compound for their estates and starve their families? How did they treat the clergy of the Church of England, sequestered the ministers, devoured the patrimony of the Church, and divided the spoil by sharing the Church lands among their soldiers, and turning her clergy out to starve? Just such measure as they have meted should be measured them again. Charity and love is the known doctrine of the Church of England, and it is plain she has put it in practice towards the Dissenters, even beyond what they ought, till she has been wanting to herself, and in effect unkind to her sons, particu- larly in the too much lenity of King James the First, men- tioned before. Had he so rooted the Puritans from the face of the land, which he had an opportunity early to have done, they had not had the power to vex the Church as since they have done. THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS 15 In the days of King Charles the Second, how did the Church reward their bloody doings with lenity and mercy, except the barbarous regicides of the pretended court of justice! Not a soul suffered for all the blood in an unnatural war. King Charles came in all mercy and love, cherished them, preferred them, employed them, withheld the rigor of the law, and oftentimes, even against the advice of his Parliament, gave them liberty of conscience; and how did they requite him with the villainous contrivance to depose and murder him and his successor at the Rye Plot!" King James, as if mercy was the inherent quality of the fam- ily, began his reign with unusual favor to them. Nor could their joining with the Duke of Monmouth against him move him to do himself justice upon them; but that mistaken prince thought to win them by gentleness and love, proclaimed an uni- versal liberty to them, and rather discountenanced the Church of England than them. How they requited him all the world knows. The late reign is too fresh in the memory of all the world to need a comment; how, under pretence of joining with the Church in redressing some grievances, they pushed things to that extremity, in conjunction with some mistaken gentlemen, as to depose the late King, as if the grievance of the nation could not have been redressed but by the absolute ruin of the prince. Here is an instance of their temper, their peace, and charity. To what height they carried themselves during the reign of a king of their own; how they crope into all places of trust and profit; how they insinuated into the favor of the King, and were at first preferred to the highest places in the nation; how they engrossed the ministry, and above all, how pitifully they managed, is too plain to need any remarks. But particularly their mercy and charity, the spirit of union, they tell us so much of, has been remarkable in Scotland. If any man would see the spirit of a Dissenter, let him look into Scotland. There they made entire conquest of the Church, trampled down the sacred orders, and suppressed the Episco- pal government, with an absolute, and, as they suppose, irre- trievable victory, though it is possible they may find themselves mistaken. Now it would be a very proper question to ask their impudent advocate, the Observator, Pray how much mercy i6 DANIEL DEFOE and favor did the members of the Episcopal Church find in Scotland from the Scotch Presbyterian Government? And I shall undertake for the Church of England that the Dissenters shall still receive as much here, though they deserve but Httle. In a small treatise of the sufferings of the Episcopal clergy in Scotland, it will appear what usage they met with; how they not only lost their livings, but in several places were plundered and abused in their persons; the ministers that could not con- form turned out with numerous families and no maintenance, and hardly charity enough left to relieve them with a bit of bread. And the cruelties of the parties are innumerable, and not to be attempted in this short piece. And now, to prevent the distant cloud which they perceived to hang over their heads from England, with a true Presby- terian policy, they put in for a union of nations, that England might unite their Church with the Kirk of Scotland, and their Presbyterian members sit in our House of Commons, and their Assembly of Scotch canting Long-Cloaks in our Convocation. What might have been if our fanatic Whiggish statesmen con- tinued, God only knows ; but we hope we are out of fear of that now. It is alleged by some of the faction — and they began to bully us with it — that if' we won't unite with them, they will not settle the crown with us again, but when Her Majesty dies, will choose a king for themselves. If they won't, we must make them, and it is not the first time we have let them know that we are able. The crowns of these kingdoms have not so far disowned the right of succession, but they may retrieve it again; and if Scotland thinks to come off from a successive to an elective state of government, England has not promised not to assist the right heir and put them into possession, without any regard to their ridiculous settlements. These are the gentlemen, these their ways of treating the Church, both at home and abroad. Now let us examine the reasons they pretend to give why we should be favorable to them, why we should continue and tolerate them among us. First, they are very numerous, they say; they are a great part of the nation, and we cannot suppress them. To this may be answered : — I. They are not so numerous as the Protestants in France, THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS 17 and yet the French King effectually cleared the nation of them at once, and we don't find he misses them at home. But I am not of the opinion they are so numerous as is pretended ; their party is more numerous than their persons, and those mistaken people of the Church who are misled and deluded by their wheedling artifices to join with them, make their party the greater; but those will open their eyes when the Government shall set heartily about the work, and come off from them, as some animals which they say always desert a house when it is likely to fall. 2. The more numerous the more dangerous, and therefore the more need to suppress them; and God has suffered us to bear them as goads in our sides for not utterly extinguishing them long ago. 3. If we are to allow them only because we cannot suppress them, then it ought to be tried whether we can or no ; and I am of opinion it is easy to be done, and could prescribe ways and means, if it were proper; but I doubt not the Government will find effectual methods for the rooting the contagion from the face of this land. Another argument they use, which is this: that it is a time of war, and we have need to unite against the common enemy. We answer, this common enemy had been no enemy if they had not made him so. He was quiet, in peace, and no way dis- turbed or encroached upon us, and we know no reason we had to quarrel with him. But further, we make no question but we are able to deal with this common enemy without their help; but why must we unite with them because of the enemy? Will they go over to the enemy if we do not prevent it by a union with them? We are very well contented they should, and make no question we shall be ready to deal with them and the common enemy tooj and better without them than with them. Besides, if we have a common enemy, there is the more need to be secure against our private enemies. If there is one com- mon enemy, we have the less need to have an enemy in our bowels. It was a great argument some people used against suppress- ing the old money, that it was a time of war, and it was too great a risk for the nation to run; if we should not master it, we i8 DANIEL DEFOE should be undone. And yet the sequel proved the hazard was not so great but it might be mastered, and the success was an- swerable. The suppressing the Dissenters is not a harder work, nor a work of less necessity to the public. We can never enjoy a settled, uninterrupted union and tranquillity in this nation till the spirit of Whiggism, faction, and schism is melted down like the old money. To talk of the difficulty is to frighten ourselves with chimeras and notions of a powerful party, which are indeed a party with- out power. Difficulties often appear greater at a distance than when they are searched into with judgment and distinguished from the vapors and shadows that attend them. We are not to be frightened with it ; this age is wiser than that, by all our experience and theirs too. King Charles the First had early suppressed this party if he had taken more deliberate measures. In short, it is not worth arguing to talk of their arms. Their Monmouths, and Shaftesburys, and Argyles are gone; their Dutch sanctuary is at an end; Heaven has made way for their destruction; and if we do not close with the divine occa- sion, we are to blame ourselves, and may remember that we had once an opportunity to serve the Church of England by extir- pating her implacable enemies, and, having let slip the minute that Heaven presented, may experimentally complain, Post est occasio calva} Here are some popular objections in the way : — As first, the Queen has promised them to continue them in their tolerated liberty, and has told us she will be a religious observer of her word. What Her Majesty will do we cannot help; but what, as the head of the Church, she ought to do, is another case. Her Ma- jesty has promised to protect and defend the Church of Eng- land, and if she cannot effectually do that without the destruc- tion of the Dissenters, she must of course dispense with one promise to comply with another. But to answer this cavil more effectually : Her Majesty did never promise to maintain the tol- eration to the destruction of the Church ; but it is upon supposi- tion that it may be compatible with the well-being and safety of the Church, which she had declared she would take especial care of. Now if these two interests clash, it is plain Her Ma- 1 "Opportunity is bald-headed behind." • THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS 19 Jesty's intentions are to uphold, protect, defend, and establish the Church, and this we conceive is impossible. Perhaps it may be said that the Church is in no immediate danger from the Dissenters, and therefore it is time enough. But this is a weak answer. For first, if a danger be real, the distance of it is no argument against, but rather a spur to quicken us to prevention, lest it be too late hereafter. And secondly, here is the opportunity, and the only one per- haps that ever the Church had, to secure herself and destroy her enemies. The representatives of the nation have now an opportunity; the time is come which all good men have wished for, that the gentlemen of England may serve the Church of England ; now they are protected and encouraged by a Church of England Queen. " What will you do for your sister in the day that she shall be spoken for? " If ever you will establish the best Christian Church in the world; if ever you will suppress the spirit of enthusiasm; if ever you will free the nation from the viperous brood that have so long sucked the blood of their mother; if ever you will leave your posterity free from faction and rebellion , this is the time! This is the time to pull up this heretical weed of sedition that has so long disturbed the peace of our Church and poi- soned the good corn. But, says another hot and cold objector, this is renewing fire and faggot, reviving the act De Heretico Comhurendo; this will be cruelty in its nature, and barbarous to all the world. I answer, it is cruelty to kill a snake or a toad in cold blood, but the poison of their nature makes it a charity to our neigh- bors to destroy those creatures, not for any personal injury re- ceived, but for prevention; not for the evil they have done, but the evil they may do. Serpents, toads, vipers, &c., are noxious to the body, and poison the sensitive life; these poison the soul, corrupt our pos- terity, ensnare our children, destroy the vitals of our happiness, our future felicity, and contaminate the whole mass. Shall any law be given to such wild creatures? Some beasts are for sport, and the huntsmen give them advantages of 20 DANIEL DEFOE ground; but some are knocked on the head by all possible ways of violence and surprise. I do not prescribe fire and faggot, but, as Scipio said of Car- thage, Delenda est Carthago, they are to be rooted out of this nation, if ever we will live in peace, serve God, or enjoy our own. As for the manner, I leave it to those hands who have a right to execute God's justice on the nation's and the Church's enemies. But if we must be frighted from this justice under the spe- cious pretences and odious sense of cruelty, nothing will be ef- fected : it will be more barbarous to our own children and dear posterity when they shall reproach their fathers, as we do ours, and tell us, "You had an opportunity to root out this cursed race from the world, under the favor and protection of a true English queen; and out of your foolish pity you spared them, because, forsooth, you would not be cruel; and now our Church is suppressed and persecuted, our religion trampled under foot, our estates plundered, our persons imprisoned and dragged to jails, gibbets, and scaffolds: your sparing this Amalekite race is our destruction, your mercy to them proves cruelty to your poor posterity." How just will such reflections be when our posterity shall fall under the merciless clutches of this uncharitable genera- tion, when our Church shall be swallowed up in schism, faction, enthusiasm, and confusion; when our government shall be de- volved upon foreigners, and our monarchy dwindled into a re- pubKc! It would be more rational for us, if we must spare this genera- tion, to summon our own to a general massacre, and, as we have brought them into the world free, send them out so, and not betray them to destruction by our supine negligence, and then cry, " It is mercy." Moses was a merciful, meek man, and yet with what fury did he run through the camp, and cut the throats of three-and- thirty thousand of his dear IsraeHtes that were fallen into idola- try. What was the reason? It was mercy to the rest to make these examples, to prevent the destruction of the whole army. How many millions of future souls we save from infection and delusion, if the present race of poisoned spirits were purged from the face of the land! It is vain to trifle in this matter; the light foolish handling of THE SHORTEST WAY WITH DISSENTERS 21 them by mulcts, fines, &c., — it is their glory and their advant- age. If the gallows instead of the Counter, ^ and the galleys in- stead of the fines, were the reward of going to a conventicle, to preach or hear, there would not be so many sufferers. The spirit of martyrdom is over ; they that will go to church to be chosen sheriffs and mayors would go to forty churches rather than be hanged. If one severe law were made and punctually executed, that whoever was found at a conventicle should be banished the nation, and the preacher be hanged, we should soon see an end of the tale. They would all come to church, and one age would make us all one again. To talk of five shillings a month for not coming to the sacra- ment, and one shilling per week for not coming to church, — this is such a way of converting people as never was known; this is selling them a liberty to transgress for so much money. If it be not a crime, why don't we give them full Ucense? And if it be, no price ought to compound for the committing it, for that is selling a liberty to people to sin against God and the government. If it be a crime of the highest consequence, both against the peace and welfare of the nation, the glory of God, the good of the Church, and the happiness of the soul, let us rank it among capital offences, and let it receive a punishment in proportion to it. We hang men for trifles, and banish them for things not worth naming; but an offence against God and the Church, against the welfare of the world and the dignity of religion, shall be bought off for five shillings! This is such a shame to a Chris- tian government that it is with regret I transmit it to pos- terity. If men sin against God, affront His ordinances, rebel against His Church, and disobey the precepts of their superiors, let them suffer as such capital crimes deserve. So will religion flourish, and this divided nation be once again united. . . . It is high time, then, for the friends of the Church of England to think of building up and establishing her in such a manner that she may be no more invaded by foreigners, nor divided by factions, schisms, and error. 1 The city prison. 22 DANIEL DEFOE If this could be done by gentle and easy methods, I should be glad; but the wound is corroded, the vitals begin to mortify, and nothing but amputation of members can complete the cure; all the Ways of tenderness and compassion, all persuasive argu- ments, have been made use of in vain. The humor of the Dissenters has so increased among the peo- ple, that they hold the Church in defiance, and the house of God is an abomination among them; nay, they have brought up their posterity in such prepossessed aversions to our holy religion, that the ignorant mob think we are all idolaters and worshipers of Baal, and account it a sin to come within the walls of our churches. The primitive Christians were not more shy of a heathen temple or of meat offered to idols, nor the Jews of swine's flesh, than some of our Dissenters are of the Church, and the divine service solemnized therein. This obstinacy must be rooted out with the profession of it; while the generation are left at liberty daily to affront God Al- mighty and dishonor His holy worship, we are wanting in our duty to God and our mother, the Church of England. How can we answer it to God, to the Church, and to our pos- terity, to leave them entangled with fanaticism, error, and ob- stinacy in the bowels of the nation; to leave them an enemy in their streets, that in time may involve them in the same crimes, and endanger the utter extirpation of religion in the nation? What is the difference betwixt this and being subjected to the power of the Church of Rome, from whence we have re- formed? If one be an extreme on one hand, and one on another, it is equally destructive to the truth to have errors settled among us, let them be of what nature they will. Both are enemies of our Church and of our peace; and why should it not be as criminal to admit an enthusiast as a Jesuit? Why should the Papist with his seven sacraments be worse than the Quaker with no sacraments at all? Why should reli- gious houses be more intolerable than meeting-houses? Alas, the Church of England! What with Popery on one hand, and schismatics on the other, how has she been crucified between two thieves! Now let us crucify the thieves. Let her foundations be estab- lished upon the destruction of her enemies. The doors of mercy THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL 23 being always open to the returning part of the deluded people, let the obstinate be ruled with the rod of iron. Let all true sons of so holy and oppressed a mother, exasper- ated by her afHictions, harden their hearts against those who have oppressed her. And may God Almighty put it into the hearts of all the friends of truth to Hft up a standard against pride and Antichrist, that the posterity of the sons of error may be rooted out from the face of this land for ever. A TRUE RELATION OF THE APPARITION OF ONE MRS. VEAL THE NEXT DAY AFTER HER DEATH, TO ONE MRS. BAR- GRAVE, AT CANTERBURY, THE EIGHTH OF SEPTEMBER, 1705 1706 [This is one of Defoe 's earliest experiments in fiction, and illustrates his usual habit of making his narrative writings so circumstantial in detail "> as to assume the appearance of veracious chronicle. It was formerly sup- posed that one object of the pamphlet was to increase the sale of Drelin- court's book on Death; this has been disproved, but Defoe's narrative was reprinted in some editions of Dr elincou rt's work, as a testimony to its worth. 1 THE PREFACE This relation is matter of fact, and attended with such cir- cumstances as may induce any reasonable man to beheve it. It was sent by a gentleman, a justice of peace at JMaidstone, in Kent, and a very intelligent person, to his friend in London, as it is here worded; which discourse is attested by a very sober and understanding gentlewoman and kinswoman of the said gentleman's, who lives in Canterbury, within a few doors of the house in which the within-named Mrs. Bargrave lives; who believes his kinswoman to be of so discerning a spirit, as not to be put upon by any fallacy, and who positively assured him that the whole matter as it is here related and laid down is really true, and what she herself had in the same words, as near as may be, from Mrs. Ba,rgrave's own mouth, who, she knows, had no reason to invent and publish such a story, 24 DANIEL DEFOE nor any design to forge and tell a lie, being a woman of much honesty and virtue, and her whole life a course, as it were, of piety. The use which we ought to make of it is to consider that there is a life to come after this, and a just God who will retribute to every one according to the deeds done in the body, and therefore to reflect upon our past course of life we have led in the world; that our time is short and uncertain; and that if we would escape the punishment of the ungodly and receive the reward of the righteous, which is the laying hold of eter- nal life, we ought, for the time to come, to return to God by a speedy repentance, ceasing to do evil, and learning to do well; to seek after God early, if haply He may be found of us, and lead such lives for the future as may be well pleasing in His sight. This thing is so rare in all its circumstances, and on so good authority, that my reading and conversation has not given me anything like it. It is fit to gratify the most ingenious and se- rious inquirer. Mrs. Bargrave is the person to whom Mrs. Veal appeared after her death; she is my intimate friend, and I can avouch for her reputation for these last fifteen or sixteen years, on my own knowledge; and I can confirm the good character she had from her youth to the time of my acquaintance; though since this relation she is calumniated by some people that are friends to the brother of Mrs. Veal who appeared, who think the relation of this appearance to be a reflection, and endeavor what they can to blast Mrs. Bargrave's reputation, and to laugh the story out of countenance. But by the circumstances there- of, and the cheerful disposition of Mrs. Bargrave, notwithstand- ing the unheard-of ill-usage of a very wicked husband, there is not the least sign of dejection in her face; nor did I ever hear her let fall a desponding or murmuring expression; nay, not when actually under her husband's barbarity, which I have been witness to, and several other persons of undoubted reputation. Now you must know Mrs. Veal was a maiden gentlewoman of about thirty years of age, and for some years last past had been troubled with fits, which were perceived coming on her by her going off from her discourse very abruptly to some imperti- nence. She was maintained by an only brother, and kept his house in Dover. She was a very pious woman, and her bro- THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL 25 ther a very sober man, to all appearance; but now he does all he can to null or quash the story. Mrs. Veal was intimately ac- quainted with Mrs. Bargrave from her childhood. Mrs. Veal's circumstances were then mean ; her father did not take care of his children as he ought, so that they were exposed to hardships; and Mrs. Bargrave in those days had as unkind a father, though she wanted neither for food nor clothing, whilst Mrs. Veal wanted for both; so that it was in the power of Mrs. Bar- grave to be very much her friend in several instances, which mightily endeared Mrs. Veal ; insomuch that she would often say, " Mrs. Bargrave, you are not only the best, but the only friend I have in the world ; and no circumstance in life shall ever dissolve my friendship." They would often condole each other's adverse fortunes, and read together Drelincourt U_pon Death, and other good books; and so, like two Christian friends, they comforted each other under their sorrow. Some time after, Mr. Veal's friends got him a place in the cus- tom-house at Dover, which occasioned Mrs. Veal, by little and little, to fall off from her intimacy with Mrs. Bargrave, though there never was any such thing as a quarrel; but an indiffer- ency came on by degrees, till at last Mrs. Bargrave had not seen her in two years and a half; though about a twelve-month of the time Mrs. Bargrave had been absent from Dover, and this last half-year had been in Canterbury about two months of the time, dwelling in a house of her own. In this house, on the 8th of September last, viz., 1705, she was sitting alone, in the forenoon, thinking over her unfortunate life, and arguing herself into a due resignation to Providence, though her condition seemed hard. " And," said she, " I have been pro- vided for hitherto, and doubt not but I shall be still; and am well satisfied that my afflictions shall end when it is most fit for me"; and then she took up her sewing-work, which she had no sooner done but she hears a knocking at the door. She went to see who was there, and this proved to be Mrs. Veal, her old friend, who was in a riding-habit; at that moment of time the clock struck twelve at noon. " Madam," said Mrs. Bargrave, "' I am surprised to see you, you have been so long a stranger"; but told her she was glad to see her, and offered to salute her, which Mrs. Veal complied with, till their lips almost touched; and then Mrs. Veal drew 26 DANIEL DEFOE her hand across her own eyes and said, " I am not very well," and so waived it. She told Mrs. Bargrave she was going a jour- ney, and had a great mind to see her first. "But," says Mrs. Bargrave, " how came you to take a journey alone? I am amazed at it, because I know you have so fond a brother." " Oh," says Mrs. Veal, "I gave my brother the slip, and came away, be- cause I had so great a desire to see you before I took my jour- ney." So Mrs. Bargrave went in with her into another room within the first, and Mrs. Veal set her down in an elbow-chair, in which Mrs. Bargrave was sitting when she heard Mrs. Veal knock. Then says Mrs. Veal, " My dear friend, I am come to renew our old friendship again, and beg your pardon for my breach of it; and if you can forgive me, you are one of the best of women." " Oh," says Mrs. Bargrave, "don't mention such a thing. I have not had an uneasy thought about it; I can easily forgive it." " What did you think of me ? " said Mrs. Veal. Says Mrs. Bargrave, " I thought you were like the rest of the world, and that prosperity had made you forget yourself and me." Then Mrs. Veal reminded Mrs. Bargrave of the many friendly ofl5ces she did in her former days, and much of the conversa- tion they had with each other in the times of their adversity; what books they read, and what comfort in particular they re- ceived from Drelincourt's Book of Death, which was the best, she said, on that subject ever wrote. She also mentioned Dr. Sherlock, the two Dutch books which were translated, wrote upon Death, and several others; but Drelincourt, she said, had the clearest notions of death and the future state of any who had handled that subject. Then she asked Mrs. Bargrave whe- ther she had Drelincourt. She said, "Yes." Says Mrs. Veal, " Fetch it." And so Mrs. Bargrave goes upstairs and brings it down. Says Mrs. Veal, " Dear Mrs. Bargrave, if the eyes of our faith were as open as the eyes of our body, we should see num- bers of angels about us for our guard. The notions we have of heaven now are nothing like what it is, as Drelincourt says. Therefore be comforted under your afflictions, and believe that the Almighty has a particular regard to you, and that your afflictions are marks of God's favor; and when they have done the business they are sent for, they shall be removed from you. And believe me, my dear friend, believe what I say to you, one minute of future happiness will infinitely reward you for all THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL '27 your suflferings; for I can never believe" (and claps her hand upon her knee with great earnestness, which indeed ran through most of her discourse) "that ever God will suffer you to spend all your days in this afflicted state; but be assured that your afflictions shall leave you, or you them, in a short time." She spake in that pathetical and heavenly manner that Mrs. Bargrave wept several times, she was so deeply affected with it. Then Mrs. Veal mentioned Dr. Horneck's Ascetic, at the end of which he gives an account of the lives of the primitive Chris- tians. Their pattern she recommended to our imitation, and said their conversation was not like this of our age; "for now," says she, "there is nothing but frothy, vain discourse, which is far different from theirs. Theirs was to edification, and to build one another up in faith, so that they were not as we are, nor are we as they were; but," said she, "we might do as they did. There was a hearty friendship among them; but where is it now to be found? " Says Mrs. Bargrave, " It is hard indeed to find a true friend in these days. " Says Mrs. Veal, "Mr. Norris has a fine copy of verses, called Friendship in Perfection, which I wonderfully admire. Have you seen the book?" says Mrs. Veal. "No," says Mrs. Bargrave, "but I have the verses of my own writing out." "Have you?" says Mrs. Veal; "then fetch them." Which she did from above- stairs, and offered them to Mrs. Veal to read, who refused, and waived the thing, saying holding down her head would make it ache; and then desired Mrs. Bargrave to read them to her, which she did. As they were admiring Friendship Mrs. Veal said, "Dear Mrs. Bargrave, I shall love you for ever." In these verses there is twice used the word Elysian. "Ah!" says Mrs. Veal, "these poets have such names for heaven!" She would often draw her hand across her own eyes and say, "Mrs. Bar- grave, do not you think I am mightily impaired by my fits?" "No," sa3^s Mrs. Bargrave, "I think you look as wefl as ever I knew you." After all this discourse, which the apparition put in much finer words than Mrs. Bargrave said she could pretend to, and as much more than she can remember (for it cannot be thought that an hour and three-quarters' conversation could be re- tained, though the main of it she thinks she does), she said to 28 DANIEL DEFOE Mrs. Bargrave she would have her write a letter to her brother, and tell him she would have him give rings to such and such, and that there was a purse of gold in her cabinet, and that she would have two broad pieces given to her cousin Watson. Talking at this rate, Mrs. Bargrave thought that a fit was coming upon her, and so placed herself in a chair just before her knees, to keep her from falling to the ground, if her fits should occasion it (for the elbow-chair, she thought, would keep her from falling on either side); and to divert Mrs. Veal, as she thought, took hold of her gown-sleeve several times, and commended it. Mrs. Veal told her it was a scoured silk, and newly made up. But for all this, Mrs. Veal persisted in her request, and told Mrs. Bargrave that she must not deny her, and she would have her tell her brother all their conversation when she had an opportunity. " Dear Mrs. Veal," said Mrs. Bargrave, " this seems so impertinent that I cannot tell how to comply with it; and what a mortify- ing story will our conversation be to a young gentleman!" "Well,"saysMrs. Veal, "I must not be denied." ''Why," says Mrs. Bargrave, " it is much better, methinks, to do it your- self." " No," says Mrs. Veal, " though it seems impertinent to you now, you will see more reason for it hereafter." Mrs. Bargrave then, to satisfy her importunity, was going to fetch a pen and ink, but Mrs. Veal said, " Let it alone now, and do it when I am gone; but you must be sure to do it"; which was one of the last things she enjoined her at parting. And so she promised her. Then Mrs. Veal asked for Mrs. Bargrave's daughter. She said she was not at home. " But if you have a mind to see her," says Mrs. Bargrave, "I'll send for her." "Do," says Mrs. Veal. On which she left her, and went to a neighbor's to send for her; and by the time Mrs. Bargrave was returning, Mrs. Veal was got without the door into the street, in the face of the beast- market, on a Saturday (which is market-day), and stood ready to part. As soon as Mrs. Bargrave came to her, she asked her why she was in such haste. She said she must be going, though perhaps she might not go her journey until Monday; and told Mrs. Bargrave she hoped she should see her again at her cousin Watson's before she went whither she was going. Then she said she would take her leave of her, and walked from Mrs. Bar- THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL 29 grave in her view, till a turning interrupted the sight of her, which was three-quarters after one in the afternoon. Mrs. Veal died the 7th of September, at twelve o'clock at noon, of her fits, and had not above four hours' sense before death, in which time she received the sacrament. The next day after Mrs. Veal's appearing, being Sunday, Mrs. Bargrave was so mightily indisposed with a cold and a sore throat, that she could not go out that day; but on Monday morning she sent a person to Captain Watson's to know if Mrs. Veal was there. They wondered at Mrs. Bargrave's inquiry, and sent her word that she was not there, nor was expected. At this answer, Mrs. Bargrave told the maid she had certainly mistook the name or made some blunder. And though she was ill, she put on her hood, and went herself to Captain Watson's, though she knew none of the family, to see if Mrs. Veal was there or not. They said they wondered at her asking, for that she had not been in town; they were sure, if she had, she would have been there. Says Mrs. Bargrave, " I am sure she was with me on Saturday almost two hours." They said it was impossible; for they must have seen her, if she had. In comes Captain Watson while they are in dispute, and said that Mrs. Veal was certainly dead, and her escutcheons were making. This strangely surprised Mrs. Bargrave, when she sent to the person immediately who had the care of them, and found it true. Then she related the whole story to Captain Watson's family, and what gown she had on, and how striped, and that Mrs. Veal told her it was scoured. Then Mrs. Watson cried out, "You have seen her indeed, for none knew but Mrs. Veal and myself that the gown was scoured." And Mrs. Watson owned that she described the gown exactly; "for," said she, "I helped her to make it up." This Mrs. Watson blazed all about the town, and avouched the demonstration of the truth of Mrs. Bargrave's seeing Mrs, Veal's apparition; and Captain Watson carried two gentlemen immediately to Mrs. Bargrave's house to hear the relation from her own mouth. And when it spread so fast that gentlemen and persons of quality, the judicious and skeptical part of the world, flocked in upon her, it at last became such a task that she was forced to go out of the way; for they were in general extremely satisfied of the truth of the thing, and plainly saw that Mrs. Bargrave was no hypochondriac, for she always appears with 30 DANIEL DEFOE such a cheerful air and pleasing mien, that she has gained the favor and esteem of all the gentry, and it is thought a great favor if they can but get the relation' from her own mouth. I should have told you before that Mrs. Veal told Mrs. Bargrave that her sister and brother-in-law were just come down from London to see her. Says Mrs. Bargrave, "How came you to order matters so strangely?" " It could not be helped," says Mrs. Veal. And her brother and sister did come to see her, and entered the town of Dover just as Mrs. Veal was expiring. Mrs. Bargrave asked her whether she would drink some tea. Says Mrs. Veal, "I do not care if I do; but I'll warrant this mad fellow" (meaning Mrs. Bargrave's husband) "has broke all your trinkets." "But," says Mrs. Bargrave, "I '11 get some- thing to drink in, for all that." But Mrs. Veal waived it, and said, " It is no matter; let it alone"; and so it passed. All the time I sat with Mrs. Bargrave, which was some hours, she recollected fresh sayings of Mrs. Veal. And one material thing more she told Mrs. Bargrave — that old Mr. Breton al- lowed Mrs. Veal ten pounds a year, which was a secret, and un- known to Mrs. Bargrave till Mrs. Veal told it her. Mrs. Bar- grave never varies in her story, which puzzles those who doubt of the truth or are unwilHng to believe it. A servant in the neighbor's yard adjoining to Mrs. Bargrave's house heard her talking to somebody an hour of the time Mrs. Veal was with her. Mrs. Bargrave went out to her next neighbor's the very mo- ment she parted with Mrs. Veal, and told her what ravishing conversation she had with an old friend, and told the whole of it. Drelincourt's Book of Death is, since this happened, bought up strangely. And it is to be observed that, notwithstanding all the trouble and fatigue Mrs. Bargrave has undergone upon this account, she never took the value of a farthing, nor suffered her daughter to take anything of anybody, and therefore can have no interest in telling the story. But Mr. Veal does what he can to stifle the matter, and said he would see Mrs. Bargrave; but yet it is certain matter of fact that he has been at Captain Watson's since the death of his sister, and yet never went near Mrs. Bargrave; and some of his friends report her to be a liar, and that she knew of Mr. Bre- ton's ten pounds a year. But the person who pretends to say so has the reputation of a notorious liar among persons whom I THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL 31 know to be of undoubted credit. Now, Mr. Veal is more of a gentleman than to say she lies, but says a bad husband has crazed her. But she needs only present herself and it will ef- fectually confute that pretence. Mr. Veal says he asked his sis- ter on her death-bed whether she had a mind to dispose of any- thing, and she said no. Now, the things which Mrs. Veal's ap- parition would have disposed of were so trifling, and nothing of justice aimed at in their disposal, that the design of it appears to me to be only in order to make Mrs. Bargrave so to demon- strate the truth of her appearance, as to satisfy the world of the reality thereof as to what she had seen and heard, and to secure her reputation among the reasonable and understanding part of mankind. And then again Mr. Veal owns that there was a purse of gold ; but it was not found in her cabinet, but in a comb- box. This looks improbable; for that Mrs. Watson owned that Mrs. Veal was so very careful of the key of the cabinet that she would trust nobody with it; and if so, no doubt she would not trust her gold out of it. And Mrs. Veal's often drawing her hand over her eyes, and asking Mrs. Bargrave whether her fits had not impaired her, looks to me as if she did it on purpose to remind Mrs. Bargrave of her fits, to prepare her not to think it strange that she should put her upon writing to her brother to dispose of rings and gold, which looks so much like a dying person's request; and it took accordingly with Mrs. Bargrave, as the effects of her fits coming upon her; and was one of the many instances of her wonderful love to her and care of her that she should not be affrighted, which indeed appears in her whole management, particularly in her coming to her in the daytime, waiving the salutation, and when she was alone, and then the manner of her parting, to prevent a second attempt to salute her. Now, why Mr. Veal should think this relation a reflection, as it is plain he does by his endeavoring to stifle it, I can't im- agine, because the generality believe her to be a good spirit, her discourse was so heavenly. Her two great errands were to com- fort Mrs. Bargrave in her affliction, and to ask her forgiveness for the breach of friendship, and with a pious discourse to en- courage her. So that after all to suppose that Mrs. Bargrave could hatch such an invention as this from Friday noon to Sat- urday noon, supposing that she knew of Mrs. Veal's death the 32 DANIEL DEFOE very first moment, without jumbling circumstances, and with- out any interest too, she must be more witty, fortunate, and wicked too, than any indifferent person, I dare say, will allow. I asked Mrs. Bargrave several times if she was sure she felt the gown. She answered modestly, " If my senses are to be relied on, I am sure of it." I asked her if she heard a sound when she clapped her hand upon her knee. She said she did not remember she did, and she said, " She appeared to be as much a substance as I did, who talked with her. And I may," said she, " be as soon persuaded that your apparition is talking to me now as that I did not really see her; for I was under no manner of fear, and received her as a friend, and parted with her as such. I would not," says she, " give one farthing to make any one believe it; I have no interest in it. Nothing but trouble is entailed upon me for a long time, for aught I know; and had it not come to light by accident, it would never have been made public." But now she says she will make her own private use of it, and keep her- self out of the way as much as she can; and so she has done since. She says she had a gentleman who came thirty miles to her to hear the relation, and that she had told it to a room full of people at a time. Several particular gentlemen have had the story from Mrs. Bargrave's own mouth. This thing has very much affected me, and I am as well satis- fied as I am of the best grounded matter of fact. And why we should dispute matter of fact because we cannot solve things of which we have no certain or demonstrative notions, seems strange to me. Mrs. Bargrave's authority and sincerity alone would have been undoubted in any other case. A SEASONABLE WARNING AND CAUTION against the insinuations of papists and jacobites "in favor of the pretender I712 [The pamphlets represented by this and the following extract were written at a time when it was feared that the succession of the House of Hanover to the throne was threatened, in the event of Queen Anne's death, by the loyalty of the Jacobite party to the House of Stuart. The Seasonable Warning and Caution was a direct appeal, — though purport- A SEASONABLE WARNING 33 ing to be "a letter from an Englishman at the Court of Hanover," — and its conclusion is one of the best examples of Defoe 's garrulous eloquence. What if the Pretender should Come, on the other hand, exempUfies his bril- liant ironical method; it is one of two tracts whose titles were intended to delude the unsuspecting Jacobite reader, the other being called Reasons against the Succession of the House of Hanover.] THE CONCLUSION Consider, then, honest countrymen and Protestants, what you are doing; look on your families; consider your innocent children, who you are going to give up to be bred in abominable superstition and idolatry; look on your dear country, which you are preparing to make the sea of war, blood, and confusion; look on your neighbors, who, while they are resisting this inunda- tion, — for you may be assured honest men will resist it to the last, — you are to fight with, whose throats you must cut, and in whose blood you must dip your hands; and lastly, consider yourselves; how free, how quiet, how in peace, plenty and in Protestant Kberty you live, but are with your own hands pulling down upon you, so far as you entertain thoughts of the Pre- tender, the walls of your own security, viz., the constitution, and making way for your French popish enemies to enter; to whom your religion, your liberties, your estates, your families, and your posterity, shall be made a sacrifice, and this flourish- ing nation be entirely ruined. In the last place, all that have any concern left for the good of their country, and for the preserving the Protestant religion, will remember how much it is in the power of the people of Brit- ain for ever to discourage all the attempts to be made in favor of these popish enemies, and to overthrow them in the execu- tion; and it is on this foundation that this paper is made public. The late letter from Douay, written by some of that side, who very well understood the Pretender's true interest, acknow- ledges this, and that if the people of England could not be wheedled and deluded into the design, it was never to be done by force. And is this your case, Britons! Will you be ruined by a peo- ple whom you ought to despise? Have they not been twenty years trying your strength, till they find it impossible for them to master you? And are they brought to such a condition as to use all their arts and shifts to bring on a peace? and will you be 34 DANIEL DEFOE brought now, in cool thoughts, to do that yourselves which you would never let them do, and which, without your most stupid negligence of yourselves, they could never do? For this reason, I say, these lines are written, and this makes them just, and the argument rational. If I were to move you to what was not in your power, I should easily be answered by being told you could not do it; that you were not able, and the like; but is it not evident that the unanimous appearance of the people of Great Britain against the Pretender would at once render all the party desperate, and make them look upon the design as utterly impracticable? As their only hope is in the breaches they are making in your resolutions, so if they should see they gain no ground there, they would despair, and give it over. It would not be worth notice to inquire who are and who are not for the Pretender; the invidious search into the conduct of great men, ministers of state and government, would be labor lost: no ministry will ever be for the Pretender, if they once may but be convinced that the people are steady; that he gets no ground in the country; that the aversions of the common people to his person and his government are not to be over- come: but if you, the good people of England, slacken your hands; if you give up the cause; if you abate your zeal for your own liberties, and for the Protestant religion; if you fall in with Popery and a French Pretender; if you forget the Revolution, and King William, what can you expect? who can stand by you then? Who can save them that will destroy themselves? The work is before you; your deliverance, your safety is in your own hands, and therefore these things are now written. None can give you up; none can betray you but yourselves; and if you could see your own happiness, it is entirely in your power, by unanimous, steady adhering to your old principles, to se- cure your peace for ever. O Jerusalem! Jerusalem! IF THE PRETENDER SHOULD COME 35 AND WHAT IF THE PRETENDER SHOULD COME? OR SOME CONSIDERATIONS OF THE ADVANTAGES AND REAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE PRETENDER'S POSSESS- ING THE CROWN OF GREAT BRITAIN I7I3 . . . That then a case so popular, and of so much conse- quence as this is, may not want such due supports as the na- ture of the thing will allow, and especially since the advantages and good consequences of the thing itself are so many, and so easy to be seen, as his friends allege; why should not the good people of Britain be made easy, and their fears be turned into peaceable satisfaction, by seeing that this devil may not be so black as he is painted ; and that the noise made of the Preten- der, and the frightful things said of his coming, and of his being received here, may not be made greater scarecrows to us than they really are; and after all that has been said, if it should ap- pear that the advantages of the Pretender's succession are really greater to us, and the dangers less to us, than those of the suc- cession of Hanover, then much of their difficulties would be over, who, standing neuter as .to persons, appear against the Pretender only because they are made to believe strange and terrible things of what shall befall the nation in case of his com- ing in, such as Popery, slavery, French power, destroying of our credit, and devouring our funds (as that scandalous scribbler, the Review,^ has been laboring to suggest), with many other things which we shall endeavor to expose to you as they de- serve. . . . To begin, then, with that most popular and affrighting argu- ment now made use of, as the bugbear of the people, against several other things besides Jacobitism, we mean French great- ness. It is most evident that the fear of this must, by the na- ture of the thing, be effectually removed upon our receiving the Pretender. The grounds and reasons why French greatness is rendered formidable to us, and so much weight supposed to be in it, that, like the name of Scanderbeg, we fright our very children with it, lie only in this, that we suggest the King of * Defoe's own journal. 36 DANIEL DEFOE France, being a professed enemy to the peace and liberty of Great Britain, will most certainly, as soon as he can a little re- cover himself, exercise all that formidable power to put the Pre- tender upon us, and not only to place him upon the throne of Great Britain, but to maintain and hold him up in it, against all the opposition, either of the people of Britain or the confed- erate princes leagued with the Elector of Hanover, who are in the interest of his claim or of his party. Now it is evident that upon a peaceable admitting this person, whom they call the Pre- tender, to receive and enjoy the crown here, all that formidable power becomes your friend, and the being so must necessarily take off from it everything that is called terrible. . . . How strange is it that none of our people have yet thought of this way of securing their native country from the insults of_ France! Were but the Pretender once received as our king, we have no more disputes with the King of France, he has no pre- tence to invade or disturb us; what a quiet world would it be with us in such a case, when the greatest monarch in the uni- verse should be our fast friend, and be in our interest to prevent any of the inconveniences which might happen to us from the disgust of other neighbors, who maybe dissatisfied with us upon other accounts. As to the terrible things which some people fright us and themselves with, from the influence which French councils may have upon us, and of French methods of govern- ment being introduced among us, these we ought to esteem only clamors and noise, raised by a party to amuse and affright us. For pray let us inquire a little into them, and see if there be any reason for us to be so terrified at them ; suppose they were really what is alleged, which we hope they are not; for example, the absolute dominion of the King of France over his subjects is such, say our people, as makes them miserable; well, but let us examine then: are we not already miserable for want of this absolute dominion? Are we not miserably divided? Is not our government miserably weak? Are we not miserably subjected to the rabbles and mob? Nay, is not the very crown mobbed here every now and then, into whatever our sovereign lord the people demand? Whereas, on the contrary, we see France en- tirely united as one man; no virulent scribblers there dare af- front the government; no impertinent P ments there dis- turb the monarch with their addresses and representations; no IF THE PRETENDER SHOULD COME 37 superiority of laws restrain the administration ; no insolent law- yers talk of the sacred constitution, in opposition to the more sacred prerogative; but all with harmony and general consent agree to support the majesty of their prince, and with their lives and fortunes; not in complimenting sham addresses only, but in reality and effectually, support the glory of their great mon- arch. In doing this they are all united together so firmly, as if they had but one heart and one mind, and that the king was the soul of the nation. What if they are what we foolishly call slaves to the absolute will of their prince? That slavery to them is mere liberty. They entertain no notion of that foolish liberty which we make so much noise about, nor have they any occasion of it, or any use for it if they had it. They are as in- dustrious in trade, as vigorous in pursuit of their affairs, go on with as much courage, and are as well satisfied when they have wrought hard twenty or thirty years to get a little money for the king to take away, as we are to get it for our wives and chil- dren; and as they plant vines and plough lands, that the king and his great men may eat the fruit thereof, they think it as great a felicity as if they eat it themselves. ... Is it not ap- parent that, under all the oppressions they talk so much of, the French are the nation the most improved and increased in manufactures, in navigation, in commerce, within these fifty years, of any nation in the world? And here we pretend liberty, property, constitutions, rights of subjects, and such stuff as that, and with all these fine gewgaws, which we pretend propa- gate trade and increase the wealth of the nation, we are every day declining, and become poor. How long will this nation be blinded by their own foolish customs? And when will they learn\ to know that the absolute government of a virtuous prince, who makes the good of his people his ultimate end, and es- teems their prosperity his glory, is the best and most godlike government in the world? Let us then be no more rendered uneasy with the notions that with the Pretender we must entertain French methods of gov- ernment, such as tyranny and arbitrary power. Tyranny is no more tyranny, when improved for the subjects' advantage: per- haps when we have tried it we may find it as much for our good many ways, nay, and more too, than our present exorbitant liberties, especially unless we can make a better use of them, 38 DANIEL DEFOE and enjoy them, without being always going by the ears about them, as we see daily, not only with our governors, but even with one another. A little French slavery, though it be a fright- ful word among us, — that is, being made so by custom, — yet , may do us a great deal of good in the main, as it may teach us not to over (under) value our liberties when we have them, so much as sometimes we have done; and this is not one of the least advantages which we shall gain by the coming of the Pre- tender. . . . There seems to be but one thing more which those people who make such a clamor at the fears of the Pretender, take hold of, and this is religion; and they tell us that not only French government, and French influence, but French religion, that is to say Popery, will come upon us. But these people know not what they talk of, for it is evident that they shall be so far from being loaded with religion, that they will rather obtain that so long desired happiness of having no religion at all. This we may easily make appear has been the advantage which has been long labored for in this nation; and as the attainments we are arrived to of that kind are very considerable already, so we cannot doubt but that, if once the Pretender were settled quietly among us, an absolute subjection, as well of religious principles as civil liberties, to the disposal of the sovereign, would take place. This is an advantage so fruitful of several other manifest improvements, that though we have not room enough in this place to enlarge upon the particulars, we cannot doubt but it must be a most grateful piece of news to a great part of the nation, who have long groaned under the oppres- sions and cruel severities of the clergy, occasioned by their own strict lives and rigorous virtue, and their imposing such austerities and restraints upon the people ; and in this particu- lar the clamor of slavery will appear very scandalous in the nation, for, the slavery of religion being taken off, and an universal freedom of vice being introduced, what greater lib- erty can we enjoy? . . . But we have more and greater advantages of the coming of the Pretender, and such as no question will invite you to re- ceive him with great satisfaction and applause; and it cannot be necessary to inform you, for your direction in other cases, how the matter, as to real and imaginary advantage, stands IF THE PRETENDER SHOULD COME 39 with the nation in this affair. And first, the coming of the Pre- tender will at once put us all out of debt. These abomination WHigs, and these bloody wars, carried on so long for little or nothing, have, as is evident to our senses now (whatever it was all along), brought a heavy debt upon the nation; so that if what a known author lately published is true, the government pays now almost six millions a year to the common people for interest of money; that is to say, the usurers eat up the nation, and devour six millions yearly; which is paid, and must be paid now for a long time, if some kind turn, such as this of the com- ing of the Pretender, or such like, does not help us out of it. The weight of this is not only great, insuperably great, but most of it is entailed for a terrible time, not only for our age, but beyond the age of our grandchildren, even for ninety-nine years. By how much the consideration of this debt is intoler- able and afflicting to the last degree, by so much the greater must the obligation be to the person who will ease the nation of such a burden; and therefore we place it among the principal advantages which we are to receive from the admission of the Pretender, that he will not fail to rid us of this grievance, and by methods peculiar to himself deliver us from so great a bur- den as these debts are now, and, unless he deliver us, are Hke to be to the ages to come. Whether he will do this at once, by remitting most graciously to the nation the whole payment, and consequently take off the burden brevi manu, as with a sponge wiping out the infamous score, leaving it to fall as fate directs, or by prudent degrees, we know not, nor is it our busi- ness to determine it here. No doubt the doing it with a jerk, as we call it, comme un coup de grace, must be the most expeditious way; nay, and the kindest way of putting the nation out of its pain; for lingering deaths are counted cruel; and though un coup d'eclat may make an impression for the present, yet the astonishment is soonest over; besides, where is the loss to the nation in this sense? Though the money be stopped from the subject on one hand, if it be stopped to the subjects on the other, the nation loses or gains nothing. We know it will be answered that it is unjust, and that thousands of families will be ruined, because they who lose will not be those who gain. But what is this to the purpose in a national revolution? Un- just! Alas! is that an argument? Go and ask the Pretender! 40 DANIEL DEFOE Does not he say you have all done unjustly by him? and since the nation in general loses nothing, what obligation has he to regard the particular injury that some familes may sustain? And yet farther, is it not remarkable that most of the money is paid by the cursed party of Whigs, who from the beginning officiously appeared to keep him from his right? And what obli- gation has he upon him to concern himself for doing them right in particular, more than other people? But to avoid the scandal of partiality, there is another thought offers to our view, which the nation is beholding to a particular author for putting us in mind of: if it be unjust that we should suppose the Pretender shall stop the payment on both sides, because it is doing the Whigs wrong, since the Tories, who perhaps, being chiefly landed men, pay the most taxes; then, to keep up a just bal- ance, he need only continue the taxes to be paid in, and only stop the annuities and interest which are to be paid out. Thus both sides having no reason to envy or reproach one another with hardships, or with suffering unequally, they may every one lose in proportion, and the money may be laid up in the hands of the new sovereign, for the good of the nation. . . . This amassing of treasure, by the stopping the funds on one hand, and the receiving the taxes on the other, will effectually enable the Pretender to set up and effectually maintain that glorious and so often desired method of government, au coup de canon, — Anglice, a standing army. . . . Then we should see a new face of our nation, and Britain would be no more a naked nation, as it has formerly been; then we should have numerous and gallant armies surrounding a martial prince, ready to make the world, as well as his own subjects, tremble. Then our in- land counties would appear full of royal fortifications, citadels, forts, and strong towns, the beauty of the kingdom, and awe of factious rebels. It is a strange thing that this refractory peo- ple of ours could never be made sensible how much it is for the glory and safety of this nation that we should be put into a pos- ture of defence against ourselves. It has been often alleged that this nation can never be ruined but with their own consent: if then we are our own enemies, is it not highly requisite that we should be put in a position to have our own ruin prevented? And that, since it is apparent we are no more fit to be trusted with our own liberties, having a natural and a national propen- A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 41 sity to destroy and undo ourselves, and may be brought to con- sent to our own ruin, we should have such princes as for the fu- ture know how to restrain us ; and how reasonable is it to allow them forces to do so! . . . This sums up the happiness of the Pretender's reign. We need not talk of security, as the Review has done, and pretend he is not able to give us security for the performance of any- thing he promises. Every man that has any sense of the prin- ciples, honor, and justice of the Pretender, his zeal for the Ro- man Catholic cause, his gratitude to his benefactor, the French King, and his love to the glory and happiness of his native coun- try, must rest satisfied of his punctually performing all these great things for us. To ask him security would be not to affront him only, but to affront the whole nation; no man can doubt him; the nature of the thing allows that he must do us all that kindness; he cannot be true to his own reason without it. Where- fore this treaty executes itself, and appears so rational to be- lieve, that whoever doubts it may be supposed to doubt even the veracity of James the Just. . . , A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR BEING OBSERVATIONS OR MEMORIALS OF THE MOST RE- MARKABLE OCCURRENCES, AS WELL PUBLIC AS PRIVATE, WHICH HAPPENED IN LONDON DURING THE LAST GREAT VISITATION IN 1665 WRITTEN BY A CITIZEN WHO CONTINUED ALL THE WHILE IN LONDON. NEVER MADE PUBLIC BEFORE 1722 [This work is the most Jampus — unless we regard Robinson Crusoe as of the same class — of the fictitious narratives which Defoe issued under the guise of personal memoirs. It appeared at the time when a recurrence of the plague was feared, and seemed so authentic that at a later time it was quoted as an authority by Dr. Mead, who had been appointed to make a report on precautions in the interest of the pubUc health. The Journal is not divided into chapters or sections; the extracts here given will be found on pages 11-18, 75-80, and 102-104 oi the Temple edition.] I NOW began to consider seriously with myself concerning my own case, and how I should dispose of myself; that is to say, 42 DANIEL DEFOE whether I should resolve to stay in London or shut up my house and flee, as many of my neighbors did. I have set this particular down so fully, because I know not but it may be of moment to those who come after me, if they come to be brought to the same distress, and to the same manner of making their choice; and therefore I desire this account may pass with them rather for a direction to themselves to act by than a his- tory of my actings, seeing it may not be of one farthing value to them to note what became of me. I had two important things before me : the one was the carry- ing on my business and shop, which was considerable, and in which was embarked all my effects in the world ; and the other was the preservation of my life in so dismal a calamity as I saw apparently was coming upon the whole city, and which, how- ever great it was, my fears perhaps, as well as other people's, represented to be much greater than it could be. The first consideration was of great moment to me. My trade was a saddler, and as my dealings were chiefly not by a shop or chance trade, but among the merchants trading to the English colonies in America, so my effects lay very much in the hands of such. I was a single man, 't is true, but I had a family of servants whom I kept at my business; had a house, shop, and warehouses filled with goods; and, in short, to leave them all as things in such a case must be left, — that is to say, with- out any overseer or person fit to be trusted with them, — had been to hazard the loss not only of my trade, but of my goods, and indeed of all I had in the world. I had an elder brother at the same time in London, and not many years before come over from Portugal, and advising with him, his answer was in three words, the same that was given in another case quite different, viz., " Master, save thyself." In a word, he was for my retiring into the country, as he resolved to do himself with his family; telling me — what he had. it seems, heard abroad — that the best preparation for the plague was to run away from it. As to my argument of losing my tra* le, my goods, or debts, he quite confuted me. He told me the same thing which I argued for my staying, viz., that I would trust God with my safety and health, was the strongest repulse to my pretensions of losing my trade and my goods. " For," says he, " is it not as reasonable that you should trust God with the . A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 43 chance or risk of losing your trade, as that you should stay in so eminent a point of danger, and trust Him with your life?" I could not argue that I was in any strait as to a place where to go, having several friends and relations in Northampton- shire, whence our family first came from; and particularly, I had an only sister in Lincolnshire, very willing to receive and entertain me. My brother, who had already sent his wife and two children into Bedfordshire, and resolved to follow them, pressed my go- ing very earnestly; and I had once resolved to comply with his desires, but at that time could get no horse; for though it is true all the people did not go out of the city of London, yet I may venture to say that in a manner all the horses did ; for there was hardly a horse to be bought or hired in the whole city for some weeks. Once I resolved to travel on foot with one servant, and, as many did, lie at no inn, but carry a soldier's tent with us, and so lie in the fields, the weather being very warm, and no danger from taking cold. I say, as many did, because several did so at last, especially those who had been in the armies in the war which had not been many years past. And I must needs say that, speaking of second causes, had most of the peo- ple that traveled done so, the plague had not been carried into so many country towns and houses as it was, to the great dam- age, and indeed to the ruin, of abundance of people. But then my servant, whom I had intended to take down with me, deceived me; and being frighted at the increase of the distemper, and not knowing when I should go, he took other measures, and left me; so I was put off for that time. And one way or other, I always found that to appoint to go away was always crossed by some accident or other, so as to disap- point and put it off again; and this brings in a story which otherwise might be thought a needless digression, viz., about these disappointments being from Heaven. I mention this story also as the best method I can advise any person to take in such a case, especially if he be one that makes conscience of his duty, and would be directed what to do in it; namely, that he should keep his eye upon the particular provi- dences which occur at that time, and look upon them com- plexly, as they regard one another, and as all together regard the question before him; and then, I think, he may safely take 44 DANIEL DEFOE them for intimations from Heaven of what is his unquestioned duty to do in such a case, — I mean as to going away from or staying in the place where we dwell, when visited with an in- fectious distemper. It came very warmly into my mind one morning, as I was musing on this particular thing, that as nothing attended us without the direction or permission of Divine Power, so these disappointments must have something in them extraordinary; and I ought to consider whether it did not evidently point out, or intimate to me, that it was the will of Heaven I should not go. It immediately followed in my thoughts that, if it really was from God that I should stay, He was able effectually to pre- serve me in the midst of all the death and danger that would surround me; and that if I attempted to secure myself by flee- ing from my habitation, and acted contrary to these intima- tions which I believed to be divine, it was a kind of flying from God, and that He could cause his justice to overtake me when and where He thought fit. These thoughts quite turned my resolutions again, and when I came to discourse with my brother again, I told him that I inclined to stay and take my lot in that station in which God had placed me, and that it seemed to be made more especially my duty, on the account of what I have said. My brother, though a very religious man himself, laughed at all I had suggested about its being an intimation from Heaven, and told me several stories of such foolhardy people, as he called them, as I was; that I ought indeed to submit to it as a work of Heaven if I had been any way disabled by distempers or dis- eases, and that then not being able to go, I ought to acquiesce in the direction of Him who, having been my Maker, had an un- disputed right of sovereignty in disposing of me, and that then there had been no difificulty to determine which was the call of His providence and which was not; but that I should take it as an intimation from Heaven that I should not go out of town, only because I could not hire a horse to go, or my fellow was run away that was to attend me, was ridiculous, since at the same time I had my health and limbs, and other servants, and might with ease travel a day or two on foot, and, having a good certificate of being in perfect health, might either hire a horse or take post on the road, as I thought fit. A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 45 Then he proceeded to tell me of the mischievous consequences which attended the presumption of the Turks and Mahometans in Asia and in other places where he had been (for my brother, being a merchant, was a few years before, as I have already ob- served, returned from abroad, coming last from Lisbon), and how, presuming upon their professed predestinating notions, and of every man's end being predetermined and unalterably beforehand decreed, they would go unconcerned into infected places and converse with infected persons, by which means they died at the rate of ten or fifteen thousand a week ; whereas the Europeans or Christian merchants, who kept themselves retired and reserved, generally escaped the contagion. Upon these arguments my brother changed my resolutions again, and I began to resolve to go, and accordingly made all things ready; for, in short, the infection increased round me. and the bills ^ were risen to almost seven hundred a week, and my brother told me he would venture to stay no longer. I de- sired him to let me consider of it but till the next day, and I would resolve; and as I had already prepared everything as well as I could as to my business, and whom to entrust my af- fairs with, I had httle to do but to resolve. I went home that evening greatly oppressed in my mind, irresolute, and not knowing what to do. I had set the evening wholly apart to consider seriously about it, and was all alone; for already people had, as it were by a general consent, taken up the custom of not going out of doors after sunset; the rea- sons I shall have occasion to say more of by-and-by. In the retirement of this evening I endeavored to resolve, first, what was my duty to do, and I stated the arguments which my brother had pressed me to go into the country, and I set against them the strong impressions which I had on my mind for staying; the visible call I seemed to have from the par- ticular circumstance of my calling, and the care due from me for the preservation of my effects, which were, as I might say, my estate; also the intimations which I thought I had from Heaven, that to me signified a kind of direction to venture; and it occurred to me that, if I had what I might call a direction to stay, I ought to suppose it contained a promise of being pre- served if I obeyed. 1 That is, the "bills of mortality," the official register of deaths. 46 DANIEL DEFOE This lay close to me, and my mind seemed more and more encouraged to stay than ever, and supported with a secret sat- isfaction I should be kept. And to this, that, turning over the Bible which lay before me, and while my thoughts were more than ordinarily serious upon the question, I cried out, "Well, I know not what to do; Lord, direct me!" and the like. And at that juncture I happened to stop turning over the book at the 91st Psalm, and, casting my eye on the second verse, I read on to the seventh verse exclusive, and after that included the tenth, as follows: "I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my for- tress ; my God, in Him will I trust. Surely He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust ; His truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked. Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling," etc. I scarce need tell the reader that from that moment I resolved that I would stay in the town, and, casting myself entirely upon the goodness and protection of the Almighty, would not seek any other shelter whatever; and that, as my times were in His hands. He was as able to keep me in a time of the infection as in a time of health; and if He did not think fit to deliver me, still I was in His hands, and it was meet He should do with me as should seem good to Him. . . . I went all the first part of the time freely about the streets, though not so freely as to run myself into apparent danger, ex- cept when they dug the great pit in the churchyard of our par- ish of Aldgate. A terrible pit it was, and I could not resist my curiosity to go and see it. As near as I may judge, it was about forty feet in length, and about fifteen or sixteen feet broad, and at the time I first looked at it, about nine feet deep; but it was said they dug it near twenty feet deep afterwards in one part of A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 47 it, till they could go no deeper for the water; for they had, it seems, dug several large pits before this. For though the plague was long a-coming to our parish, yet, when it did come, there was no parish in or about London where it raged with such vio- lence as in the two parishes of Aldgate and Whitechapel. I say they had dug several pits in another ground, when the distemper began to spread in our parish, and especially when the dead-carts began to go about, which was not, in our parish, till the beginning of August. Into these pits they had put per- haps fifty or sixty bodies each; then they made larger holes, wherein they buried all that the cart brought in a week, which, by the middle to the end of August, came to from 200 to 400 a week; and they could not well dig them larger, because of the order of the magistrates confining them to leave no bodies within six feet of the surface; and the water coming on at about seventeen or eighteen feet, they could not well, I say, put more in one pit. But now, at the beginning of September, the plague raging in a dreadful manner, and the number of burials in our parish increasing to more than was ever buried in any parish about London of no larger extent, they ordered this dreadful gulf to be dug, — for such it was, rather than a pit. They had supposed this pit would have supplied them for a month or more, when they dug it, and some blamed the church- wardens for suffering such a frightful thing, telling them they were making preparations to bury the whole parish, and the like. But time made it appear the churchwardens knew the condition of the parish better than they did; for, the pit being finished the 4th of September, I think, they began to bury in it the 6th, and by the 20th, which was just two weeks, they had thrown into it 11 14 bodies, when they were obliged to fill it up, the bodies being then come to lie within six feet of the surface, I doubt not but there may be some ancient persons ahve in the parish who can justify the fact of this, and are able to show even in what place of the churchyard the pit lay better than I can. The mark of it also was many years to be seen in the churchyard on the surface, lying in length parallel with the pas- sage which goes by the west wall of the churchyard out of Houndsditch, and turns East again into Whitechapel, coming out near the Three Nuns' Inn. It was about the loth of September that my curiosity led, or 48 DANIEL DEFOE rather drove, me to go and see this pit again, when there had been near 400 people buried in it; and I was not content to see it in the day-time, as I had done before, for then there would have been nothing to have been seen but the loose earth; for all the bodies that were thrown in were immediately covered with earth by those they called the buriers, which at other times were called bearers; but I resolved to go in the night and see some of them thrown in. There was a strict order to prevent people coming to those pits, and that was only to prevent infection. But after some time that order was more necessary, for people that were in- fected and near their end, and delirious also, would run to those pits, wrapped in blankets or rugs, and throw themselves in, and, as they said, bury themselves. I cannot say that the officers suffered any wiUingly to lie there; but I have heard that in a great pit in Finsbury, in the parish of Cripplegate, it lying open then to the fields, for it was not then walled about, some came and threw themselves in, and expired there, before they threw any earth upon them ; and that when they came to bury others, and found them there, they were quite dead, though not cold. This may serve a little to describe the dreadful condition of that day, though it is impossible to say anything that is able to give a true idea of it to those who did not see it, other than this, — that it was indeed very, very, very dreadful, and such as no tongue can express. I got admittance into the churchyard by being acquainted with the sexton who attended, who, though he did not refuse me at all, yet earnestly persuaded me not to go, telling me very seriously, for he was a good, religious, and sensible man, that it was indeed their business and duty to venture, and to run all hazards, and that in it they might hope to be preserved; but that I had no apparent call to it but my own curiosity, which, he said, he believed I would not pretend was sufficient to justify my running that hazard. I told him I had been pressed in my mind to go, and that perhaps it might be an instructing sight, that might not be without its uses. "Nay," says the good man, "if you will venture upon that score, name of God go in; for, depend upon it, 'twill be a sermon to you, it may be, the best that ever you heard in your life. 'Tis a speaking sight," says he, "and has a voice with it, and a loud one, to call us all to repent- A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 49 ance." And with that he opened the door and said, "Go, if you will." His discourse had shocked my resolution a little, and I stood wavering for a good while, but just at that interval I saw two links come over from the end of the Minories, and heard the bellman, and then appeared a dead-cart, as they called it, com- ing over the streets; so I could no longer resist my desire of see- ing it, and went in. There was nobody, as I could perceive at first, in the churchyard, or going into it, but the buriers and the fellow that drove the cart, or rather led the horse and cart; but when they came up to the pit they saw a man go to and again, muffled up in a brown cloak, and making motions with his hands under his cloak, as if he was in a great agony, and the buriers immediately gathered about him, supposing he was one of those poor delirious or desperate creatures that used to pre- tend, as I have said, to bury themselves. He said nothing as he walked about, but two or three times groaned very deeply and loud, and sighed as he would break his heart. When the buriers came up to him they soon found he was neither a person infected and desperate, as I have observed above, or a person distempered in mind, but one oppressed with a dreadful weight of grief indeed, having his wife and sev- eral of his children all in the cart that was just come in with him, and he followed in an agony and excess of sorrow. He mourned heartily, as it was easy to see, but with a kind of mas- cuhne grief that could not give itself vent by tears; and, calmly defying the buriers to let him alone, said he would only see the bodies thrown in and go away. So they left importuning him. But no sooner was the cart turned round and the bodies shot into the pit promiscuously, which was a surprise to him, for he at least expected they would have been decently laid in, though indeed he was afterwards convinced that was impracticable, — I say, no sooner did he see the sight but he cried aloud, unable to contain himself. I could not hear what he said, but he went backward two or three steps and fell down in a swoon. The buriers ran to him and took him up, and in a little while he came to himself, and they led him away to the Pie Tavern over against the end of Houndsditch, where, it seems, the man was known, and where they took care of him. He looked into the pit again as he went away, but the buriers had covered the bod- 50 DANIEL DEFOE ies so immediately with throwing in earth, that, though there was light enough, — for there were lanterns, and candles in them, placed all night round the sides of the pit, upon heaps of earth, seven or eight, or perhaps more, — yet nothing could be seen. This was a mournful scene indeed, and affected me almost as much as the rest; but the other was awful and full of terror. The cart had in it sixteen or seventeen bodies; some were wrapped up in linen sheets, some in rags, some little other than naked, or so loose that what covering they had fell from them in the shooting out of the cart; and they fell quite naked among the rest. But the matter was not much to them, or the indecency much to anyone else, seeing they were all dead, and were to be huddled together into the common grave of mankind, as we may call it; for here was no difference made, but poor and rich went together; there was no other way of burials, neither was it possible there should, for coffins were not to be had for the prodigious numbers that fell in such a calamity as this. . . . In these walks I had many dismal scenes before my eyes, as particularly of persons falling dead in the streets, terrible shrieks and screechings of women, who, in their agonies, would throw open their chamber windows and cry out in a dismal, surprising manner. It is impossible to describe the variety of postures in which the passions of the poor people would ex- press themselves. Passing through Tokenhouse Yard, in Lothbury, of a sudden a casement violently opened just over my head, and a woman gave three frightful screeches, and then cried — "Oh! death, death, death!" in a most inimitable tone, and which struck me with horror and a chillness in my very blood. There was no- body to be seen in the whole street, neither did any other win- dow open, for people had no curiosity now in any case, nor could anybody help one another; so I went on to pass into Bell Alley. Just in Bell Alley, on the right hand of the passage, there was a more terrible cry than that, though it was not so directed out at the window; but the whole family was in a terrible fright, and I could hear women and children run screaming about the rooms like distracted, when a garret-window opened, A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR 51 and somebody from a window on the other side the alley called and asked, "What is the matter?" Upon which, from the first window it was answered, " O Lord! my old master has hanged himself! " The other asked again, " Is he quite dead? " and the first answered, "Ay, ay, quite dead; quite dead and cold!" This person was a merchant and a deputy alderman, and very rich. I care not to mention the name, though I knew his name too ; but that would be an hardship to the family, which is now flourishing again. But this is but one; it is scarce credible what dreadful cases happened in particular families every day. People in the rage of the distemper, or in the torment of their swellings, which was indeed intolerable, running out of their own government, rav- ing and distracted, and oftentimes laying violent hands upon themselves, throwing themselves out at their windows, shoot- ing themselves, etc. ; mothers murdering their own children in their lunacy; some dying of mere grief as a passion, some of mere fright and surprise without any infection at all, others frightened into idiotism and foolish distractions, some into de- spair and lunacy, others into melancholy madness. 5t^-..A JONATHAN SWIFT A TALE OF A TUB WRITTEN FOR THE UNIVERSAL IMPROVEMENT OF MANKIND Diu muUumgue desideratum 1704 [This early example of Swift's satire was written chiefly in the year 1697. The title was already a familiar phrase in the meaning of an absurd or pointless story. The book contains a Dedication to Lord Somers, an address from Bookseller to Reader, an Epistle Dedicatory to Posterity, an Author's Preface, and eleven sections, of which one is called The Intro- duction, five are called Digressions of various kinds, and the remaining five give the Tale of the Tub proper, — the story of the three brothers. Of these, Peter represents the Roman Catholic Church, Martin (from Martin Luther) the moderate Reformers — especially of the Church of England, and Jack (from John Calvin) the more violent reformers — Presbyterians and other Dissenters. The father's will is of course the Bible, and the sons' coats are organized theology and church poHty; for the more detailed allusions throughout the satire, the reader must be re- ferred to some annotated edition, like that of Craik or Prescott. For convenience, extracts from the tale of the three brothers are here brought together continuously, — from Sections 11, iv,vi, and xi; those from the Digression on Madness, which forms Section ix, are added separately.] THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY, TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS PRINCE POSTERITY Sir : I here present your Highness with the fruits of a very few leisure hours, stolen from the short intervals of a world of business, and of an employment quite alien from such amuse- ments as this the poor production of that refuse of time, which has lain heavy upon m}^ hands during a long prorogation of Parliament, a great dearth of foreign news, and a tedious fit of rainy weather; for which, and other reasons, it cannot choose extremely to deserve such a patronage as that of your Highness, whose numberless virtues, in so few years, make the world look upon you as the future example to all princes. For although your Highness is hardly got clear of infancy, yet has A TALE OF A TUB 53 the universal learned world already resolved upon appealing to your future dictates, with the lowest and most resigned sub- mission, fate having decreed you sole arbiter of the productions of human wit, in this poKte and most accomplished age. Me- thinks the number of appellants were enough to shock and startle any judge of a genius less unlimited than yours; but, in order to prevent such glorious trials, the person, it seems, to whose care the education of your Highness is committed, has resolved (as I am told) to keep you in ahnost a universal igno- rance of our studies, which it is your inherent birthright to in- spect. It is amazing to me that this person should have the assur- ance, in the face of the sun, to go about persuading your High- ness that our age is ahnost wholly illiterate, and has hardly pro- duced one writer upon any subject. I know very well that, when your Highness shall come to riper years, and have gone through the learning of antiquity, you will be too curious to neglect inquiring into the authors of the very age before you; and to think that this insolent, in the account he is preparing for your view, designs to reduce them to a number so insigni- ficant as I am ashamed to mention, — it moves my zeal and my spleen, for the honor and interest of our vast flourishing body, as well as of myself, for whom, I know by long experi- ence, he has professed, and still continues, a pecuKar mahce. It is not unlikely that, when your Highness will one day pe- ruse what I am now writing, you may be ready to expostulate with your governor, upon the credit of what I here affirm, and command him to show you some of our productions. To which he will answer (for I am well informed of his designs) by asking your Highness where they are? and what is become of them? and pretend it a demonstration that there never were any, be- cause they are not then to be found. Not to be found! Who has mislaid them? are they sunk in the abyss of things? It is certain that in their own nature they were fight enough to sv^^im upon the surface for all eternity. Therefore the fault is in him who tied weights so heavy to their heels as to depress them to the centre. Is their very essence destroyed? Who has annihil- ated them? Were they drowned by purges, or martyred by pipes? But, that it may no longer be a doubt with your High- ness who is to be the author of this universal ruin, I beseech you 54 JONATHAN SWIFT to observe that large and terrible scythe which your governor affects to bear continually about him. Be pleased to remark the length and strength, the sharpness and hardness, of his nails and teeth; consider his baneful, abominable breath, enemy to life and matter, infectious and corrupting; and then reflect whether it be possible for any mortal ink and paper of this gen- eration to make a suitable resistance. Oh ! that your Highness would one day resolve to disarm this usurping maUre dii palais of his furious engines, and bring your empire hors de page} It were needless to recount the several methods of tyranny and destruction, which your governor is pleased to practice upon this occasion. His inveterate malice is such to the writ- ings of our age, that of several thousands produced yearly from this renowned city, before the next revolution of the sun there is not one to be heard of. Unhappy infants! many of them barbarously destroyed, before they have so much as learnt their mother tongue to beg for pity. Some he stifles in their cradles; others he frights into convulsions, whereof they sud- denly die; some he flays alive, others he tears limb from hmb. Great numbers are offered to Moloch ; and the rest, tainted by his breath, die of a languishing consumption. But the concern I have most at heart is for our corporation of poets, from whom I am preparing a petition to your High- ness, to be subscribed with the names of one hundred and thirty-six of the first rate, but whose immortal productions are never likely to reach your eyes, though each of them is now an humble and earnest appellant for the laurel, and has large comely volumes ready to show, for a support to his preten- sions. The never-dying works of these illustrious persons, your governor, sir, has devoted to unavoidable death; and your High- ness is to be made to believe that our age has never arrived at the honor to produce one single poet. We confess Immortahty to be a great and powerful goddess, but in vain we offer up to her our devotions and our sacrifices, if your Highness's gov- ernor, who has usurped the priesthood, must, by an unparalleled ambition and avarice, wholly intercept and devour them. To affirm that our age is altogether unlearned, and devoid of writers in any kind, seems to be an assertion so bold and so false, that I have been some time thinking the contrary may 1 Independent (having finished the term of service of a page). A TALE OF A TUB 55 almost be proved by uncontrollable demonstration. It is true, indeed, that although their numbers be vast, and their produc- tions numerous in proportion, yet are they hurried so hastily off the scene that they escape our memory and elude our sight. When I first thought of this address, I had prepared a copious list of titles to present to your Highness, as an undisputed argu- ment for what I affirm. The originals were posted fresh upon all gates and corners of streets; but, returning in a very few hours to take a review, they were all torn down, and fresh ones in their places. I inquired after them among readers and book- sellers, but I inquired in vain; the memorial of them was lost among men; their place was no more to be found; and I was laughed to scorn for a clown and a pedant, without all taste and refinement, little versed in the course of present affairs, and that knew nothing of what had passed in the best companies of court and town. So that I can only avow in general to your Highness that we do abound in learning and wit; but to fix upon particulars is a task too slippery for my slender abilities. If I should venture in a windy day to affirm to your Highness that there is a large cloud near the horizon, in the form of a bear; another in the zenith, with the head of an ass; a third to the westward, with claws like a dragon; and your Highness should in a few minutes think fit to examine the truth, it is cer- tain they would all be changed in figure and position. New ones would arise, and all we could agree upon would be that clouds there were, but that I was grossly mistaken in the zoo- graphy and topography of them. But your governor perhaps may still insist, and put the ques- tion, — What is then become of those immense bales of paper, which must needs have been employed in such numbers of books? Can these also be wholly annihilate, and so of a sudden, as I pretend? What shall I say in return of so invidious an ob- jection? Books, like men their authors, have no more than one way of coming into the world, but there are ten thousand to go out of it, and return no more. I profess to your Highness, in the integrity of my heart, that what I am going to say is literally true this minute I am writ- ing; what revolutions may happen before it shall be ready for your perusal, I can by no means warrant; however, I beg you to accept it as a specimen of our learning, our politeness, and 56 JONATHAN SWIFT our wit. I do therefore affirm, upon the word of a sincere man, that there is now actually in being a certain poet, called John Dryden, whose translation of Virgil was lately printed in a large folio, well bound, and, if diligent search were made, for aught I know, is yet to be seen. There is another, called Na- hum Tate, who is ready to make oath that he has caused many reams of verse to be published, whereof both himself and his bookseller (if lawfully required) can still produce authentic copies, and therefore wonders why the world is pleased to make such a secret of it. There is a third, known by the name of Tom Durfey, a poet of a vast comprehension, a universal genius, and most profound learning. There are also one Mr. Rymer and one Mr. Dennis, most profound critics. There is a person styled Dn Bentley, who has written near a thousand pages of immense erudition, giving a full and true account of a certain squabble of wonderful importance between himself and a book- seller; he is a writer of infinite wit and humor; no man rallies with a better grace, and in more sprightly turns. Farther, I avow to your Highness that with these eyes I have beheld the person of William Wo tton, B.D., who has written a good sizable vol- ume against a friend ^ of your governor (from whom, alas ! he must therefore look for little favor), in a most gentlemanly style, adorned with the utmost politeness and civility, replete with discoveries equally valuable for their novelty and use, and embellished with traits of wit so poignant and so appo- site that he is a worthy yokemate to his forementioned friend. Why should I go upon farther particulars, which might fill a volume with the just eulogies of my contemporary brethren? I shall bequeath this piece of justice to a larger work, wherein I intend to write a character of the present set of wits in our nation. Their persons I shall describe particularly and at length, their genius and understandings in miniature. In the meantime, I do here make bold to present your High- ness with a faithful abstract, drawn from the universal body of all arts and sciences, intended wholly for your service and instruction. Nor do I doubt in the least but your Highness will peruse it as carefully, and make as considerable improve- ments, as other young princes have already done by the many volumes of late years written for a help to their studies. ' Sir William Temple, who had taken the part of antiquity in the "quarrel of the an- cients and moderns," while Wotton represented the latter. See Swift's Battle oftfte Books. A TALE OF A TUB 57 That your Highness may advance in wisdom and virtue, as well as years, and at last outshine all your royal ancestors, shall be the daily prayer of. Sir, Your Highness's most devoted, &c. Dec. 1697. A TALE OF A TUB Once upon a time, there was a man who had three sons by one wife, and all at a birth; neithgL could the midwife tell cer- tainly which was the eldest. Their father died while they were young; and upon his death-bed, calling the lads to him, spoke thus : "Sons, because I have purchased no estate, nor was born to any, I have long considered of some good legacies to bequeath you; and at last, with much care, as well as expense, have pro- vided each of you (here they are) a new coat. Now you are to JK_- understand that these coats have two virtues contained in them : T one is, that with good wearing they will last you fresh and \ , . sound as long as you live; the other is, that they will grow in the same proportion with your bodies, lengthening and widen- ing of themselves, so as to be always fit. Here, — let me see them on you before I die. So; very well; pray, children, wear them clean, and brush them often. You will find in my will^ {b^i*H> (here it is) full instructions in every particular concerning the wearing and management of your coats; wherein you must be very exact, to avoid the penalties I have appointed for every transgression or neglect, upon which your future fortunes will entirely depend. I have also commanded in my will, that you should live together in one house like brethren and friends, for then you will be sure to thrive, and not otherwise." Here, the story says, this good father died, and the three sons went all together to seek their fortunes. I shall not trouble you with recounting what adventures they met for the first seven years, any farther than by taking notice that they carefully observed their father's will, and kept their coats in very good order; that they traveled through several countries, encountered a reasonable quantity of giants, and slew certain dragons. Being now arrived at the proper age for producing themselves, S8 JONATHAN SWIFT they came up to town, and fell in love with the ladies, but espe- cially three, who about that time were in chief reputation, — the Duchess d'Argent, Madame de Grands Titres, and the Countess d'Orgueil. On their first appearance, our three ad- venturers met with a very bad reception ; and soon with great sagacity guessing out the reason, they quickly began to improve in the good qualities of the town: they writ, and rallied, and rhymed, and sung, and said, and said nothing; they drank, and fought, and slept, and swore, and took snuff; they went to new plays on the first night, haunted the chocolate-houses, beat the watch, and lay on bulks; they bilked hackney-coachmen, and ran in debt with shopkeepers; they killed bailiffs, kicked fid- dlers down stairs, eat at Locket's, loitered at Will's;^ they talked of the drawing-room, and never came there; dined with lords they never saw ; whispered a duchess, and spoke never a word ; exposed the scrawls of their laundress for billetdoux of quality; came ever just from court, and were never seen in it; attended the levee sub dio ; ^ got a list of peers by heart in one company, and with great familiarity retailed them in another. Above all, they constantly attended those committees of senators who are silent in the house and loud in the coffee-house, where they nightly adjourn to chew the cud of politics, and are encom- passed with a ring of disciples, who lie in wait to catch up their droppings. The three brothers had acquired forty other qualifications of the like stamp, too tedious to recount, and by consequence were justly reckoned the most accomplished per- sons in the town; but all would not suffice, and the ladies afore- said continued still inflexible. To clear up which difficulty I must, with the reader's good leave and patience, have recourse to some points of weight, which the authors of that age have not sufficiently illustrated. For about this time it happened a sect arose, whose tenets obtained and spread very far, especially in the grand monde, and among everybody of good fashion. They worshiped a sort of idol ^^ who, as their doctrine delivered, did daily create men by a kind of manufactory operation. This idol they placed in the highest part of the house, on an altar erected about three foot; he was shown in the posture of a Persian emperor, sitting 1 A leading coSee-house, in Covent Garden. Locket's was a restaurant near Charing Cross. * In the open air; i. e. they stayed in the street. ' The tailor. A TALE OF A TUB 59 on a superficies, with his legs interwoven under him. This god had a^oose for his ensign; whence it is that some learned men pretend to deduce his original from Jupiter CapitoHnus. At his left hand, beneath the altar, Hell seemed to open, and catch at the animals the idol was creating; to prevent which, certain of his priests hourly flung in pieces of the uninformed mass, or substance, and sometimes whole limbs already enhvened, which that horrid gulf insatiably swallowed, terrible to behold. The goose was held a subaltern divinity or deus minorum gentium, before whose shrine was sacrificed that creature whose hourly food is human gore, and who is in so great renown abroad for being the delight and favorite of the Egyptian Cercopithecus. Millions of these animals were cruelly slaughtered every day to appease the hunger of that consuming deity. The chief idol was also worshiped as the inventor of the yard and needle; whether as the god of seamen, or on account of certain other mystical attributes, has not been sufficiently cleared. The worshipers of this deity had also a system of their be- lief, which seemed to turn upon the following fundamentals. They held the universe to be a large suit of clothes, which in- vests everything; that the earth is invested by the air; the air is invested by the stars ; and the stars are invested by the primum mobile. Look on this globe of earth, you will find it to be a very complete and fashionable dress. What is that which some call land, but a fine coat faced with green? or the sea, but a waist- coat of water- tabby? Proceed to the particular works of the creation, you will find how curious journeyman Nature has been, to trim up the vegetable beaux; observe how sparkish a peri- wig adorns the head of a beech, and what a fine doublet of white satin is worn by the birch. To conclude from all, what is man himself but a micro-coat, or rather a complete suit of clothes with all its trimmings? As to his body, there can be no dispute; but examine even the acquirements of his mind, you will find them all contribute in their order towards furnishing out an ex- act dress: to instance no more, is not religion a cloak; honesty a pair of shoes worn out in the dirt; self-love a surtout; vanity a shirt; and conscience a pair of breeches? These postulata being admitted, it will follow in due course of reasoning that those beings, which the world calls improperly suits of clothes, are in reality the most refined species of ani- 6o JONATHAN SWIFT mals; or, to proceed higher, that they are rational creatures, or men. For is it not manifest that they live, and move, and talk, and perform all other offices of human life? Are not beauty, and wit, and mien, and breeding, their inseparable proprieties? In short, we see nothing but them, hear nothing but them. Is it not they who walk the streets, fill up parliament-, coffee-, play-houses? It is true, indeed, that these animals, which are vulgarly called suits of clothes, or dresses, do, according to cer- tain compositions, receive different appellations. If one of them be trimmed up with a gold chain, and a red gown, and a white rod, and a great horse, it is called a lord-mayor; if certain er- mines and furs be placed in a certain position, we style them a judge; and so an apt conjunction of lawn and black satin we entitle a bishop. Others of these professors, though agreeing in the main sys- tem, were yet more refined upon certain branches of it, and held that man was an animal compounded of two dresses, the natural and celestial suit, which were the body and the soul; that the soul was the outward, and the body the inward cloth- ing; that the latter was ex traduce ^^ but the former of daily creation and circumfusion ; this last they proved by scripture, be- cause in them we live, and move, and have our being, as like- wise by philosophy, because they are all in all, and all in every part. Besides, said they, separate these two, and you will find the body to be only a senseless unsavory carcase. By all which it is manifest that the outward dress must needs be the soul. To this system of religion were tagged several subaltern doc- trines, which were entertained with great vogue; as particu- larly, the faculties of the mind were deduced by the learned among them in this manner: embroidery was sheer wit; gold fringe was agreeable conversation; gold lace was repartee; a huge long periwig was humor; and a coat full of powder was very good raillery ; — all which required abundance of finesse and delicatesse to manage with advantage, as well as a strict observance after times and fashions. I have, with much pains and reading, collected out of an- cient authors this short summary of a body of philosophy and divinity, which seems to have been composed by a vein and ' Received directly from the original source; an allusion to a theological dispute as to the origin of the soul. A TALE OF A TUB 6i race of thinking very different from any other systems either an- cient or modern. And it was not merely to entertain or satisfy the reader's curiosity, but rather to give him hght into several circumstances of the following story; that, knowing the state of dispositions and opinions in an age so remote, he may better comprehend those great events which were the issue of them. I advise therefore the courteous reader to peruse with a world of application, again and again, whatever I have written upon this matter. And leaving these broken ends, I carefully gather up the chief thread of my story and proceed. These opinions, therefore, were so universal, as well as the practices of them, among the refined part of court and town, that our three brother-adventurers, as their circumstances then stood, were strangely at a loss. For, on the one side, the three ladies they addressed themselves to, whom we have named already, were at the very top of the fashion, and abhorred all that were below it the breadth of a hair. On the other side, their father's will was very precise, and it was the main pre- cept in it, with the greatest penalties annexed, not to add to or diminish from their coats one thread, without a positive com- mand in the will. Now the coats their father had left them were, it is true, of very good cloth, and besides, so neatly sewn, you would swear they were all of a piece; but at the same time very plain, and with Httle or no ornament; and it happened that, before they were a month in town, great shoulder-knots came up; straight all the world was shoulder-knots; — no approach- ing the ladies' ruellcs ^ without the quota of shoulder-knots. " That fellow," cries one, " has no soul; where is his shoulder- knot?" Our three brethren soon discovered their want by sad experience, meeting in their walks with forty mortifications and indignities. If they went to the play-house, the door-keeper showed them into the twelve-penny gallery. If they called a boat, says a waterman, " I am first sculler." If they stepped to the Rose to take a bottle, the drawer would cry, "Friend, we sell no ale." If they went to visit a lady, a footman met them at the door, with ''Pray send up your message." In this un- happy case, they went immediately to consult their father's will, read it over and over, but not a word of the shoulder-knot. What should thfy do? What temper should they find? Obe- 1 The bed-room alcoves used as reception-rooms by French ladies. 62 JONATHAN SWIFT dience was absolutely necessary, and yet shoulder-knots ap- peared extremely requisite. After much thought, one of the brothers, who happened to be more book-learned than the other two, said he had found an expedient. "It is true," said he, ' ' there is nothing here in this will, totidem verbis, making men- tion of shoulder-knots; but I dare conjecture, we may find them inclusive, or totidem syllabis." This distinction was immediately approved by all, and so they fell again to examine the will; but their evil star had so directed the matter that the first syllable was not to be found in the whole writings. Upon which disap- pointment, he who found the former evasion took heart, and said, " Brothers, there are yet hopes; for though we cannot find them totidem verbis, nor totidem syllabis, I dare engage we shall make them out tertio modo, or totidem Uteris." This discovery was also highly commended, upon which they fell once more to the scrutiny, and picked out s,h,o,u,l,d,e,r; when the same planet, enemy to their repose, had wonderfully contrived that a K was not to be found. Here was a weighty difficulty! But the distinguishing brother, for whom we shall hereafter find a name, now his hand was in, proved by a very good argument that k was a modern, illegitimate letter, unknown to the learned ages, nor anywhere to be found in ancient manuscripts. '"Tis true," said he, ''Calendae hath in q. v. c.^ been sometimes written with a K, but erroneously; for in the best copies it has been ever spelt with a c." And, by consequence, it was a gross mistake in our language to spell knot with a k ; but that from henceforward he would take care it should be written with a c. Upon this all farther difiiculty vanished; shoulder-knots were made clearly out to he jure paterno; and our three gentlemen swaggered with as large and as flaunting ones as the best. But, as human happi- ness is of a very short duration, so in those days were human fashions, upon which it entirely depends. Shoulder-knots had their time, and we must now imagine them in their decline; for a certain lord came just from Paris, with fifty yards of gold lace upon his coat, exactly trimmed after the court fashion of that month. In two days all mankind appeared closed up in bars of gold lace; whoever durst peep abroad without his complement of gold lace, was ill received among the women. What should our three knights do in this momentous affair? They had suffi- * Some ancient MSS. {quibusdam veteribus codicibus). A TALE OF A TUB 63 ciently strained a point already in the affair of shoulder-knots; upon recourse to the will, nothing appeared there but altum si- lentium. That of the shoulder-knots was a loose, flying, circum- stantial point; but this of gold lace seemed too considerable an alteration without better warrant; it did aliquo modo essentice adhcerere,^ and therefore required a positive precept. But about this time it fell out that the learned brother aforesaid had read Arisiotelis dialectica, and especially that wonderful piece de in- ter pretatione, which has the faculty of teaching its readers to find out a meaning in everything but itself, — like commenta- tors on the Revelaiiojis, who proceed prophets without under- standing a syllable of the text. "Brothers," said he, "you are to be informed that of wills duo sunt genera, nuncupatory and scriptory; that in the scrip tory will here before us, there is no precept or mention about gold lace, conceditur; but, si idem affir- metur de nuncupatorio , negaiur. For, brothers, if you remem- ber, we heard a fellow say, when we were boys, that he heard my father's man say that he heard my father say that he would advise his sons to get gold lace on their coats, as soon as ever they could procure money to buy it." " By G — ! that is very true," cried the other. "I remember it perfectly well," said the third. And so without more ado got the largest gold lace in the parish, and walked about as fine as lords. A while after there came up all in fashion a pretty sort of flame-colored satin for linings, and the mercer brought a pat- tern of it immediately to our three gentlemen. "An please your worships," said he, "my Lord C and Sir J. W. had hn- ings out of this very piece last night ; it takes wonderfully, and I shall not have a remnant left enough to make my wife a pin- cushion, by to-morrow morning at ten o'clock." Upon this they fell again to rummage the will, because the present case also required a positive precept, the lining being held by orthodox writers to be of the essence of the coat. After long search, they could fix upon nothing to the matter in hand, except a short ad- vice of their father in the will, to take care of fire, and put out their candles before they went to sleep. This, though a good deal for the purpose, and helping very far towards self-convic- tion, yet not seeming wholly of force to establish a command 1 This and the Latin phrases that follow burlesque the jargon of the Schoolmen of the mediaeval church. 64 JONATHAN SWIFT (being resolved to avoid farther scruple, as well as future occa- sion for scandal), says he that was the scholar, "I remember to have read in wills of a codicil annexed, which is indeed a part of the will, and what it contains has equal authority with the rest. Now I have been considering of this same will here before us, and I cannot reckon it to be complete for want of such a codicil. I will therefore fasten one in its proper place very dexterously; I have had it by me some time ; it was written by a dog-keeper of my grandfather's, and talks a great deal, as good luck would have it, of this very flame-colored satin." The project was im- mediately approved by the other two; an old parchment scroll was tagged on according to art, in the form of a codicil annexed, and the satin bought and worn. Next winter a player, hired for the purpose by the corpora- tion of fringe-makers, acted his part in a new comedy, all cov- ered with silver fringe, and, according to the laudable custom, gave rise to that fashion. Upon which the brothers, consulting their father's will, to their great astonishment found these words: ^^ Item, I charge and command my said three sons to wear no sort of silver fringe upon or about their said coats, &c.," with a penalty, in case of disobedience, too long here to insert. However, after some pause, the brother so often mentioned for his erudition, who was well skilled in criticisms, had found in a certain author, which he said should be nameless, that the same word which, in the will, is called fringe, does also signify a broom-stick, and doubtless ought to have the same interpreta- tion in this paragraph. This another of the brothers disliked, because of that epithet silver, which could not, he humbly con- ceived, in propriety of speech, be reasonably applied to a broom- stick; but it was replied upon him that his epithet was under- stood in a mythological and allegorical sense. However, he objected again, why their father should forbid them to wear a broom-stick on their coats, a caution that seemed unnatural and impertinent? — upon which he was taken up short, as one who spoke irreverently of a mystery, which doubtless was very useful and significant, but ought not to be over-curiously pried into, or nicely reasoned upon. And, in short, their father's authority being now considerably sunk, this expedient was allowed to serve as a lawful dispensation for wearing their full proportion of silver fringe. A TALE OF A TUB 65 A while after was revived an old fashion, long antiquated, of embroidery with Indian figures of men, women, and children. Here they had no occasion to examine the will; they remem- bered but too well how their father had always abhorred this fashion; that he made several paragraphs on purpose, import- ing his utter detestation of it, and bestowing his everlasting curse to his sons, whenever they should wear it. For all this, in a few days they appeared higher in the fashion than anybody else in the town. But they solved the matter by saying that these fig- ures were not at all the same with those that were formerly worn, and were meant in the will. Besides, they did not wear them in the sense as forbidden by their father, but as they were a com- mendable custom, and of great use to the public. That these rigorous clauses in the will did therefore require some allowance, and a favorable interpretation, and ought to be understood cum grano sails. Bjit fashions perpetually altering in that age, the scholastic brother grew weary of searching farther evasions, and solving everlasting contradictions. Resolved, therefore, at all hazards, to comply with the modes of the world, they concerted matters together, and agreed unanimously to lock up their father's will in a strong box, brought out of Greece or Italy, I have forgotten which, and trouble themselves no farther to examine it, but only refer to its authority whenever they thought fit. In con- sequence whereof, a while after it grew a general mode to wear an infinite number of points, most of them tagged with silver; upon which, the scholar pronounced ex cathedra that points were absolutely jure paterno, as they might very well re- member. It is true, indeed, the fashion prescribed somewhat more than were directly named in the will; however, that they, as heirs-general of their father, had power to make and add certain clauses for public emolument, though not deducible, totidem verbis, from the letter of the will, or else multa ahsurda sequerentur. This was understood for canonical, and therefore, on the following Sunday, they came to church all covered with points. The learned brother, so often mentioned, was reckoned the best scholar in all that, or the next street to it; insomuch as, having run something behind-hand in the world, he obtained the favor of a certain lord to receive him into his house, and to 66 JONATHAN SWIFT teach his children. A while after the lord died, and he, by long practice of his father's will, found the way of contriving a deed of conveyance of that house to himself and his heirs ; upon which he took possession, turned the young squires out, and received his brothers in their stead. I have now, with much pains and study, conducted the reader to a period where he must expect to hear of great revolutions. For no sooner had our learned brother, so often mentioned, got a warm house of his own over his head, than he began to look big, and take mightily upon him; insomuch that unless the gen- tle reader, out of his great candor, will please a little to exalt his idea, I am afraid he will henceforth hardly know the hero of the play, when he happens to meet him ; his part, his dress, and his mien being so much altered. He told his brothers, he would have them to know that he was their elder, and consequently his father's sole heir; nay, a while after, he would not allow them to call him brother, but Mr. Peter; and then he must be styled Father Peter; and some- times, My Lord Peter. . . . In short, Peter grew so scandalous that all the neighborhood began in plain words to say he was no better than a knave. And his two brothers, long weary of his ill usage, resolved at last to leave him; but first they humbly desired a copy of their father's will, which had now lain by neglected time out of mind. Instead of granting this request, he called them damned sons of whores, rogues, traitors, and the rest of the vile names he could muster up. However., while he was abroad one day upon his projects, the two youngsters watched their opportunity, made a shift to come at the will, and took a copia vera,^ by which they presently saw how grossly they had been abused; their father having left them equal heirs, and strictly commanded that what- ever they got should lie in common among them all. Pursuant to which, their next enterprise was to break open the cellar- door, and get a little good drink, to spirit and comfort their hearts. . . . While all this was in agitation, there enters a solicitor from Newgate, desiring Lord Peter would please procure a par- don for a thief that was to be hanged to-morrow. But the two brothers told him he was a coxcomb to seek pardons from a fellow who deserved to be hanged much better than his client, 1 True copy. A TALE OF A TUB 67 and discovered all the method of that imposture, in the same form I delivered it a while ago, advising the solicitor to put his " friend upon obtaining a pardon from the king. In the midst of all this clutter and revolution, in comes Peter with a file of dra- goons at his heels, and, gathering from all hands what was in the wind, he and his gang, after several millions of scurrilities and curses, not very important here to repeat, by main force very fairly kicked them both out of doors, and would never let them come under his roof from that day to this. . . . The two exiles, so nearly united in fortune and interest, took a lodging together; where, at their first leisure, they began to reflect on the numberless misfortunes and vexations of their past life, and could not tell on the sudden to what failure in their conduct they ought to impute them; when, after some recollec- tion, they called to mind the copy of their father's will, which they had so happily recovered. This was immediately pro- duced, and a firm resolution taken between them to alter what- ever was already amiss, and reduce all their future measures to the strictest obedience prescribed therein. The main body of the will (as the reader cannot easily have forgot) consisted in certain admirable rules about the wearing of their coats ; in the perusal whereof, the two brothers, at every period, duly com- paring the doctrine with the practice, there was never seen a wider difference between two things, — horrible downright transgressions of every point. Upon which they both resolved, without further delay, to fall immediately upon reducing the whole, exactly after their father's model. But here it is good to stop the hasty reader, ever impatient to see the end of an adventure, before we writers can duly pre- pare him for it. I am to record that these two brothers began to be distinguished at this time by certain names. One of them desired to be called Martin, and the other took the appellation of Jack. These two had lived in much friendship and agreement under the tyranny of their brother Peter, as it is the talent of fellow-sufferers to do, — men in misfortune being like men in the dark, to whom all colors are the same; but when they came forward into the world, and began to display themselves to each other, and to the light, their complexions appeared extremely different; which the present posture of their affairs gave them sudden opportunity to discover. 68 JONATHAN SWIFT But here the severe reader may justly tax me as a writer of short memory, a deficiency to which a true modern cannot but, of necessity, be a Httle subject. Because memory, being an em- ployment of the mind upon things past, is a faculty for which the learned in our illustrious age have no manner of occasion, who deal entirely with invention, and strike all things out of themselves, or at least by collision from each other; upon which account we think it highly reasonable to produce our great for- getfulness as an argument unanswerable for our great wit. I ought in method to have informed the reader, about fifty pages ago, of a fancy Lord Peter took, and infused into his brothers, to wear on their coats whatever trimmings came up in fashion ; never pulling off any, as they went out of the mode, but keeping on all together, which amounted in time to a medley the most antic you can possibly conceive ; and this to a degree that, upon the time of their falUng out, there was hardly a thread of the original coat to be seen, but an infinite quantity of lace and rib- bons, and fringe, and embroidery, and points, — I mean only those tagged with silver, for the rest fell off. Now this material circumstance, having been forgot in due place, as good fortune hath ordered, comes in very properly here, when the two bro- thers are just going to reform their vestures into the primitive state prescribed by their father's will. They both unanimously entered upon this great work, look- ing sometimes on their coats, and sometimes on the will. Mar- tin laid the first hand; at one twitch brought off a large handful of points, and with a second pull stripped away ten dozen yards -ef-Mnge. But when he had gone thus far, he demurred a while. He knew very well there yet remained a great deal more to be done; however, the first heat being over, his violence began to cool, and he resolved to proceed more moderately in the rest of the work; having already narrowly escaped a swinging rent in pulUng off the points, which, being tagged with silver (as we have observed before), the judicious workman had, with much sagacity, double sewn, to preserve them from falling. Resolv- ing therefore to rid his coat of a huge quantity of gold lace, he picked up the stitches with much caution, and diligently gleaned out all the loose threads as he went, which proved to be a work of time. Then he fell about the embroidered Inxiian figures of men, women, and children, against which, as you have heard in A TALE OF A TUB 69 its due place, their father's testament was extremely exact and severe; these, with much dexterity and application, were, after a while, quite eradicated, or utterly defaced. For the rest, where he observed the embroidery to be worked so close as not to be got away without damaging the cloth, or where it served to hide or strengthen any flaw in the body of the coat, con- tracted by the perpetual tampering of workmen upon it, he con- cluded the wisest course was to let it remain, resolving in no case whatsoever that the substance of the stuff should suffer injury ; which he thought the best method for serving the true intent and meaning of his father's will. And this is the nearest account I have been able to collect of Martin's proceedings upon this great revolution. But his brother Jack, whose adventures will be so extraordi- nary as to furnish a great part in the remainder of this discourse, entered upon the matter with other thoughts, and a quite differ- ent spirit. For the memory of Lord Peter's injuries produced a degree of hatred and spite, which had a much greater share of inciting him than any regards after his father's commands, since these appeared, at best, only secondary and subservient to the other. . . . Having thus kindled and inflamed himself as high as possible, and by consequence in a delicate temper for begin- ning a reformation, he set about the work immediately, and in three minutes made more dispatch than Martin had done in as many hours. For, courteous reader, you are given to under- stand that zeal is never so highly obliged as when you set it a-tearing ; and Jack, who doted on that quality in himself, allowed it at this time its full swing. Thus it happened that, stripping down a parcel of gold lace a little too hastily, he rent the main body of his coat from top to bottom; and, whereas his talent was not of the happiest in taking up a stitch, he knew no better way than to darn it again with packthread and a skewer. But the matter was yet infinitely worse (I record it with tears) when he proceeded to the embroidery; for, being clumsy by na- ture, and of temper impatient, — withal, beholding millions of stitches that required the nicest hand, and sedatest constitu- tion, to extricate, — in a great rage he tore off the whole piece, cloth and all, and flung it into the kennel; and furiously thus continuing his career, — "Ah, good brother Martin," said he, " do as I do, for the love of God! Strip, tear, pull, rend, flay off 70 JONATHAN SWIFT all, that we may appear as unlike the rogue Peter as it is possi- ble. I would not, for a hundred pounds, carry the least mark about me, that might give occasion to the neighbors of sus- pecting that I was related to such a rascal." . , . Jack had provided a fair copy of his father's will, engrossed in form upon a large skin of parchment; and, resolving to act the part of a most dutiful son, be became the fondest creature of it imaginable. For although, as I have often told the reader, it consisted wholly in certain plain, easy directions, about the management and wearing of their coats, with legacies and pen- alties in case of obedience or neglect, yet he began to entertain a fancy that the matter was deeper and darker, and therefore must needs have a great deal more of mystery at the bottom. "Gentlemen," said he, "I will prove this very skin of parch- ment to be meat, drink, and cloth; to be the philosopher's stone, and the universal medicine." In consequence of which raptures he resolved to make use of it iiKthe most necessary, as well as the most paltry occasions of lif\^He had a way of working it into any shape he pleased, so that it served him for a nightcap when he went to bed, and for an umbrella in rainy weather. He would lap a piece of it about a sore toe, or, when he had fits, burn two inches under his nose; or, if anything lay heavy on his stomach, scrape off, and swallow as much of the powder as would lie on a silver penny ; they were all infallible remedies. With analogy to these refinements, his common talk and conversation ran wholly in the phrase of his will, and he circumscribed the utmost of his eloquence within that com- pass, not daring to let slip a syllable without authority from thence. He made it a part of his religion never to say grace to his meat; nor could all the world persuade him, as the common phrase is, to eat his victuals like a Christian. He bore a strange kind of appetite to snap-dragon, and to the livid snuffs of a burning candle, which he would catch and swallow with an agility wonderful to conceive; and, by this pro- cedure, maintained a perpetual flame in his belly, which, issuing in a glowing steam from both his eyes, as well as his nostrils and his mouth, made his head appear in a dark night like the skull of an ass, wherein a roguish boy hath conveyed a farthing candle, to the terror of His Majesty's liege subjects. Therefore A TALE OF A TUB 71 he made use of no other expedient to light himself home, but was wont to say that a wise man was his own lantern. He would shut his eyes as he walked along the streets, and if// he happened to bounce his head against a post, or fall into a// kennel (as he seldom missed either to do one or both), he wouljf tell the gibing prentices, who looked on, that he submitted with entire resignation, as to a trip, or a blow of fate, with whom he found, by long experience, how vain it was either to wrestle or to cufif; and whoever durst undertake to do either, would be sure to come off with a swinging fall, or a bloody nose. " It was or- dained," said he, "some few days before the creation, that my nose and this very post should have a rencounter; and therefore nature thought fit to send us both into the world in the same age, and to make us countrymen and fellow-citizens. Now had my eyes been open, it is very likely the business might have been a great deal worse; for how many a confounded slip is daily got by a man with all his foresight about him? Besides, the eyes of the understanding see best, when those of the senses are out of the way; and therefore blind men are observed to tread their steps with much more caution, and conduct, and judgment, than those who rely with too much confidence upon the virtue of the visual nerve, which every little accident shakes out of order, and a drop, or a film, can wholly disconcert; — like a lantern among a pack of roaring buUies when they scour the streets, exposing its owner and itself to outward kicks and buffets, which both might have escaped, if the vanity of ap- pearing would have suffered them to walk in the dark. But further, if we examine the conduct of these boasted lights, it will prove yet a great deal worse than their fortune. 'T is true, I have broke my nose against this post, because Providence either forgot, or did not think it convenient, to twitch me by the elbow, and give me notice to avoid it. But let not this en- courage either the present age, or posterity, to trust their noses into the keeping of their eyes, which may prove the fairest way of losing them for good and all. For, O ye eyes, ye blind guides! miserable guardians are ye of our frail noses; ye, I say, who fasten upon the first precipice in view, and then tow our wretched willing bodies after you, to the very brink of destruc- tion; but, alas! that brink is rotten, our feet slip, and we tum- ble down prone into a gulf, without one hospitable shrub in the 72 JONATHAN SWIFT way to break the fall; a fall, to which not any nose of mortal make is equal, except that of the giant Laurcalco, who was lord of the silver bridge. Most properly therefore, O eyes! and with great justice, may you be compared to those foolish lights which conduct men through dirt and darkness, till they fall into a deep pit or a noisome bog." This I have produced as a scantUng of Jack's great eloquence, and the force of his reasoning upon such abtruse matters. . .• . A DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE ORIGINAL, THE USE, AND IM- PROVEMENT OF MADNESS, IN A COMMONWEALTH r . . . The reader will, I am sure, agree with me in the conclu- sion that, if the moderns mean by madness only a disturbance or transposition of the brain, by force of certain vapors issuing up from the lower faculties, then hath this madness been the parent of all those mighty revolutions that have happened in empire, philosophy, and in religion. For the brain, in its na- tural position and state of serenity, disposes its owner to pass his life in the common forms, without any thoughts of subduing multitudes to his own power, his reasons, or his visions; and the more he shapes his understanding by the pattern of human learning, the less he is inclined to form parties, after his particu- lar notions, because that instructs him in his private infirmities, as well as in the stubborn ignorance of the people. But when a man's fancy gets astride on his reason, when im- agination is at cuffs with the senses, and common understand- ing, as well as common sense, is kicked out of doors, the first proselyte he makes is himself; and when that is once compassed, the difficulty is not so great in bringing over others, a strong delusion always operating from without as vigorously as from within. For cant and vision are to the ear and the eye the same that tickling is to the touch. Those entertainments and pleasures we most value in life are such as dupe and play the wag with the senses. For, if we take an examination of what is generally understood by happiness, as it hath respect either to the understanding or the senses, we shall find all its properties and adjuncts will herd under this short definition, — that it is aj)erpetual possession of being well deceived. And, first, with relation tcr^the mind or understanding, 'tis manifest what mighty advantages fiction has over truth; and the reason is just A TALE OF A TUB 73 at our elbow, — because imagination can build nobler scenes, and produce more wonderful revolutions, than fortune or na- ture will be at expense to furnish. Nor is mankind so much to blame in his choice, thus determining him, if we consider that the debate merely lies between things past and things con- ceived; and so the question is only this, — whether things that have place in the imagination may not as properly be said to exist as those that are seated in the memory; which may be justly held in the affirmative, and very much to the advantage of the former, since this is acknowledged to be the womb of things, and the other allowed to be no more than the grave. Again, if we take this definition of happiness, and examine it with reference to the senses, it will be acknowledged wonder- fully adapt. How fading and insipid do all objects accost us, that are not conveyed in the vehicle of delusion! How shrunk is everything, as it appears in the glass of nature ! So that if it were not for the assistance of artificial mediums, false lights, refracted angles, varnish and tinsel, there would be a mighty level in the felicity and enjoyments of mortal men. If this were seriously considered by the world, as I have a certain rea- son to suspect it hardly will, men would no longer reckon among their high points of wisdom, the art of exposing weak sides, and pubHshing infirmities, — an employment, in my opinion, neither better nor worse than that of unmasking, which, I think, has never been allowed ^ fair usage, either in the world or the playhouse. In the proportion that credulity is a more peaceful posses- sion of the mind than curiosity, so far preferable is that wisdom which converses about the surface, to that pretended philosophy which enters into the depth of things, and then comes gravely back with informations and discoveries that in the inside they are good for nothing. The two senses to which all objects first address themselves are the sigh t and the^t ouch ; these never examine farther than the color, the shape, the size, and what- ever other qualities dwell, or are drawn by art, upon the out- ward of bodies; and then comes reason officiously, with tools for cutting and opening and mangling and piercing, offering to demonstrate that they are not of the same consistence quite through. Now I take all this to be the last degree of pervert- 1 Considered (to be). 74 JONATHAN SWIFT ing nature, one of whose eternal laws it is, to put her best furni- ture forward. And therefore, in order to save the charges of all such expensive anatomy for the time to come, I do here think fit to inform the reader that, in such conclusions as these, rea- son is certainly in the right, and that in most corporeal beings which have fallen under my cognizance, the outside has been infinitely preferable to the in; whereof I have been farther convinced from some late experiments. Last week I saw a wo- man flayed, and you will hardly believe how much it altered her person for the worse. Yesterday I ordered the carcase of a beau to be stripped in my presence, when we were all amazed to find so many unsuspected faults under one suit of clothes. Then I laid open his brain, his heart, and his spleen; but I plainly per- ceived at every operation, that the farther we proceeded, we found the defects increase upon us in number and bulk. From all which, I justly formed this conclusion to myself, that what- ever philosopher or projector can find out an art to solder and patch up the flaws and imperfections of nature, will deserve much better of mankind, and teach us a more useful science, than that so much in present esteem, of widening and exposing them, like him who held anatomy to be the ultimate end of physic. And he whose fortunes and dispositions have placed him in a convenient station to enjoy the fruits of this noble art, — he that can, with Epicurus, content his ideas with the films and images that fly off upon his senses from the superficies of things, — such a man, truly wise, creams off nature, leaving the sour and the dregs for philosophy and reason to lap up. This is the sublime and refined point of felicity, called the posses- sion of being well deceived, — the serene, peaceful state of be- ing a fool among knaves. But to return to madness. It is certain that, according to the system I have above deduced, every species thereof proceeds from a redundancy of vapors. Therefore, as some kinds of frenzy give double strength to the sinews, so there are of other species which add vigor, and life, and spirit to the brain. Now it usually happens that these active spirits, getting possession of the brain, resemble those that haunt other waste and empty dwellings, which, for want of business, either vanish, and carry away a piece of the house, or else stay at home and fling it all out of the windows. By which are mystically displayed two A TALE OF A TUB 75 principal branches of madness, and which some philosophers, not considering so well as I, have mistook to be different in their causes, over-hastily assigning the first to deficiency and the other to redundance. I think it therefore manifest, from what I have here advanced, that the main point of skill and address is to furnish employ- ment for this redundancy of vapor, and prudently to adjust the seasons of it; by which means it may certainly become of car- dinal and cathohc emolument in a commonwealth. Thus one man, choosing a proper juncture, leaps into a gulf, from thence proceeds a hero, and is called the savior of his country; another achieves the same enterprise, but, unluckily timing it, has left the brand of madness fixed as a reproach upon his memory. Upon so nice a distinction are we taught to repeat the name of Cur tins with reverence and love, that of Empedocles with hatred and contempt. Thus also it is usually conceived that the elder Brutus only personated the fool and madman for the good of the public; but this was nothing else than a redundancy of the same vapor long misapplied, called by the Latins ingenium par negotiis, — or, to translate it as nearly as I can, a sort of frenzy, never in its right element, till you take it up in business of the state. Upon all which, and many other reasons of equal weight, though not equally curious, I do here gladly embrace an oppor- tunity I have long sought for, of recommending it as a very noble undertaking to Sir Edward Seymour, Sir Christopher Musgrave, Sir John Bowls, John How, Esq.,^ and other patriots concerned, that they would move for leave to bring in a bill for appointing commissioners to inspect into Bedlam^ and the parts adjacent; who shall be empowered to send for persons, papers, and records; to examine into the merits and qualifications of every student and professor ; to observe with utmost exactness their several dispositions and behavior; by which means duly distinguishing and adapting their talents, they might produce admirable instruments for the several offices in a state. . . . Is any student tearing his straw in piecemeal, swearing and blaspheming, biting his grate, foaming at the mouth? Let the right worshipful the Commissioners of Inspection give him a regiment of dragoons, and send him into Flanders among the 1 Leading Tories. * The insane asylum. 76 JONATHAN SWIFT rest. Is another eternally talking, sputtering, gaping, bawling, in a sound without period or article? What wonderful talents are here mislaid! Let him be furnished immediately with a green bag and papers, and threepence in his pocket, and away with him to Westminster Hall.^ . , . Accost the hole of an- other kennel (first stopping your nose) , you will behold a surly, gloomy, nasty, slovenly mortal. The student of this apartment is very sparing of his words, but somewhat over-liberal of his breath; he holds his hand out ready to receive your penny, and immediately upon receipt withdraws to his former occupations. Now is it not amazing to think the Society of Warwick Lane ^ should have no more concern for the recovery of so useful a member? who, if one may judge from these appearances, would become the greatest ornament to that illustrious body? . . . AN ARGUMENT TO PROVE THAT THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY IN ENGLAND . MAY, AS THINGS NOW STAND, BE ATTENDED WITH SOME INCONVENIENCES, AND PERHAPS NOT PRODUCE THOSE MANY GOOD EFFECTS PROPOSED THEREBY 1708 [This was one of several pamphlets by Swift on religious subjects which appeared in 1708. It represents his work in defense of the Church of Eng- land, especially as opposed to the Deists, who at this time were becoming influential, as the Tale of a Tub had been directed against Roman Catholics and Dissenters. Leading deistical writers are referred to in the tract: To- land, author of Christianity not Mysterious (1605), and Tindal, author of Rights of the Christian Church (1706) ; together with Dr. William Coward, who had published an essay denying immortality (1702). For the stu- dent of literature the importance of the pamphlet is in its exhibition of Swift's masterful irony.] I AM very sensible what a weakness and presumption it is to reason against the general humor and disposition of the world. I remember it was with great justice, and due regard to the freedom both of the public and the press, forbidden upon sev- eral penalties to write, or discourse, or lay wagers against the Union, even before it was confirmed by Parliament, because 1 Where the law courts sat. ' The College of Physiciaas. THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY 77 that was looked upon as a design to oppose the current of the people, — which, besides the folly of it, is a manifest breach of the fundamental law that makes this majority of opinion the voice of God. In Jike manner, and for the very same reasons, it may perhaps be neither safe nor prudent to argue against the aboHshing of Christianity, at a juncture when all parties seem so unanimously determined upon the point, as we cannot but allow from their actions, their discourses, and their writings. However, I know not how, whether from the affectation of sin- gularity, or the perverseness of human nature, but so it unhap- pily falls out, that I cannot be entirely of this opinion. Nay, though I were sure an order were issued for my immediate pro- secution by the Attorney- General, I should still confess that, in the present posture of our affairs at home or abroad, I do not yet see the absolute necessity of extirpating the Christian re- hgion from among us. This may perhaps appear too great a paradox even for our wise and paradoxical age to endure; therefore I shall handle it with all tenderness, and with the utmost deference to that great and profound majority which is of another sentiment. And yet the curious may please to observe how much the genius of a nation is liable to alter in half an age. I have heard it affirmed for certain, by some very old people, that the con- trary opinion was even in their memories as much in vogue as the other is now, and that a project for the abolishing of Chris- tianity would then have appeared as singular, and been thought as absurd, as it would be at this time to write or discourse in its defense. Therefore I freely own that all appearances are against me. The system of the gospel, after the fate of other systems, is gen- erally antiquated and exploded; and the mass or body of the common people, among whom it seems to have had its latest credit, are now grown as much ashamed of it as their betters; opinions, like fashions, always descending from those of quality to the middle sort, and thence to the vulgar, where at length they are dropped and vanish. But here I would not be mistaken, and must therefore be so bold as to borrow a distinction from the writers on the other side, when they make a difference between nominal and real Trinitarians. I hope no reader imagines me so weak to stand 78 ^/ »K JONATHAN SWIFT T up in the defense of real Christianity, such as used, in primitive times (if we may beheve the authors of those ages) , to have an influence upon men's belief and actions. To offer at the restor- ing of that, would indeed be a wild project; it would be to dig up foundations; to destroy, at one blow, all the wit, and half the learning, of the kingdom ; to break the entire frame and con- stitution of things; to ruin trade, extinguish arts and sciences, with the professors of them; in short, to turn our courts, ex- changes, and shops, into deserts; and would be full as absurd as the proposal of Horace, where he advises the Romans, all in a body, to leave their city, and seek a new seat in some remote part of the world, by way of cure for the corruption of their manners. Therefore I think this caution was in itself altogether unne- cessary (which I have inserted only to prevent all possibility of caviling) , since every candid reader will easily understand my discourse to be intended only in defense of nominal Christian- ity; the other having been for some time wholly laid aside by general consent, as utterly inconsistent with our present schemes of wealth and power. But why we should therefore cast off the name and title of Christians, although the general opinion and resolution be so violent for it, I confess I cannot (with submission) apprehend; nor is the consequence necessary. However, since the under- takers propose such wonderful advantages to the nation by this project, and advance many plausible objections against the system of Christianity, I shall briefly consider the strength of both, fairly allow them their greatest weight, and offer such answers as I think most reasonable. After which I will beg leave to show what inconveniences may possibly happen by such an innovation, in the present posture of our affairs. ^, First, one great advantage proposed by the aboKshing of Christianity is, that it would very much enlarge and establish liberty of conscience, that great bulwark of our nation, and of the Protestant religion, which is still too much limited by priest- craft, notwithstanding all the good intentions of the legisla- ture, as we have lately found by a severe instance. For it is confidently reported that two young gentlemen of real hopes, bright wit, and profound judgment, who, upon a thorough examination of causes and effects, and by the mere force of THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY 79 natural abilities, without the least tincture of learning, having made a discovery that there was no God, and generously com- municating their thoughts for the good of the public, were some time ago, by an unparalleled severity, and upon I know not what obsolete law, broke^ for blasphemy. And, as it has been wisely observed, if persecution once begins, no man ahve knows how far it may reach, or where it will end. In answer to all which, with deference to wiser judgments, I think this rather shows the necessity of a nominal religion among us. Great wits love to be free with the highest objects; and if they cannot be allowed a God to revile or renounce, they will speak evil of dignities, abuse the government, and reflect upon the ministry; which I am sure few will deny to be of much more pernicious consequence, — according to the saying of Tiberius, deorum ojfensa diis curcer As to the particular fact related, I think it is not fair to argue from one instance; per- haps another cannot be produced; yet (to the comfort of all those who may be apprehensive of persecution) blasphemy, we know, is freely spoken a million of times in every coffeehouse and tavern, or wherever else good company meet. It must be allowed, indeed, that to break an English free-born officer, only for blasphemy, was, to speak the gentlest of such an action, a very high strain of absolute power. Little can be said in excuse for the general; perhaps he was afraid it might give offense to the allies, among whom, for aught we know, it may be the cus- tom of the country to believe a God. But if he argued, as some have done, upon a mistaken principle, that an officer who is guilty of speaking blasphemy may some time or other proceed so far as to raise a mutiny, the consequence is by no means to be admitted ; for surely the commander of an English army is likely to be but ill obeyed, whose soldiers fear and reverence him as Httle as they do a Deity. It is farther objected against the gospel system, that it obhges men to the behef of things too difficult for free-thinkers, and such who have shaken off the prejudices that usually cling to a confined education. To which I answer, that men should be cautious how they raise objections which reflect upon the wisdom of the nation. Is not everybody freely allowed to be- lieve whatever he pleases, and to publish his belief to the world ' Cashiered. 2 "Wrongs done to the gods are the gods' concern." 8o JONATHAN SWIFT whenever he thinks fit, especially if it serves to strengthen the . party which is in the right? Would any indifferent foreigner, ^ ^ who should read the trumpery lately written by AsgilV Tindal, ^ Toland, Coward, and forty more, imagine the gospel to be our rule of faith, and confirmed by parliaments? Does any man either believe, or say he believes, or desire to have it thought that he says he beHeves, one syllable of the matter? And is any man worse received upon that score, or does he find his want of nominal faith a disadvantage to him, in the pursuit of any civil or military employment? What if there be an old dormant statute or two against him, are they not now obsolete to a de- gree that Empson and Dudley ^ themselves, if they were now aUve, would find it impossible to put them in execution ? It is likewise urged that there are, by computation, in this kingdom, above ten thousand parsons, whose revenues, added to those of my lords the bishops, would suffice to maintain at least two hundred young gentlemen of wit and pleasure and free-thinking, enemies to priestcraft, narrow principles, pedan- try, and prejudices, who might be an ornament to the court and town; and then again, so great a number of able (bodied) divines might be a recruit to our fleet and armies. This indeed appears to be a consideration of some weight; but then, on the other side, several things deserve to be considered likewise: as first, whether it may not be thought necessary that in certain tracts of country, like what we call parishes, there shall be one man at least of abilities to read and write. Then it seems a wrong computation that the revenues of the church through- out this island would be large enough to maintain two hundred young gentlemen, or even half that number, after the present refined way of living, — that is, to allow each of them such a rent as, in the modern form of speech, would make them easy. But still there is in this project a greater mischief behind; and we ought to beware of the woman's folly who killed the hen that every morning laid her a golden egg. For pray what would be- ^ come of the race of men in the next age, if we had nothing to trust beside the scrofulous, consumptive productions, furnished by our men of wit and pleasure, when, having squandered away their vigor, health, and estates, they are forced, by some dis- 1 An eccentric writer, whose book called An Argument to prove that death is not obliga- tory on Christians, was burned by order of the House of Commons. 2 Extortionate tax-collectors for Henry VII. THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY 8i agreeable marriage, to piece up their broken fortunes, and entail rottenness and politeness on their posterity? Now, here are ten thousand persons reduced, by the wise regulations of Henry the Eighth, ^ to the necessity of a low diet and moderate exercise, who are the only great restorers of our breed, without which the nation would, in an age or two, become one great hospital. Another advantage proposed by the abolishing of Christian- ity is the clear gain of one day in seven, which is now entirely lost, and consequently the kingdom one serenth less consider- able in trade, business, and pleasure; beside the loss to the pub- He of so many stately structures, now in the hands of the clergy, which might be converted into playhouses, market-houses, ex- changes, common dormitories, and other public edifices. I hope I shall be forgiven a hard word, if I call this a perfect cavil. I readily own there has been an old custom, time out of mind, for people to assemble in the churches every Sunday, and that shops are still frequently shut, in order, as it is conceived, to preserve the memory of that ancient practice ; but how this can prove a hindrance to business or pleasure, is hard to imagine. What if the men of pleasure are forced, one day in the week, to game at home instead of the chocolate-houses ? are not the taverns and coffee-houses open ? Can there be a more conven- ient season for taking a dose of physic ? Is not that the chief day for traders to sum up the accounts of the week, and for law- yers to prepare their briefs ? But I would fain know how it can be pretended that the churches are misapplied ? Where are more appointments and rendezvouses of gallantry ? Where more care to appear in the foremost box, with greater advan- tage of dress ? where more meetings for business ? where more bargains driven of all sorts ? and A/vhere so many conveniences or enticements to sleep ? ' There is one advantage, greater than any of the foregoing, proposed by the abolishing of Christianity, — that it will ut- terly extinguish parties among us, by removing those factious distinctions of high and low church, of Whig, and Tory, Presby- terian and Church of England, which are now so many griev- ous clogs upon pubUc proceedings, and are apt to dispose men to prefer the gratifying of themselves, or depressing of their ad- versaries, before the most important interest of the state. ' Depriving the church of its revenues. 82 JONATHAN SWIFT I confess, if it were certain that so great an advantage would redound to the nation by this expedient, I would submit and be silent; but will any man say that if the words whoring, drinking, cheating, lying, stealing were by Act of Parliament ejected out of the English tongue and dictionaries, we should all awake next morning chaste and temperate, honest and just, and lovers of truth ? Is this a fair consequence ? Or, if the physicians would forbid us to pronounce the words gout, rheumatism, and stone, would that expedient serve, like so many talismans, to destroy the diseases themselves ? Are party and faction in men's hearts no deeper than phrases borrowed from religion, or founded upon no firmer principles ? And is our language so poor that we cannot find other terms to express them ? Are envy, pride, avar- ice, and ambition such ill nomenclators that they cannot furnish appellations for their owners ? Will not heydukes and mame- lukes, mandarins, and patshaws, or any other words formed at pleasure, serve to distinguish those who are in the ministry from others who would be in it if they could ? What, for in- stance, is easier than to vary the form of speech, and instead of the word church, make it a question in politics, whether the Monument be in danger ? Because religion was nearest at hand to furnish a few convenient phrases, is our invention so barren we can find no other ? Suppose, for argument sake, that the To- ries favored Margarita, the Whigs Mrs. Tofts, and the trim- mers Valentini;^ would not Margarilians, Toftians, and Valen- tinians be very tolerable marks of distinction? The Prasini and Veniti, two most virulent factions in Italy, began (if I remember right) by a distinction of colors in ribbons ; and we might con- tend with as good a grace about the dignity of the blue and the green, which would serve as properly to divide the court, the parliament, and the kingdom, between them, as any terms of art whatsoever, borrowed from religion. And therefore I think there is little force in this objection against Christianity, or prospect of so great an advantage as is proposed in the abolish- ing of it. It is again objected, as a very absurd, ridiculous custom, that a set of men should be suffered, much less employed and hired, to bawl one day in seven against the lawfulness of those meth- ods most in use, toward the pursuit of greatness, riches, and * Opera singers of the period. THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY 83 pleasure, which are the constant practice of all men alive on the other six. But this objection is, I think, a little unworthy of so refined an age as ours. Let us argue this matter calmly: I ap- peal to the breast of any polite free-thinker, whether, in the pursuit of gratifying a predominant passion, he has not always a wonderful incitement, by reflecting it was a thing forbidden ; and therefore we see, in order to cultivate this taste, the wis- dom of the nation has taken special care that the ladies should be furnished with prohibited silks, and the men with prohibited wine. And indeed it were to be wished that some other pro- hibitions were promoted, in order to improve the pleasures of the town; which, for want of such expedients, begin already, as I am told, to flag and grow languid, giving way daily to cruel inroads from the spleen. It is likewise proposed as a great advantage to the public, that, if we once discard the system of the gospel, all religion will of course be banished for ever; and consequently, ^ong with it, those grievous prejudices of education, which, under the names of virtue, conscience, honor, justice, and the Hke, are so apt to dis- turb the peace of human minds, and the notions whereof are so hard to be eradicated, by right reason, or free- thinking, some- times during the whole course of our lives. Here first I observe, how difficult it is to get rid of a phrase which the world is once grown fond of, though the occasion that first produced it be entirely taken away. For several years past, if a man had but an ill-favored nose, the deep thinkers of the age would, some way or other, contrive to impute the cause to the prejudice of his education. From this fountain were said to be derived all our foolish notions of justice, piety, love of our country; all our opinions of God, or a future state, heaven, hell, and the like ; and there might formerly perhaps have been some pretence for this charge. But so effectual care has been taken to remove those prejudices, by an entire change in the methods of education, that (with honor I mention it to our polite inno- vators) the young gentlemen who are now on the scene seem to have not the least tincture left of those infusions, or string of those weeds; and, by consequence, the reason for abolishing nominal Christianity upon that pretext is wholly ceased. For the rest, it may perhaps admit a controversy, whether the banishing of all notions of religion whatsoever, would be T 84 JONATHAN SWIFT convenient for the vulgar. Not that I am in the least of opin- ion with those who hold religion to have been the invention of politicians, to keep the lower part of the world in awe, by the fear of invisible powers ; unless mankind were then very differ- ent to what it is now ; for I look upon the mass or body of our people here in England, to be as free thinkers, that is to say, as staunch unbelievers, as any of the highest rank. But I con- ceive some scattered notions about a superior power to be of singular use for the common people, as furnishing excellent ma- terials to keep children quiet when they grow peevish, and pro- viding topics of amusement in a tedious winter night. Lastly, it is proposed, as a singular advantage, that the abol- / ishing of Christianity will very much contribute to the uniting of Protestants, by enlarging the terms of communion, so as to take in all sorts of dissenters, who are now shut out of the pale, upon account of a few ceremonies which all sides confess to be things indifferent; that this alone will effectually answer the great ends of a scheme for comprehension, by opening a large noble gate, at which all bodies may enter; whereas the chaffer- ing with dissenters, and dodging about this or the other cere- mony, is but Hke opening a few wickets, and leaving them at jar, by which no more than one can get in at a time, and that not without stooping, and sidling, and squeezing his body. To all this I answer that there is one darhng inclination of mankind, which usually affects to be a retainer to religion, though she be neither its parent, its godmother, or its friend; I mean the spirit of opposition, that lived long before Chris- tianity, and can easily subsist without it. Let us, for instance, examine wherein the opposition of sectaries among us con- sists; we shall find Christianity to have no share in it at all. Does the gospel anywhere prescribe a starched, squeezed coun- tenance, a stiff, formal gait, a singularity of manners and habit, or any affected modes of speech, different from the reasonable part of mankind ? Yet, if Christianity did not lend its name to stand in the gap, and to employ or divert these humors, they must of necessity be spent in contraventions to the laws of the land, and disturbance of the pubUc peace. There is a portion of enthusiasm assigned to every nation, which, if it has not proper objects to work on, will burst out, and set all in a flame. If the quiet of a state can be bought, by only flinging men a few cere- THE ABOLISHING OF CHRISTIANITY 85 monies to devour, it is a purchase no wise man would refuse. Let the mastiffs amuse themselves about a sheep's skin stuffed with hay, provided it will keep them from worrying the flock. The constitution of convents abroad seems, in one point, a strain of great wisdom; there being few irregularities in human pas- sions that may not have recourse to vent themselves in some of those orders, which are so many retreats for the speculative, the melancholy, the proud, the silent, the poHtic, and the mo- rose, to spend themselves, and evaporate the noxious parti- cles; for each of whom we, in this island, are forced to provide a several sect of religion, to keep them quiet; and whenever Christianity shall be abolished, the legislature must find some other expedient to employ and entertain them. For what im- ports it how large a gate you open, if there will be always left a number who place a pride and a merit in refusing to enter ? Having thus considered the most important objections against Christianity, and the chief advantages proposed by the abolishing thereof, I shall now, with equal deference and sub- mission to wiser judgments, as before, proceed to mention a few inconveniences that may happen, if the gospel should be re- pealed, which perhaps the projectors may not have sufficiently J f^' considered. And first, I am very sensible how much the gentlemen of wit and pleasure are apt to murmur and be shocked at the sight of so many daggled-tail parsons, who happen to fall in their way, and offend their eyes; but at the same time these wise reform- ers do not consider what an advantage and felicity it is for great wits to be always provided with objects of scorn and contempt, in order to exercise and improve their talents, and divert their spleen from falling on each other, or on themselves; especially when all this may be done without the least imaginable danger to their persons. And to urge another argument of a parallel nature : if Chris- tianity were once aboKshed, how could the free-thinkers, the strong reasoners, and the men of profound learning, be able to find another subject, so calculated in all points, whereon to dis- play their abilities ? What wonderful productions of wit should we be deprived of, from those whose genius, by continual prac- tice, has been wholly turned upon raillery and invectives against rehgion, and would therefore never be able to shine or distin- 86 JONATHAN SWIFT guish themselves upon any other subject ! We are daily com- plaining of the great decline of wit among us, and would we take away the greatest, perhaps the only topic, we have left ? Who would ever have suspected Asgill for a wit, or Toland for a philosopher, if the inexhaustible stock of Christianity had not been at hand, to provide them with materials ? What other sub- ject, through all art or nature, could have produced Tindal for a profound author, or furnished him with readers ? It is the wise choice of the subject, that alone adorns and distinguishes the writer. For had a hundred such pens as these been employed on the side of rehgion, they would have immediately sunk into silence and oblivion. . . . And therefore, if notwithstanding all I have said it still be thought necessary to have a bill brought in for repealing Chris- tianity, I would humbly offer an amendment, that, instead of the word Christianity, may be put religion in general; which, I conceive, will much better answer all the good ends proposed by the projectors of it. For, as long as we leave in being a God and His providence, with all the necessary consequences which curious and inquisitive men will be apt to draw from such pre- mises, we do not strike at the root of the evil, though we should ever so effectually annihilate the present scheme of the gospel. For of what use is freedom of thought, if it will not produce freedom of action ? — which is the sole end, how remote soever in appearance, of all objections against Christianity; and there- fore the free-thinkers consider it as a sort of edifice, wherein all the parts have such a mutual dependence on each other, that if you happen to pull out one single nail, the whole fabric must fall to the ground. This was happily expressed by him who had heard of a text brought for proof of the Trinity, which in an an- cient manuscript was differently read; he thereupon immedi- ately took the hint, and, by a sudden deduction of a long sorites, most logically concluded : "Why, if it be as you say, I may safely whore and drink on, and defy the parson." From which, and many the like instances easy to be produced, I think nothing can be more manifest, than that the quarrel is not against any particular points of hard digestion in the Christian system, but against religion in general; which, by laying restraints on human nature, is supposed the great enemy to the freedom of thought and action. THE ENGLISH TONGUE 87 Upon the whole, if it shall be thought for the benefit of church and state that Christianity be abolished, I conceive, however, it may be more convenient to defer the execution to a time of peace; and not venture, in this conjuncture, to disoblige our allies, who, as it falls out, are all Christians, and many of them, by the prejudices of their education, so bigoted as to place a sort of pride in the appellation. If, upon being rejected by them, we are to trust an alliance with the Turk, we shall find ourselves much deceived: for, as he is too remote, and generally engaged in war with the Persian Emperor, so his people would be more scandalized at our infidelity than our Christian neigh- bors. For the Turks are not only strict observers of religious worship, but, what is worse, believe a God, — which is more than is required of us, even while we preserve the name of Chris- tians. To conclude : whatever some may think of the great advan- tages to trade by this favorite scheme, I do very much appre- hend that in six months' time after the act is passed for the ex- tirpation of the gospel, the Bank and East India stock may fall at least one per cent. And since that is fifty times more than ever the wisdom of our age thought fit to venture for the pre- servation of Christianity, there is no reason we should be at so great a loss, merely for the sake of destroying it. A PROPOSAL FOR CORRECTING, IMPROVING, AND ASCERTAINING THE ENGLISH TONGUE IN A LETTER TO THE MOST HONORABLE ROBERT, EARL OF OXFORD AND MORTIMER, LORD HIGH TREASURER OF GREAT BRITAIN I712 [This was the first of Swift's publications which appeared over his ac- knowledged name. His correspondence shows that he took his proposal very seriously; but nothing came of it. It was sagaciously criticised by Dr. Johnson in his Life of Swift.] . . . The period wherein the English tongue received most improvement, I take to commence with the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's reign, and to conclude with the great rebellion in 88 JONATHAN SWIFT forty-two. It is true there was a very ill taste, both of style and wit, which prevailed under King James the First, but that seems to have been corrected in the first years of his successor, who, among many other qualifications of an excellent prince, was a great patron of learning. From the Civil War to this present time, I am apt to doubt whether the corruptions in our language have not at least equaled the refinements of it, and these corruptions very few of the best authors in our age have wholly escaped. During the usurpation, such an infusion of enthusiastic jargon prevailed in every writing, as was not shaken off in many years after. To this succeeded that licentiousness which entered with the Restoration, and, from infecting our religion and mor- als, fell to corrupt our language ; which last was not likely to be much improved by those who at that time made up the court of King Charles the Second, — either such who had followed him in his banishment, or who had been altogether conversant in the dialect of those fanatic times, or young men, who had been educated in the same country; so that the court, which used to be the standard of propriety and correctness of speech, was then, and, I think, has ever since continued, the worst school in England for that accomplishment, and so will remain till bet- ter care be taken in the education of our young nobility, that they may set out into the world with some foundation of litera- ture, in order to qualify them for patterns of pohteness. The consequence of this defect upon our language may appear from the plays, and other compositions written for entertain- ment, within fifty years past, filled with a succession of affected phrases, and new conceited words, either borrowed from the current style of the court, or from those who, under the char- acter of men of wit and pleasure, pretended to give the law. Many of these refinements have already been long antiquated, and are now hardly intelligible, — which is no wonder, when they were the product only of ignorance and caprice. I have never known this great town without one or more dunces of figure, who had credit enough to give rise to some new word, and propagate it in most conversations, though it had neither humor nor significancy. If it struck the present taste, it was soon transferred into the plays and current scrib- bles of the week, and became an addition to our language; while THE ENGLISH TONGUE 89 the men of wit and learning, instead of early obviating such corruptions, were too often seduced to imitate and comply with them. V There is another set of men who have contributed very much to the spoiling of the English tongue; I mean the poets, from the time of the Restoration. These gentlemen, although they could not be insensible how much our language was al- ready overstocked with monosyllables, yet, to save time and pains, introduced that barbarous custom of abbreviating words to fit them to the measure of their verses; and this they have frequently done so very injudiciously as to form such harsh, unharmonious sounds, that none but a northern ear could en- dure. They have joined the most obdurate consonants with one intervening vowel, only to shorten a syllable; and their taste in time became so depraved that what was at first a poeti- cal license, not to be justified, they made their choice, alleging that words pronounced at length sounded faint and languid. This was a pretence to take up the same custom in prose, so that most of the books we see nowadays are full of those man- glings and abbreviations. Instances of this abuse are innumer- able; what does your lordship think of the words drudged, dis- turbed, rebuk'd, fledged, and a thousand others everywhere to be met with in prose as well as verse ? — where, by leaving out a vowel to save a syllable, we form so jarring a sound, and so diffi- cult to utter, that I have often wondered how it could ever ob- tain. Another cause (and perhaps borrowed from the former) which has contributed not a little to the maiming of our lan- guage, is a foolish opinion, advanced of late years, that we ought to spell exactly as we speak; which, beside the obvious inconvenience of utterly destroying our etymology, would be a thing we should never see an end of. Not only the several towns and counties of England have a different way of pro- nouncing, but even here in London they clip their words after one manner about the court, another in the City, and a third in the suburbs; and in a few years, it is probable, will all differ from themselves, as fancy or fashion shall direct, — all which, reduced to writing, would entirely confound orthography. Yet many people are so fond of thi? conceit that it is sometimes a difficult matter to read modern books and pamphlets, where 90 JONATHAN SWIFT the words are so curtailed, and varied from their original spell- ing, that whoever has been used to plain English will hardly know them by sight. Several young men at the universities, terribly possessed with the fear of pedantry, run into a worse extreme, and think all politeness to consist in reading the daily trash sent down to them from hence; this they call knowing the world, and read- ing men and manners. Thus furnished, they come up to town, reckon all their errors for accomplishments, borrow the newest set of phrases; and, if they take a pen into their hands, all the odd words they have picked up in a coffee-house, or a gaming ordinary, are produced as flowers of style, — and the ortho- graphy refined to the utmost. ... To this we owe that strange race of wits who tell us they write to the humor of the age. And I wish I could say these quaint fopperies were wholly absent from graver subjects. In short, I would undertake to show your lordship several pieces where the beauties of this kind are so predominant that, with all your skill in languages, you could never be able to read or understand them. . . . In order to reform our language, I conceive, my lord, that a free judicious choice should be made of such persons as are gen- erally allowed to be best qualified for such a work, without any regard to quality, party, or profession. These, to a certain num- ber at least, should assemble at some appointed time and place, and fix on rules by which they design to proceed. What meth- ods they will take is not for me to prescribe. Your lordship, and other persons in great employments, might please to be of the number; and I am afraid such a society would want your instruction and example, as much as your protection, for I have, not without a little envy, observed of late the style of some great ministers very much to exceed that of any other produc- tions. 1. The persons who are to undertake this work will have the ex- ample of the French before them, to imitate where these have proceeded right, and to avoid their mistakes. Beside the gram- mar part, wherein we are allowed to be very defective, they will observe many gross improprieties which, however authorized by practice, and grown familiar, ought to be discarded. They will find many words that deserve to be utterly thrown out of our language, many more to be corrected, and perhaps not a THE ENGLISH TONGUE 91 few long since antiquated, which ought to be restored on ac- count of their energy and sound. But what I have most at heart is, that some method should be thought on for ascertaining and fixing our language for ever, after such alterations are made in it as shall be thought requi- site. For I am of opinion it is better a language should not be wholly perfect, than that it should be perpetually changing; and we must give over at one time, or at length infallibly change for the worse; as the Romans did, when they began to quit their simplicity of style for affected refinements, such as we meet in Tacitus and other authors, which ended by degrees in many barbarities, even before the Goths had invaded Italy. The fame of our writers is usually confined to these two is- lands, and it is hard it should be limited in time, as much as place, by the perpetual variations of our speech. It is your lordship's observation, that if it were not for the Bible and Common Prayer Book in the vulgar tongue, we should hardly be able to understand anything that was written among us a hundred years ago; which is certainly true, for those books, be- ing perpetually read in churches, have proved a kind of stand- ard for language, especially to the common people. And I doubt whether the alterations since introduced have added much to the beauty or strength of the English tongue, though they have taken off a great deal from that simplicity which is one of the greatest perfections in any language. You, my lord, who are so conversant in the sacred writings, and so great a judge of them in their originals, will agree that no translation our country ever yet produced has come up to that of the Old and New Testa- ment; and by the many beautiful passages which I have often had the honor to hear your lordship cite from thence, I am per- suaded that the translators of the Bible were masters of an English style much fitter for that work than any we see in our present writings, — which I take to be owing to the simplicity that runs through the whole. Then, as to the greatest part of our Uturgy, compiled long before the translation of the Bible now in use, and Httle altered since, there seem to be in it as great strains of true sublime eloquence as are anywhere to be found in our language, which every man of good taste will ob- serve in the communion service, that of burial, and other parts. But when I say that I would have our language, after it is 92 JONATHAN SWIFT duly correct, always to last, I do not mean that it should never be enlarged. Provided that no word which a society shall give a sanction to, be afterward antiquated and exploded, they may have liberty to receive whatever new ones they shall find occa- sion for; because then the old books will yet be always valuable according to their intrinsic worth, and not thrown aside on ac- count of unintelligible words and phrases, which appear harsh and uncouth only because they are out of fashion. Had the Roman tongue continued vulgar in that city till this time, it would have been absolutely necessary, from the mighty changes that have been made in law and religion, from the many terms of art required in trade and in war, from the new inventions that have happened in the world, from the vast spreading of navigation and commerce, with many other obvious circum- stances, to have made great additions to that language; yet the ancients would still have been read and understood with plea- sure and ease. The Greek tongue received many enlargements between the time of Homer and that of Plutarch, yet the former author was probably as well understood in Trajan's time as the latter. What Horace says of words going off and perishing like leaves, and new ones coming in their place, is a misfortune he laments, rather than a thing that he approves. But I cannot see why this should be absolutely necessary; or if it were, what would have become of his monujnentum (Ere perennius ?^ Writing by memory only, as I do at present, I would gladly keep within my depth, and therefore shall not enter into farther particulars. Neither do I pretend more than to show the use- fulness of this design, and to make some general observations, leaving the rest to that society, which I hope will owe its in- stitution and patronage to your lordship. Besides, I would willingly avoid repetition, having, about a year ago, com- municated to the pubHc much of what I had to offer upon this subject, by the hands of an ingenious gentleman who for a long time did thrice a week divert or instruct the kingdom by his papers, and is supposed to pursue the same design at present, under the title of Spectator. This author, who has tried the force and compass of our language with so much success, agrees entirely with me in most of my sentiments relating to it. So do the greatest part of the men of wit and learning whom I have * "Monument more enduring than bronze." THE ENGLISH TONGUE 93 had the happiness to converse with; and therefore I imagine that such a society would be pretty unanimous in the main points. . . . As barbarous and ignorant as we were in former centuries, there was more effectual care taken by our ancestors to pre- serve the memory of times and persons, than we find in this age of learning and politeness, as we are pleased to call it. The rude Latin of the monks is still very intelligible; whereas, had their records been delivered down only in the vulgar tongue, so bar- ren and so barbarous, so subject to continual succeeding changes, they could not now be understood, unless by antiquaries who make it their study to expound them. And we must, at this day, have been content with such poor abstracts of our English story as laborious men of low genius would think fit to give us ; and even these, in the next age, would be likewise swallowed up in succeeding collections. If things go on at this rate, all I can promise your lordship is, that, about two hundred years hence, some painful compiler, who will be at the trouble of studying old language, may inform the world that, in the reign of Queen Anne, Robert, Earl of Oxford, a very wise and excel- lent man, was made High Treasurer, and saved his country, which in those days was almost ruined by a foreign war and a domestic faction. Thus much he may be able to pick out, and willing to transfer into his new history; but the rest of your char- acter, which I or any other writer may now value ourselves by drawing, and the particular account of the great things done under your ministry, for which you are already so celebrated in most parts of Europe, will probably be dropped, on account of the antiquated style and manner they are delivered in. How then shall any man, who has a genius for history equal to the best of the ancients, be able to undertake such a work with spirit and cheerfulness, when he considers that he will be read with pleasure but a very few years, and, in an age or two, shall hardly be understood without an interpreter? This is like employing an excellent statuary to work upon mouldering stone. Those who apply their studies to preserve the memory of others, will always have some concern for their own; and I believe it is for this reason that so few writers among us, of any distinction, have turned their thoughts to such a discouraging employment; for the best English historian must He under this 94 JONATHAN SWIFT mortification, — that when his style grows antiquated, he will be only considered as a tedious relater of facts, and perhaps consulted, in his turn, among other neglected authors, to fur- nish materials for some future collector. . . . TRAVELS INTO SEVERAL REMOTE NATIONS OF THE WORLD IN FOUR PARTS. BY LEMUEL GULLIVER 1726 [This book had been begun about 1720, and was known to Swift's friends sometime before its publication. It appears to have been the only one of his works for which he received pay, — £200, obtained through Pope's intervention. The Travels are divided into four parts: A Voyage to Lilliput; A Voyage to Brobdingnag; A Voyage to Laputa, Balnibarbi, Glubbdubdrib, Luggnagg, and Japan; A Voyage to the Country of the Houyhnhnms. In the first part Swift satirizes humanity by representing it as appearing contemptible in the eyes of creatures very much smaller than we; in the second part by representing it as equally contemptible when viewed through the other end of the telescope, — by creatures very much larger; in the third part he satirizes especially the intellectual efforts of the race, and its longings for immortality; in the fourth part he repre- sents humanity as infinitely contemptible from the standpoint of a com- monwealth of horses (human beings appearing in the loathsome form of "Yahoos"). The first two parts are universally known as brilliant exam- ples of circumstantial fiction; the third and fourth parts are less attractive, but more characteristic, from the increased virulence of their satire. The following extracts are from the Voyage to Laputa and Balnibarbi (chap- ters II, IV, v) and the Voyage to the Houyhnhnms (chapters v and vi).] [laputa] At my alighting, I was surrounded with a crowd of people; but those who stood nearest seemed to be of better quahty. They beheld me with all the marks and circumstances of won- der; neither, indeed, was I much in their debt, having never till then seen a race of mortals so singular in their shapes, habits, and countenances. Their heads were all rechned either to the right or the left; one of their eyes turned inward, and the other directly up to the zenith. Their outward garments were adorned with the figures of suns, moons, and stars, interwoven with those of fiddles, flutes, harps, trumpets, guitars, harpsichords, and many other instruments of music, unknown to us in Eu- GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 95 rope. I observed, here and there, many in the habit of ser- vants, with a blown bladder fastened like a flail to the end of a short stick, which they carried in their hands. In each bladder was a small quantity of dried peas, or little pebbles (as I was afterwards informed) . With these bladders they now and then flapped the mouths and ears of those who stood near them, of which practice I could not then conceive the meaning. It seems the minds of these people are so taken up with intense specula- tions, that they neither can speak, nor attend to the discourses of others, without being roused by some external taction upon the organs of speech and hearing ; for which reason those persons who are able to afford it always keep a flapper (the original is dimenole) in their family, as one of their domestics, nor ever walk abroad, or make visits, without him. And the business of this officer is, when two, three, or more persons are in company, gently to strike with his bladder the mouth of him who is to speak, and the right ear of him or them to whom the speaker addresses himself. This flapper is likewise employed dihgently to attend his master in his walks, and, upon occasion, to give him a soft flap on his eyes, because he is always so wrapped up in cogitation that he is in manifest danger of falling down every precipice, and bouncing his head against every post; and in the streets, of josthng others, or being jostled himself, into the kennel. It was necessary to give the reader this information, without which he would be at the same loss with me to understand the proceedings of these people, as they conducted me up the stairs to the top of the island, and from thence to the royal palace. While we were ascending, they forgot several times what they were about, and left me to myself, till their memories were again roused by their flappers; for they appeared altogether unmoved by the sight of my foreign habit and countenance, and by the shouts of the vulgar, whose thoughts and minds were more dis- engaged. At last we entered the palace, and proceeded into the cham- ber of presence, where I saw the king seated on his throne, at- tended on each side by persons of prime quality. Before the throne was a large table filled with globes and spheres, and mathematical instruments of all kinds. His Majesty took not the least notice of us, although our entrance was not without 96 JONATHAN SWIFT sufficient noise, by the concourse of all persons belonging to the court. But he was then deep in a problem, and we attended at least an hour before he could solve it. There stood by him on each side a young page, with flaps in their hands, and, when they saw he was at leisure, one of them gently struck his mouth, and the other his right ear ; at which he started hke one awaked on the sudden, and looking towards me, and the company I was in, recollected the occasion of our coming, whereof he had been informed before. He spoke some words, whereupon immedi- ately a young man with a flap came up to my side, and flapped me gently on the right ear, but I made signs, as well as I could, that I had no occasion for such an instrument; which, as I after- wards found, gave his Majesty, and the whole court, a very mean opinion of my understanding. The king, as far as I could conjecture, asked me several questions, and I addressed myself to him in all the languages I had. When it was found that I could neither understand nor be understood, I was conducted, by his order, to an apartment in his palace (this prince being distinguished, above all his predecessors, for his hospitality to strangers), where two servants were appointed to attend me. My dinner was brought, and four persons of quality, whom I remembered to have seen very near the king's person, did me the honor to dine with me. We had two courses, of three dishes each. In the first course there was a shoulder of mutton, cut into an equilateral triangle, a piece of beef into a rhomboid, and a pudding into a cycloid. The second course was two ducks, trussed up into the form of fiddles, sausages and puddings re- sembling flutes and hautboys, and a breast of veal in the shape of a harp. The servants cut our bread into cones, cyhnders, parallelograms, and several other mathematical figures. While we were at dinner, I made bold to ask the names of several things in their language, and those noble persons, by the assistance of their flappers, delighted to give me answers, hop- ing to raise my admiration of their great abilities, if I could be brought to converse with them. I was soon able to call for bread and drink, or whatever else I wanted. After dinner my company withdrew, and a person was sent to me, by the king's order, attended by a flapper. He brought with him pen, ink, and paper, and three or four books, giving me to understand by signs that he was sent to teach me the GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 97 language. We sat together four hours, in which time I wrote down a great number of words in columns, with the transla- tions over against them ; I likewise made a shift to learn several short sentences. For my tutor would order one of my servants to fetch something, to turn about, to make a bow, to sit, or to stand, or walk, and the like. Then I took down the sentence in writing. He showed me also, in one of his books, the figures of the sun, moon, and stars, the Zodiac, the tropics, and polar cir- cles, together with the denominations of many figures of planes and solids. He gave me the names and descriptions of all the musical instruments, and the general terms of art in playing on each of them. After he had left me, I placed all my words, with their interpretations, in alphabetical order. And thus, in a few days, by the help of a very faithful memory, I got some insight into their language. The word which I interpret the flying or floating island, is, in the original, laputa, whereof I could never learn the true ety- mology. Lap, in the old obsolete language, signifieth high, and untuh, a governor, from which they say, by corruption, was de- rived laputa, from lapuntuh. But I do not approve of this deri- vation, which seems to be a little strained. I ventured to offer to the learned among them a conjecture of my own, that laputa was quasi lap outed ; lap signifying properly the dancing of the sun-beams in the sea, and outed a wing; which, however, I shall not obtrude, but submit to the judicious reader. Those to whom the king had entrusted me, observing how ill I was clad, ordered a tailor to come next morning and take my measure for a suit of clothes. This operator did his office after a different manner from those of his trade in Europe. He first took my altitude by a quadrant, and then, with rule and com- passes, described the dimensions and outlines of my whole body, all which he entered upon paper, and in six days brought my clothes — very ill made, and quite out of shape, by happening to mistake a figure in the calculation. But my comfort was that I observed such accidents very frequent, and little re- garded. During my confinement for want of clothes, and by an indis- position that held me some days longer, I much enlarged my dictionary; and, when I went next to court, was able to under- stand many things the king spoke, and to return him some kind 98 JONATHAN SWIFT of answers. His Majesty had given orders that the islands should move north-east and by east, to the vertical point over Lagado, the metropolis of the whole kingdom below upon the firm earth. It was about ninety leagues distant, and our voy- age lasted four days and a half. I was not in the least sensible of the progressive motion made in the air by the island. On the second morning, about eleven o'clock, the king himself, in per- son, attended by his nobility, courtiers, and officers, having pre- pared all their musical instruments, played on them for three hours, without intermission, so that I was quite stunned with the noise; neither could I possibly guess the meaning, till my tutor informed me. He said that the people of their island had their ears adapted to hear the music of the spheres, which al- ways played at certain periods, and the court was now pre- pared to bear their part, in whatever instrument they most ex- celled. In our journey towards Lagado, the capital city, his Majesty ordered that the island should stop over certain towns and vil- lages, from whence he might receive the petitions of his sub- jects. And, to this purpose, several packthreads were let down, with small weights at the bottom. On these packthreads the people strung their petitions, which mounted up directly, like the scraps of paper fastened by schoolboys at the end of the string that holds their kite. Sometimes we received wine and victuals from below, which were drawn up by pulleys. The knowledge I had in mathematics gave me great assist- ance in acquiring their phraseology, which depended much upon that science and music; and in the latter I was not un- skilled. Their ideas are perpetually conversant in lines and figures. If they would, for example, praise the beauty of a wo- man, or any other animal, they describe it by rhombs, circles, parallelograms, ellipses, and other geometrical terms; or by words of art drawn from music, needless here to repeat. I ob- served, in the king's kitchen, all sorts of mathematical and musical instruments, after the figures of which they cut up the joints that were served to his Majesty's table. Their houses are very ill built, the walls bevel, without one right angle in any apartment; and this defect ariseth from the contempt they bear to practical geometry, which they despise as vulgar and mechanic, those instructions they give being too GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 99 refined for the intellectuals of their workmen, which occasions perpetual mistakes. And although they are dexterous enough upon a piece of paper in the management of the rule, the pencil, and the divader, yet, in the common actions and behavior of life, I have not seen a more clumsy, awkward, and unhandy people, nor so slow and perplexed in their conceptions upon all other subjects, except those of mathematics and music. They are very bad reasoners, and vehemently given to opposition, unless when they happen to be of the right opinion, which is seldom their case. Imagination, fancy, and invention they are wholly strangers to, nor have any words in their language by which those ideas can be expressed; the whole compass of their thoughts and mind being shut up within the two forementioned sciences. Most of them, and especially those who deal in the astrono- mical part, have great faith in judicial astrolog}^ although they are ashamed to own it publicly. But what I chiefly admired, and thought altogether unaccountable, was the strong disposi- tion I observed in them towards news and politics, perpetually inquiring into public affairs, giving their judgments in matters of state, and passionately disputing every inch of a party opin- ion. I have, indeed, observed the same disposition among most of the mathematicians I have known in Europe, although I could never discover the least analogy between the two sciences ; unless those people suppose that, because the smallest circle hath as many degrees as the largest, therefore the regulation and management of the world require no more abilities than the handling and turning of a globe. But I rather take this quality to spring from a very common infirmity of human na- ture, inclining us to be more curious and conceited in matters where we have least concern, and for which we are least adapted either by study or nature. These people are under continual disquietudes, never enjoy- ing a minute's piece of mind; and their disturbances proceed from causes which very little affect the rest of mortals. Their apprehensions arise from several changes they dread in the ce- lestial bodies. For instance, that the earth, by the continual approaches of the sun towards it, must in course of time be ab- sorbed, or swallowed up. That the face of the sun will by de- grees be encrusted with its own effluvia, and give no more light 100 JONATHAN SWIFT to the world. That the earth very narrowly escaped a brush from the tail of the last comet, which would have infallibly re- duced it to ashes ; and that the next, which they have calculated for one-and-thirty years hence, will probably destroy us. For if in its perihelion it should approach within a certain degree of the sun (as by their calculations they have reason to dread), it will conceive a degree of heat ten thousand times more intense than that of red-hot glowing iron, and, in its absence from the sun, carry a blazing tail ten hundred thousand and fourteen miles long; through which if the earth should pass, at the dis- tance of one hundred thousand miles from the nucleus or main body of the comet, it must in its passage be set on fire, and re- duced to ashes. That the sun, daily spending its rays without any nutriment to supply them, will at last be wholly consumed and annihilated ; which must be attended with the destruction of this earth, and of all the planets that receive their light from it. They are so perpetually alarmed with the apprehensions of these and the hke impending dangers, that they can neither sleep quietly in their beds, nor have any relish for the common pleasures or amusements of life. When they meet an acquaint- ance in the morning, the first question is about the sun's health, — how he looked at his setting and rising, and what hopes they have to avoid the stroke of the approaching comet. This con- versation they are apt to run into with the same temper that boys discover in dehghting to hear terrible stories of spirits and hobgobhns, which they greedily listen to, and dare not go to bed for fear. . . . [balnibarbi] This academy is not an entire single building, but a continu- ation of several houses on both sides of a street, which, growing waste, was purchased, and applied to that use. I was received very kindly by the warden, and went for many days to the academy. Every room hath in it one or more projectors, — and I beheve I could not be in fewer than five hundred rooms. The first man I saw was of a meagre aspect, with sooty hands and face, his hair and beard long, ragged, and singed in several places. His clothes, shirt, and skin were all of the same color. He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sun- GULLIVER'S TRAVELS loi beams out of cucumbers, which were to be put into vials her- metically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw inclement summers. He told me he did not doubt, in eight years more, he should be able to supply the governor's gardens with sunshine at a reasonable rate ; but he complained that his stock was low, and entreated me to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers. I made him a small present, for my lord had furnished me with money on purpose, because he knew their practice of begging from all who go to see them. . . . I saw another at work to calcine ice into gunpowder, who like- wise showed me a treatise he had written concerning the mal- leabihty of fire, which he intended to publish. There was a most ingenious architect, who had contrived a new method for building houses, by beginning at the roof and working downwards to the foundation, which he justified to me by the like practice of those two prudent insects, the bee and the spider. There was a man born blind, who had several apprentices in his own condition ; their employment was to mix colors for paint- ers, which their master taught them to distinguish by feehng and smelling. It was, indeed, my misfortune to find them, at that time, not very perfect in their lessons, and the professor himseK happened to be generally mistaken. This artist is much encouraged and esteemed by the whole fraternity. In another apartment I was highly pleased with a projector who had found a device of plowing the ground with hogs, to save the charges of ploughs, cattle, and labor. The method is this: in an acre of ground, you bury, at six inches distance, and eight deep, a quantity of acorns, dates, chestnuts, and other mast, or vegetables, whereof these animals are fondest; then you drive six hundred or more of them into the field, where, in few days, they will root up the whole ground in search of their food, and make it fit for sowing, at the same time manuring it with their dung. It is true, upon experiment, they found the charge and trouble very great, and they had httle or no crop. However, it is not doubted that this invention may be capable of great improvement. I went into another room, where the walls and ceiling were all hung round with cobwebs, except a narrow passage for the I02 JONATHAN SWIFT artist to go in and out. At my entrance, he called aloud to me not to disturb his webs. He lamented the fatal mistake the world had been so long in of using silk-worms, while we had such plenty of domestic insects who infinitely excelled the for- mer, because they understood how to weave as well as spin. And he proposed farther, that, by employing spiders, the charge of dyeing silks would be wholly saved; whereof I was fully con- vinced, when he showed me a vast number of flies most beauti- fully colored, wherewith he fed his spiders, assuring us that the webs would take a tincture from them ; and as he had them of all hues, he hoped to fit everybody's fancy, as soon as he could find proper food for the flies, of certain gums, oils, and other glutinous matter, to give a strength and consistence to the threads. There was an astronomer, who had undertaken to place a sun-dial upon the great weather-cock on the town house, by ad- justing the annual and diurnal motions of the earth and sun, so as to answer and coincide with all accidental turnings of the wind. . . . I visited many other apartments, but shall not trouble my reader with all the curiosities I observed, being studious of brevity. I had hitherto seen only one side of the academy, the other being appropriated to the advancers of speculative learning, of whom I shall say something, when I have mentioned one illus- trious person more, who is called among them "the universal artist." He told us he had been thirty years employing his thoughts for the improvement of human life. He had two large rooms full of wonderful curiosities, and fifty men at work. Some were condensing air into a dry tangible substance, by ex- tracting the nitre, and letting the aqueous or fluid particles per- colate; others softening marble for pillows and pin-cushions; others petrifying the hoofs of a living horse, to preserve them from foundering. The artist himself was at that time busy upon two great designs ; the first, to sow land with chaff, wherein he affirmed the true seminal virtue to be contained, as he de- monstrated by several experiments which I was not skillful enough to comprehend. The other was, by a certain composi- tion of gums, minerals, and vegetables, outwardly applied, to prevent the growth of wool upon two young lambs; and he GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 103 hoped, in a reasonable time, to propagate the breed of naked sheep all over the kingdom. We crossed a walk to the other part of the academy, where, as I have already said, the projectors in speculative learning resided. The first professor I saw was in a very large room, with forty pupils about him. After salutation, observing me to look earnestly upon a frame which took up the greatest part of both the length and breadth of the room, he said perhaps I might wonder to see him employed in a project for improving specula- tive knowledge by practical and mechanical operations; but the world would soon be sensible of its usefulness, and he flattered himself that a more noble, exalted thought never sprang in any other man's head. Every one knew how laborious the usual method is of attaining to arts and sciences; whereas, by his con- trivance, the most ignorant person, at a reasonable charge, and with a little bodily labor, may write books in philosophy, poetry, politics, law, mathematics, and theology, without the least assistance from genius or study. He then led me to the frame, about the sides whereof all his pupils stood in ranks. It was twenty feet square, placed in the middle of the room. The superficies was composed of several bits of wood, about the big- ness of a die, but some larger than others. They were all linked together by slender wires. These bits of wood were covered on every square with paper pasted on them; and on these papers were written all the words of their language, in their several moods, tenses, and declensions, but without any order. The professor then desired me to observe, for he was going to set his engine at work. The pupils, at his command, took each of them hold of an iron handle, whereof there were forty fixed round the edges of the frame; and, giving them a sudden turn, the whole disposition of the words was entirely changed. He then com- manded six-and- thirty of the lads to read the several lines softly, as they appeared upon the frame; and, where they found three or four words together that might make part of a sentence, they dictated to the four remaining boys, who were scribes. This work was repeated three or four times, and at every turn the engine was so contrived that the words shifted into new places, as the square bits of wood moved upside down. Six hours a day the young students were employed in this I04 JONATHAN SWIFT labor, and the professor showed me several volumes in large foho, already collected, of broken sentences which he intended to piece together, and, out of those rich materials, to give the world a complete body of all arts and sciences; which, however, might be still improved, and much expedited, if the public would raise a fund for making and employing live hundred such frames in Lagado, and oblige the managers to contribute in common their several collections. He assured me that this invention had employed all his thoughts from his youth; that he had emptied the whole vocab- ulary into his frame, and made the strictest computation of the general proportion there is in books between the numbers of particles, nouns, and verbs, and other parts of speech. I made my humblest acknowledgment to this illustrious per- son for his great communicativeness; and promised, if ever I had the good fortune to return to my native country, that I would do him justice, as the sole inventor of this wonderful ma- chine; the form and contrivance of which I desired leave to de- lineate upon paper, as in the figure here annexed. I told him, although it were the custom of our learned in Europe to steal inventions from each other, — who had thereby at least this advantage, that it became a controversy which was the right owner, — yet I would take such caution, that he should have the honor entire, without a rival. We next went to the school of languages, where three pro- fessors sat in consultation upon improving that of their own country. The first project was to shorten discourse by cutting poly- syllables into one, and leaving out verbs and participles; be- 'tause, in reality, all things imaginable are but nouns. The other project was a scheme for entirely abolishing all words whatsoever; and this was urged as a great advantage in point of health, as well as brevity. For it is plain that every word we speak is, in some degree, a diminution of our lungs by corrosion, and consequently contributes to the shortening of our lives. An expedient was therefore offered, that, since words are only names for things, it would be more convenient for all men to carry about them such things as were necessary to ex- press the particular business they are to discourse on. And this invention would certainly have taken place, to the great ease as GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 105 well as health of the subject, if the women, in conjunction with the vulgar and illiterate, had not threatened to raise a rebellion, unless they might be allowed the liberty to speak with their tongues after the manner of their forefathers; such constant irreconcilable enemies to science are the common people. How- ever, many of the most learned and wise adhere to the new scheme of expressing themselves by things; which hath only this inconvenience attending it, that, if a man's business be very great, and of various kinds, he must be obliged, in proportion, to carry a greater bundle of things upon his back, unless he can af- ford one or two strong servants to attend him. I have often be- held two of those sages almost sinking under the weight of their packs, Hke peddlers among us, who, when they met in the streets, would lay down their loads, open their sacks, and hold conversation for an hour together, — then put up their imple- ments, help each other resume their burdens, and take their leave. But for short conversations a man may carry implements in his pockets, and under his arms, enough to supply him; and in his house he cannot be at a loss. Therefore the room where com- pany meet, who practice this art, is full of all things ready at hand, requisite to furnish matter for this kind of artificial con- verse. Another great advantage proposed by this invention was, that it would serve as an universal language, to be understood in all civilized nations, whose goods and utensils are generally of the same kind, or nearly resembling, so that their uses might easily be comprehended. And thus ambassadors would be qualified to treat with foreign princes, or ministers of state, to whose tongues they were utter strangers. I was at the mathematical school, where the master taught his pupils after a method scarce imaginable to us in Europe. The proposition and demonstration were fairly written on a thin wafer, with ink composed of a cephalic tincture. This the student was to swallow upon a fasting stomach, and for three days following eat nothing but bread and water. As the wafer digested, the tincture mounted to his brain, bearing the proposi- tion along with it. But the success had not hitherto been an- swerable, partly by some error in the quantum or composition, and partly by the perverseness of lads, to whom this bolus is io6 JONATHAN SWIFT so nauseous, that they generally steal aside, and discharge it upwards, before it can operate; neither have they been yet persuaded to use so long an abstinence as the prescription re- quires. . . . [the houyhnhnms] The reader may please to observe that the following extract of many conversations I had with my master, contains a sum- mary of the most material points which were discoursed at sev- eral times, for above two years, his Honor often desiring fuller satisfaction, as I farther improved in the Houyhnhnm tongue. I laid before him, as well as I could, the whole state of Europe; I discoursed of trade and manufactures, of arts and sciences; and the answers I gave to all the questions he made, as they arose upon several subjects, were a fund of conversation not to be exhausted. But I shall here only set down the substance of what passed between us concerning my own country, reducing it into order as well as I can, without any regard to time, or other circumstances, while I strictly adhere to truth. My only concern is, that I shall hardly be able to do justice to my mas- ter's arguments and expressions, which must needs suffer by my want of capacity, as well as by a translation into our bar- barous English. In obedience, therefore, to his Honor's commands, I related to him the revolution under the Prince of Orange ; the long war with France entered into by the said Prince, and renewed by his successor the present Queen, wherein the greatest powers of Christendom were engaged, and which still continued; I com- puted, at his request, that about a million of Yahoos might have been killed in the whole progress of it, and perhaps a hundred or more cities taken, and five times as many ships burnt or sunk. He asked me what were the usual causes or motives that made one country go to war with another. I answered they were innumerable; but I should only mention a few of the chief. Sometimes the ambition of princes, who never think they have land or people enough to govern; sometimes the corruption of ministers, who engage their master in a war in order to stifle or divert the clamor of the subjects against their evil administra- tion. Difference in opinion hath cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 107 the juice of a certain berry be blood or wine; whether whistling be a vice or virtue; whether it be better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire; what is the best color for a coat, — whether black, white, red, or gray ; and whether it should be long or short, narrow or wide, dirty or clean; with many more. Neither are any wars so furious and bloody, or of so long continuance, as those occasioned by difference in opinion, especially if it be in things indifferent. Sometimes the quarrel between two princes is to decide which of them shall dispossess a third of his dominions, where neither of them pretend to any right. Sometimes one prince quarrel- eth with another, for fear the other should quarrel with him. Sometimes a war is entered upon, because the enemy is too strong; and sometimes because he is too weak. Sometimes our neighbors want the things which we have, or have the things which we want; and we both fight, till they take ours, or give us theirs. It is a very justifiable cause of a war, to invade a country, after the people have been wasted by famine, destroyed by pes- tilence, or embroiled by factions among themselves. It is justi- fiable to enter into war against our nearest ally, when one of his towns hes convenient for us, or a territory of land, that would render our dominions round and complete. If a prince sends forces into a nation where the people are poor and ignor- ant, he may lawfully put half of them to death, and make slaves of the rest, in order to civiHze and reduce them from their bar- barous way of living. It is a very kingly, honorable, and fre- quent practice, when one prince desires the assistance of another to secure him against an invasion, that the assistant, when he hath driven out the invader, should seize on the dominions him- self, and kill, imprison, or banish the prince he came to relieve. Alliance by blood or marriage is a frequent cause of war between princes; and the nearer the kindred is, the greater is their dis- position to quarrel. Poor nations are hungry, and rich nations are proud; and pride and hunger will ever be at variance. For these reasons, the trade of a soldier is held the most honorable of all others; because a soldier is a Yahoo hired to kill in cold blood as many of his own species, who had never offended him, as possibly he can. There is likewise a kind of beggarly princes in Europe, not able to make war by themselves, who hire out their troops to io8 JONATHAN SWIFT richer nations, for so much a day to each man; of which they keep three-fourths to themselves, and it is the best part of their maintenance; such are those in Germany and other northern parts of Europe. " What you have told me," said my master, "upon the sub- ject of war, does, indeed, discover most admirably the effects of that reason you pretend to; however, it is happy that the shame is greater than the danger, and that Nature hath left you utterly incapable of doing much mischief. For, your mouths lying flat with your faces, you can hardly bite each other to any purpose, unless by consent. Then, as to the claws upon your feet before and behind, they are so short and tender, that one of our Yahoos would drive a dozen of yours before him. And therefore, in recounting the numbers of those who have been killed in battle, I cannot but think that you have said the thing which is not." I could not forbear shaking my head, and smiling a little at his ignorance. And, being no stranger to the art of war, I gave him a description of cannons, culverins, muskets, carbines, pis- tols, bullets, powder, swords, bayonets, battles, sieges, retreats, attacks, undermines, countermines, bombardments, sea-fights; ships sunk with a thousand men; twenty thousand killed on each side; dying groans, limbs flying in the air; smoke, noise, confusion, trampling to death under horses' feet; flight, pursuit, victory; fields strewed with carcases, left for food to dogs and wolves and birds of prey; plundering, stripping, ravishing, burning, and destroying. And, to set forth the valor of my own dear countrymen, I assured him that I had seen them blow up a hundred enemies at once in a siege, and as many in a ship; and beheld the dead bodies come down in pieces from the clouds, to the great diversion of the spectators. I was going on to more particulars when my master com- manded me silence. He said, whoever understood the nature of Yahoos might easily believe it possible for so vile an animal to be capable of every action I had named, if their strength and cunning equaled their malice. But as my discourse had in- creased his abhorrence of the whole species, so he found it gave him a disturbance in his mind, to which he was wholly a stran- ger before. He thought his ears, being used to such abominable words, might, by degrees, admit them with less detestation. GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 109 That, although he hated the Yahoos of this country, yet he no more blamed them for their odious qualities than he did a gnnayh (a bird of prey) for its cruelty, or a sharp stone for cut- ting his hoof. But when a creature pretending to reason could be capable of such enormities, he dreaded lest the corruption of that faculty might be worse than brutaUty itself. He seemed therefore confident that, instead of reason, we were only pos- sessed of some quality fitted to increase our natural vices, as the reflection from a troubled stream returns the image of anill- shapen body, not only larger, but more distorted. He added that he had heard too much upon the subject of war, both in this and some former discourses. There was another point which a little perplexed him at present. I had informed him that some of our crew left their country on account of be- ing ruined by law; that I had already explained the meaning of the word, but he was at a loss how it should come to pass that the law, which was intended for every man's preservation, should be any man's ruin. Therefore he desired to be further satisfied what I meant by law, and the dispensers thereof, ac- cording to the present practice in my own country; because he thought Nature and reason were sufl&cient guides for a reason- able animal, as we pretended to be, in showing us what we ought to do and what to avoid. I assured his Honor that law was a science in which I had not much conversed, further than by employing advocates in vain, upon some injustices that had been done me; however, I would give him all the satisfaction I was able. I said, there was a society of men among us, bred up from their youth in the art of proving, by words multiplied for the purpose, that white is black, and black is white, according as they are paid. To this society all the rest of the people are slaves. For example, if my neighbor hath a mind to my cow, he hires a lawyer to prove that he ought to have my cow from me. I must then hire another to defend my right, it being against all rules of law that any man should be allowed to speak for himself. Now in this case I, who am the right owner, lie under two disadvantages; first, my lawyer, being practiced almost from his cradle in defending falsehood, is quite out of his ele- ment when he would be an advocate for justice, — which, as an office unnatural, he always attempts with great awkwardness, no JONATHAN SWIFT if not with ill-will. The second disadvantage is, that my lawyer must proceed with great caution, or else he will be reprimanded by the judges, and abhorred by his brethren, as one that would lessen the practice of the law. And therefore I have but two methods to preserve my cow. The first is, to gain over my ad- versary's lawyer with a double fee; who will then betray his client, by insinuating that he hath justice on his side. The second way is for my lawyer to make my cause appear as un- just as he can, by allowing the cow to belong to my adversary; and this, if it be skillfully done, will certainly bespeak the favor of the bench. Now, your Honor is to know that these judges are persons appointed to decide all controversies of property, as well as for the trial of criminals, and picked out from the most dexterous lawyers, who are grown old or lazy, and, hav- ing been biased all their Hves against truth and equity, are imder such a fatal necessity of favoring fraud, perjury, and oppression, that I have known several of them refuse a large bribe from the side where justice lay, rather than injure the faculty by doing anything unbecoming their nature or their office. It is a maxim among these lawyers that whatever hath been done before may legally be done again; and therefore they take special care to record all the decisions formerly made against common justice and the general reason of mankind. These, under the name of precedents, they produce as authori- ties, to justify the most iniquitous opinions, and the judges never fail of directing accordingly. In pleading, they studiously avoid entering into the merits of the cause, but are loud, violent, and tedious, in dwelling upon all circumstances which are not to the purpose. For instance, in the case already mentioned, they never desire to know what claim or title my adversary hath to my cow, but whether the said cow were red or black, her horns long or short, — whether the field I graze her in be round or square, — whether she was milked at home or abroad, — what diseases she is subject to, and the like; after which they consult precedents, adjourn the cause from time to time, and in ten, twenty, or thirty years, come to an issue. It is hkewise to be observed that this society hath a pecu- liar cant and jargon of their own, that no other mortal can un- GULLIVER'S TRAVELS iii derstand, and wherein all their laws are written, which they take special care to multiply; whereby they have wholly con- founded the very essence of truth and falsehood, of right and wrong; so that it will take thirty years to decide whether the field left me by my ancestors for six generations, belongs to me, or to a stranger three hundred miles off. . . . My master was yet wholly at a loss to understand what mo- tives could incite this race of lawyers to perplex, disquiet, and weary themselves, and engage in a confederacy of injustice, merely for the sake of injuring their fellow-animals; neither could he comprehend what I meant in saying they did it for hire. Whereupon I was at much pains to describe to him the use of money, the materials it was made of, and the value of the metals ; that, when a Yahoo had got a great store of this pre- cious substance, he was able to purchase whatever he had a mind to, — the finest clothing, the noblest houses, great tracts of land, the most costly meats and drinks, and have his choice of the most beautiful females. Therefore, since money alone was able to perform all these feats, our Yahoos thought they could never have enough of it to spend, or to save, as they found themselves inclined, from their natural bent, either to profusion or avarice. That the rich man enjoyed the fruit of the poor man's labor, and the latter were a thousand to one in proportion to the former. That the bulk of our people were forced to Hve miserably, by laboring every day for small wages, to make a few Hve plentifully. I enlarged myself much on these and many other particulars, to the same purpose, but his Honor was still to seek ; for he went upon a supposition that all animals had a title to their share in the productions of the earth, and especially those who presided over the rest. Therefore he desired I would let him know what these costly meats were, and how any of us happened to want them. Whereupon I enu- merated as many sorts as came into my head, with the various methods of dressing them, which could not be done without sending vessels by sea to every part of the world, as well for liquors to drink, as for sauces, and innumerable other conve- niences. I assured him that this whole globe of earth must be at least three times gone round, before one of our better female Yahoos could get her breakfast, or a cup to put it in. He said that must needs be a miserable country which cannot furnish 112 JONATHAN SWIFT food for its own inhabitants. But what he chiefly wondered at, was how such vast tracts of ground as I described should be wholly without fresh water, and the people put to the necessity of sending over the sea for drink. I replied that England (the dear place of my nativity) was computed to produce three times the quantity of food more than its inhabitants are able to consume, as well as hquors extracted from grain, or pressed out of the fruit of certain trees, which made excellent drink; and the same proportion in every other convenience of life. But in order to feed the luxury and intemperance of the males, and the vanity of the females, we sent away the greatest part of our necessary things to other countries, from whence, in return, we brought the materials of diseases, folly, and vice, to spend among ourselves. Hence it follows of necessity that vast num- bers of our people are compelled to seek their livelihood by begging, robbing, stealing, cheating, pimping, forswearing, flat- tering, suborning, forging, gaming, lying, fawning, hectoring, voting, scribbling, star-gazing, poisoning, whoring, canting, libeling, free-thinking, and the like occupations ; every one of which terms I was at much pains to make him understand. That wine was not imported among us from foreign coun- tries, to supply the want of water, or other drinks, but because it was a sort of liquid which made us merry, by putting us out of our senses; diverted all melancholy thoughts, begat wild ex- travagant imaginations in the brain, raised our hopes, and ban- ished our fears; suspended every ofiice of reason for a time, and deprived us of the use of our limbs, till we fell into a profound sleep; although it must be confessed that we always awaked sick and dispirited, and that the use of this liquor filled us with diseases which made our lives uncomfortable and short. But, beside all this, the bulk of our people supported them- selves by furnishing the necessities or conveniences of life to the rich, and to each other. For instance, when I am at home, and dressed as I ought to be, I carry on my body the workman- ship of an hundred tradesmen; the building and furniture of my house employ as many more, and five times the number to adorn my wife. I was going on to tell him of another sort of people, who get their Hvelihood by attending the sick, having upon some occa- sions informed his Honor that many of my crew had died of GULLIVER'S TRAVELS 113 diseases. But here it was with the utmost difficulty that I brought him to apprehend what I meant. He could easily con- ceive that a Houyhnhnm grew weak and heavy a few days be- fore his death; or, by some accident, might hurt a Hmb. But that Nature, who works all things to perfection, should suffer any pains to breed in our bodies, he thought impossible, and desired to know the reason of so unaccountable an evil. I told him, we fed on a thousand things, which operated contrary to each other; that we ate when we were not hungry, and drank without the provocation of thirst; that we sat whole nights drinking strong liquors, without eating a bit, which disposed us to sloth, inflamed our bodies, and precipitated or prevented digestion. That it would be endless to give him a catalogue of all diseases incident to human bodies, for they could not be fewer than five or six hundred, spread over every limb and joint; in short, every part, external and intestine, having dis- eases appropriated to each. To remedy which, there was a sort of people bred up among us, in the profession, or pretence, of curing the sick. And, because I had some skill in the faculty, I would, in gratitude to his Honor, let him know the whole mystery and method by which they proceed. Their fundamental idea is, that all diseases arise from reple- tion ; from whence they conclude that a great evacuation of the body is necessary. Their next business is, from herbs, miner- als, gums, oils, shells, salts, juices, seaweed, excrements, barks of trees, serpents, toads, frogs, spiders, dead men's flesh and bones, birds, beasts, and fishes, to form a composition for smell and taste the most abominable, nauseous, and detestable they can possibly contrive, which the stomach immediately rejects with loathing; and this they call a vomit. Or else, from the same storehouse, with some other poisonous additions, they command us to take in a medicine equally annoying and dis- gustful to the bowels. . . . But, besides real diseases, we are subject to many that are only imaginary, for which the physicians have invented im- aginary cures; these have their several names, and so have the drugs that are proper for them; and with these our female Yahoos are always infested. . . . 114 JONATHAN SWIFT -^^^^^ A MODEST PROPOSAL FOR PREVENTING THE CHILDREN OF POOR PEOPLE .1^,^ IN IRELAND FROM BEING A BURDEN TO THEIR PARENTS OR COUNTRY, AND FOR MAKING THEM BENEFICIAL TO THE PUBLIC 1729 [This is the most famous of Swift's tracts on Irish aflfairs, occasioned by his long residence in Dublin and his concern for the suffering and wrongs of the Irish people; it is also the most terrible example of his caustic irony. Craik remarks: "He adopts the phraseology, the outward style, the man- nerisms of the humorist; but it is only to give intensity to the irony." And Prescott: "To overlook Swift's serious purpose is entirely to mis- understand the piece. Take the passage in which Swift proposes remedies, — the expedients rejected, in the ironical presentation, being of course the very ones which he wishes seriously to recommend."] It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town, or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin-doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags, and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest Hvelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants; who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbadoes. I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is, in the present deplorable state of the kingdom, a very great additional griev- ance; and therefore whoever could find out a fair, cheap, and easy method of making these children sound, useful members of the commonwealth, would deserve so well of the public as to have his statue set up for a preserver of the nation. But my intention is very far from being confined to provide only for the children of professed beggars; it is of a much greater extent, and shall take in the whole number of infants at a certain age, who are born of parents in effect as little able A MODEST PROPOSAL ii5 ' "^ to support them, as those who demand our charity in the streets. As to my own part, having turned my thoughts for many years upon this important subject, and maturely weighed the several schemes of our projectors, I have always found them grossly mistaken in their computation. It is true a child just born may be supported by its mother's milk for a solar year, with little other nourishment; at most, not above the value of two shillings, which the mother may certainly get, or the value in scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging; and it is exactly at one year old that I propose to provide for them in such a manner as, instead of being a charge upon their parents or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the rest of their lives, they shall on the contrary contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing, of many thousands. There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that hor- rid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas, too frequent among us! sacrificing the poor innocent babes, I doubt more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast. The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which number I subtract thirty thousand couple, who are able to maintain their own children (although I apprehend there cannot be so many, under the present distresses of the king- dom) ; but this being granted, there will remain a hundred and seventy thousand breeders. I again subtract fifty thousand, for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by acci- dent or disease within the year. There only remain a hundred and twenty thousand children of poor parents annually born. The question therefore is, How this number shall be reared and provided for? which, as I have already said, under the present situation of affairs is utterly impossible by all the methods hitherto proposed. For we can neither employ them in handi- craft or agriculture; we neither build houses (I mean in the country) nor cultivate land; they can very seldom pick up a livelihood by stealing, till they arrive at six years old, except where they are of towardly parts, — although I confess they V ii6 JONATHAN SWIFT learn the rudiments much earlier; during which time they can, however, be properly looked upon only as probationers; as I have been informed by a principal gentleman in the county of Cavan, who protested to me that he never knew above one or two instances under the age of six, even in a part of the king- dom so renowned for the quickest proficiency in that art. I am assured by our merchants that a boy or a girl before twelve years old is no saleable commodity ; and even when they come to this age they will not yield above three pounds, or three pounds and half-a-crown at most, on the exchange; which can- not turn to account either to the parents or kingdom, the charge of nutriment and rags having been at least four times that value. I shall now, therefore, humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection. I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and A wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout. I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration, that of the hundred and twenty thousand children already com- puted, twenty thousand may be reserved for breed, whereof only one-fourth part to be males ; which is more than we allow to sheep, black-cattle, or swine; and my reason is, that these children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded by our savages; therefore one male will be sufficient for four females. That the remaining hundred thou- sand may, at a year old, be offered in sale to the persons of quality and fortune through the kingdom ; always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump and fat for a good table. A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends ; and when the fam- ily dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, and, seasoned with a little pepper or salt, will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter. I have reckoned, upon a medium, that a child just born will weigh twelve pounds, and in a solar year, if tolerably nursed, will increase to twenty-eight pounds. / A MODEST PROPOSAL 117 I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children. . . . I have already computed the charge of nursing a beggar's child (in which list I reckon all cottagers, laborers, and four- fifths of the farmers) to be about two shillings per annum, rags included; and I believe no gentleman would repine to give ten shillings for the carcass of a good fat child, which, as I have said, will make four dishes of excellent nutritive meat, when he has only some particular friend, or his own family, to dine with him. Thus the squire will learn to be a good landlord, and grow popular among his tenants ; the mother will have eight shillings net profit, and be fit for work till she produces another child. Those who are more thrifty (as I must confess the times require) may flay the carcass; the skin of which, artificially dressed, will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer- boots for fine gentlemen. As to our city of Dublin, shambles may be appointed for this purpose in the most convenient parts of it, and butchers we may be assured will not be wanting ; although I rather recom- mend buying the children alive, then dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs. A very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem, was lately pleased, in discoursing on this matter, to offer a refinement upon my scheme. He said that, many gentlemen of this kingdom having of late destroyed their deer, he conceived that the want of venison might be well supplied by the bodies of young lads and maidens, not exceed- ing fourteen years of age, nor under twelve; so great a number of both sexes in every country being now ready to starve for want of work and service; and these to be disposed of by their parents, if alive, or otherwise by their nearest relations. But, with due deference to so excellent a friend, and so deserving a patriot, I cannot be altogether in his sentiments ; for as to the males, my American acquaintance assured me, from frequent experience, that their flesh was generally tough and lean, like that of our schoolboys, by continual exercise, and their taste disagreeable; and to fatten them would not answer the charge. Then as to the females, it would, I think, with humble submis- ii8 JONATHAN SWIFT sion, be a loss to the public, because they soon would become breeders themselves. And besides, it is not improbable that some scrupulous people might be apt to censure such a prac- tice (although indeed very unjustly) , as a little bordering upon cruelty ; which, I confess, has always been with me the strongest objection against any project, how well soever intended. But in order to justify my friend, he confessed that this expedient was put into his head by the famous Psalmanazar, a native of the island Formosa, who came from thence to Lon- don above twenty years ago, and in conversation told my friend that in his country, when any young person happened to be put to death, the executioner sold the carcass to persons of quality as a prime dainty ; and that in his time the body of a plump girl of fifteen, who was crucified for an attempt to poison the emperor, was sold to his imperial majesty's prime minister of state, and other great mandarins of the court, in joints from the gibbet, at four hundred crowns. Neither in- deed can I deny that, if the same use were made of several plump young girls in this town, who, without one single groat to their fortunes, cannot stir abroad without a chair, and ap- pear at playhouse and assemblies in foreign fineries which they never will pay for, the kingdom would not be the worse. Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people who are aged, diseased, or maimed ; and I have been desired to employ my thoughts, what course may be taken to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. But I am not in the least pain upon that matter, because it is very well known that they are every day dying, and rotting, by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. And as to the young laborers, they are now in almost as hopeful a condition ; they cannot get work, and consequently pine away for want of nourishment, to a degree that, if at any time they are accidentally hired to common labor, they have not strength to perform it; and thus the country and themselves are happily delivered from the evils to come. I have too long digressed, and therefore shall return to my subject. I think the advantages by the proposal which I have made are obvious and.many, as well as of the highest import- ance. A MODEST PROPOSAL 119 For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of Papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation, as well as our most dangerous enemies; and who stay at home on purpose to de- liver the kingdom to the Pretender, hoping to take their ad- vantage by the absence of so many good Protestants, who have chosen rather to leave their country than stay at home and pay tithes against their conscience to an Episcopal curate. Secondly, The poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own, which by law may be made liable to distress, and help to pay their landlord's rent; their corn and cattle being already seized, and money a thing unknown. Thirdly, Whereas the maintenance of a hundred thousand children, from two years old and upward, cannot be computed at less than ten shillings apiece per annum, the nation's stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum, beside the profit of a new dish introduced to the tables of all gentlemen of fortune in the kingdom, who have any refinement in taste. And the money will circulate among ourselves, the goods being entirely of our own growth and manufacture. Fourthly, The constant breeders, beside the gain of eight shillings sterling per annum by the sale of their children, will be rid of the charge of maintaining them after the first year. Fifthly, This food would likewise bring great custom to tav- erns ; where the vintners will certainly be so prudent as to pro- cure the best receipts for dressing it to perfection, and, con- sequently, have their houses frequented by all the fine gentle- men, who justly value themselves upon their knowledge in good eating; and a skillful cook, who understands how to oblige his guests, will contrive to make it as expensive as they please. Sixthly, This would be a great inducement to marriage, which all wise nations have either encouraged by rewards, or enforced by laws and penalties. It would increase the care and tenderness of mothers toward their children, when they were sure of a settlement for life to the poor babes, provided in some sort by the public, to their annual profit or expense. We should see an honest emulation among the married women, which of them could bring the fattest child to the market. Many other advantages might be enumerated. For instance, the addition of some thousand carcasses in our exportation of I20 JONATHAN SWIFT barreled beef; the propagation of swine's flesh, and improve- ment in the art of making good bacon, so much wanted among us by the great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our table ; which are no way comparable in taste or magnificence to a well-" grown, fat, yearling child, which, roasted whole, will make a considerable figure at a lord mayor's feast, or any other public entertainment. But this, and many others, I omit, being stu- dious of brevity. Supposing that one thousand families in this city would be constant customers for infants' flesh, beside others who might have it at merry-meetings, particularly at weddings and chris- tenings, I compute that Dublin would take off annually about twenty thousand carcases ; and the rest of the kingdom (where probably they will be sold somewhat cheaper) the remaining eighty thousand. I can think of no one objection that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged that the num- ber of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. This I freely own, and it was indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. I desire the reader will observe that I calculate my remedy for this one individual kingdom of Ire- land, and for no other that ever was, is, or I think ever can be. upon earth. Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedi- ents : of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound ; of using neither clothes, nor household furniture, except what is our own growth and manufacture; of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury; of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women; of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence, and temperance; of learning to love our country, in the want of which we differ even from Laplanders, and the inhabitants of Topinamboo; of quitting our animosities and factions, nor acting any longer like the Jews, who were murdering one an- other at the very moment their city was taken; of being a little cautious not to sell our country and conscience for nothing; of teaching landlords to have at least one degree of mercy toward their tenants; lastly, of putting a spirit of honesty, industry, and skill into our shopkeepers, who, if a resolution could now be taken to buy only our native goods, would immediately unite to cheat and exact upon us in the price, the measure, and A MODEST PROPOSAL i2i the goodness, nor could ever yet be brought to make one fair proposal of just dealmg, though often and earnestly invited to it. Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, till he has at least some glimpse of hope that there will be ever some hearty and sincere attempt to put them in practice. But, as to myself, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this pro- posal; which, as it is wholly new, so it has something solid and real, of no expense and little trouble, full in our own power, and whereby we can incur no danger in disobliging England. For this kind of commodity will not bear exportation, the flesh being of too tender a consistence to admit a long continuance in salt, although perhaps I could name a country which would be glad to eat up our whole nation without it. After all, I am not so violently bent upon my own opinion as to reject any offer proposed by wise men, which shall be found equally innocent, cheap, easy, and effectual. But before something of that kind shall be advanced in contradiction to my scheme, and offering a better, I desire the author, or authors, will be pleased maturely to consider two points. First, as things now stand, how they will be able to find food and raiment for a hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. And, secondly, there being a round million of creatures in human figure throughout this kingdom, whose whole subsist- ence put into a common stock would leave them in debt two millions of pounds sterling, adding those who are beggars by profession, to the bulk of farmers, cottagers, and laborers, with the wives and children who are beggars in effect, — I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold as to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals, whether they would not at this day think it a great happiness to have been sold for food at a year old, in the manner I prescribe, and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes as they have since gone through, by the oppression of landlords, the impossibility of paying rent without money or trade, the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor clothes to cover them from 122 JONATHAN SWIFT the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable pros- pect of entailing the like or greater miseries upon their breed for ever. I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this neces- sary work, having no other motive than the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, reliev- ing the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich, I have no children by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child-bearing. RICHARD STEELE ^ ^ THE TATLER \ ^ [This periodical was founded by Steele, and issued three times a week for 271 numbers, from April, 1709, to January, 1711. Steele himself wrote about 188 of these. The papers were supposed to be written by one Isaac Bickerstaff, a pseudonym which had been used by Swift in certain pam- phlets in which he attacked, and predicted the death of, an astrologer named Partridge. (See the allusion to this practical joke in the extracts from the first number.)] No. I. Tuesday, April 12, 1709 Quicquid agunl homines . . . nostri farrago libelli. — Juv., Sat. I, 85, 86. Though the other papers which are pubh'shed for the use of the good people of England have certainly very wholesome effects, and are laudable in their particular kinds, yet they do not seem to come up to the main design of such narrations, which, I humbly presume, should be principally intended for the use of politic persons, who are so public-spirited as to neglect their own affairs to look into transactions of state. Now these gentlemen, for the most part, being men of strong zeal and weak intellects, it is both a charitable and a necessary work to offer something whereby such worthy and well- affected members of the commonwealth may be instructed, after their reading, what to think; which shall be the end and purpose of this my paper; wherein I shall from time to time report and consider all matters of what kind soever that shall occur to me, and publish such my advices and reflections every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday in the week, for the con- venience of the post. I have also resolved to have something which may be of entertainment to the fair sex, in honor of whom I have taken the title of this paper. I therefore earn- estly desire all persons, without distinction, to take it in for the present gratis, and hereafter at the price of one penny, forbidding all hawkers to take more for it at their peril. And I desire my readers to consider that I am at a very great charge for proper materials for this work, as well as that, before I 124 RICHARD STEELE resolved upon it, I had settled a correspondence in all parts of the known and knowing world. And forasmuch as this globe is not trodden upon by mere drudges of business only, but that men of spirit and genius are justly to be esteemed as consider- able agents in it, we shall not, upon a dearth of news, present you with musty foreign edicts, or dull proclamations, but shall divide our relation of the passages which occur in action or dis- course throughout this town, as well as elsewhere, under such dates of places as may prepare you for the matter you are to expect; in the following manner: All accounts of gallantry, pleasure, and entertainment shall be under the article of White's Chocolate-house; poetry, un- der that of Will's Coffee-house; learning, under the title of Grecian; foreign and domestic news you will have from St. James's Coffee-house; and what else I shall on any other sub- ject offer, shall be dated from my own apartment. I once more desire my readers to consider that, as I cannot keep an ingenious man to go daily to Will's under twopence each day merely for his charges, to White's under sixpence, nor to the Grecian without allowing him some plain Spanish, to be as able as others at the learned table, and that a good observer cannot speak with even Kidney ^ at St. James's with- out clean linen, — I say, these considerations will, I hope, make all persons willing to comply with my humble request (when my gratis stock is exhausted) of a penny apiece; espe- cially since they are sure of some proper amusement, and that it is impossible for me to want means to entertain them, — having, besides the helps of my own parts, the power of divi- nation, and that I can, by casting a figure, tell you all that will happen before it comes to pass. But this last faculty I shall use very sparingly, and not speak of anything until it is passed, for fear of divulging matters which may offend our supe- riors. . . . From my own apartment. . I am sorry I am obliged to trouble the public with so much discourse upon a matter which I at the very first mentioned as a trifle, viz., the death of Mr. Partridge, under whose name there is an almanac come out for the year 1709, in one page of which it is asserted by the said John Partridge, that he is still , 1 A waiter. THE TATLER 125 living, and that not only so, but that he was also living some time before, and even at the instant when I writ of his death. I have in another place, and in a paper by itself, sufficiently convinced this man that he is dead; and if he has any shame, I don't doubt but that by this time he owns it to all his acquaint- ance; for though the legs and arms and whole body of that man may still appear and perform their animal functions, yet since, as I have elsewhere observed, his art is gone, the man is gone. I am, as I said, concerned that this little matter should make so much noise; but since I am engaged, I take myself obliged in honor to go on in my lucubrations, and by the help of these arts of which I am master, as well as my skill in astrological speculations, I shall, as I see occasion, proceed to confute other dead men, who pretend to be in being, that they are actually deceased. I therefore give all men fair warning to mend their manners, for I shall from time to time print bills of mortality; ^ and I beg the pardon of all such who shall be named therein, if they who are good for nothing shall find themselves in the number of the deceased. No. 25. June 7, 1709 White's Chocolate-house. A letter from a young lady, written in the most passion- ate terms, wherein she laments the misfortune of a gentleman, her lover, who was lately wounded in a duel, has turned my thoughts to that subject, and inclined me to examine into the causes which precipitate men into so fatal a folly. And as it has been proposed to treat of subjects of gallantry in the arti- cle from hence, and no one point of nature is more proper to be considered by the company who frequent this place, than that of duels, it is worth our consideration to examine into this chi- merical groundless humor, and to lay every other thought aside till we have stripped it of all its false pretences to credit and reputation amongst men. But I must confess, when I consider what I am going about, and run over in my imagination all the endless crowd of men of honor who will be ofTended at such a discourse, I am undertaking, methinks, a work worthy an invulnerable hero in romance, rather than a private gentleman with a single rapier. But as I am pretty well acquainted by 1 See note to page 45. 126 RICHARD STEELE great opportunities with the nature of man, and know of a truth that all men fight against their will, the danger vanishes, and resolution rises upon this subject. For this reason I shall talk very freely on a custom which all men wish exploded, though no man has courage enough to resist it. But there is one unintelligible word which I fear will extremely perplex my dissertation, and I confess to you I find very hard to explain, which is the term ''satisfaction." An honest country gentle- man had the misfortune to fall into company with two or three modern men of honor, where he happened to be very ill-treated; and one of the company, being conscious of his offense, sends a note to him in the morning, and tells him he was ready to give him satisfaction. "This is fine doing," says the plain fellow. " Last night he sent me away cursedly out of humor, and this morning he fancies it would be a satisfaction to be run through the body." As the matter at present stands, it is not to do handsome actions denominates a man of honor; it is enough if he dares to defend lill ones. Thus you often see a common sharper in competition with a gentleman of the first rank, though all mankind is convinced that a fighting gamester is only a pick- pocket with the courage of a highwayman. One cannot with any patience reflect on the unaccountable jumble of persons and things in this town and nation, which occasions very frequently that a brave man falls by a hand below that of the common hangman, and yet his executioner escapes the clutches of the hangman for doing it. I shall therefore hereafter consider how the bravest men in other ages and nations have behaved themselves upon such incidents as we decide by combat, and show, from their practice, that this resentment neither has its foundation from true reason nor sohd fame, but is an impos- ture, made up of cowardice, falsehood, and want of understand- ing. For this work, a good history of quarrels would be very edifying to the public, and I apply myself to the town for par- ticulars and circumstances within their knowledge, which may serve to embellish the dissertation with proper cuts. Most of the quarrels I have ever known have proceeded from some valiant coxcomb's persisting in the wrong, to defend some pre- vailing folly, and preserve himself from the ingenuity of own- ing a mistake. THE TATLER 127 By this means it is called ''giving a man satisfaction" to urge your offense against him with your sword ; which puts me in mind of Peter's order to the keeper, in the Tale of a Tub: " If you neglect to do all this, damn you and your generation for ever; and so we bid you heartily farewell." If the contra- diction in the very terms of one of our challenges were as well explained, and tjirned into plain English, would it not run after this manner? " Sir: Your extraordinary behavior last night, and the liberty you were pleased to take with me, makes me this morning give you this, to tell you, because you are an ill-bred puppy, I will meet you in Hyde Park an hour hence; and because you want both breeding and humanity, I desire you would come with a pistol in your hand, on horseback, and endeavor to shoot me through the head, to teach you more manners. If you fail of doing me this pleasure, I shall say you are a rascal on every post in town. And so, sir, if you will not injure me more, I shall never forgive what you have done already. Pray, sir, do not fail of getting everything ready, and you will infinitely oblige, Sir, Your most obedient, humble servant, &c." . . . No. 95. November 17, 1709 Interea dulces pendent circum oscula nati; Casta piidiciliam servat domus. ViRG., Georg. ii, 523. From my own apartment. There are several persons who have many pleasures and entertainments in their possession which they do not enjoy. It is therefore a kind and good office to acquaint them with their own happiness, and turn their attention to such instances of their good fortune which they are apt to overlook. Persons in the married state often want such a monitor, and pine away their days by looking upon the same condition in anguish and murmur which carries with it, in the opinion of others, a com- plication of all the pleasures of life, and a retreat from its in- quietudes. I am led into this thought by a visit I made an old friend who was formerly my school-fellow. He came to town last week 128 RICHARD STEELE with his family for the winter, and yesterday morning sent me word his wife expected me to dinner. I am, as it were, at home at that house, and every member of it knows me for their well- wisher. I cannot indeed express the pleasure it is, to be met by the children with so much joy as I am when I go thither; the boys and girls strive who shall come first, when they think it is I that am knocking at the door; and that child which loses the race to me, runs back again to tell the father it is Mr. Bicker- staff. This day I was -led in by a pretty girl, that we all thought must have forgot me ; for the family has been out of town these two years. Her knowing me again was a mighty subject with us, and took up our discourse at the first entrance. After which they began to rally me upon a thousand little stories they heard in the country about my marriage to one of my neighbor's daughters; upon which the gentleman my friend said: " Nay, if Mr. Bickerstaff marries a child of any of his old companions, I hope mine shall have the preference. There's Mrs. Mary is now sixteen, and would make him as fine a widow as the best of them. But I know him too well ; he is so enamored with the very memory of those who flourished in our youth, that he will not so much as look upon the modern beauties. I remember, old gentleman, how often you went home in a day to refresh your countenance and dress, when Teraminta reigned in your heart. As we came up in the coach, I repeated to my wife some of your verses on her." With such reflections on little passages which happened long ago, we passed our time during a cheerful and elegant meal. After dinner his lady left the room, as did also the children. As soon as we were alone, he took me by the hand. '' Well, my good friend," says he, "I am heartily glad to see thee; I was afraid you would never have seen all the company that dined with you to-day again. Do not you think the good woman of the house a little altered, since you followed her from the play- house, to find out who she was, for me?" I perceived a tear fall down his cheek as he spoke, which moved me not a little. But to turn the discourse, said I, " She is not, indeed, quite the creature she was when she returned me the letter I carried from you, and told me she hoped, as I was a gentleman, I would be employed no more to trouble her who had never offended me, but would be so much the gentleman's friend as THE TATLER X29 to dissuade him from a pursuit which he could never succeed in. You may remember I thought her in earnest, and you were forced to employ your cousin Will, who made his sister get acquainted with her for you. You cannot expect her to be for- ever fifteen." "Fifteen?" replied my good friend. ''Ah! you little under- stand, you that have Hved a bachelor, how great, how exqui- site a pleasure there is in being really beloved ! It is impossible that the most beauteous face in nature should raise in me such pleasing ideas as when I look upon that excellent woman. That fading in her countenance is chiefly caused by her watchinjg with me in my fever. This was followed by a fit of sickness, which had like to have carried her off last winter. I tell you sincerely, I have so many obligations to her that I cannot with any sort of moderation think of her present state of health. But as to what you say of fifteen — she gives me every day pleasures beyond what I ever knew in the possession of her beauty when I was in the vigor of youth. Every moment of her life brings me fresh instances of her complacency to my inclinations, and her prudence in regard to my fortune. Her face is to me much more beautiful than when I first saw it; there is no decay in any feature which I cannot trace from the very instant it was occasioned by some anxious concern for my welfare and interests. Thus at the same time, methinks, the love I conceived towards her for what she was, is heightened by my gratitude for what she is. The love of a wife is as much above the idle passion commonly called by that name, as the loud laughter of buffoons is inferior to the elegant mirth of gentlemen. Oh! she is an inestimable jewel. In her examina- tion of her household affairs, she shows a certain fearfulness to find a fault, which makes her servants obey her like children; and the meanest we have has an ingenuous shame for an offense, not always to be seen in children in other families. I speak freely to you, my old friend; ever since her sickness, things that gave me the quickest joy before, turn now to a certain anxiety. As the children play in the next room, I know the poor things by their steps, and am considering what they must do, should they lose their mother in their tender years. The pleasure I used to take in telling my boy stories of the battles, and asking my girl questions about the disposal of her 130 RICHARD STEELE baby, and the gossiping of it, is turned into inward reflection and melancholy." He would have gone on in this tender way, when the good lady entered, and, with an inexpressible sweetness in her coun- tenance, told us she had been searching her closet for some- thing very good to treat such an old friend as I was. Her hus- band's eyes sparkled with pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance, and I saw all his fears vanish in an instant. The lady, observing something in our looks which showed we had been more serious than ordinary, and seeing her husband re- ceive her with great concern under a forced cheerfulness, im- mediately guessed at what we had been talking of; and, apply- ing herself to me, said, with a smile, "Mr. Bickerstaff, don't believe a word of what he tells you. I shall still live to have you for my second, as I have often promised you, unless he takes more care of himself than he has done since his coming to town. You must know, he tells me that he finds London a much more healthy place than the country; for he sees several of his old acquaintance and school-fellows are here young fellows, with fair full-bottomed periwigs. I could scarce keep him this morning from going out open-breasted." My friend, who is always extremely delighted with her agree- able humor, made her sit down with us. She did it with that easiness which is pecuhar to women of sense, and, to keep up the good humor she had brought in with her, turned her rail- lery upon me. "Mr. Bickerstaff, you remember you followed me one night from the playhouse ; supposing you should carry me thither to-morrow night, and lead me into the front box." This put us into a long field of discourse about the beauties who were mothers to the present, and shone in the boxes twenty years ago. I told her I was glad she had transferred so many of her charms, and I did not question but her eldest daughter was within half a year of being a toast. We were pleasing ourselves with this fantastical preferment of the young lady, when on a sudden we were alarmed with the noise of a drum, and immediately entered my little godson, to give me a point of war. His mother, between laughing and chiding, would have put him out of the room ; but I would not part with him so. I found, upon conversation with him, though he was a little noisy in his mirth, that the child had excellent parts, THE TATLER 131 and was a great master of all the learning on the other side eight years old. I perceived him a very great historian in yEsop's fables; but he frankly declared to me his mind that he did not delight in that learning, because he did not believe they were true. For which reason I found he had very much turned his studies, for about a twelvemonth past, into the lives and adventures of Don Belianis of Greece, Guy of Warwick, the Seven Champions, and other historians of that age. I could not but observe the satisfaction the father took in the forward- ness of his son; and that these diversions might turn to some profit, I found the boy had made remarks which might be of service to him during the course of his whole life. He would tell you the mismanagements of John Hickathrift, find fault with the passionate temper in Bevis of Southampton, and loved St. George for being the champion of England; and by this means had his thoughts insensibly moulded into the no- tions of discretion, virtue, and honor. I was extolling his accomplishments, when the mother told me that the little girl who led me in this morning was in her way a better scholar than he. " Betty," says she, " deals chiefly in fairies and sprites; and sometimes, in a winter night, will terrify the maids with her accounts, till they are afraid to go up to bed." I sat with them till it was very late, sometimes in merry, sometimes in serious discourse, with this particular pleasure, which gives the only true relish to all conversation, — a sense that every one of us liked each other. I went home considering the different conditions of a married life and that of a bachelor; and I must confess it struck me with a secret concern to reflect that, whenever I shall go off, I shall leave no traces behind me. In this pensive mood I returned to my family, — that is to say, to my maid, my dog, and my cat, who only can be the better or worse for what happens to me. No. 104. December 8, 1709 . . . There were several of us making merry at a friend's house in a country village, when the sexton of the parish church entered the room in a sort of surprise, and told us that, as he was digging a grave in the chancel, a little blow of his pick-axe opened a decayed coffin, in which there were several written' 132 RICHARD STEELE papers. Our curiosity was immediately raised, so that we went to the place where the sexton had been at work, and found a great concourse of people about the grave. Among the rest, there was an old woman who told us the person buried there was a lady whose name I do not think fit to mention, though there is nothing in the story but what tends very much, to her honor. This lady Hved several years an exemplary pattern of conjugal love, and, dying soon after her husband, who every way answered her character in virtue and affection, made it her death-bed request that all the letters which she had re- ceived from him, both before and after her marriage, should be buried in the cofiin with her. These I found upon examina- tion were the papers before us. Several of them had suffered so much by time, that I could only pick out a few words, as — *'Mysoul!" "Lilies!" "Roses!" "Dearest angel!" and the like. One of them, which was legible throughout, ran thus: Madam: If you would know the greatness of my love, consider that of your own beauty. That blooming countenance, that snowy bosom, that graceful person, return every moment to my imagination. The brightness of your eyes hath hindered me from closing mine, since I last saw you. You may still add to your beauties by a smile. A frown will make me the most wretched of men, as I am the most passionate of lovers.^ It filled the whole company with a deep melancholy, to com- pare the description of the letter with the person that occa- sioned it, who was now reduced to a few crumbHng bones and a little mouldering heap of earth. With much ado I deciphered another letter, which begun with " My dear, dear wife." This gave me a curiosity to see how the style of one written in mar- riage differed from one written in courtship. To my surprise, I found the fondness rather augmented than lessened, though the panegyric turned upon a different accomplishment. The words were as follow : — Before this short'absence from you, I did not know that I loved you so much as I really do; though at the same time I thought I loved you as much as possible. I am under great apprehensions lest you should have any un- easiness whilst I am defrauded of my share in it, and can't think of tasting any pleasures that you don't partake with me. Pray, my dear, be careful of your health, if for no other reason because you know I could not out- live you. It is natural in absence to make professions of an inviolable con- > These letters are said to have been genuine, and to have been written by Sir Thomas (or Sir John) Chicheley. THE TATLER 133 stancy; but towards so much merit it is scarce a virtue, expecially when it is but a bare return to that of which you have given me such continued proofs ever since our first acquaintance. I am, &c. It happened that the daughter of these two excellent per- sons was by when I was reading this letter. At the sight of the coffin, in which was the body of her mother, near that of her father, she melted into a flood of tears. As I had heard a great character of her virtue, and observed in her this instance of filial piety, I could not resist my natural inclination of giving advice to young people, and therefore addressed myself to her. " Young lady," said I, " you see how short is the possession of that beauty in which Nature has been so liberal to you. You find the melancholy sight before you is a contradiction to the first letter that you heard on that subject; whereas you may observe the second letter, which celebrates your mother's con- stancy, is itself, being found in this place, an argument of it. But, Madam, I ought to caution you not to think the bodies that lie before you, your father and your mother. Know their constancy is rewarded by a nobler union than by this mingling of their ashes, in a state where there is no danger or possibility of a second separation." No. 181. June 6, 1710. . . . The first sense of sorrow I ever knew was upon the death of my father, at which time I was not quite five years of age, but was rather amazed at what all the house meant, than possessed with a real understanding why nobody was willing to play with me. I remember I went into the room where his body lay, and my mother sat weeping alone by it. I had my battledore in my hand, and fell a-beating the coffin, and calling " Papa " ; for I know not how I had some slight idea that he was locked up there. My mother catched me in her arms, and, transported beyond all patience of the silent grief she was before in, she almost smothered me in her embrace, and told me, in a flood of tears, papa could not hear me, and would play with me no more, for they were going to put him under ground, whence he could never come to us again. She was a very beautiful woman, of a noble spirit, and there was a dignity in her grief amidst all the wildness of her transport, which, me- thought, struck me with an instinct of sorrow which, before I 134 RICHARD STEELE was sensible of what it was to grieve, seized my very soul, and has made pity the weakness of my heart ever since. The mind in infancy is, methinks, like the body in embryo, and receives impressions so forcible that they are as hard to be removed by reason, as any mark with which a child is born is to be taken away by any future application. Hence it is that good-nature in me is no merit, but, having been so frequently overwhelmed with her tears before I knew the cause of any affliction, or could draw defenses from my own judgment, I imbibed con- sideration, remorse, and an unmanly gentleness of mind, which has since ensnared me into ten thousand calamities, and from whence I can reap no advantage, except it be that in such a humor as I am now in, I can the better indulge myself in the softnesses of humanity, and enjoy that sweet anxiety which arises from the memory of past afflictions. We that are very old are better able to remember things which befell us in our distant youth, than the passages of later days. For this reason it is that the companions of my strong and vigorous years present themselves more immediately to me in this office of sorrow. Untimely or unhappy deaths are what we are most apt to lament, so little are we able to make it indifferent when a thing happens, though we know it must happen. Thus we groan under life, and bewail those who are relieved from it. Every object that returns to our imagination raises different passions according to the circumstance of their departure. Who can have lived in an army, and in a serious hour reflect upon the many gay and agreeable men that might long have flourished in the arts of peace, and not join with the imprecations of the fatherless and widow on the tyrant to whose ambition they fefl sacrifices? But gallant men who are cut off by the sword move rather our veneration than our pity, and we gather relief enough from their own contempt of death, to m.ake it no evil, which was approached with so much cheer- fulness and attended with so much honor. But when we turn our thoughts from the great parts of life on such occasions, and, instead of lamenting those who stood ready to give death to those from whom they had the fortune to receive it, — I say, when we let our thoughts wander from such noble objects, and consider the havoc which is made among the tender and the innocent, pity enters with an unmixed softness, and pos- sesses our souls at once. THE TATLER 135 Here, were there words to express such sentiments with proper tenderness, I should record the beauty, innocence, and untimely death of the first object my eyes ever beheld with love. The beauteous virgin ! How ignorantly did she charm, how carelessly excel! O Death! thou hast right to the bold, to the ambitious, to the high, and to the haughty; but why this cruelty to the humble, to the meek, to the undiscerning, to the thoughtless? Nor age, nor business, nor distress can erase the dear image from my imagination. In the same week I saw her dressed for a ball, and in a shroud. How ill did the habit of Death become the pretty trifler! I still behold the smiling earth — A large train of disasters were coming on to my memory, when my servant knocked at my closet door, and interrupted me with a letter, attended with a hamper of wine, of the same sort with that which is to be put to sale on Thursday next at Garraway's Coffee-house.^ Upon the receipt of it, I sent for three of my friends. We are so intimate that we can be com- pany in whatever state of mind we meet, and can entertain each other without expecting always to rejoice. The wine we found to be generous and warming, but with such a heat as moved us rather to be cheerful than frolicsome. It revived the spirits without firing the blood. We commended it till two of the clock this morning, and, having to-day met a little before dinner, we found that, though we drank two bottles a man, we had much more reason to recollect than forget what had passed the night before. No. 217. Tuesday, August 29, 17 10 Atque deos alque asira vocat crudelia mater. — Virg. Eclog. v, 23. From my own apartment. As I was passing by a neighbor's house this morning, I over- heard the wife of the family speak things to her husband which gave me much disturbance, and put me in mind of a character which I wonder I have so long omitted, and that is an out- rageous species of the fair sex which^ is, distinguished by the term Scolds. The generality of women are by nature loqua- 1 One regrets to note that this is an allusion to an advertisement, which appeared in the same number of the Taller, of the sale of "forty-six hogsheads and one half of extraordi- nary French claret." 136 RICHARD STEELE cious ; therefore mere volubility of speech is not to be imputed to them, but should be considered with pleasure when it is used to express such passions as tend to sweeten or adorn conversa- tion. But when, through rage, females are vehement in their eloquence, nothing in the world has so ill an effect upon the features; for by the force of it I have seen the most amiable become the most deformed, and she that appeared one of the Graces immediately turned into one of the Furies. I humbly conceive the great cause of this evil may proceed from a false notion the ladies have of what we call a modest woman. They have too narrow a conception of this lovely character, and believe they have not at all forfeited their pretensions to it, provided they have no imputations on their chastity. But alas! the young fellows know they pick out better women in the side-boxes than many of those who pass upon the world and themselves for modest. Modesty never rages, never murmurs, never pouts; when it is ill-treated, it pines, it beseeches, it languishes. The neighbor I mention is one of your common modest women ; that is to say, those as are ordinarily reckoned such. Her husband knows every pain in life with her but jealousy. Now because she is clear in this particular, the man can't say his soul is his own, but she cries, "No modest woman is respected nowadays." What adds to the comedy in this case is that it is very ordinary with this sort of women to talk in the language of distress. They will complain of the forlorn wretchedness of their condi- tion, and then the poor helpless creatures shall throw the next thing they can lay their hands on at the person who offends them. Our neighbor was only saying to his wife she went a little too fine, when she immediately pulled his periwig ofif, and, stamping it under her feet, wrung her hands and said, "Never modest woman was so used." These ladies of irresisti- ble modesty are those who make virtue unamiable; not that they can be said to be virtuous, but as they live without scan- dal; and, being under the common denomination of being such, men fear to meet their faults in those who are as agreeable as they are innocent. I take the bully among men, and the scold among women, to draw the foundation of their actions from the same defect in the mind. A bully thinks honor consists wholly in being THE TATLER 137 brave, and therefore has regard to no one rule of hfe, if he preserves himself from the accusation of cowardice. The fro- ward woman knows chastity to be the first merit in a woman, and therefore, since no one can call her one ugly name, she . calls all mankind all the rest. These ladies, where their companions are so imprudent as to take their speeches for any other than exercises of their own lungs, and their husbands' patience, gain by the force of being resisted, and flame with open fury, which is no way to be op- posed but by being neglected ; though at the same time human frailty makes it very hard to relish the philosophy of contemn- ing even frivolous reproach. There is a very pretty instance of this infirmity in the man of the best sense that ever was, — no less a person than Adam himself. According to Milton's description of the first couple, as soon as they had fallen, and the turbulent passions of anger, hatred, and jealousy first entered their breasts, Adam grew moody, and talked to his wife as you may find it in the 359th page and ninth book of Paradise Lost, in the octavo edition; which, out of heroics, and put into domestic style, would run thus : — "Madam, if my advice had been of any authority with you when that strange desire of gadding possessed you this morn- ing, we had still been happy. But your cursed vanity, and opinion of your own conduct, which is certainly very wavering when it seeks occasions of being proved, has ruined both your- self and me who trusted you." Eve had no fan in her hand to ruffle, or tucker to pull down ; but with a reproachful air she answered: "Sir, do you impute that to my desire of gadding, which might have happened to yourself with all your wisdom and gravity? The serpent spoke so excellently, and with so good a grace, that — Besides, what harm had I ever done him, that he should design me any? Was I to have been always at your side, I might as well have con- tinued there, and been but your rib still; but if I was so weak a creature as you thought me, why did you not interpose your sage authority more absolutely? You denied me going as faintly as you say I resisted the serpent. Had not you been too easy, neither you nor I had now transgressed." Adam replied: "Why, Eve, hast thou the impudence to up- braid me as the cause of thy transgression, for my indulgence 138 RICHARD STEELE to thee? Thus it will ever be with him who trusts too much to a woman. At the same time that she refuses to be governed, if she suffers by her obstinacy she will accuse the man that shall leave her to herself." Thus they in mutual accusation spent The fruitless hours, but neither self -condemning; And of their vain contest appeared no end. This to the modern will appear but a very faint piece of con- jugal enmity; but you are to consider that they were but just begun to be angry, and they wanted new words for express- ing their new passions. The passionate and famihar terms with which the same case, repeated daily for so many thousand years, has furnished the present generation, were not then in use; but the foundation of debate has ever been the same, a contention about their merit and wisdom. Our general mother was a beauty, and hearing that there was another now in the world, could not forbear (as Adam tells her) showing herself, though to the devil, by whom the same vanity made her liable to be betrayed. I cannot, with all the help of science and astrology, find any other remedy for this evil but what was the medicine in this first quarrel; which was, as appeared in the next book, that they were convinced^f their being^bi>thjweak,^but one weaker than the other. . . . ADVERTISEMENT The season now coming on in which the town will begin to fill, Mr. Bickerstaff gives notice that, from the ist of October next, he will be much wittier than he has hitherto been. No. 263. Thursday, December 14, 1710 Minima contentos node Britannos. — Juv., Sat. ii, i6i. From my own apartment. An old friend of mine being lately come to town, I went to see him on Tuesday last about eight o'clock in the evening, with a design to sit with him an hour or two and talk over old stories, but upon inquiring after him, his servant told me he was just gone to bed. The next morning, as soon as I was up and dressed, and had dispatched a little business, I came again THE TATLER 139 to my friend's house about eleven o'clock, with a design to renew my visit; but upon asking for him, his servant told me he was just sat down to dinner. In short, I found that my old- fashioned friend religiously adhered to the example of his fore- fathers, and observed the same hours that had been kept in the family ever since the Conquest. It is very plain that the night was much longer formerly in this island than it is at present. By the night I mean that por- tion of time which nature has thrown into darkness, and which the wisdom of mankind had formerly dedicated to rest and silence. This used to begin at eight o'clock in the evening, and conclude at six in the morning. The curfew, or eight o'clock bell, was the signal throughout the nation for putting out their candles and going to bed. Our grandmothers, though they were wont to sit up the last in the family, were all of them fast asleep at the same hours that their daughters are busy at crimp and basset. Modern states- men are concerting schemes, and engaged in the depth of poli- tics, at the time when their forefathers were laid down quietly to rest, and had nothing in their heads but dreams. As we have thus thrown business and pleasure into the hours of rest, and by that means made the natural night but half as long as it should be, we are forced to piece it out with a great part of the morning; so that near two- thirds of the nation lie fast asleep for several hours in broad daylight. This irregularity is grown so very fashionable at present, that there is scarce a lady of quality in Great Britain that ever saw the sun rise. And if the humor increases in proportion to what it has done of late years, it is not impossible but our children may hear the bell- man going about the streets at nine o'clock in the morning, and the watch making their rounds till eleven. This unaccountable disposition in mankind to continue awake in the night, and sleep in sunshine, has made me inquire whether the same change of inclination has happened to any other animals. For this reason I desired a friend of mine in the country to let me know whether the lark rises as early as he did formerly, and whether the cock begins to crow at his usual hour. My friend has answered me that his poultry are as regu- lar as ever, and that all the birds and the beasts of his neigh- borhood keep the same hours that they have observed in the / 140 RICHARD STEELE memory of man, and the same which, in all probability, they have kept for these five thousand years. If you would see the innovations that have been made among us in this particular, you may only look into the hours of col- leges, where they still dine at eleven and sup at six, which were doubtless the hours of the whole nation at the time when those places were founded. But at present the courts of justice are scarce opened in Westminster Hall at the time when William Rufus used to go to dinner in it. All business is driven for- ward : the landmarks of our fathers (if I may so call them) are removed, and planted further up into the day; insomuch that I am afraid our clergy will be obliged, if they expect full con- gregations, not to look any more upon ten o'clock in the morn- ing as a canonical hour. In my own memory the dinner has crept by degrees from twelve o'clock to three, and where it will fix nobody knows. I have sometimes thought to draw up a memorial in the behalf of supper against dinner, setting forth that the said dinner has made several encroachments upon the said supper, and entered very far upon his frontiers; that he has banished him out of several families, and in all has driven him from his headquarters, and forced him to make his retreat into the hours of midnight; and, in short, that he is now in danger of being entirely confounded and lost in a breakfast. . . . For my own part, I value an hour in the morning as much as common libertines do an hour at midnight. When I find my- self awakened into being, and perceive my life renewed within me, and at the same time see the whole face of nature recovered out of the dark uncomfortable state in which it lay for several hours, my heart overflows with such secret sentiments of joy and gratitude as are a kind of implicit praise to the great Author of Nature.' The mind in these early seasons of the day is so refreshed in all its faculties, and borne up with such new supplies of animal spirits, that she finds herself in a state of youth, especially when she is entertained with the breath of flowers, the melody of birds, the dews that hang upon the plants, and all those other sweets of nature that are peculiar to the morning. It is impossible for a man to have this relish of being, this exquisite taste of life, who does not come into the world before it is in all its noise and hurry; who loses the rising of the sun, the still hours of the day, and immediately THE SPECTATOR 141 upon his first getting up plunges himself into the ordinary cares or folHes of the world. I shall conclude this paper with Milton's inimitable descrip- tion of Adam's awakening his Eve in Paradise, which indeed would have been a place as httle deUghtful as a barren heath or desert, to those who slept in it. . . . THE SPECTATOR [This periodical was founded jointly by Steele and Addison, and was issued six times a week, from March, 1 711, to December, 1712, amounting to 555 numbers; of these Steele wrote some 236. In 171 2 the papers were selling at some 10,000 per week, and in bound volumes they had no less success. The supposed author of this periodical was the gentleman called "the Spectator," whose character was sketched by Addison in the first number, and further described by Steele in the fourth, here reproduced.] No. 4. Monday, March 5, 17 11 Egregii mortalem altique silentii. — HoK. An author, when he first appears in the world, is very apt to beUeve it has nothing to think of but his performances. With a good share of this vanity in my heart, I made it my business these three days to listen after my own fame; and as I have sometimes met with circumstances which did not displease me, I have been encountered by others which gave me much mortification. It is incredible to think how empty I have in this time observed some part of the species to be, — what mere blanks they are when they first come abroad in the morning, — how utterly they are at a stand until they are set a-going by some paragraph in a newspaper. Such persons are very accept- able to a young author, for they desire no more in anything but to be new, to be agreeable. If I found consolation among such, I was as much disquieted by the incapacity of others. These are mortals who have a certain curiosity without power of reflection, and perused my papers like spectators rather than readers. But there is so little pleasure in inquiries that so nearly concern ourselves (it being the worst way in the world to fame, to be too anxious about it), that upon the whole I resolved for the future to go on in my ordinary way, and, with- out too much fear or hope about the business of reputation, to \ 142 RICHARD STEELE be very careful of the design of my actions, but very negligent of the consequences of them. It is an endless and frivolous pursuit to act by any other rule than the care of satisfying our own minds in what we do. One would think a silent man, who concerned himself with no one breathing, should be very little liable to misrepresentations; and yet I remember I was once taken up for a Jesuit, for no other reason but my profound taciturnity. It is from this mis- fortune that, to be out of harm's way, I have ever since affected crowds. He who comes into assembUes only to gratify his curiosity, and not to make a figure, enjoys the pleasures of retirement in a more exquisite degree than he possibly could in his closet; the lover, the ambitious, and the miser, are fol- lowed thither by a worse crowd than any they can withdraw from. To be exempt from the passions with which others are tormented, is the only pleasing solitude. I can very justly say with the sage, "I am never less alone than when alone." As I am insignificant to the company in public places, and as it is visible I do not come thither as most do, to show my- self, I gratify the vanity of all who pretend to make an appear- ance, and have often as kind looks from well-dressed gentlemen and ladies as a poet would bestow upon one of his audience. There are so many gratifications attend this public sort of obscurity, that some little distastes I daily receive have lost their anguish; and I did, the other day, without the least dis- pleasure, overhear one say of me, "That strange fellow"; and another answer, "I have known the fellow's face these twelve years, and so must you; but I believe you are the first ever asked who he was." There are, I must confess, many to whom my person is as well known as that of their nearest relations, who give themselves no farther trouble about calling me by my name or quality, but speak of me very currently by the appel- lation of Mr. What-d'ye-call-him. To make up for these trivial disadvantages, I have the high- est satisfaction of beholding all nature with an unprejudiced eye, and, having nothing to do with men's passions or inter- ests, I can, with the greater sagacity, consider their talents, manners, failings, and merits. It is remarkable that those who want any one sense, possess the others with greater force and vivacity. Thus my want of, or rather resignation of, speech THE SPECTATOR 143 gives me the advantages of a dumb man. I have, methinks, a more than ordinary penetration in seeing, and flatter myself that I have looked into the highest and lowest of mankind, and made shrewd guesses, without being admitted to their conversation, at the inmost thoughts and reflections of all whom I behold. It is from hence that good or ill fortune has no manner of force towards affecting my judgment. I see men flourishing in courts, and languishing in jails, without being prejudiced from their circumstances to their favor or disad- vantage; but, from their inward manner of bearing their con- dition, often pity the prosperous and admire the unhappy. Those who converse with the dumb know from the turn of their eyes, and the changes of their countenance, their senti- ments of the objects before them. I have indulged my silence to such an extravagance, that the few who are intimate with me answer my smiles with concurrent sentences, and argue to the very point I shaked my head at, without my speaking. Will Honeycomb was very entertaining the other night at a play, to a gentleman who sat on his right hand, while I was at his left. The gentleman believed Will was talking to himself, when, upon my looking with great approbation at a young thing in a box before us, he said, "I am quite of another opin- ion. She has, I will allow, a very pleasing aspect, but methinks that simplicity in her countenance is rather childish than inno- cent." When I observed her a second time, he said, "I grant her dress is very becoming, but perhaps the merit of that choice is owing to her mother; for though," continued he, "I allow a beauty to be as much to be commended for the ele- gance of her dress as a wit for that of his language, yet if she has stolen the color of her ribands from another, or had advice about her trimmings, I shall not allow her the praise of dress any more than I would call a plagiary an author." When I threw my eye towards the next woman to her, Will spoke what I looked, according to his romantic imagination, in the following manner: "Behold, you who dare, that charming virgin ! behold the beauty of her person chastised by the inno- cence of her thoughts. Chastity, good-nature, and affability are the graces that play in her countenance; she knows she is handsome, but she knows she is good. Conscious beauty adorned with conscious virtue ! What a spirit is there in those 144 RICHARD STEELE eyes ! What a bloom in that person ! How is the whole woman expressed in her appearance ! Her air has the beauty of motion, and her look the force of language." It was prudence to turn away my eyes from this object, and therefore I turned them to the thoughtless creatures who make yup the lump of that sex, and move a knowing eye no more than the portraiture of insignificant people by ordinary painters, which are but pictures of pictures. \ Thus the working of my own mind is the general entertain- .■^^^^r^ ment of my life; I never enter into the commerce of discourse with any but my particular friends, and not in pubhc even with them. Such a habit has perhaps raised in me uncommon re- flections, but this effect I cannot communicate but by my writingOAs my pleasures are almost wholly confined to those of the sight, I take it for a peculiar happiness that I have always had an easy and familiar admittance to the fair sex. If I never praised or flattered, I never belied or contradicted them. As these compose half the world, and are, by the just complais- ance and gallantry of our nation, the more powerful part of our people, I shall dedicate a considerable share of these my speculations to their service, and shall lead the young through all the becoming duties of virginityj marriagejjLjnd^widowho When it is a woman's day, in my works, I shall endeavor at a style and air suitable to their understanding. When I say this, u^Vt^ '^Al must be understood to mean that I shall not lower but exalt "*- I the subjects I treat upon. Discourse for their entertainment / is not to be debased, but refined. A man may appear learned /without talking sentences, as in his ordinary gesture he dis- covers he can dance, though he does not cut capers. In a word, I shall take it for the greatest glory of my work, if among reasonable women this paper may furnish tea-table talk. In order to it, I shall treat on matters which relate to females, as they are concerned to approach or fly from the other sex, or as they are tied to them by blood, interest, or affection. Upon this occasion I think it but reasonable to declare that, what- ever skill I may have in speculation, I shall never betray what the eyes of lovers say to each other in my presence. At the same time I shall not think myself obliged by this promise to conceal any false protestations which I observe made by glances in public assemblies, but endeavor to make both sexes appear in THE SPECTATOR 145 their conduct what they are in their hearts. By this means, love, during the time of my speculations, shall be carried on with the same sincerity as any other affair of less consideration. As this is the greatest concern, men shall be from henceforth liable to the greatest reproach for misbehavior in it. False- hood in love shall hereafter bear a blacker aspect than infidehty in friendship or villainy in business. For this great and good end, all breaches against that noble passion, the cement of society, shall be severely examined. But this, and all other matters loosely hinted at now, and in my former papers, shall have their proper place in my following discourses. The present writing is only to admonish the world that they shall not find me an idle but a busy Spectator. No. 49. Thursday, April 26, 171 1 Hominem pagina nostra sapit. — Mart. It is very natural for a man who is not turned for mirthful meetings of men, or assemblies of the fair sex, to dehght in that sort of conversation which we find in coffee-houses. Here a man of my temper is in his element; for if he cannot talk, he can still be more agreeable to his company, as well as pleased in himself, in being only a hearer. It is a secret known to but few, yet of no small use in the conduct of life, that when you fall into a man's conversation, the first thing you should con- sider is, whether he has a greater inclination to hear you or that you should hear him. The latter is the more general desire, and I know very able flatterers that never speak a word in praise of the persons from whom they obtain daily favors, but still practice a skillful attention to whatever is uttered by those with whom they converse. We are very curious to observe the behavior of great men and their clients, but the same passions and interests move men in lower spheres; and I (that have nothing else to do but make observations) see in every parish, street, lane, and alley of this populous city, a little potentate that has his court and his flatterers, who lay snares for his affection and favor by the same arts that are practiced upon men in higher stations. In the place I most usually frequent, men differ rather in the time of day in which they make a figure, than in any real great- 146 RICHARD STEELE ness above one another. I, who am at the coffee-house at six in the morning, know that my friend Beaver, the haberdasher, has a levee of more undissembled friends and admirers than most of the courtiers or generals of Great Britain. Every man about him has, perhaps, a newspaper in his hand, but none can pretend to guess what step will be taken in any one court of Europe, till Mr. Beaver has thrown down his pipe, and de- clares what measures the Alhes must enter into, upon this new posture of affairs. Our coffee-house is near one of the Inns of Court, and Beaver has the audience and admiration of his neighbors from six till within a quarter of eight, at which time he is interrupted by the students of the house, some of whom are ready dressed for Westminster at eight in a morning, with faces as busy as if they were retained in every cause there, and others come in their night-gowns to saunter away their time, as if they never designed to go thither. I do not know that I meet in any of my walks objects which move both my spleen and laughter so effectually, as those young fellows at the Grecian, Squire's, Searle's, and all other coffee-houses adja- /cent to the law, who rise early for no other purpose but to pub- Hsh their laziness. One would think these young virtuosos take a gay'^ap and slippers, with a scarf and parti-colored gown, to be the ensigns of dignity; for the vain things approach each other with an air which shows they regard one another for ^- their vestments. I have observed that the superiority among ^^ these proceeds from an opinion of gallantry and fashion. The gentleman in the strawberry sash, who presides so much over the rest, has, it seems, subscribed to every opera this last winter, and is supposed to receive favors from one of the actresses. When the day grows too busy for these gentlemen to enjoy any longer the pleasures of their dishabille with any manner of confidence, they give place to men who have business or good sense in their faces, and come to the coffee-house either to transact affairs or enjoy conversation. The persons to whose behavior and discourse I have most regard, are such as are be- tween these two sorts of men; such as have not spirits too active to be happy and well pleased in a private condition, nor complexions too warm to make them neglect the duties and relations of life. Of these sort of men consist the worthier part THE SPECTATOR 147 of mankind; of these are all good fathers, generous brothers, sincere friends, and faithful subjects. Their entertainments are derived rather from reason than imagination, which is the causeTEatTEere is no impatience or instability in their speech or action. You see in their countenances they are at home, and in quiet possession of the present instant as it passes, without desiring to quicken it by gratifying any passion, or prosecuting any new design. These are the men formed for society, and those little communities which we express by the word neigh- borhood. The coffee-house is the place of rendezvous to all that live near it, who are thus turned to relish calm and ordinary life. Eubulus presides over the middle hours of the day, when this assembly of men meet together. He enjoys a great fortune handsomely, without launching into expense, and exerts many noble and useful qualities, without appearing in any public employment. His wisdom and knowledge are serviceable to all that think fit to make use of them, and he does the office of a counsel, a judge, an executor, and a friend, to all his acquaint- ance, not only without the profits which attend such offices, but also without the deference and homage which are usually paid to them. The giving of thanks is displeasing to him. The . ' greatest gratitude you can show him is to let him see that you ' are a better man for his services, and that you are as ready to oblige others as he is to oblige you. In the private exigencies of his friends, he lends at legal value considerable sums which he might highly increase by rolling in the public stocks. He does not consider in whose hands his money will improve most, but where it will do most good. ■= «-^-^^^ Eubulus has so great an authority in his little diurnal audi- ence, that when he shakes his head at any piece of public news, they all of them appear dejected, and on the contrary, go home to their dinners with a good stomach and cheerful aspect, when Eubulus seems to intimate that things go well. Nay, their \'eneration towards him is so great that when they are in other company they speak and act after him, are wise in his sen- tences, and are no sooner sat down at their own tables, but they hope or fear, rejoice or despond, as they saw him do at the coffee-house. In a word, every man is Eubulus as soon as his back is turned. <^ 148 RICHARD STEELE Having here given an account of the several reigns that suc- ceed each other from daybreak till dinner-time, I shall men- tion the monarchs of the afternoon on another occasion, and shut up the whole series of them with the history of Tom the Tyrant, who, as the first minister of the coffee-house, takes the government upon him between the hours of eleven and twelve at night, and gives his orders in the most arbitrary manner to the servants below him, as to the disposition of liquors, coal, and cinders. No. 157. Thursday, August 30, 1711 — Genius, natale comes qui temperat astrum, Natura deus humana: morlalis in untim Quodque caput. — Hor. I am very much at a loss to express by any word that occurs to me in our language, that which is understood by indoles in Latin. The natural disposition to any particular art, science, profession, or trade, is very much to be consulted in the care of youth, and studied by men for their own conduct when they form to themselves any scheme of life. It is wonderfully hard, indeed, for a man to judge of his own capacity impartially. That may look great to me which may appear little to another, and I may be carried by fondness towards myself so far as to attempt things too high for my talents and accomplishments. But it is not, methinks, so very difficult a matter to make a judgment of the abilities of others, especially of those who are in their infancy. My commonplace book directs me on this occasion to mention the dawning of greatness in Alexander, who, being asked in his youth to contend for a prize in the Olympic games, answered he would if he had kings to run against him. Cassius, who was one of the conspirators against Caesar, gave as great a proof of his temper, when in his child- hood he struck a playfellow, the son of Sylla, for saying his father was master of the Roman people. Scipio is reported to have answered, when some flatterers at supper were asking him what the Romans should do for a general after his death," Take Marius." Marius was then a very boy, and had given no in- stances of his valor; but it was visible to Scipio, from the man- ners of the youth, that he had a soul for the attempt and exe- cution of great undertakings. THE SPECTATOR 149 I n:ust confess I have very often with much sorrow bewailed the misfortune of the children of Great Britain, when I con- sider the ignorance and undiscerning of the generality of schoolmasters. The boasted liberty we talk of is but a mean reward for the long servitude, the many heart-aches and ter- rors, to which our childhood is exposed in going through a grammar-school. Many of these stupid tyrants exercise their cruelty without any manner of distinction of the capacities of children, or the intention of parents in their behalf. There are many excellent tempers which are worthy to be nourished and cultivated with all possible diligence and care, that were never designed to be acquainted with Aristotle, Tully, or Virgil; and there are as many who have great capacities for understanding every word those great persons have writ, and yet were not born to have any relish of their writings. For want of this com- mon and obvious discerning in those who have the care of youth, we have so many hundred unaccountable creatures every age whipped up into great scholars, that are forever near a right understanding, and will never arrive at it. These are the scandal of letters, and these are generally the men who are to teach others. The sense of shame and honor is enough to keep the world itself in order, without corporal punishment, — much more to train the minds of uncorrupted and innocent children. It happens, I doubt not, more than once in a year, that a lad is chastised for a blockhead, when it is good appre- hension that makes him incapable of knowing what his teacher means. A brisk imagination very often may suggest an error which a lad could not have fallen into if he had been as heavy in conjecturing as his master in explaining. But there is no mercy even towards a wrong interpretation of his meaning; the suffer- ings of the scholar's body are to rectify the mistakes of his mind. I am confident that no boy who will not be allured to letters without blows, will ever be brought to anything with them. A great or good mind must necessarily be the worse for such indignities, and it is a sad change to lose of its virtue for the improvement of its knowledge. No one who has gone through what they call a great school, but must remember to have seen children of excellent and ingenuous natures (as has afterward appeared in their manhood) — I say no man has passed through this way of education, but must have seen an ingenuous crea- I50 RICHARD STEELE ture, expiring with shame, with pale looks, beseeching sorrow, and silent tears, throw up its honest eyes, and kneel on its ten- der knees to an inexorable blockhead, to be forgiven the false quantity of a word in making a Latin verse. The child is pun- ished, and the next day he commits a like crime, and so a third, with the same consequence. I would fain ask any reasonable man whether this lad, in the simplicity of his native innocence, full of shame and capable of any impression from that grace of soul, was not fitter for any purpose in this life, than 'after that spark of virtue is extinguished in him, though he is able to write twenty verses in an evening? Seneca says, after his exalted way of talking, ''As the im- mortal gods never learnt any virtue, though they are endued with all that is good, so there are some men who have so natural a propensity to what they should follow, that they learn it almost as soon as they hear it." Plants and vegetables are cultivated into the production of finer fruits than they would yield without that care; and yet we cannot entertain hopes of producing a tender conscious spirit into acts of virtue, without the same methods as are used to cut timber, or give new shape to a piece of stone. It is wholly to this dreadful practice that we may attribute a certain hardness and ferocity which some men, though liberally educated, carry about them in all their behavior. To be bred like a gentleman, and pun- ished like a malefactor, must, as we see it does, produce that illiberal sauciness which we see sometimes in men of letters. The Spartan boy who suffered the fox, which he had stolen and hid under his coat, to eat into his bowels, I dare say had not half the wit or petulance which we learn at great schools among us; but the glorious sense of honor, or rather fear of shame, which he demonstrated in that action, was worth all the learning in the world without it. It is, methinks, a very melancholy consideration that a little negligence can spoil us, but great industry is necessary to improve us. The most excellent natures are soon depreciated, but evil tempers are long before they are exalted into good habits. To help this by punishments is the same thing as kill- ing a man to cure him of a distemper; when he comes to suffer punishment in that one circumstance, he is brought below the existence of a rational creature, and is in the state of a brute THE SPECTATOR 151 that moves only by the admonition of stripes. But since this custom of educating by the lash is suffered by the gentry of Great Britain, I would prevail only that honest heavy lads may be dismissed from slavery sooner than they are at present, and not whipped on to their fourteenth or fifteenth year, whether they expect any progress from them or not. Let the child's capacity be forthwith examined, and he sent to some mechanic way of life, without respect to his birth, if nature designed him for nothing higher; let him go before he has in- nocently suffered, and is debased into a dereliction of mind for being what it is no guilt to be — a plain man. I would not here be supposed to have said that our learned men of either robe, who have been whipped at school, are not still men of noble and liberal minds; but I am sure they would have been much more so than they are, had they never suffered that infamy. "No. 324. Wednesday, March 27, 171 2 O curiKB in terris animcB, el cceleslium inanes ! — Pers. Mr. Spectator: The materials you have collected towards a general history of clubs, make so bright a part of your Specu- lations, that I think it is but a justice we all owe the learned world, to furnish you with such assistances as may promote that useful work. For this reason I could not forbear com- municating to you some imperfect informations of a set of men (if you will allow them a place in that species of being) who have lately erected themselves into a nocturnal fraternity, under the title of the Mohock Club,^ — a name borrowed, it seems, from a sort of cannibals in India, who subsist upon plundering and devouring all the nations about them. The president is styled Emperor of the Mohocks, and his arms are a Turkish crescent, which his imperial majesty bears at present in a very extraordinary manner engraved upon his forehead. Agreeable to their name, the avowed design of their institu- tion is mischief; and upon this foundation all their rules and orders are framed. An outrageous ambition of doing all pos- sible hurt to their fellow-creatures is the great cement of their assembly, and the only qualification required in the members. In order to exert this principle to its full strength and perfec- _ _ * An actual organization, often referred to by writers of the period. 152 RICHARD STEELE tion, they take care to drink themselves to a pitch, — that is, beyond the possibility of attending to any motions of reason or humanity; then make a general sally, and attack all that are so unfortunate as to walk the streets through which they patrol. Some are knocked down, others stabbed, others cut and carbonadoed. To put the watch to a total rout, and mor- tify some of those inoffensive militia, is reckoned a coup d' eclat. The particular talents by which these misanthropes are dis- tinguished from one another, consist in the various kinds of barbarities which they execute upon their prisoners. Some are celebrated for a happy dexterity in tipping the lion upon them, which is performed by squeezing the nose flat to the face, and boring out the eyes with their fingers. Others are called the dancing-masters, and teach their scholars to cut capers, by running swords through their legs, — a new invention, whether originally French I cannot tell. ... In this manner they carry on a war against mankind. I must own, sir, these are only broken, incoherent memoirs of this wonderful society; but they are the best I have been yet able to procure, for, being but of late established, it is not ripe for a just history, — and, to be serious, the chief design of this trouble is to hinder it from ever being so. You have been pleased, out of a concern for the good of your countrymen, to act, under the character of Spectator, not only the part of a looker-on, but an overseer of their actions; and whenever such enormities as this infest the town, we immediately fly to you for redress. I have reason to believe that some thoughtless youngsters, out of a false notion of bravery, and an immoder- ate fondness to be distinguished for fellows of fire, are insensi- bly hurried into this senseless, scandalous project. Such will probably stand corrected by your reproofs, especially if you inform them that it is not courage for half a score fellows, mad with wine and lust, to set upon two or three soberer than themselves; and that the manners of Indian savages are not becoming accomphshments to an EngHsh fine gentleman. Such of them as have been bullies and scowerers of a long standing, and are grown veterans in this kind of service, are, I fear, too hardened to receive any impressions from your admonitions. But I beg you would recommend to their perusal your ninth Speculation. They may there be taught to take warning from THE SPECTATOR 153 the club of Duellists, and be put in mind that the common fate of those men of honor was to be hanged. I am, sir, Your most humble servant, Philanthropos. The following letter is of a quite contrary nature; but I add it here, that the reader may observe, at the same view, how amiable ignorance may be, when it is shown in its simplicities, and how detestable in barbarities. It is written by an honest countryman to his mistress, and came to the hands of a lady of good sense, wrapped about a thread-paper, who has long kept it by her as an image of artless love. To her I very much respect, Mrs. Margaret Clark. Lovely, and O that I could write loving Mrs. Margaret Clark, I pray you let affection excuse presumption. Having been so happy as to enjoy the sight of your sweet countenance and comely body, sometimes when I had occasion to buy treacle or Hquorish powder at the apothecary's shop, I am so enamored with you that I can no more keep close my flaming desire to become your servant. And I am the more bold now to write to your sweet self, because I am now my own man, and may match where I please; for my father is taken away, and now I am come to my living, which is ten yard land and a house; and there is never a yard land in our field but is as well worth ten pound a year as a thief's worth a halter, and all my brothers and sisters are provided for. Besides, I have good household stuff, though I say it, both brass and pewter, linens and woolens; and though my home be thatched, yet, if you and I match, it shall go hard but I will have one half of it slated. If you think well of this motion, I will wait upon you as soon as my new clothes is made, and hay-harvest is in. I could, though I say it, have good matches in our town; but my mother (God's peace be with her) charged me upon her death-bed to marry a gen- tlewoman, one who had been well trained up in sewing and cookery. I do not think but that, if you and I can agree to marry, and lay our means to- gether, I shall be made grand juryman ere two or three years come about, and that will be a great credit to us. If I could have got a messenger for sixpence, I would have sent one on purpose, and some trifle or other for a token of my love, but I hope there is nothing lost for that neither. So, hoping you will take this letter in good part, and answer it with what care and speed you can, I rest and remain, Yours, if my own Mr. Gabriel Bullock, Swepston, Leicestershire. now my father is dead. When the coal carts come, I shall send oftener, and may come in one of them myself.^ ' In the original paper the last part of this letter (beginning "matches in our town") was missing, and Steele observed: "The rest is torn off; and posterity must be contented to know that Mrs. Margaret Clark was very pretty, but are left in the dark as to the name of her lover." In No. 328 he published the conclusion, from a copy sent him by a corre- spondent, who testified to its authenticity. 154 RICHARD STEELE THE GUARDIAN [This periodical was issued by Steele from March to October, 17 13, appearing six times a week; Steele himself wrote some 82 of the papers. Unlike the Taller and the Spectator, the Guardian dealt in part with politi- cal subjects, and was concerned in controversy with the Tory Examiner. Swift attacked it in his famous The Importance of the Guardian Considered.] No. 34. Monday, April 20, 1713 Mores mullorum vidit. Hor. It is a most vexatious thing to an old man, who endeavors to square his notions by reason, and to talk from reflection and experience, to fall in with a circle of young ladies at their after- noon tea-table. This happened very lately to be my fate. The conversation, for the first half-hour, was so very rambling that it is hard to say what was talked of, or who spoke least to the purpose. The various motions of the fan, the tossings of the head, intermixed with all the pretty kinds of laughter, made up the greatest part of the discourse. At last this modish way of shining and being witty settled into something like conver- sation, and the talk ran upon fine gentlemen. From the sev- eral characters that were given, and the exceptions that were made, as this or that gentleman happened to be named, I found that a lady is not difficult to be pleased, and that the town swarms with fine gentlemen. A nimble pair of heels, a smooth complexion, a full-bottom wig, a laced shirt, an embroidered suit, a pair of fringed gloves, a hat and feather, — any one or more of these and the like accomplishments ennobles a man, and raises him above the vulgar, in a female imagination. On the contrary, a modest, serious behavior, a plain dress, a thick pair of shoes, a leathern belt, a waistcoat not lined with silk, and such like imperfections, degrade a man, and are so many blots in his escutcheon. I could not forbear smiling at one of the prettiest and liveliest of this gay assembly, who excepted to the gentility of Sir WilHam Hearty, because he wore a frieze coat, and breakfasted upon toast and ale. I pre- tended to admire the fineness of her taste, and to strike in with her in ridiculing those awkward healthy gentlemen that seem THE GUARDIAN 155 to make nourishment the chief end of eating. I gave her an account of an honest Yorkshire gentleman, who (when I was a traveler) used to invite his acquaintance at Paris to break their fast with him upon cold roast beef and mum. There was, I remember, a little French marquis, who was often pleased to rally him unmercifully upon beef and pudding, of which our countryman would despatch a pound or two with great alac- rity, while this antagonist was piddling at a mushroom or the haunch of a frog. I could perceive the lady was pleased with what I said, and we parted very good friends, by virtue of a maxim I always observe, Never to contradict or reason with a ' sprightly female. I went home, however, full of a great many serious reflections upon what had passed, and though, in com- plaisance, I disguised my sentiments, to keep up the good humor of my fair companions, and to avoid being looked upon as a testy old fellow, yet out of the good-will I bear to the sex, and to prevent for the future their being imposed upon by counterfeits, I shall give them the distinguishing marks of a true fine gentleman. When a good artist would express any remarkable character in sculpture, he endeavors to work up his figure into all the perfections his imagination can form, and to imitate not so much what is, as what may or ought to be. I shall follow their example, in the idea I am going to trace out of a fine gentle- man, by assembling together such qualifications as seem requisite to make the character complete* In order to this I shall premise, in general, that by a fine gentleman I mean a man completely qualified as well for the service and good as for the ornament and delight of society. When I consider the frame of mind peculiar to a gentleman, I suppose it graced with all the dignity and elevation of spirit that human nature is capable of. To this I would have joined a clear- understanding, a reason free from prejudice, a steady judgment,' and an extensive knowledge. When I think of the heart of a gentleman, I imagine it firm and intrepid, void of all inordinate passions, and full of tenderness, compassion, and benevolence. When I view the fine gentleman with regard to his manners, methinks I see him modest without bashfulness, frank and affable with- out impertinence, obhging and complaisant without serviHty, 156 RICHARD STEELE cheerful and in good humor without noise. These amiable qualities are not easily obtained; neither are there many men that have a genius to excel this way. A finished gentleman is perhaps the most uncommon of all the great characters in life. Besides the natural endowments with which this distinguished man is to be born, he must run through a long series of educa- tion. Before he makes his appearance and shines in the world, he must be principled in reUgion, instructed in all the moral virtues, and led through the whole course of the polite arts and sciences. He should be no stranger to courts and to camps; he must travel to open his mind, to enlarge his views, to learn the policies and interests of foreign states, as well as to fashion and polish himself, and to get clear of national prejudices, of which every country has its share. To all these more essential improvements he must not forget to add the fashionable ornaments of life, such as are the languages and the bodily exercises most in vogue; neither would I have him think even dress itself beneath his notice. It is no very uncommon thing in the world to meet with men of probity; there are likewise a great many men of honor to be found. Men of courage, men of sense, and men of letters are frequent; but a true fine gentleman is what one seldom sees. He is properly a compound of the various good qualities that embellish mankind. As the great poet animates all the differ- ent parts of learning by the force of his genius, and irradiates all the compass of his knowledge by the lustre and brightness of his imagination, so all the great and solid perfections of life appear in the finished gentleman, with a beautiful gloss and varnish. Everything he says or does is accompanied with a manner, or rather a charm, that draws the admiration and good-will of every beholder. ADVERTISEMENT for the Benefit of my Female Readers N. B. The gilt chariot, the diamond ring, the gold snuff-box, and brocade sword-knot, are no essential parts of a fine gentle- man, but may be used by him, provided he casts his eye upon them but once a day. MR. STEELE'S APOLOGY 157 MR. STEELE'S APOLOGY FOR HIMSELF AND HIS WRITINGS, OCCASIONED BY HIS EXPULSION FROM THE HOUSE OF COMMONS I7I4 [Steele was expelled from the House of Commons on March 18, 17 14, having been accused of uttering seditious libels, after the publication of some of his most vigorous political pamphlets. In reply to the majority party, and in self-defense, he issued the Apology, which is now chiefly remembered for the summary of his literary career included in the follow- ing extract.] ... I FLATTER mysclf that I shall convince all my fellow- subjects of my innocence from the following circumstances, allowed to be of weight in all trials of this nature: from the general character of the offender, the motive to his offense, and the character of the persons who appear for him, opposed to those who are against him. There are some points to be allowed which bear hard against the prisoner at the bar, and we must grant this by way of confessing and avoiding, and give it up, that the defendant has been as great a libertine as a confessor. We will suppose, then, a witness giving an account of him, who, if he spoke true, would say as follows: — "I have been long acquainted with Mr. Steele, who is ac- cused as a mahcious writer, and can give an account of him (from what he used to confess to us his private friends) , what was the chief motive of his first appearing in print. Besides this, I have read everything he has writ or pubhshed. He first became an author when an ensign of the Guards, a way of life exposed to much irregularity, and, being thoroughly con- vinced of many things of which he often repented and which he more often repeated, he writ, for his own private use, a little book called The Christian Hero, with a design principally to fix upon his own mind a strong impression of virtue and religion, in opposition to a stronger propensity toward unwar- rantable pleasures. This secret admonition was too weak; he therefore printed the book with his name, in hopes that a standing testimony against himself, and the eyes of the world (that is to say, of his acquaintance) upon him in a new h'ght, might curb his desires, and make him ashamed of understand- 158 RICHARD STEELE ing and seeming to feel what was virtuous, and living so quite contrary a life. This had no other good effect but that, from being thought no undelightful companion, he was soon reck- oned a disagreeable fellow. One or two of his acquaintance thought fit to misuse him, and try their valor upon him, and everybody he knew measured the least levity in his words and actions with the character of a Christian hero. Thus he found himself slighted, instead of being encouraged, for his declara- tions as to rehgion, and it was now incumbent upon him to enliven his character; for which reason he writ the comedy called The Funeral, in which (though full of incidents that move laughter) virtue and vice appear just as they ought to do. Nothing can make the town so fond of a man as a successful play, and this, with some particulars enlarged upon to his advantage (for princes never hear good or evil in the manner others do), obtained him the notice of the king, and his name, to be provided for, was in the last table-book ever worn by the glorious and immortal William the Third. "His next appearance as a writer was in the quality of the lowest minister of state, to wit, in the office of Gazetteer, where he worked faithfully according to order, without ever erring against the rule observed by all ministries, to keep that paper very innocent and very insipid. "It is believed it was to the reproaches he heard every Gazette-day against the writer of it, that the defendant owes the fortitude of being remarkably neghgent of what people say, which he does not deserve, except in so great cases as that now before us. His next productions were still plays, then the Tatler, then the Spectator, then the Guardian, then the Eng- lishman. And now, though he has published and scribbled so very much, he may defy any man to find one leaf in all these writings which is not, in point, a defense against this impu- tation; to find a leaf which does not mediately or immediately tend to the honor of the Queen or the service of the nobility and gentry, or which is not particularly respectful to the uni- versities. Farther this witness sayeth not." . . . JOSEPH ADDISON THE SPECTATOR [For the dates, etc., of this periodical, see above under Steele. Addison wrote 274 of the papers, signing them by one of the four letters in the n"ame of the muse Clio. The most characteristic element in his contributions was that of literary criticism; his purpose in this connection is described in the important passage at the close of No. 409, reprinted below.] No. 10. Monday, March 12, 171 1 Non aliler quant qui adverse vix flumine lembum Remigiis subigit : si brachia forte remisil, Atque ilium in prcEceps prono rapit alveus amni. — ViRG. It is with much satisfaction that I hear this great city in- quiring day by day after these my papers, and receiving my morning lectures with a becoming seriousness and attention. My pubHsher tells me that there are already three thousand of them distributed every day. So that if I allow twenty readers to every paper, which I look upon as a modest computation, I rnay reckon about threescore thousand disciples in London and Westminster, who I hope will take care to distinguish them- selves from the thoughtless herd of their ignorant and unatten- tive brethren. Since I have raised to myself so great an audi- ence, I shall spare no pains to make their instruction agreeable, and their diversion useful. For which reasons I shall endeavor to enliven morahty with wit, and to temper wit with morahty, that my readers may, if possible, both ways find their account in the speculation of the day. And to the end that their virtue and discretion may not be short, transient, intermitting starts of thought, I have resolved to refresh their memories from day to day, till I have recovered them out of that desperate state of vice and folly into which the age is fallen. The mind that lies fallow but a single day, sprouts up in follies that are only to be killed by a constant and assiduous culture. It was said of Socrates that he brought philosophy down from heaven, to inhabit among men ; and I shall be ambitious to have it said of me that I have brought philosophy out of closets and libraries, i6o JOSEPH ADDISON schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea- tables and in coffee-houses. I would therefore in a very particular manner recommend these my speculations to all well-regulated families, that set apart an hour in every morning for tea and bread and butter ; and would earnestly advise them for their good to order this paper to be punctually served up, and to be looked upon as a part of the tea-equipage. Sir Francis Bacon observes that a well written book, com- pared with its rivals and antagonists, is like Moses's serpent, that immediately swallowed up and devoured those of the Egyptians. I shall not be so vain as to think that where the Spectator appears, the other public prints will vanish; but shall leave it to my reader's consideration whether, is it not much better to be let into the knowledge of one's self, than to hear what passes in Muscovy or Poland ; and to amuse ourselves with such writings as tend to the wearing out of ignorance, passion, and prejudice, than such as naturally conduce to inflame hatreds and make enmities irreconcilable? In the next place, I would recommend this paper to the daily perusal of those gentlemen whom I cannot but consider as my good brothers and allies, — I mean the fraternity of spectators, who live in the world without having anything to do in it, and, either by the affluence of their fortunes, or laziness of their dis- positions, have no other business with the rest of mankind, but to look upon them. Under this class of men are compre- hended all contemplative tradesmen, titular physicians, fel- lows of the Royal Society, Templars that are not given to be contentious, and statesmen that are out of business; in short, every one that considers the world as a theatre, and desires to form a right judgment of those who are the actors on it. There is another set of men that I must likewise lay a claim to, whom I have lately called the blanks of society, as being altogether unfurnished with ideas, till the business and con- versation of the day has supplied them. I have often considered these poor souls with an eye of great commiseration, when I have heard them asking the first man they have met with, whether there was any news stirring? and by that means gathering together materials for thinking. These needy per- sons do not know what to talk of, till about twelve o'clock in THE SPECTATOR i6i the morning; for by that time they are pretty good judges of the weather, know which way the wind sits, and whether the Dutch mail be come in. As they He at the mercy of the first man they meet, and are grave or impertinent all the day long, according to the notions which they have imbibed in the morn- ing, I would earnestly entreat them not to stir out of their chambers till they have read this paper, and to promise them that I will daily instil into them such sound and wholesome sentiments as shall have a good effect on their conversation for the ensuing twelve hours. But there are none to whom this paper will be more useful, than to the female world. I have often thought there has not been sufficient pains taken in finding out proper employments and diversions for the fair ones. Their amusements seem con- trived for them rather as they are women than as they are reasonable creatures, and are more adapted to the sex than to the species. The toilet is their great scene of business, and the right adjusting of their hair the principal employment of their lives. The sorting of a suit of ribbons is reckoned a very good morning's work; and if they make an excursion to a mercer's or a toy-shop, so great a fatigue makes them unfit for anything else all the day after. Their more serious occupations are sew- ing and embroidery, and their greatest drudgery the prepara- tion of jellies and sweetmeats. This, I say, is the state of ordinary women; though I know there are multitudes of those of a more elevated life and conversation, that move in an exalted sphere of knowledge and virtue, that join all the beauties of the mind to the ornaments of dress, and inspire a kind of awe and respect, as well as love, into their male be- holders. I hope to increase the number of these by publishing this daily paper, which I shall always endeavor to make an innocent if not an improving entertainment, and by that means at least divert the minds of my female readers from greater trifles. At the same time, as I would fain give some finishing touches to those which are already the most beautiful pieces in human nature, I shall endeavor to point out all those imper- fections that are the blemishes, as well as those virtues which are the embellishments, of the sex. In the meanwhile I hope these my gentle readers, who have so much time on their hands, will not grudge throwing away a quarter of an hour in a day i62 JOSEPH ADDISON on this paper, since they may do it without any hindrance to business. I know several of my friends and well-wishers are in great pain for me, lest I should not be able to keep up the spirit of a paper which I oblige myself to furnish every day ; but to make them easy in this particular, I will promise them faithfully to give it over as soon as I grow dull. This I know will be matter of great raillery to the small wits, who will frequently put me in mind of my promise, desire me to keep my word, assure me that it is high time to give over, with many other little pleas- antries of the like nature, which men of a little smart genius cannot forbear throwing out against their best friends, when they have such a handle given them of being witty. But let them remember that I do hereby enter my caveat against this piece of raillery. No. i6. Monday, March 19, 17 11 Quid verum atque decens euro el rogo, el omnis in hoc sum. — HOR. I have received a letter desiring me to be very satirical upon the little muff that is now in fashion. Another informs me of a pair of silver garters buckled below the knee, that have been lately seen at the Rainbow Coffee-house in Fleet Street. A third sends me a heavy complaint against fringed gloves. To be brief, there is scarce an ornament of either sex which one or other of my correspondents has not inveighed against with some bitterness, and recommended to my observation. I must, therefore, once for all inform my readers that it is not my in- tention to sink the dignity of this my paper with reflection upon red heels or top-knots, but rather to enter into the pas- sions of mankind, and to correct those depraved sentiments that give birth to all those little extravagances which appear in their outward dress and behavior. Foppish and fantastic . ornaments are only indications of vice, not criminal in them- selves. Extinguish vanity in the mind, and you naturally re- trench the Httle superfluities of garniture and equipage. The blossoms will fall of themselves when the root that nourishes them is destroyed. I shall therefore, as I have said, apply my remedies to the first seeds and principles of an affected dress, without descend- THE SPECTATOR 163 ing to the dress itself ; though at the same time I must own that I have thoughts of creating an officer under me, to be entitled the Censor of Small Wares, and of allotting him one day in the week for the execution of such his office. An operator of this nature might act under me, with the same regard as a surgeon to a physician; the one might be employed in healing those blotches and tumors which break out in the body, while the other is sweetening the blood and rectifying the constitution. To speak truly, the young people of both sexes are so wonder- fully apt to shoot out into long swords or sweeping trains, bushy head-dresses or full-bottomed periwigs, with several other en- cumbrances of dress, that they stand in need of being pruned very frequently, lest they should be oppressed with ornaments, and overrun with the luxuriancy of their habits. I am much in doubt whether I should give the preference to a Quaker that is trimmed close, and almost cut to the quick, or to a beau that is loaden with such a redundance of excrescences. I must therefore desire my correspondents to let me know how they approve my project, and whether they think the erecting of such a petty censorship may not turn to the emolument of the public; for I would not do anything of this nature rashly and without advice. There is another set of correspondents to whom I must address myself in the second place: I mean such as fill their letters with private scandal, and black accounts of particular persons and families. The world is so full of ill-nature that I have lampoons sent me by people who cannot spell, and satires composed by those who scarce know how to write. By the last post in particular, I received a packet of scandal which is not legible, and have a whole bundle of letters in women's hands, that are full of blots and calumnies; insomuch that, when I see the name of Celia, Phillis, Pastora, or the like, at the bottom of a scrawl, I conclude of course that it brings me some account of a fallen virgin, a faithless wife, or an amorous widow. I must therefore inform these my correspondents, that it is not my design to be a publisher of intrigues, or to bring little infamous stories out of their present lurking-holes into broad daylight. If I attack the vicious, I shall only set upon them in a body, and will not be provoked by the worst usage I can receive from others to make an example of any particular i64 JOSEPH ADDISON criminal. In short, I have so much of a Drawcansir^ in me, that I shall pass over a single foe to charge whole armies. It is not Lais or Silenus, but the harlot and the drunkard, whom I shall endeavor to expose; and shall consider the crime as it appears in the species, not as it is circumstanced in an indi- vidual. I think it was Caligula who wished the whole city of Rome had but one neck, that he might behead them at a blow. I shall do, out of humanity, what that emperor would have done in the cruelty of his temper, and aim every stroke at a collective body of offenders. At the same time I am very sen- sible that nothing spreads a paper Hke private calumny and defamation; but as my speculations are not under this neces- sity, they are not exposed to this temptation. In the next place I must apply myself to my party corre- spondents, who are continually teasing me to take notice of one another's proceedings. How often am I asked by both sides if it is possible for me to be an unconcerned spectator of the rogueries that are committed by the party which is opposite to him that writes the letter. About two days since I was re- proached with an old Grecian law, that forbids any man to stand as a neuter, or a looker-on, in the divisions of his country. However, as I am very sensible my paper would lose its whole effect, should it run into the outrages of a party, I shall take care to keep clear of everything which looks that way. If I can any way assuage private inflammations, or allay public fer- ments, I shall apply my heart to it with my utmost endeavors; but will never let my heart reproach me with having done anything towards increasing those feuds and animosities that extinguish rehgion, deface government, and make a nation miserable. What I have said under the three foregoing heads will, I am afraid, very much retrench the number of my correspondents. I shall therefore acquaint my reader that, if he has started any hint which he is not able to pursue, if he has met with any surprising story which he does not know how to tell, if he has discovered any epidemical vice which has escaped my observa- tion, or has heard of any uncommon virtue which he would desire to publish, — in short, if he has any materials that can furnish out an innocent diversion, I shall promise him my best > A hero in The Rehearsal, burlesquing Dryden's Almanzor. ; THE SPECTATOR 165 assistance in the working of them up for a pubHc entertain- ment. . . . No. 18. Wednesday, March 21, 1711 — Eqiiilis quoqucjam migravil ab aure voliiplas Omnis ad incertos oculos et gaudia vana. — Hor. It is my design in this paper to deliver down to posterity a faithful account of the Italian opera, and of the gradual pro- gress which it has made upon the Enghsh stage ; for there is no question but our great-grandchildren will be very curious to know the reason why their forefathers used to sit together like an audience of foreigners in their own country, and to hear whole plays acted before them in a tongue which they did not understand. Arisinoe^ was the first opera that gave us a taste of Italian music. The great success this opera met with produced some, attempts of forming pieces upon Italian plans, which should give a more natural and reasonable entertainment than what can be met with in the elaborate trifles of that nation. This alarmed the poetasters and fiddlers of the town, who were used to deal in a more ordinary kind of ware, and therefore laid down an estabhshed rule, which is received as such to this day, "That nothing is capable of being well set to music, that is not nonsense." This maxim was no sooner received, but we immediately fell to translating the Italian operas; and as there was no danger of hurting the sense of those extraordinary pieces, our authors would often make words of their own which were entirely foreign to the meaning of the passages they pretended to trans- late; their chief care being to make the numbers of the English verse answer to those of the Italian, that both of them might go to the same tune. Thus the famous song in Camilla, Barbara, si, t'intendo, etc. Barbarous woman, yes, I know your meaning, which expresses the resentments of an angry lover, was trans- lated into that English lamentation, Frail are a lover's hopes, etc. • By Clayton (1705). i66 JOSEPH ADDISON And it was pleasant enough to see the most refined persons of the British nation dying away and languishing to notes that were filled with a spirit of rage and indignation. It happened also very frequently, where the sense was rightly translated, the necessary transposition of words which were drawn out of the phrase of one tongue into that of another, made the music appear very absurd in one tongue that was very natural in the other. I remember an Italian verse that ran thus, word for word : And turned my rage into pity; which the EngHsh for rhyme's sake translated, And into pity turned my rage. By this means the soft notes that were adapted to pity in the ItaHan, fell upon the word rage in the English; and the angry sounds that were tuned to rage in the original, were m'ade to express pity in the translation. It oftentimes happened, like- wise, that the finest notes in the air fell upon the most insig- nificant words in the sentence. I have known the word and pursued through the whole gamut, have been entertained with many a melodious the, and have heard the most beautiful graces, quavers, and divisions bestowed upon then, for, and from, to the eternal honor of our English particles. The jiext. step to our refinement was the introducing of Italian actors into our opera, who sung their parts in their own language, at the same time that our countrymen performed theirs in our native tongue. The king or hero of the play gen- erally spoke in Italian, and his slaves answered him in English; the lover frequently made his court, and gained the heart of his princess, in a language which she did not understand. One would have thought it very difficult to have carried on dia- logues after this manner, without an interpreter between the persons that conversed together; but this was the state of the English stage for about three years. At length the audience grew tired of understanding half the opera, and therefore, to ease themselves entirely of the, fatigue of thinking, have so ordered it at present, that the whole opera is performed in an unknown tongue. We no longer understand the language of our own stage; insomuch that I have often been afraid, when I have seen our Italian performers chatter- THE SPECTATOR 167 ing in the vehemence of action, that they have been calling us names, and abusing us among themselves; but I hope, since we do put such an entire confidence in them, they will not talk against us before our faces, though they may do it with the same safety as if it were behind our backs. In the mean time, I cannot forbear thinking how naturally an historian who writes two or three hundred years hence, and does not know the taste of his wise forefathers, will make the following reflection: "In the beginning of the eighteenth century the Italian tongue was so well understood in England, that operas were acted on the public stage in that language." One scarce knows how to be serious in the confutation of an absurdity that shows itself at the first sight. It does not want any great measure of sense to see the ridicule of this monstrous practice; but what makes it the more astonishing, it is not the taste of the rabble, but of persons of the greatest politeness, which has established it. If the Italians have a genius for music above the English, the English have a genius for other performances of a much higher nature, and capable of giving the mind a much nobler entertainment. Would one think it was possible, at a time when an author ^ lived that was able to write the Phccdra and Hippolitus, for a people to be so stupidly fond of the Itahan opera, as scarce to give a third day's hearing to that admirable tragedy? Music is certainly a very agreeable entertainment, but if it would take the entire possession of our ears, if it would make us incapable of hearing sense, if it would exclude arts that have a much greater tendency to the refinement of human nature, I must confess I would allow it no better quarter than Plato has done, who banishes it out of his commonwealth. At present our notions of music are so very uncertain that we do not know what it is we like; only, in general, we are transported with anything that is not EngHsh; so it be of a for- eign growth, let it be Italian, French, or High Dutch, it is the same thing. In short, our English music is quite rooted out, and nothing yet planted in its stead. When a royal palace is burnt to the ground, every man is at liberty to present his plan for a new one; and though it be but indifferently put together, it may furnish several hints that * Edmund Smith. i68 JOSEPH ADDISON may be of use to a good architect. I shall take the same liberty, in a following paper, of giving my opinion upon the subject of music; which I shall lay down only in a problematical manner, to be considered by those who are masters in the art. No. 26. Friday, March 30, 171 1 Pallida mors aqiio pulsat pede paupcrum tabernas Rcgiimque turres, O heate Sexli, Vitce siimma brevis spent nos vctal inchoare longam: Jam te premet nox, fabulceque manes, Et domus exilis Plutonia. — Hor. When I am in a serious humor, I very often walk by myself in Westminster Abbey; where the gloominess of the place, and the use to which it is applied, with the solemnity of the build- ing, and the condition of the people who lie in it, are apt to fill the mind with a kind of melancholy, or rather thoughtfulness, that is not disagreeable. I yesterday passed a whole afternoon in the churchyard, the cloisters, and the church, amusing my- self with the tombstones and inscriptions that I met with in those several regions of the dead. Most of them recorded nothing else of the buried person, but that he was born upon one day, and died upon another; the whole history of his life being comprehended in those two circumstances that are com- mon to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of existence, whether of brass or marble, as a kind of satire upon the departed persons, who had left no other memorial of them but that they were born and that they died. They put me in mind of several persons mentioned in the battles of heroic poems, who have sounding names given them, for no other reason but that they may be killed, and are celebrated for nothing but being knocked on the head. T\avKbv re M^Soyrd re QepaVkox^v re. — HoM. Glaucumque, Medontaque, Thersilochumque. — Virg. The life of these men is finely described in Holy Writ by " the path of an arrow," which is immediately closed up and lost. Upon my going into the church, I entertained myself with the digging of a grave, and saw, in every shovelful of it that was thrown up, the fragment of a bone or skull intermixed with a kind of fresh mouldering earth that some time or other had a place in the composition of a human body. Upon this, I THE SPECTATOR 169 began to consider with myself what innumerable multitudes of people lay confused together under the pavement of that ancient cathedral; how men and women, friends and enemies, priests and soldiers, monks and prebendaries, were crumbled amongst one another, and blended together in the same com- mon mass; how beauty, strength, and youth, with old age, weakness and deformity, lay undistinguished in the same promiscuous heap of matter. After having thus surveyed this great magazine of mortahty, as it were, in the lump, I examined it more particularly by the accounts which I found on several of the monuments which are raised in every quarter of that ancient fabric. Some of them were covered with such extravagant epitaphs that, if it were possible for the dead person to be acquainted with them, he would blush at the praises which his friends have bestowed upon him. There are others so excessively modest that they deliver the character of the person departed in Greek or He- brew, and by that means are not understood once in a twelve- month. In the poetical quarter, I found there were poets who had no monuments, and monuments which had no poets. I observed indeed that the present war had filled the church with many of these uninhabited monuments, which had been erected to the memory of persons whose bodies were perhaps buried in the plains of Blenheim, or in the bosom of the ocean. I could not but be very much delighted with several modern epitaphs, which are written with great elegance of expression and justness of thought, and therefore do honor to the living as well as to the dead. As a foreigner is very apt to conceive an idea of the ignorance or politeness of a nation, from the turn of their public monuments and inscriptions, they should be sub- mitted to the perusal of men of learning and genius, before they are put in execution. Sir Cloudesly Shovel's monument has very often given me great offense: instead of the brave rough English admiral, which was the distinguishing character of that plain gallant man, he is represented on his tomb by the figure of a beau, dressed in a long periwig, and reposing him- self upon velvet cushions under a canopy of state. The inscrip- tion is answerable to the monument; for instead of celebrating the many remarkable actions he had performed in the service of his country, it acquaints us only with the manner of his 170 JOSEPH ADDISON death, in which it was impossible for him to reap any honor. The Dutch, whom we are apt to despise for want of genius, show an infinitely greater taste of antiquity and pohteness in their buildings and works of this nature, than what we meet with in those of our own country. The monuments of their admirals, which have been erected at the pubhc expense, represent them like themselves, and are adorned with rostral crowns and naval ornaments, with beautiful festoons of sea- weed, shells, and coral. But to return to our subject. I have left the repository of our English kings for the contemplation of another day, when I shall find my mind disposed for so serious an amusement. I know that entertainments of this nature are apt to raise dark and dismal thoughts in timorous minds and gloomy imagina- tions; but for my own part, though I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be melancholy, and can therefore take a view of nature in her deep and solemn scenes with the same pleasure as in her most gay and delightful ones. By this means I can improve myself with those objects which others consider with terror. When I look upon the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies in me; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow; when I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the. holy men that divided the world with their contests and dis- putes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance together. No. 34. Monday, April 9, 171 1 — parcit Cognatis maculis similis fera. — Juv. The club of which I am a member is very luckily composed of such persons as are engaged in different ways of Ufe, and THE SPECTATOR 171 deputed, as it were, out of the most conspicuous classes of mankind. By this means I am furnished with the greatest variety of hints and materials, and know everything that passes in the different quarters and divisions, not only of this great city, but of the whole kingdom. My readers, too, have the satisfaction to find that there is no rank or degree among them who have not their representative in this club, and that there is always somebody present who will take care of their respective interests, that nothing may be written or pub- lished to the prejudice or infringement of their just rights and privileges. I last night sat very late in company with this select body of friends, who entertained me with several remarks which they and others had made upon these my speculations, as also with the various success which they had met with among their several ranks and degrees of readers. Will Honeycomb told me, in the softest manner he could, that there were some ladies (''but for your comfort," says Will, "they are not those of the most wit") that were offended at the liberties I had taken with the opera and the puppet-show; that some of them were hke- wise very much surprised that I should think such serious points as the dress and equipage of persons of quahty, proper subjects for raillery. ■^ He was going on, when Sir Andrew Freeport took him up short, and told him that the papers he hinted at had done great good in the city, and that all their wives and daughters were the better for them; and farther added that the whole City thought themselves very much obliged to me for declaring my generous intentions to scourge vice and folly as they appear in a multitude, without condescending to be a pubhsher of particular intrigues. "In short," says Sir Andrew, "if you avoid that foolish beaten road of falHng upon aldermen and citizens, and employ your pen upon the vanity and luxury of courts, your paper must needs be of general use." Upon this, my friend the Templar told Sir Andrew that he wondered to hear a man of his sense talk after that manner; that the City had always been the province for satire; and that the wits of King Charles's time jested upon nothing else during his whole reign. He then showed, by the examples of Horace, Juvenal, Boileau, and the best writers of every age, that the 172 JOSEPH ADDISON follies of the stage and court had never been accounted too sacred for ridicule, how great soever the persons might be that patronized them. "But after all," says he, "I think your rail- lery has made too great an excursion, in attacking several per- sons of the Inns of Court, and I do not believe you can show me any precedent for your behavior in that particular." My good friend Sir Roger de Coverley, who had said nothing all this while, began his speech with a Pish! and told us that he wondered to see so many men of sense so very serious upon fooleries. "Let our good friend," says he, "attack every one that deserves it. I would only advise you, Mr. Spectator," applying himself to me, "to take care how you m.eddle with country squires. They are the ornaments of the English na- tion, — men of good heads and sound bodies; and, let me tell you, some of them take it ill of you that you mention fox- hunters with so little respect." Captain Sentry spoke very sparingly on this occasion. What he said was only to commend my prudence in not touching upon the army, and advised me to continue to act discreetly in that point. By this time I found every subject of my speculations was taken away from me by one or other of the club, and began to think myself in the condition of the good man that had one wife who took a dislike to his gray hair, and another to his black, till by their picking out what each of them had an aver- sion to, they left his head altogether bald and naked. While I was thus musing with myself, my worthy friend the clergyman, who — very luckily for me — was at the club that night, undertook my cause. He told us that he wondered any order of persons should think themselves too considerable to be advised. That it was not quality, but innocence, which exempted men from reproof. That vice and folly ought to be attacked wherever they could be met with, and especially when they were placed in high and conspicuous stations of life. He farther added that my paper would only serve to ag- gravate the pains of poverty, if it chiefly exposed those who are already depressed, and in some measure turned into ridi- cule, by the meanness of their conditions and circumstances. He afterwards proceeded to take notice of the great use this paper m.ight be of to the public, by reprehending those vices THE SPECTATOR 173 which are too trivial for the chastisement of the law, and too fantastical for the cognizance of the pulpit. He then advised me to prosecute my undertaking with cheerfulness, and as- sured me that, whoever might be displeased with me, I should be approved by all those whose praises do honor to the persons on whom they are bestowed. The whole club pay a particular deference to the discourse of this gentleman, and are drawn into what he says as much by the candid, ingenuous manner with which he delivers him- self, as by the strength of argument and force of reason which he makes use of. Will Honeycomb immediately agreed that what he had said was right, and that, for his part, he would not insist upon the quarter which he had demanded for the ladies. Sir Andrew gave up the City with the same frankness. The Templar would not stand out, and was followed by Sir Roger and the Captain, who all agreed that I should be at liberty to carry the war into what quarter I pleased, provided I con- tinued to combat with criminals in a body, and to assault the vice without hurting the person. This debate, which was held for the good of mankind, put me in mind of that which the Roman triumvirate were for- merely engaged in for their destruction. Every man at first stood hard for his friend, till they found that by this means they should spoil their proscription; and at length, making a sacrifice of all their acquaintance and relations, furm'shed out a very decent execution. Having thus taken my resolutions to march on boldly in the cause of virtue and good sense, and to annoy their adversaries in whatever degree or rank of men they may be found, I shall be deaf for the future to all the remonstrances that shall be made to me on this account. If Punch grows extravagant, I shall reprimand him very freely. If the stage becomes a nur- sery of folly and impertinence, I shall not be afraid to anim- advert upon it. In short, if I meet with anything in City, court, or country, that shocks modesty or good manners, I shall use my utmost endeavors to make an example of it. I must, how- ever, entreat every particular person who does me the honor to be a reader of this paper, never to think himself, or any one of his friends or enemies, aimed at in what is said; for I promise him never to draw a faulty character which does not fit at least 174 JOSEPH ADDISON a thousand people, or to publish a single paper that is not written in the spirit of benevolence and with a love of mankind. No. 40. Monday, April 16, 171 1 Ac ne forte pules me, quae facer e ipse recusem, Cum rede tfactant alii, laudare maligne; Ille per extentum funem mihi posse mdetiir Ire poeta, meum qui pectus inaniler angit, Irrilal, mulcet, falsis terroribus implet, Ut magus; et modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. — HoR. The English writers of tragedy are possessed with a notion that when they represent a virtuous or innocent person in dis- tress, they ought not to leave him till they have delivered him out of his troubles, or made him triumph over his enemies. This error they have been led into by a ridiculous doctrine in modern criticism, that they are obliged to an equal distribu- tion of rewards and punishments, and an impartial execution of poetical justice. Who were the first that established this rule I know not; but I am sure it has no foundation in nature, in reason, or in the practice of the ancients. We find that good and evil happen alike to all men on this side the grave ; and as the principal design of tragedy is to raise commiseration and terror in the minds of the audience, we shall defeat this great end if we always make virtue and innocence happy and suc- cessful. Whatever crosses and disappointments a good man suffers in the body of the tragedy, they will make but small impression on our minds, when we know that in the last act he is to arrive at the end of his wishes and desires. W^hen we see him engaged in the depth of his afflictions, we are apt to com- fort ourselves, because we are sure he will find his way out of them, and that his grief, how great soever it may be at present, will soon terminate in gladness. For this reason the ancient writers of tragedy treated men in their plays, as they are dealt with in the world, by making virtue sometimes happy and sometimes miserable, as they found it in the fable which they made choice of, or as it might affect their audience in the most agreeable manner. Aristotle considers the tragedies that were written in either of these kinds, and observes that those which ended unhappily had always pleased the people, and carried away the prize in the public disputes of the stage, from those THE SPECTATOR 175 that ended happily. Terror and commiseration leave a pleas- ing anguish in the mind, and fix the audience in such a serious composure of thought, as is much more lasting and delightful than any little transient starts of joy and satisfaction. Accord- ingly we find that more of our English tragedies have suc- ceeded, in which the favorites of the audience sink under their calamities, than those in which they recover themselves out of them. The best plays of this kind are The Orphan, Venice Preserved, Alexander the Great, Theodosius, All for Love, (Edipus, Oroonoko, Othello,^ etc. King Lear is an admirable tragedy of the same kind, as Shakespeare wrote it; but as it is reformed^ according to the chimerical notion of poetical justice, in my humble opinion it has lost half its beauty. At the same time I must allow that there are very noble tragedies which have been framed upon the other plan, and have ended happily; as indeed most of the good tragedies, which have been written since the starting of the above mentioned criticism, have taken this turn : as The Mourning Bride, Tamerlane, Ulysses, Phcedra and Hippolitus,^ with most of Mr. Dryden's. I must also allow that many of Shakespeare's, and several of the celebrated trage- dies of antiquity, are cast in the same form. I do not there- fore dispute against this way of writing tragedies, but against the criticism that would establish this as the only method, and by that means would very much cramp the English tragedy, and perhaps give a wrong bent to the genius of our writers. The tragi-comedy, which is the product of the English theatre, is one of the most monstrous inventions that ever entered into a poet's thoughts. An author might as well think of weaving the adventures of ^neas and Hudibras into one poem, as of writing such a motley piece of mirth and sorrow. But the absurdity of these performances is so very visible that I shall not insist upon it. The same objections which are made to tragi-comedy may in some measure be applied to all tragedies that have a double plot in them, which are Hkewise more frequent upon the Eng- ' Of these plays, The Orphan and Venire Preserved arc by Otway, Alexander and Theo- dosius by Lee, All for Love by Dryden, QLdipus by Dryden and Lee, Oroonoko by Mrs. Behn. ^ In an altered version, by Nahum Tate. ' The Mourning Bride is by Congreve, Tamerlane a' Ulysses by Rowe, Phcedra by Edmund Smith (from Racine). 176 JOSEPH ADDISON lish stage than upon any other; for though the grief of the audience, in such performances, be not changed into another passion, as in tragi-comedies, it is diverted upon another ob- ject, which weakens their concern for the principal action, and breaks the tide of sorrow by throwing it into different channels. This inconvenience, however, may in a great measure be cured, if not wholly removed, by the skillful choice of an under-plot, which may bear such a near relation to the principal design as to contribute towards the completion of it, and be concluded by the same catastrophe. There is also another particular which may be reckoned among the blemishes, or rather the false beauties, of our Eng- lish tragedy: I mean those particular speeches which are com- monly known by the name of "rants." The warm and passion- ate parts of a tragedy are always the most taking with the audience; for which reason we often see the players pronounc- ing, in all the violence of action, several parts of the tragedy which the author writ with great temper, and designed that they should have been so acted. I have seen Powell very often raise himself a loud clap by this artifice. The poets that were acquainted with this secret have given frequent occasion for such emotions in the actor, by adding vehemence to words where there was no passion, or inflaming a real passion into fustian. This hath filled the mouths of our heroes with bom- bast, and given them such sentiments as proceed rather from a swelling than a greatness of mind. Unnatural exclama- tions, curses, vows, blasphemies, a defiance of mankind, and an outraging of the gods, frequently pass upon the audience for towering thoughts, and have accordingly met with infinite applause. . . . No. 50. Friday, April 27, 1711 Nunquam aliud nalura, alind sapientia dixit. — Juv. When the four Indian kings were in this country about a twelvemonth ago, I often mixed with the rabble, and followed them a whole day together, being wonderfully struck with the sight of everything that is new or uncommon. I have, since their departure, employed a friend to make many inquiries of their landlord the upholsterer, relating to their manners and conversation, as also concerning the remarks which they made THE SPECTATOR 177 in this country; for, next to the forming a right notion of such strangers, I should be desirous of learning what ideas they have conceived of us. The upholsterer, finding my friend very inquisitive about these his lodgers, brought him some time since a httle bundle of papers, which he assured him were written by King Sa Ga Yean Qua Rash Tow, and, as he supposes, left behind by some mistake. These papers are now translated, and contain abun- dance of very odd observations, which I find this little fra- ternity of kings made during their stay in the isle of Great Britain. I shall present my reader with a short specimen of them in this paper, and may perhaps communicate more to him hereafter. In the article of London are the following words, which without doubt are meant of the church of St. Paul. "On the most rising part of the town there stands a huge house, big enough to contain the whole nation of which I am king. Our good brother E Tow O Koam, King of the Rivers, is of opinion it was made by the hands of that great God to whom it is consecrated. The Kings of Granajah and of the Six Nations believe that it was created with the earth, and produced on the same day with the sun and moon. But for my own part, by the best information that I could get of this matter, I am apt to think that this prodigious pile was fash- ioned into the shape it now bears by several tools and instru- ments, of which they have a wonderful variety in this country. It was probably at first an huge misshapen rock that grew upon the top of the hill, which the natives of the country (after having cut it into a kind of regular figure) bored and hollowed with incredible pains and industry, till they had wrought in it all those beautiful vaults and caverns into which it is divided at this day. As soon as this rock was thus curiously scooped to their liking, a prodigious number of hands must have been employed in chipping the outside of it, which is now as smooth as the surface of a pebble, and is in several places hewn out into pillars, that stand like the trunks of so many trees bound about the top with garlands of leaves. It is probable that when this great work was begun, which must have been many hun- dred years ago, there was some religion among this people; for they give it the name of a temple, and have a tradition that it was designed for men to pay their devotions in. And indeed 178 JOSEPH ADDISON there are several reasons which make us think that the natives of this country had formerly among them some sort of wor- ship, for they set apart every seventh day as sacred; but upon my going into one of these holy houses on that day, I could not observe any circumstance of devotion in their behavior. There was indeed a man in black who was mounted above the rest, and seemed to utter something with a great deal of vehemence; but as for those underneath him, instead of pay- ing their worship to the deity of the place, they were most of them bowing and curtsying to one another, and a considerable number of them fast asleep. "The queen of the country appointed two men to attend us, that had enough of our language to make themselves under- stood in some few particulars. But we soon perceived these two were great enemies to one another, and did not always agree in the same story. We could make a shift to gather out of one of them, that this island was very much infested with a monstrous kind of animals, in the shape of men, called Whigs; and he often told us that he hoped we should meet with none of them in our way, for that if we did, they would be apt to knock us down for being kings. "Our other interpreter used to talk very much of a kind of animal called a Tory, that was as great a monster as the Whig, and would treat us as ill for being foreigners. These two crea- tures, it seems, are born with a secret antipathy to one an- other, and engage when they meet as naturally as the elephant and the rhinoceros. But as we saw none of either of these species, we are apt to think that our guides deceived us with misrepresentations and fictions, and amused us with an account of such monsters as are not really in their country. "These particulars we made a shift to pick out from the discourse of our interpreters, which we put together as well as we could, being able to understand but here and there a word of what they said, and afterwards making up the meaning of it among ourselves. The men of the country are very cunning and ingenious in handicraft works, but withal so very idle that we often saw young lusty rawboned fellows carried up and down the streets in little covered rooms by a couple of porters, who are hired for that service. Their dress is likewise very barbarous, for they almost strangle themselves about the neck, THE SPECTATOR 179 and bind their bodies with many ligatures, that we are apt to think are the occasion of several distempers among them, which our country is entirely free from. Instead of those beautiful feathers with which we adorn our heads, they often buy up a monstrous bush of hair, which covers their heads, and falls down in a large fleece below the middle of their backs ; with which they walk up and down the streets, and are as proud of it as if it was of their own growth. "We were invited to one of their public diversions, where we hoped to have seen the great men of their country running down a stag or pitching a bar, that we might have discovered who were the persons of the greatest abilities among them; but instead of that, they conveyed us into a huge room lighted up with abundance of candles, where this lazy people sat still above three hours to see several feats of ingenuity performed by others, who it seems were paid for it. v^' As for_ the women of the country, not being able to talk with them, we could only make our remarks upon them at a distance. They let the hair of their heads grow to a great length; but as the men make a great show with heads of hair that are none of their own, the women, who they say have very fine heads of hair, tie it up in a knot, and cover it from being seen. The women look like angels, and would be more beauti- ful than the sun, were it not for little black spots that are apt to break out in their faces, and sometimes rise in very odd figures.^ I have observed that those little blemishes wear off very soon; but when they disappear in one part of the face, they are very apt to break out in another, insomuch that I have seen a spot upon the forehead in the afternoon, which was upon the chin in the morning." The author then proceeds to show the absurdity of breeches and petticoats, with many other curious observations, which I shall reserve for another occasion. I cannot, however, con- clude this paper without taking notice that, amidst these wild remarks, there now and then appears something very reason- able. I cannot likewise forbear observing that we are all guilty in some measure of the same narrow way of thinking which we meet with in this abstract of the Indian journal, when we fancy the customs, dresses, and manners of other countries are ridicu- lous and extravagant, if they do not resemble those of our own. 1 See No. Si, below. i8o JOSEPH ADDISON No. 62.^ Friday, May ii, 1711 Scribendi rede sapere esl el principium et fans. — HoR. Mr. Locke has an admirable reflection upon the difference of \vijt and judgment, whereby he endeavors to show the reason why they are not always the talents of the same person. His words are as follow: "And hence, perhaps, may be given some reason of that common observation, that men who have a great deal of wit, and prompt memories, have not always the clearest judgment or deepest reason. For wit lying most in the assemblage of ideas, and putting those together with quickness and variety wherein can be found any resemblance or congruity, thereby to make up pleasant pictures, and agree- able visions in the fancy; judgment, on the contrary, hes quite on the other side, in separating carefully one from another ideas wherein can be found the least difference, thereby to avoid being misled by similitude, and by afhnity to take one thing for another. This is a way of proceeding quite contrary to metaphor and allusion, wherein, for the most part, lies that entertainment and pleasantry of wit, which strikes so lively on the fancy, and is therefore so acceptable to all people." This is, I think, the best and most philosophical account that I have ever met with of wit, which generally, though not always, consists in such a resemblance and congruity of ideas as this author mentions. I shall only add to it, by way of ex- planation, that every resemblance of ideas is not that which we call wit, unless it be such a one that gives delight and surprise to the reader. These two properties seem essential to wit, more particularly the last of them. In order, therefore, that the re- semblance in the ideas be wit, it is necessary that the ideas should not lie too near one another in the nature of things; for where the likeness is obvious, it gives no surprise. To com- pare one man's singing to that of another, or to represent the whiteness of any object by that of milk and snow, or the variety' of its colors by those of the rainbow, cannot be called wit, unless, besides this obvious resemblance, there be some farther congruity discovered in the two ideas, that is capable of giving the reader some surprise. Thus when a poet tells us the bosom of his mistress is as white as snow, there is no wit in the com- 1 The fifth of six papers on Wit. THE SPECTATOR i8i parison; but when he adds, with a sigh, it is as cold too, it then grows into wit. Every reader's memory may supply him with innumerable instances of the same nature. For this reason the similitudes in heroic poets, who endeavor rather to fill the mind with great conceptions than to divert it with such as are new and surprising, have seldom anything in them that can be called wit. Mr. Locke's account of wit, with this short explanation, comprehends most of the species of wit, — as metaphors, simiKtudes, allegories, enigmas, mottos, parables, fables, dreams, visions, dramatic writings, burlesque, and all the methods of allusion. There are many other species of wit, how remote soever ihey may appear at first sight from the fore- going description, which upon examination will be found to agree with it. As true wit generally consists in this resemblance and con- gruity of ideas, false wit chiefly consists in the resemblance and congruity, sometimes of single letters, as in anagrams, chrono- t.^,.,^^*-'' grams, hpograms, and acrostics; sometimes of syllables, as in ' echoes and doggerel rhymes; and sometimes of whole sentences or poems, cast into the figures of eggs, axes, or altars. Nay, some carry the notion of wit so far as to ascribe it even to ex- ternal mimicry, and to look upon a man as an ingenious per- son that can resemble the tone, posture, or face of another. As true wit consists in the resemblance of ideas, and false wit in the resemblance of words, according to the foregoing instances, there is another kind of wit which consists partly in the resemblance of ideas, and partly in the resemblance of words, which for distinction sake I shall call mixed wit. This kind of wit is that which abounds in Cowley, more than in any other author that ever wrote. Mr. Waller has likewise a great deal of it. Mr. Dryden is very sparing in it. Milton had a genius much above it. Spenser is in the same class with Milton. The Italians, even in their epic poetry, are full of it. Monsieur Boileau, who formed himself upon the ancient poets, has everywhere rejected it with scorn. . . . Out of the innumerable branches of mixed wit, I shall choose j^-t^..^ one instance which may be metVith in all the writers of this i>« „ class. The passion of love in its nature has been thought to resemble fire, for which reason the words fire and fi.ame are made use of to signify love. The witty poets therefore have i82 JOSEPH ADDISON taken an advantage from the double meaning of the word fire, to make an infinite number of witticisms. Cowley, observing the cold regard of his mistress's eyes, and at the same time their power of producing love in him, considers them as burning- glasses made of ice; and, finding himself able to live in the greatest extremities of love, concludes the torrid zone to be habitable. When his mistress has read his letter written in juice of lemon, by holding it to the fire, he desires her to read it over a second time by love's flame. When she weeps, he wishes it were inward heat that distilled those drops from the limbeck. When she is absent, he is beyond eighty, — that is, thirty degrees nearer the Pole than when she is with him. His ambitious love is a fire that naturally mounts upwards; his happy love is the beams of heaven, and his unhappy love flames of hell. When it does not let him sleep, it is a flame that sends up no smoke ; when it is opposed by counsel and advice, it is a fire that rages the more by the winds blowing upon it. Upon the dying of a tree in which he had cut his loves, he observed that his written flames had burnt up and withered the tree. When he resolves to give over his passion, he tells us that one burnt like him forever dreads the fire. His heart is an ^tna, that, instead of Vulcan's shop, encloses Cupid's forge in it. His endeavoring to drown his love in wine is throwing oil upon the fire. He would insinuate to his mistress that the fire of love, like that of the sun (which produces so many hving creatures), should not only warm, but beget. Love, in another place, cooks pleasure at his fire. Sometimes the poet's heart is frozen in every breast, and sometimes scorched in every eye. Sometimes he is drowned in tears and burnt in love, hke a ship set on fire in the middle of the sea. The reader may observe in every one of these instances, that the poet mixes the qualities of fire with those of love; and, in the same sentence speaking of it both as a passion and as real fire, surprises the reader with those seeming resemblances or contradictions that make up all the wit in this kind of writ- ing. Mixed wit is therefore a composition of pun and true wit, and is more or less perfect as the resemblance lies in the ideas or in the words. Its foundations are laid partly in falsehood and partly in truth; reason puts in her claim for one half of it, and extravagance for the other. The only province, therefore, THE SPECTATOR 183 for this kind of wit is epigram, or those Httle occasional poems that in their own nature are nothing else but a tissue of epi- grams. I cannot conclude this head of mixed wit without own- ing that the admirable poet out of whom I have taken the examples of it, had as much true wit as any author that ever writ, and indeed all other talents of an extraordinary genius. It may be expected, since I am upon this subject, that I should take notice of Mr. Dryden's definition of wit; which, with all the deference that is due to the judgment of so great a man, is not so properly a definition of wit as of good writing in general. Wit, as he defines it, is "a propriety of words and thoughts adapted to the subject." If this be a true definition of wit, I am apt to think that Euclid was the greatest wit that ever set pen to paper. It is certain there never was a greater propriety of words and thoughts adapted to the subject, than what that author has made use of in his Elements. I shall only appeal to my reader if this definition agrees with any notion he has of wit. If it be a true one, I am sure Mr. Dryden was not only a better poet, but a greater wit, than Mr. Cowley, and Virgil a much more facetious man than either Ovid or Martial. Bouhours, whom I look upon to be the most penetrating of all the French critics, has taken pains to show that it is im- possible for any thought to be beautiful which is not just, and has not its foundation in the nature of things; that the basis of all wit is truth; and that no thought can be valuable of which good sense is not the ground- work. Boileau has en- deavored to inculcate the same notion in several parts of his writings, both in prose and verse. This is that natural way of writing, that beautiful simplicity, which we so much admire in the compositions of the ancients, and which nobody devi- ates from but those who want strength of genius to make a thought shine in its own natural beauties. Poets who want this strength of genius to give that majestic simplicity to nature which we so much admire in the works of the ancients, are forced to hunt after foreign ornaments, and not to let any piece of wit of what kind soever escape them. I look upon these writers as Goths in poetry, who, hke those in architecture, not being able to come up to the beautiful simplicity of the old Greeks and Romans, have endeavored to supply its place with all the extravagancies of an irregular fancy. . . . Were I not i84 JOSEPH ADDISON supported by so great an authority as that of Mr. Dryden, I should not venture to observe that the taste of most of our English poets, as well as readers, is extremely Gothic. .. ,. . No. 70. Monday, May 21, 171 1 Interdum viilgus rectum videt. — Hor. When I traveled, I took a particular delight in hearing the songs and fables that are come from father to son, and are most in vogue among the common people of the countries through which I passed; for it is impossible that anything should be universally tasted and approved by a multitude, though they are only the rabble of a nation, which hath not in it some peculiar aptness to please and gratify the mind of man. Human nature is the same in all reasonable creatures; and whatever falls in with it will meet with admirers amongst readers of all qualities and conditions. MoHere, as we are told by Monsieur Boileau, used to read all his comedies to an old woman who was his housekeeper, as she sat with him at her work by the chimney-corner, and could foretell the success of his play in the theatre, from the reception it met at his fire- side ; for he tells us the audience always followed the old woman, and never failed to laugh in the same place. I know nothing which more shows the essential and inherent perfection of simplicity of thought, above that which I call the Gothic manner in writing, than this: the first pleases all kinds of palates, and the latter only such as have formed to themselves a wrong artificial taste upon little fanciful authors and writers of epigram. Homer, Virgil, or Milton, so far as the language of their poems is understood, will please a reader of plain common sense, who would neither relish nor comprehend an epigram of Martial, or a poem of Cowley; so, on the con- trary, an ordinary song or ballad that is the delight of the com- mon people, cannot fail to please all such readers as are not unquahfied for the entertainment by their affectation or igno- rance; and the reason is plain, because the same paintings of nature which recommend it to the most ordinary reader, will appear beautiful to the most refined. The old song of Chevy Chase is the favorite ballad of the common people of England, and Ben Jonson used to say he had THE SPECTATOR 185 rather have been the author of it than of all his works. Sir Philip Sidney, in his discourse of Poetry, speaks of it in the following words: "I never heard the old song of Percy and Douglas, that I found not my heart more moved than with a trumpet; and yet it is sung by some blind crowder with no rougher voice than rude style ; which being so evil appareled in the dust and cobweb of that uncivil age, what would it work trimmed in the gorgeous eloquence of Pindar?" For my own part, I am so professed an admirer of this antiquated song that I shall give my reader a critique upon it, without any further apology for so doing. The greatest modern critics have laid it down as a rule that an heroic poem should be founded upon some important precept of morahty, adapted to the constitution of the country in which the poet writes. Homer and Virgil have formed their plans in this view. As Greece was a collection of many govern- ments, who suffered very much among themselves, and gave the Persian emperor, who was their common enemy, many advantages over them by their mutual jealousies and ani- mosities. Homer, in order to establish among them an union, which was so necessary for their safety, grounds his poem upon the discords of the several Grecian princes who were engaged in a confederacy against an Asiatic prince, and the several advantages which the enemy gained by such their discords. At the time the poem we are now treating of was written, the dissensions of the barons, who were then so many petty princes, ran very high, whether they quarreled among themselves, or with their neighbors, and produced unspeakable calamities to the country. The poet, to deter men from such unnatural con- tentions, describes a bloody battle and dreadful scene of death, occasioned by the mutual feuds which reigned in the families of an EngUsh and Scotch nobleman. That he designed this for the instruction of his poem, we may learn from his four last lines, in which, after the example of the modern trage- dians, he draws from it a precept for the benefit of his read- ers: — God save the King, and bless the land In plenty, joy, and peace; And grant henceforth that foul debate 'Twixt noblemen may cease. i86 JOSEPH ADDISON The next point observed by the greatest heroic poets, hath been to celebrate persons and actions which do honor to their country: thus Virgil's hero was the founder of Rome, Homer's a prince of Greece; and for this reason Valerius Flaccus and Statius, who were both Romans, might be justly derided for having chosen the expedition of the Golden Fleece, and the Wars of Thebes, for the subject of their epic writings. The poet before us has not only found out an hero in his own country, but raises the reputation of it by several beauti- ful incidents. The English are the first who take the field, and the last who quit it. The English bring only fifteen hundred to the battle, and the Scotch two thousand. The English keep the field with fifty-three; the Scotch retire with fifty-five; all the rest on each side being slain in battle. But the most re- markable circumstance of this kind is the different manner in which the Scotch and English kings receive the news of this fight, and of the great men's deaths who commanded in it. , This news was brought to Edinburgh, Where Scotland's king did reign, j That brave Earl Douglas suddenly Was with an arrow slain. heavy news. King James did say; Scotland can witness be, 1 have not any captain more Of such account as he. Like tidings to King Henry came Within as short a space. That Percy of Northumberland Was slain in Chevy-Chase. Now God be with him, said our King, Sith 't will no better be; I trust I have within my realm Five hundred as good as he. Yet shall not Scot nor Scotland say But I will vengeance take, And be revenged on them all For brave Lord Percy's sake. This vow full well the King performed After on Humble-down; THE SPECTATOR 187 In one day fifty knights were slain, With lords of great renown. And of the rest of small account Did many thousand die, etc. j At the same time that our poet shows a laudable partiality to his countrymen, he represents the Scots after a manner not unbecoming so bold and brave a people. Earl Douglas on a milk-white steed, Most like a baron bold, Rode foremost of the company, Whose armor shone like gold. His sentiments and actions are every way suitable to an hero. "One of us two," says he, "must die. I am an earl as well as yourself, so that you can have no pretence for refusing the combat; however (says he), 'tis pity, and indeed would be a sin, that so many innocent men should perish for our sakes; rather let you and I end our quarrel in single fight." Ere thus I will outbraved be. One of us two shall die; I know thee well, an earl thou art, Lord Percy, so am I. But trust me, Percy, pity it were. And great offense, to kill Any of these our harmless men. For they have done no ill. Let thou and I the battle try. And set our men aside; Accurs'd be he, Lord Percy said. By whom this is denied. When these brave men had distinguished themselves in the battle and in single combat with each other, in the midst of a generous parley, full of heroic sentiments, the Scotch earl falls; and with his dying words encourages his men to revenge his death, representing to them, as the most bitter circum- stance of it, that his rival saw him fall. With that there came an arrow keen Out of an English bow. Which struck Earl Douglas to the heart A deep and deadly blow. i88 JOSEPH ADDISON Who never spoke more words than these: Fight on, my merry men all, For why, my life is at an end, Lord Percy sees my fall. "Merry men," in the language of those times, is no more than a cheerful word for companions and fellow-soldiers. A passage in the eleventh book of Virgil's Mneids is very much to be admired, where Camilla, in her last agonies, instead of weeping over the wound she had received, as one might have expected from a warrior of her sex, considers only (like the hero of whom we are now speaking) how the battle should be continued after her death. Turn sic expirans, etc. A gathering mist o'erclouds her cheerful eyes, And from her cheeks the rosy color flies. Then turns to her whom, of her female train, She trusted most, and thus she speaks with pain: Acca, 't is past! he swims before my sight, Inexorable death, and claims his right. Bear my last words to Turnus, fly with speed, And bid him timely to my charge succeed; Repel the Trojans, and the town relieve; Farewell. Turnus did not die in so heroic a manner; though our poet seems to have had his eye upon Turnus's speech in the last verse, Lord Percy sees my fall. Vicisti, et victum tendere palmas Ausonii videre.^ Earl Percy's lamentation over his enemy is generous, beauti- ful, and passionate; I must only caution the reader not to let the simplicity of the style, which one may well pardon in so old a poet, prejudice him against the greatness of the thought. Then leaving life. Earl Percy took The dead man by the hand. And said, Earl Douglas, for thy life Would I had lost my land. I "You conquered, and the Ausonii saw the' conquered man stretch forth his hands." THE SPECTATOR 189 O Christ! my very heart doth bleed With sorrow for thy sake; For sure a more renowned knight Mischance did never take. That beautiful line, "Taking the dead man by the hand," will put the reader in mind of ^neas's behavior towards Lausus, whom he himself had slain as he came to the rescue of his aged father. At vero ut vultum vidit morientis, et era, Ora modis Anchisiades pallentia miris; Ingemuit, miserans graviter, dextramque tetendit, etc. The pious prince beheld young Lausus dead ; He grieved, he wept; then grasped his hand, and said: Poor hapless youth! what praises can be paid To worth so great! I shall take another opportunity to consider the other parts of this old song. No. 81. Saturday, June 2, 17 11 Qualis ubi audilo venatitiim murmure tigris Horruit in maculas. — Statius. About the middle of last winter I went to see an opera at the theatre in the Haymarket, where I could not but take notice of two parties of very fine women, that had placed them- selves in the opposite side-boxes, and seemed drawn up in a kind of battle array one against another. After a short survey of them, I found they were patched differently; the faces on one hand being spotted on the right side of the forehead, and those upon the other on the left. I quickly perceived that they cast hostile glances upon one another, and that their patches were placed in those different situations, as party signals to distinguish friends from foes. In the middle boxes, between these two opposite bodies, were several ladies who patched in- differently on both sides of their faces, and seemed to sit there with no other intention but to see the opera. Upon inquiry I found that the body of Amazons on my right hand were Whigs, and those on my left Tories; and that those who had placed themselves in the middle boxes were a neutral party, whose faces had' not yet declared themselves. These last, however. I90 JOSEPH ADDISON as I afterwards found, diminished daily, and took their party with one side or the other; insomuch that I observed in several of them the patches, which were before dispersed equally, are now all gone over to the Whig or Tory side of the face. The censorious say that the men, whose hearts are aimed at, are very often the occasions that one part of the face is thus dis- honored, and Hes under a kind of disgrace, while the other is so much set off and adorned by the owner; and that the patches turn to the right or to the left, according to the principles of the man who is most in favor. But, whatever may be the motives of a few fantastical coquettes, who do not patch for the public good so much as for their own private advantage, it is certain that there are several women of honor who patch out of principle, and with an eye to the interest of their country. Nay, I am informed that some of them adhere so steadfastly to their party, and are so far from sacrificing their zeal for the public to their passion for any particular person, that in a late draught of marriage articles a lady has stipulated with her hus- band that, whatever his opinions are, she shall be at liberty to patch on which side she pleases. I must here take notice that Rosalinda, a famous Whig partisan, has most unfortunately a very beautiful mole on the Tory part of her forehead; which, being very conspicuous, has occasioned many mistakes, and given an handle to her enemies to misrepresent her face, as though it had revolted from the Whig interest. But, whatever this natural patch may seem to insinuate, it is well known that her notions of government are still the same. This unlucky mole, however, has misled several coxcombs, and, like the hanging out of false colors, made some of them converse with Rosalinda in what they thought the spirit of her party, when on a sudden she has given them an unexpected fire, that has sunk them all at once. If Rosalinda is unfortunate in her mole, Nigranilla is as unhappy in a pim- ple, which forces her, against her inclinations, to patch on the Whig side. I am told that many virtuous matrons, who formerly have been taught to believe that this artificial spotting of the face was unlawful, are now reconciled, by a zeal for their cause, to what they could not be prompted by a concern for their beauty. This way of declaring war upon one another puts me in mind THE SPECTATOR 191 of what is reported of the tigress, that several spots rise in her skin when she is angry; or, as Mr. Cowley has imitated the verses that stand as the motto of this paper, — She swells with angry pride, And calls forth all her spots on every side. When I was in the theatre the time above mentioned, I had the curiosity to count the patches on both sides, and found the Tory patches to be about twenty stronger than the Whig ; but to make amends for this small inequality, I the next morning found the whole puppet-show filled with faces spotted after the Whiggish manner. Whether or no the ladies had retreated hither in order to rally their forces, I cannot tell; but the next night they came in so great a body to the opera, that they out- numbered the enemy. This account of party patches will, I am afraid, appear im- probable to those who live at a distance from the fashionable world; but as it is a distinction of a very singular nature, and what perhaps may never meet with a parallel, I think I should not have discharged the office of a faithful Spectator, had I not recorded it. I have, in former papers, endeavored to expose this party rage in women, as it only serves to aggravate the hatreds and animosities that reign among men, and in a great measure deprives the fair sex of those pecuhar charms with which nature has endowed them. When the Romans and Sabines were at war, and just upon the point of giving battle, the women who were allied to both of them interposed with so many tears and entreaties, that they prevented the mutual slaughter which threatened both parties, and united them together in a firm and lasting peace. I would recommend this noble example to our British ladies, at a time when their country is torn with so many unnatural divisions that, if they continue, it will be a misfortune to be born in it. The Greeks thought it so improper for women to interest themselves in competitions and contentions, that for this reason, among others, they forbade them, under pain of death, to be present at the Olympic games, notwithstanding these were the public diversions of all Greece. ^ As our English women excel those of all nations in beauty, 192 JOSEPH ADDISON they should endeavor to outshine them in all other accom- plishments proper to the sex, and to distinguish themselves as tender mothers and faithful wives, rather than as furious parti- sans. Female virtues are of a domestic turn. The family is the proper province for private women to shine in. If they must be showing their zeal for the pubUc, let it not be against those who are perhaps of the same family, or at least of the same reUgion or nation, but against those who are the open, pro- fessed, undoubted enemies of their faith, liberty and country. When the Romans were pressed with a foreign enemy, the ladies voluntarily contributed all their rings and jewels to assist the government under the public exigence, which ap- peared so laudable an action in the eyes of their countrymen, that from thenceforth it was permitted by a law to pronounce public orations at the funeral of a woman in praise of the deceased person, which till that time was peculiar to men. Would our English ladies, instead of sticking on a patch against those of their own country, show themselves so truly pubhc- spirited as to sacrifice every one her necklace against the common enemy, what decrees ought not to be made in favor of them? Since I am recollecting upon this subject such passages as occur to my memory out of ancient authors, I cannot omit a sentence in the celebrated funeral oration of Pericles which he made in honor of those brave Athenians that were slain in a fight with the Lacedemonians. After having addressed himself to the several ranks and orders of his countrymen, and shown them how they should behave themselves in the public cause, he turns to the female part of his audience: "And as for you," (says he) "I shall advise you in very few words: aspire only to those virtues that are peculiar to your sex ; follow your natu- ral modesty, and think it your greatest commendation not to be talked of one way or other." No. 159. Saturday, September i, 171 i Omncm, qua nunc ohduda tuenti Mortales hebetat visus tibi, et hnmida circum Caligat, nubem eripiam. — Virg. When I was at Grand Cairo I picked up several oriental manuscripts, which I have still by me. Among others I met THE SPECTATOR 193 with one entitled "The Visions of Mirzah," which I have read over with great pleasure. I intend to give it to the public when I have no other entertainment for them; and shall begin with the first vision, which I have translated word for word as fol- lows : — ''On the fifth day of the moon, which, according to the cus- tom of my forefathers, I always keep holy, after having washed myself, and offered up my morning devotions, I ascended the high hills of Bagdat, in order to pass the rest of the day in medi- tation and prayer. As I was here airing myself on the tops of the mountains, I fell into a profound contemplation on the vanity of human Hfe; and, passing from one thought to an- other, 'Surely,' said I, 'man is but a shadow and life a dream.' Whilst I was thus musing, I cast my eyes towards the summit of a rock that was not far from me, where I discovered one in the habit of a shepherd, with a musical instrument in his hand. As I looked upon him he applied it to his lips, and began to play upon it. The sound of it was exceeding sweet, and wrought into a variety of tunes that were inexpressibly melodious, and altogether different from anything I had ever heard. They put me in mind of those heavenly airs that are played to the departed souls of good men upon their first arrival in Paradise, to wear out the impressions of the last agonies, and qualify them for the pleasures of that happy place. My heart melted away in secret raptures. " I had been often told that the rock before me was the haunt of a genius, and that several had been entertained with music who had passed by it, but never heard that the musician had before made himself visible. When he had raised my thoughts, by those transporting airs which he played, to taste the pleas- ures of his conversation, as I looked upon him like one aston- ished, he beckoned to me, and by the waving of his hand directed me to approach the place where he sat. I drew near with that reverence which is due to a superior nature; and as my heart was entirely subdued by the captivating strains I had heard, I fell down at his feet and wept. The genius smiled upon me with a look of compassion and affability that famil- iarized him to my imagination, and at once dispelled all the fears and apprehensions with which I approached him. He lifted me from the ground, and, taking me by the hand, 194 JOSEPH ADDISON 'Mirzah,' said he, 'I have heard thee in thy soliloquies; fol- low me.' *'He then led me to the highest pinnacle of the rock, and, placing me on the top of it, ' Cast thy eyes eastward,' said he, 'and tell me what thou seest.' *I see,' said I, 'a huge valley, and a prodigious tide of water rolling through it.' 'The valley that thou seest,' said he, 'is the vale of misery, and the tide of water that thou seest is part of the great tide of eternity.' 'What is the reason,' said I, 'that the tide I see rises out of a thick mist at one end, and again loses itself in a thick mist at the other?' 'What thou seest,' said he, 'is that portion of eternity which is called time, measured out by the sun, and reaching from the beginning of the world to its consummation. Examine now,' said he, 'this sea that is thus bounded with darkness at both ends, and tell me what thou discoverest in it.' 'I see a bridge,' said I, 'standing in the midst of the tide.' 'The bridge thou seest,' said he, 'is human Hfe; consider it attentively.' Upon a more leisurely survey of it, I found that it consisted of threescore and ten entire arches, with several broken arches, which, added to those that were entire, made up the number about an hundred. As I was counting the arches the genius told me that this bridge consisted at first of a thou- sand arches; but that a great flood swept away the rest, and left the bridge in the ruinous condition I now beheld it. 'But tell me further,' said he, 'what thou discoverest on it.' '"I see multitudes of people passing over it,' said I, 'and a black cloud hanging on each end of it.' As I looked more at- tentively, I saw several of the passengers dropping through the bridge, into the great tide that flowed underneath it; and, upon further examination, perceived there were innumerable trap-doors that lay concealed in the bridge, which the passen- gers no sooner trod upon, but they fell through them into the tide and immediately disappeared. These hidden pitfalls were set very thick at the entrance of the bridge, so that throngs of people no sooner broke through the cloud, but many of them fell into them. They grew thinner towards the middle, but multiphed and lay closer together towards the end of the arches that were entire. "There were indeed some persons — but their number was very small — that continued a kind of hobbling march on THE SPECTATOR 195 the broken arches, but fell through one after another, being quite tired and spent with so long a walk. "I passed some time in the contemplation of this wonderful structure, and the great variety of objects which it presented. My heart was filled with a deep melancholy to see several drop- ping unexpectedly in the midst of mirth and jollity, and catch- ing at everything that stood by them to save themselves. Some were looking up towards the heavens in a thoughtful posture, and in the midst of a speculation stumbled and fell out of sight. Multitudes were very busy in the pursuit of bubbles that glittered in their eyes and danced before them, but often, when they thought themselves within the reach of them, their footing failed, and down they sunk. In this con- fusion of objects, I observed some with scimitars in their hands, and others with urinals, who ran to and fro upon the bridge, thrusting several persons on trap-doors which did not seem to He in their way, and which they might have escaped, had they not been thus forced upon them. "The genius, seeing me indulge myself in this melancholy prospect, told me I had dwelt long enough upon it. ' Take thine eyes off the bridge, ' said he, ' and tell me if thou yet seest anything thou dost not comprehend.' Upon looking up, 'What mean,' said I, ' those great flights of birds that are perpetually hover- ing about the bridge, and settling upon it from time to time? I see vultures, harpies, ravens, cormorants; and among many other feathered creatures several little winged boys, that perch in great numbers upon the middle arches.' 'These,' said the genius, 'are envy, avarice, superstition, despair, love, with the like cares and passions that infest human life.' "I here fetched a deep sigh. 'Alas,' said I, 'man was made in vain! how is he given away to misery and mortahty! tor- tured in Hfe, and swallowed up in death!' The genius, being moved with compassion towards me, bid me quit so uncomfort- able a prospect. 'Look no more,' said he, 'on man in the first stage of his existence, in his setting out for eternity; but cast thine eye on that thick mist into which the tide bears the sev- eral generations of mortals that fall into it.' I directed my sight as I was ordered, and (whether or no the good genius strengthened it with any supernatural force, or dissipated part of the mist that was before too thick for the eye to penetrate) 196 JOSEPH ADDISON I saw the valley opening at the further end, and spreading forth into an immense ocean, that had a huge rock of adamant running through the midst of it, and dividing it into two equal parts. The clouds still rested on one half of it, insomuch that I could discover nothing in it; but the other appeared to me a vast ocean planted with innumerable islands, that were covered with fruits and flowers, and interwoven with a thousand httle shining seas that ran among them. I could see persons dressed in glorious habits, with garlands upon their heads, passing among the trees, lying down by the sides of fountains, or rest- ing on beds of flowers; and could hear a confused harmony of singing birds, falling waters, human voices, and musical instru- ments. Gladness grew in me upon the discovery of so delight- ful a scene. I wished for the wings of an eagle, that I might fly away to those happy seats; but the genius told me there was no passage to them, except through the gates of death that I saw opening every moment upon the bridge. 'The islands,' said he, 'that lie so fresh and green before thee, and with which the whole face of the ocean appears spotted as far as thou canst see, are more in number than the sands on the sea-shore ; there are myriads of islands behind those which thou here discover- est, reaching further than thine eye or even thine imagina- tion can extend itself. These are the mansions of good men after death, who, according to the degree and kinds of virtue in which they excelled, are distributed among these several islands, which abound with pleasures of different kinds and degrees, suitable to the relishes and perfections of those who are settled in them; every island is a paradise accommodated to its respective inhabitants. Are not these, O Mirzah, habita- tions worth contending for? Does life appear miserable, that gives thee opportunities of earning such a reward? Is death to be feared, that will convey thee to so happy an existence? Think not man was made in vain, who has such an eternity reserved for him,' I gazed with inexpressible pleasure on these happy islands. At length said I, ' Show me now, I beseech thee, the secrets that lie hid under those dark clouds which cover the ocean on the other side of the rock of adamant.' The genius making me no answer, I turned about to address myself to him a second time, but I found that he had left me; I then turned again to the vision which I had been so long contem- THE SPECTATOR 197 plating, but instead of the rolling tide, the arched bridge, and the happy islands, I saw nothing but the long hollow valley of Bagdat, with oxen, sheep, and camels grazing upon the sides of it.' The end of the first vision of Mirzah. No. 267.' Saturday, January 5, 1712 ^W^U^ Cedite Romani scriptores, cedite Graii. — Propert. '-"^' '^'^' , hr-i There is nothing in nature more irksome than general dis- courses, especially when they turn chiefly upon words. For this reason I shall waive the discussion of that point which was started some years since, whether Milton's Paradise Lost may be called an heroic poem. Those who will not give it that title may call it, if they please, a divine poem. It will be sufficient to its perfection, if it has in it all the beauties of the highest kind of poetry; and as for those who allege it is not an heroic poem, they advance no more to the diminution of it, than if they should say Adam is not ^Eneas, nor Eve Helen. I shall therefore examine it by the rules of epic poetry, and see whether it falls short of the Iliad or Mneid in the beauties which are essential to that kind of writing. The first thing to be considered in an epic poem is the fable, which is perfect or imperfect, according as the action which it relates is more or less so. This action should have three qualifications in it. First, it should be but one action; secondly, it should be an entire action; and thirdly, it should be a great action. To con- sider the action of the Iliad, Mneid, and Paradise Lost, in these three several lights. Homer, to preserve the unity of his action, hastens into the midst of things, as Horace has observed. Had he gone up to Leda's egg, or begun much later, even at the rape of Helen, or the investing of Troy, it is manifest that the story of the poem would have been a series of several actions. He therefore opens his poem with the discord of his princes, and artfully interweaves, in the several succeeding parts of it, an account of everything material which relates to them, and had passed before this fatal dissension. After the same manner iF^neas makes his first appearance in the Tyrrhene seas, and within sight of Italy, because the action proposed to be cele- * The first of eighteen papers on Paradise Lost. See page 207, below. 198 JOSEPH ADDISON brated was that of his settling himself in Latium. But because it was necessary for the reader to know what had happened to him in the taking of Troy, and in the preceding parts of his voyage, Virgil makes his hero relate it by way of episode in the second and third books of the ^neid; the contents of both which books come before those of the first book in the thread of the story, though, for preserving of this unity of action, they follow it in the disposition of the poem. Milton, in imitation of these two great poets, opens his Paradise Lost with an infer- nal council plotting the fall of man, which is the action he pro- posed to celebrate; and as for those great actions, the battle of the angels and the creation of the world (which preceded in point of time, and which, in my opinion, would have entirely destroyed the unity of his principal action, had he related them in the same order that they happened), he cast them into the fifth, sixth, and seventh books, by way of episode to this noble poem. Aristotle himself allows that Homer has nothing to boast of as to the unity of his fable, though at the same time that great critic and philosopher endeavors to palliate this imperfection in the Greek poet, by imputing it in some measure to the very nature of an epic poem. Some have been of opinion that the jEneid also labors in this particular, and has episodes which may be looked upon as excrescences rather than as parts of the action. On the contrary, the poem which we have now under our consideration hath no other episodes than such as natu- rally arise from the subject, and yet is filled with such a multi- tude of astonishing incidents, that it gives us at the same time a pleasure of the greatest variety, and of the greatest simplicity; uniform in its nature, though diversified in the execution. I must observe also that as Virgil, in the poem which was designed to celebrate the original of the Roman empire, has described the birth of its great rival, the Carthaginian com- monwealth, Milton, with the hke art, in his poem on the fall of man has related the fall of those angels who are his professed enemies. Besides the many other beauties in such an episode, its running parallel with the great action of the poem hinders it from breaking the unity so much as another episode would have done, that had not so great an affinity with the principal sub- ject. In short, this is the same kind of beauty which the critics THE SPECTATOR 199 admire in The Spanish Friar or The Double Discovery,^ where the two different plots look like counterparts and copies of one another. The second qualification required in the action of an epic poem is that it should be an entireaction . An action is entire when it is complete in all its parts; or, as Aristotle describes it, when it consists of a beginning, a middle, and an end. Nothing should go before it, be intermixed with it, or follow after it that is not related to it; as, on. the contrary, no single step should be omitted in that just and regular process which it must be supposed to take from its original to its consumma- tion. Thus we see the anger of Achilles in its birth, its continu- ance, and effects; and ^Eneas's settlement in Italy, carried on through all the oppositions in his way to it both by sea and land. The action in Milton excels (I think) both the former in this particular; we see it contrived in hell, executed upon earth, and punished by Heaven. The parts of it are told in the most distinct manner, and grow out of one another in the most natu- ral order. The third qualification of an epic poem is its greatness. The anger of Achilles was of such consequence that it embroiled the kings of Greece, destroyed the heroes of Asia, and engaged all the gods in factions. The settlement of yEneas in Italy pro- duced the Caesars, and gave birth to the Roman empire. Mil- ton's subject was still greater than either of the former; it does not determine the fate of single persons or nations, but of a whole species. The united powers of hell are joined together for the destruction of mankind, which they effected in part, and would have completed, had not Omnipotence itself inter- posed. The principal actors are man in his greatest perfection, and woman in her highest beauty. Their enemies are the fallen angels; the Messiah their friend, and the Almighty their pro- tector. In short, everything that is great in the whole circle of being, whether within the verge of nature or out of it, has a proper part assigned it in this admirable poem. In poetry, as in architecture, not only the whole, but the principal members, and every part of them, should be great. I will not presume to say that the book of games in the Mneid, or that in the Iliad^ are not of this nature, nor to reprehend » By Dryden. 200 JOSEPH ADDISON Virgil's simile of a top, and many others of the same kind in the Iliad, as liable to any censure in this particular; but I think we may say, without derogating from those wonderful per- formances, that there is an indisputable and unquestioned magnificence in every part of Paradise Lost, and indeed a much greater than could have been formed upon any pagan system. But Aristotle, by the greatness of the action, does not only mean that it should be great in its nature, but also in its dura- tion, or in other words, that it should have a due length in it, as well as what we properly call greatness. The just measure of this kind of magnitude he explains by the following simili- tude. An animal no bigger than a mite cannot appear perfect to the eye, because the sight takes it in at once, and has only a confused idea of the whole, and not a distinct idea of all its parts; if on the contrary you should suppose an animal of ten thousand furlongs in length, the eye would be so filled with a single part of it that it could not give the mind an idea of the whole. What these animals are to the eye, a very short or a very long action would be to the memory. The first would be, as it were, lost and swallowed up by it, and the other difficult to be contained in it. Homer and Virgil have shown their prin- cipal art in this particular; the action of the Iliad, and that of the Mneid, were in themselves exceeding short, but are so beautifully extended and diversified by the invention of epi- sodes, and the machinery of gods, with the like poetical orna- ments, that they make up an agreeable story, sufficient to employ the memory without overcharging it. Milton's action is enriched with such variety of circumstances, that I have taken as much pleasure in reading the contents of his books as in the best invented story I ever met with. It is possible that the traditions on which the Iliad and Mneid were built had more circumstances in them than the history of the fall of man, as it is related in Scripture. Besides, it was easier for Homer and Virgil to dash the truth with fiction, as they were in no danger of offending the rehgion of their country by it. But as for Milton, he had not only a very few circumstances upon which to raise his poem, but was also obliged to proceed with the greatest caution in everything that he added out of his own invention. And indeed, notwithstanding all the restraints he was under, he has filled his story with so many surprising THE SPECTATOR 201 incidents, which bear so close an analogy with what is dehvered in Holy Writ, that it is capable of pleasing the most dehcate reader, without giving offense to the most scrupulous. The modern critics have collected, from several hints in the Iliad and yEneid, the space of time which is taken up by the action of each of those poems; but as a great part of Milton's story was transacted in regions that lie out of the reach of the sun and the sphere of day, it is impossible to gratify the reader with such a calculation, which indeed would be more curious than instructive; none of the critics, either ancient or modern, having laid down rules to circumscribe the action of an epic poem with any determined number of years, days, or hours. But of this more particular hereafter. No. 323. Tuesday, March ii, 171 2 Modo vir, modo femina. — Vieg. The Journal ^ with which I presented my reader on Tuesday last, has brought me in several letters with accounts of many private Kves cast into that form. I have the Rake's Journal, the Sot's Journal, the Whoremaster's Journal, and among several others a very curious piece, entitled The Journal of a Mohock. By these instances I find that the intention of my last Tues- day's paper has been mistaken by many of my readers. I did not design so much to expose vice as idleness, and aimed at those persons who pass away their time rather in trifles and impertinence than in crimes and immorahties. Offenses of this later kind are not to be dallied with, or treated in so ludicrous a manner. In short, my journal only holds up folly to the light, and shows the disagreeableness of such actions as are indifferent in themselves, and blamable only as they pro- ceed from creatures endowed with reason. My following correspondent, who calls herself Clarinda, is such a joumaHst as I require: she seems by her letter to be placed in a modish state of indifference between vice and virtue, and to be susceptible of either, were there proper pains taken with her. Had her journal been filled with gallantries, or such occurrences as had shown her wholly divested of her natural innocence, notwithstanding it might have been more » The "journal of a citizen." 202 JOSEPH ADDISON pleasing to the generality of readers, I should not have pub- lished it; but as it is only the picture of a life filled with a fash- ionable kind of gaiety and laziness, I shall set down five days of it, as I have received it from the hand of my correspondent . Dear Mr. Spectator, — You having set your readers an exercise in one of your last week's papers, I have performed mine according to your orders, and herewith send it you enclosed. You must know, Mr. Specta- tor, that I am a maiden lady of a good fortune, who have had several matches offered me for these ten years last past, and have at present warm applications made to me by a very pretty fellow. As I am at my own dis- posal, I come up to town every winter, and pass my time in it after the manner you will find in the following journal, which I began to write upon the very day after your Spectator upon that subject. Tuesday night. Could not go to sleep till one in the morning for think- ing of my journal. Wednesday. From Eight till Ten. Drank two dishes of chocolate in bed, and fell asleep after them. From Ten to Eleven. Eat a sljce of bread and butter, drank a dish of bohea, read the Spectator. From Eleven to One. At my toilette ; tried a new head. Gave orders for Veny to be combed and washed. Mem. I look best in blue. From One till half an hour after Two. Drove to the Change. Cheapened a couple of fans. Till Four. At dinner. Mem. Mr. Froth passed by in his new liveries. From Four to Six. Dressed, paid a visit to old Lady Blithe and her sister, having before heard they were gone out of town that day. From Six to Eleven. At basset. Mem. Never set again upon the ace of diamonds. Thursday. From Eleven at night to Eight in the morning. Dreamed that I punted to Mr. Froth. From Eight to Ten. Chocolate. Read two acts in Aiirengzehe a-bed. From Ten to Eleven. Tea-table. Sent to borrow Lady Faddle's Cupid for Veny. Read the play-bills. Received a letter from Mr. Froth. Mem. Locked it up in my strong box. Rest of the morning. Fontange, the tire-woman, her account of my Lady Blithe's wash. Broke a tooth in my little tortoise-shell comb. Sent Frank to know how my Lady Hectic rested after her monkey's leaping out at window. Looked pale. Fontange tells me my glass is not true. Dressed by Three. From Three to Four. Dinner cold before I sat down. From Four to Eleven. Saw company. Mr. Froth's opinion of Milton. His account of the Mohocks. His fancy for a pin-cushion. Picture in the lid of his snuff-box. Old Lady Faddle promises me her woman to cut my hair. Lost five guineas at crimp. Twelve o'clock at night. Went to bed. THE SPECTATOR 203 Friday. Eight in the morning. A-bed. Read over all Mr. Froth's letters. Cupid and Veny. Ten o'clock. Stayed within all day, not at home. From Ten to Twelve. In conference with my mantuamaker. Sorted a suit of ribands. Broke my blue china cup. From Twelve to One. Shut myself up in my chamber, practiced Lady Betty Modely's skuttle. One in the afternoon. Called for my flowered handkerchief. Worked half a violet leaf in it. Eyes_ached and head out of order. Threw by my work, and read over the remaining part of Aurengzebe. From Three to Four. Dined. From Four to Twelve. Changed my mind, dressed, went abroad, and played at crimp till midnight. Found Mrs. Spitely at home. Conversa- tion: Mrs. Brillant's necklace false stones. Old Lady Loveday going to be married to a young fellow that is not worth a groat. Miss Prue gone into the country. Tom Townley has red hair. Mem. Mrs. Spitely whispered in my ear that she had something to tell me about Mr. Froth ; I am sure it is not true. Between Twelve and One. Dreamed that Mr. Froth lay at my feet, and called me Indamora. Saturday. Rose at eight o'clock in the morning. Sat down to my toilette. From Eight to Nine. Shifted a patch for half an hour before I could determine it. Fixed it above my left eyebrow. From Nine to Twelve. Drank my tea, and dressed. From Twelve to Two. At chapel. A great deal of good company. Mem. The third air in the new opera. Lady Blithe dressed frightfully. From Three to Four. Dined. Mrs. Kitty called upon me to go to the opera before I was risen from table. From dinner to Six. Drank tea. Turned off a footman for being rude to Veny. Six o'clock. Went to the opera. I did not see Mr. Froth till the begin- ning of the second act. Mr. Froth talked to a gentleman in a black wig. Bowed to a lady in the front box. Mr. Froth and his friend clapped NicoHni in the third act. Mr. Froth cried out " Ancora.'' Mr. Froth led me to my chair. I think he squeezed my hand. Eleven at night. Went to bed. Melancholy dreams. Methought Nico- lini said he was Mr. Froth. Sunday. Indisposed. Monday. Eight 0^ clock. Waked by Miss Kitty. Aurengzebe lay upon the chair by me. Kitty repeated without book the eight best lines in the play. Went in our mobs to the dumb man, according to appointment. Told me that my lover's name began with a G. Mem. The conjurer was within a letter of Mr. Froth's name, etc. ^ ' Upon looking back into this my journal, I find that I am at a loss to 204 JOSEPH ADDISON know whether I pass my time well or ill; and indeed never thought of considering how I did it, before I perused your speculation upon that sub- ject. I scarce find a single action in these five days that I can thoroughly approve of, except the working upon the violet leaf, which I am resolved to finish the first day I am at leisure. As for Mr. Froth and Veny, I did not think they took up so much of my time and thoughts as I find they do upon my journal. The latter of them I will turn off if you insist upon it; and if Mr. Froth does not bring matters to a conclusion very suddenly, I will not let my life run away in a dream. Your humble servant, Clarinda. To resume one of the morals of my first paper, and to con- firm Clarinda in her good incUnations, I would have her con- sider what a pretty figure she would make among posterity, were the history of her whole life published Uke these five days of it. . . . No. 409. Thursday, June 19, 1712 MuscEO contingere cuncta lepore. — Lucr. Gratian very often recommends fine taste as the utmost per- fection of an accomplished man. As this word arises very often in conversation, I shall endeavor to give some account of it, and to lay down rules how we may know whether we are pos- sessed of it, and how we may acquire that fine taste of writing which is so much talked of among the polite world. Most languages make use of this metaphor, to express that faculty of mind which distinguishes all the most concealed faults and nicest perfections in writing. We may be sure that this metaphor would not have been so general in all tongues, had there not been a very great conformity between that men- tal taste, which is the subject of this paper, and that sensitive taste which gives us a relish of every different flavor that affects the palate. Accordingly we find there are as many degrees of refinement in the intellectual faculty as in the sense which is marked out by this common denomination. I knew a person who possessed the one in so great a per- fection, that, after having tasted ten different kinds of tea, he would distinguish, without seeing the color of it, the par- ticular sort which was offered him; and not only so, but any two sorts of them that were mixed together in an equal pro- portion. Nay, he has carried the experiment so far as, upon THE SPECTATOR 205 tasting the composition of three different sorts, to name the parcels from whence the three several ingredients were taken. A man of a fine taste in writing will discern, after the same manner, not only the general beauties and imperfections of an author, but discover the several ways of thinking and express- ing himself which diversify him from all other authors, with the several foreign infusions of thought and language, and the particular authors from whom they were borrowed. After having thus far explained what is generally meant by a fine taste in writing, and shown the propriety of the meta- phor which is used on this occasion, I think I may define it to be ''that faculty of the soul which discerns the beauties of an author with pleasure, and the imperfections with dislike." If a man would know whether he is possessed of this faculty, I would have him read over the celebrated works of antiquity, which have stood the test of so many different ages and coun- tries, or those works among the moderns which have the sanc- tion of the politer part of our contemporaries. If, upon the perusal of such writings, he does not find himself delighted in an extraordinary manner, or if, upon reading the admired passages in such authors, he finds a coldness and indifference in his thoughts, he ought to conclude, not — as is too usual among tasteless readers — that the author wants those per- fections which have been admired in him, but that he himself wan ts the faculty of dis coviering them. He should, in the second place, be very careful to, observe whether he tastes the distinguishing perfections, or — if I may be allowed to call them so — the specific qualities of the author whom he peruses ; whether he is particularly pleased with Li vy for his manner of telling a story, with Sallust for his entering into those internal principles of action which arise from the characters and manners of the persons he describes, or with Tacitus for displaying those outward motives of safety and interest which gave birth to the whole series of transactions which he relates. He may Hkewise consider how differently he is affected by the same thought which presents itself in a great writer, from what he is when he finds it delivered by a person of an ordinary genius; for there is as much difference in apprehending a thought clothed in Cicero's language, and that of a common 2o6 JOSEPH ADDISON author, as in seeing an object by the light of a taper or by the light of the sun. It is very difficult to lay down rules for the acquirement of such a taste as that I am here speaking of. The faculty must in some degree be born with us; and it very often happens that those who have other qualities in perfection are wholly void of this. One of the most eminent mathematicians of the age has assured me that the greatest pleasure he took in reading Virgil was in examining ^neas's voyage by the map; as I question not but many a modern compiler of history would be dehghted with little more in that divine author than the bare matters of fact. But, notwithstanding this faculty must in some measure be born in us, there are several methods for cultivating and im- proving it, and without which it will be very uncertain and of little use to the person that possesses it. The most natural method for this purpose is to be conversant among the writings of the most polite authors. A man who has any relish for fine writing either discovers new beauties, or receives stronger impressions, from the masterly strokes of a great author, every time he peruses him; besides that he naturally wears himself into the same manner of speaking and thinking. Conversation with men of a polite genius is another method for improving our natural taste. It is impossible for a man of the greatest parts to consider anything in its whole extent and in all its variety of lights. Every man, besides those general observations which are to be made upon an author, forms several reflections that are pecuHar to his own manner of thinking; so that conversation will naturally furnish us with hints which we did not attend to, and make us enjoy other men's parts and reflections, as well as our own. This is the best reason I can give for the observation which several have made, that men of great genius in the same way of writing sel- dom rise up singly, but at certain periods of time appear together, and in a body; as they did at Rome in the reign of Augustus, and in Greece about the age of Socrates. I cannot think that Corneille, Racine, Moliere, Boileau, La Fontaine, Bruyere, Bossuet, or the Daciers, would have written so well as they have done, had they not been friends and contempo- raries. THE SPECTATOR 207 It is likewise necessary for a man who would form to himself a finished taste of good writing, to be well versed in the works of the best critics, both ancient and modern. I must confess that I could wish there were authors of this kind, who, besides the mechanical rules, which a man of very little taste may dis- course upon, would enter into the very spirit and soul of fine writing, and show us the several sources of that pleasure which rises in the mind upon the perusal of a noble work. Thus, although in poetry it be absolutely necessary that the unities of time, place, and action, should be thoroughly explained and understood, there is still something more essential to the art, something that elevates and astonishes the fancy, and gives a greatness of mind to the reader, which few of the critics besides Longinus have considered. Our general taste in England is for epigram, turns of wit, and forced conceits, which have no manner of influence either for the bettering or enlarging the mind of him who reads them, and have been carefully avoided by the greatest writers, both among the ancients and moderns. I have endeavored, in sev- eral of my speculations, to banish this Gothic taste which has taken possession among us. I entertained the town for a week together with an essay upon wit, in which I endeavored to detect several of those false kinds which have been admired in the different ages of the world, and at the same time to show wherein the nature of true wit consists. I afterward gave an instance of the great force which lies in a natural simplicity of thought to affect the mind of the reader, from such vulgar pieces as have little else besides this single qualification to recommend them. I have likewise examined the works of the greatest poet which our nation, or perhaps any other, has pro- duced, and particularized most of those rational and manly beauties which give a value to that divine work. I shall next Saturday enter upon an essay on "The Pleasures of the Imagination," which, though it shall consider that subject at large, will perhaps suggest to the reader what it is that gives a beauty to many passages of the finest writers both in prose and verse. As an undertaking of this nature is entirely new, I question not but it will be received with candor. 2o8 JOSEPH ADDISON No. 419.^ Tuesday, July i, 1712 Mentis gratissimus error. — Hor. There is a kind of writing wherein the poet quite loses sight of nature, and entertains his reader's imagination with the characters and actions of such persons as have, many of them, no existence but what he bestows on them. Such are fairies, witches, magicians, demons, and departed spirits. This Mr. Dryden calls "the fairy way of writing," which is indeed more difficult than any other that depends on the poet's fancy, because he has no pattern to follow in it, and must work alto- gether out of his own invention. There is a very odd turn of thought required for this sort of writing, and it is impossible for a poet to succeed in it who has not a particular cast of fancy, and an imagination naturally fruitful and superstitious. Besides this, he ought to be very well versed in legends and fables, antiquated romances, and the traditions of nurses and old women, that he may fall in with our natural prejudices, and humor those notions which we have imbibed in our infancy. For otherwise he will be apt to make his fairies talk like people of his own species, and not like other sets of beings, who converse with different objects and think in a different manner from that of mankind. . . . I do not say, with Mr. Bayes in The Rehearsal, that spirits must not be confined to speak sense, but it is certain their sense ought to be a Httle discolored, that it may seem particular, and proper to the person and condition of the speaker. These descriptions raise a pleasing kind of horror in the mind of the reader, and amuse his imagination with the strange- ness and novelty of the persons who are represented in them. They bring up into our memory the stories we have heard in our childhood, and favor those secret terrors and apprehen- sions to which the mind of man is naturally subject. We are pleased with surveying the different habits and behaviors of foreign countries; how much more must we be delighted and surprised when we are led, as it were, into a new creation, and see the persons and manners of another species! Men of cold fancies and philosophical dispositions object to this kind of poetry, that it has not probability enough to affect the imagi- 1 The ninth of the eleven papers on "The Pleasures of the Imagination." THE SPECTATOR 209 nation. But to this it may be answered that we are sure, in general, there are many intellectual beings in the world besides ourselves, and several species of spirits, who are subject to different laws and economies from those of mankind. When we see, therefore, any of these represented naturally, we can- not look upon the representation as altogether impossible; nay, many are prepossessed with such false opinions as dispose them to believe these particular delusions; at least we have all heard so many pleasing relations in favor of them, that we do not care for seeing through the falsehood, and willingly give our- selves up to so agreeable an imposture. The ancients have not much of this poetry among them; for, indeed, almost the whole substance of it owes its original to the darkness and superstition of later ages, when pious frauds were made use of to amuse mankind, and frighten them into a sense of their duty. Our forefathers looked upon nature with more reverence and horror, before the world was enlight- ened by learning and philosophy, and loved to astonish them- selves with the apprehensions of witchcraft, prodigies, charms, and enchantments. There was not a village in England that had not a ghost in it; the churchyards were all haunted; every large common had a circle of fairies belonging to it; and there was scarce a shepherd to be met with who had not seen a spirit. Among all the poets of this kind our English are much the best, by what I have yet seen; whether it be that we abound with more stories of this nature, or that the genius of our coun- try is fitter for this sort of poetry. For the English are naturally fanciful, and very often disposed, by that gloominess and mel- ancholy of temper which is so frequent in our nation, to many wild notions and visions to which others are not so liable. Among the English, Shakespeare has incomparably excelled all o_thers. That noble extravagance of fancy, which he had in so great perfection, thoroughly qualified him to touch this weak superstitious part of his reader's imagination, and made him capable of succeeding where he had nothing to support him besides the strength of his own genius. There is something so wild, and yet so solemn, in the speeches of his ghosts, fairies, witches, and the like imaginary persons, that we cannot for- bear thinking them natural, though we have no rule by which to judge of them, and must confess, if there are such beings in 210 JOSEPH ADDISON the world, it looks highly probable they should talk and act as he has represented them. There is another sort of imaginary beings that we some- times meet with among the poets, when the author represents any passion, appetite, virtue, or vice under a visible shape, and makes it a person or an actor in his poem. Of this nature are the descriptions of Hunger and Envy in Ovid, of Fame in Virgil, and of Sin and Death in Milton. We find a whole crea- tion of the like shadowy persons in Spenser, who had an admirable talent in representations of this kind. I have dis- coursed of these emblematical persons in former papers, and shall therefore only mention them in this place. Thus we see how many ways poetry addresses itself to the imagination, as it has not only the whole circle of nature for its province, but makes new worlds of its own, shows us persons who are not to be found in being, and represents even the fac- ulties of the soul, with the several virtues and vices, in a sen- sible shape and character. / / JOHN DENNIS - -'^-a v--^^^-^ ON THE GENIUS AND WRITINGS OF SHAKESPEARE 1712 [The following is from the first of three letters written by Dennis in February, 171 1, in connection with a new version he had made of Shake- speare's Coriolanus (called The Invader of his Country). The letters were published in 171 2, under the title An Essay on the Genius, etc., together with two other letters attacking some of Addison's papers in the Spec- tator. The main theme of the letters on Shakespeare is his want of learn- ing; to the modern student a matter of especial interest is Dennis's dis- cussion of the doctrine of poetic justice. Addison attacked this doctrine in No. 40 of the Spectator; see the passage on p. 174 above.] . . . Shakespeare was one of the greatest geniuses that the world e'er saw for the tragic stage. Though he lay under greater disadvantages than any of his successors, yet had he greater and more genuine beauties than the best and greatest of them. And what makes the brightest glory of his character, those beauties were entirely his own, and owing to the force of his own nature; whereas his faults were owing to his education, and to the age that he lived in. One may say of him as they did of Homer, that he had none to imitate, and is himself inimitable. His imaginations were often as just as they were bold and strong. He had a natural discretion which never could have been taught him, and his judgment was strong and penetrating. He seems to have wanted nothing but time and leisure for thought, to have found out those rules of which he appears so ignorant. His characters are always drawn justly, exactly, graphically, except where he failed by not knowing history or the poetical art. He has for the most part more fairly distinguished them than any of his successors have done, who have falsified them or confounded them by making love the predominant quality in all. He had so fine a talent for touching the passions, and they are so lively in him, and so truly in nature, that they often touch us more without their due preparations than those of other tragic poets who have all 212 JOHN DENNIS the beauty of design and all the advantage of incidents. His master passion was terror, which he has often moved so power- fully and so wonderfully that we may justly conclude that, if he had had the advantage of art and learning, he would have surpassed the very best and strongest of the ancients. His paintings are often so beautiful and so lively, so graceful and so powerful, especially where he uses them in order to move terror, that there is nothing perhaps more accomplished in our English poetry. His sentiments for the most part, in his best tragedies, are noble, generous, easy, and natural, and adapted to the persons who use them. His expression is in many places good and pure after a hundred years; simple though elevated, graceful though bold, and easy though strong. He seems to have been the very original of our English tragical harmony, — that is, the harmony of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trisyllable terminations. For that diversity distinguishes it from heroic harmony, and, bringing it nearer to common use, makes it more proper to gain attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verse we make when we are writing prose; we make such verse in common conversa- tion. /If Shakespeare had these great qualities by nature, what would he not have been if he had joined to so happy a genius learning and the poetical art? For want of the latter, our author has sometimes made gross mistakes in the characters which he has drawn from history, against the equality and con- veniency of manners of his dramatical persons. Witness Mene- nius in the following tragedy, whom he has made an errant buffoon, which is a great absurdity. For he might as well have imagined a grave majestic jack-pudding, as a buffoon in a Roman senator. Aufidius, the general of the Volscians, is shown a base and a profligate villain. He has offended against the equahty of the manners even in his hero himself. For Coriolanus, who in the first part of the tragedy is shown so open, so frank, so violent, and so magnanimous, is represented in the latter part by Aufidius — which is contradicted by no one — a flattering, fawning, cringing, insinuating traitor. For want of this poetical art, Shakespeare has introduced things into his tragedies which are against the dignity of that noble poem, as the rabble in Julius Ccesar and that in Corio- THE GENIUS OF SHAKESPEARE 213 laniis; though that in Coriolanus offends not only against the dignity of tragedy, but against the truth of history Hkewise, and the customs of ancient Rome, and the majesty of the Roman people, as we shall have occasion to show anon. For want of this art, he has made his incidents less moving, less surprising, and less wonderful. He has been so far from seeking those fine occasions to move with which an action fur- nished according to art would have furnished him, that he seems rather to have industriously avoided them. He makes Corio- lanus, upon his sentence of banishment, take his leave of his wife and his mother out of sight of the audience, and so has pur- posely, as it were, avoided a great occasion to move. If we are willing to allow that Shakespeare, by sticking to the bare events of history, has moved more than any of his successors, yet his just admirers must confess that if he had had the poetical art he would have moved ten times more. For 't is impossible that by a bare historical play he could move so much as he would have done by a fable. We find that a romance entertains the generality of mankind with more satisfaction than history, if they read only to be entertained; but if they read history through pride or ambi- tion, they bring their passions along with them, and that alters the case. Nothing is more plain than that even in an historical relation some parts of it, and some events, please more than others. And therefore a man of judgment, who sees why they do so, may, in forming a fable and disposing an action, please more than an historian can do. For the just fiction of a fable moves us more than an historical relation can do, for the two following reasons. First, by reason of the communication and mutual dependence of its parts. For if passion springs from motion, then the obstruction of that motion or a counter motion must obstruct and check the passion; and therefore an historian, and a writer of historical plays, passing from events of one nature to events of another nature without a due preparation, must of necessity stifle and confound one passion by another. The second reason why the fiction of a i" :' \i pleases us more than an historical relation can do, is, be- cai! e in an historical relation we seldom are acquainted with tilt true causes of events, whereas in a feigned action which is daly constituted — that is, which has a just beginning — 214 JOHN DENNIS those causes always appear. For 't is observable that, both, in a poetical fiction and an historical relation, those events are the most entertaining, the most surprising, and the most won- derful, in which Providence most plainly appears. And 'tis for this reason that the author of a just fable must please more than the writer of an historical relation. The good must never fail to prosper, and the bad must always be pun- ished; otherwise the incidents, and particularly the cata- strophe which is the grand incident, are liable to be imputed rather to chance than to almighty conduct and to sovereign jus- tice. The want of this impartial distribution of justice makes the Coriolanus of Shakespeare to be without moral. 'T is true, indeed, Coriolanus is killed by those foreign enemies with whom he had openly sided against his country, which seems to be an event worthy of Providence, and would look as if it were contrived by infinite wisdom, and executed by supreme justice, to make Coriolanus a dreadful example to all who lead on foreign enemies to the invasion of their native country, if there were not something in the fate of the other characters which gives occasion to doubt of it, and which suggests to the skeptical reader that this might happen by accident. For Aufidius, the principal murderer of Coriolanus, who in cold blood gets him assassinated by ruffians, instead of leaving him to the law of the country and the justice of the Volscian senate, and who commits so black a crime not by any erroneous zeal or a mistaken public spirit, but through jealousy, envy, and inveterate malice, — this assassinator not only survives, and survives unpunished, but seems to be rewarded for so detest- able an action by engrossing all those honors to himself which Coriolanus before had shared with him. . . . But indeed Shakespeare has been wanting in the exact dis- tribution of poetical justice not only in his Coriolanus, but in most of his best tragedies, in which the guilty and the inno- cent perish promiscuously; as Duncan and Banquo in Macbeth, as Hkewise Lady Macduff and her children; Desdemona in Othello; Cordelia, Kent, and King Lear, in the tragedy that bears his name; Brutus and Portia in Julius Ccesar; and young Hamlet in the tragedy of Hamlet. For though it may be said in defense of the last, that Hamlet had a design to kill his unci who then reigned, yet this is justified by no less than a cA\ REMARKS UPON CATO 215 from heaven, and raising up one from the dead to urge him to it. The good and the bad, then, perishing promiscuously in the best of Shakespeare's tragedies, there can be either none or very weak instruction in them; for such promiscuous events call the government of Providence into question, and by skeptics and libertines are resolved into chance. I humbly con- ceive, therefore, that this want of dramatical justice in the tragedy of Coriolanus gave occasion for a just alteration, and that I was obliged to sacrifice to that justice Aufidius and the tribunes, as well as Coriolanus. Thus have we endeavored to show that, for want of the poetical art, Shakespeare lay under very great disadvantages. At the same time we must own to his honor that he has often performed wonders without it, in spite of the judgment of so great a man as Horace : — Natura fieret laudabile carmen, an arte, Qucesitum est : ego nee studium sine divite vena, ■ Nee rude quid prosit video ingenium; alterius sic Altera poscit opem res, et conjurat amice} But from this very judgment of Horace we may justly con- clude that Shakespeare would have wonderfully surpassed himself, if art had been joined to nature. . . . REMARKS UPON CATO 1713 [The pamphlet from which the following extract is taken is one of several connected with a prolonged quarrel involving Addison, Dennis, and others, which began in 1711. Addison's Cato was produced in April, 1 7 13 (see the account given by Colley Gibber, page 271 below). It was char- acterized in particular by the unusual effort to carry out the old rule of "unity of place"; and Dennis seized upon the resulting improbabilities as an opportunity to vent his rage, both personal and critical, upon the dramatist. The passages here reproduced are also quoted, with com- ments, in Dr. Johnson's Life of Addison.] . . . Upon the departure of Portius, Sempronius makes but one soliloquy, and immediately in comes Syphax, and then the ' "Inquiry'has been made whether the praiseworthy poem is the product of nature or art; for my part, I do not see what advantage there is either in unpolished talent or in study without a rich natural vein, — so the one demands the aid of the other, and enters into friendly conspiracy with it." 2i6 JOHN DENNIS two politicians are at it immediately. They lay their heads together, with their snuff-boxes in their hands, as Mr. Bayes has it, and feague it away. But, in the midst of that wise scene, Syphax seems to give a seasonable caution to Sempronius: — But is it true, Sempronius, that your senate Is called together? Gods! thou must be cautious; Cato has piercing eyes. There is a great deal of caution shown indeed, in meeting in a governor's own hall to carry on their plot against him. Whatever opinion they have of his eyes, I suppose they have none of his ears, or they would never have talked at this fooUsh rate so near. Gods! thou must be cautious! Oh yes! very cautious; for if Cato should overhear you, and turn you off for politicians, Ctesar would never take you; no, Caesar would never take you. When Cato (Act II) turns the senators out of the hall, upon pretence of acquainting Juba with the result of their debates, he appears to me to do a thing which is neither reason- able nor civil. Juba might certainly have better been made acquainted with the result of that debate in some private apartment of the place. But the poet was driven upon this absurdity to make way for another; and that is, to give Juba an opportunity to demand Marcia of her father. But the quar- rel and rage of Juba and Syphax, in the same act; the invect- ives of Syphax against the Romans and Cato ; the advice that he gives Juba, in her father's hall, to bear away Marcia by force ; and his brutal and clamorous rage upon his refusal, and at a time when Cato was scarcely out of sight, and perhaps not out of hearing, — at least some of his guards or domestics must necessarily be supposed to be within hearing, — is a thing that is so far from being probable that it is hardly possible. Sempronius, in the second act, comes back once more in the same morning to the governor's hall, to carry on the con- spiracy with Syphax against the governor, his country, and his family; which is so stupid that it is below the wisdom of the 's, the Mac's, and the Teague's; even Eustace Com- mins himself would never have gone to Justice Hall, to have REMARKS UPON CATO 217 conspired against the government. If ofi&cers at Portsmouth should lay their heads together, in order to the carrying off J G 's ^ niece or daughter, would they meet in J G 's hall to carry on that conspiracy? There would be no necessity for their meeting there, at least till they came to the execution of their plot, because there would be other places to meet in. There would be no probability that they should meet there, because there would be places more private and more commodious. Now there ought to be nothing in a tragi- cal action but what is necessary or probable. But treason is not the only thing that is carried on in this hall. That, and love, and philosophy take their turns in it, without any manner of necessity or probability occasioned by the action, as duly and regularly, without interrupting one another, as if there were a triple league between them, and a mutual agreement that each should give place to and make way for the other, in a due and orderly succession. We now come to the third act. Sempronius, in this act, comes into the governor's hall, with the leaders of the mutiny; but, as soon as Cato is gone, Sempronius, who but just before had acted hke an unparalleled knave, discovers himself, Uke an egregious fool, to be an accompHce in the conspiracy. Know, villains, when such paltry slaves presume To mix in treason, if the plot succeeds, They're thrown neglected by; but, if it fails, They're sure to die like dogs, as you shall do. Here, take these factious monsters, drag them forth To sudden death. 'Tis true, indeed, the second leader says, there are none there but friends; but is that possible at such a juncture? Can a parcel of rogues attempt to assassinate the governor of a town of war, in his own house, in mid-day? and, after they are discovered and defeated, can there be none near them but friends? Is it not plain from these words of Sempronius, — Here, take these factious monsters, drag them forth To sudden death, — and from the entrance of the guards upon the word of com- mand, that those guards were within earshot? Behold Sem- 1 That is, Sir John Gibson, Lieutenant Governor of Portsmouth. 2i8 JOHN DENNIS pronius then palpably discovered. How comes it to pass, then, that instead of being hanged up with the rest, he remains secure in the governor's hall, and there carries on his conspiracy against the government, the third time in the same day, with his old comrade Syphax, who enters at the same time that the guards are carrying away the leaders, big with the news of the defeat of Sempronius? — though where he had his intelligence so soon is difficult to imagine. . . . But now let us lay before the reader that part of the scenery of the fourth act which may show the absurdities which the au- thor has run into through the indiscreet observance of the unity of place. I do not remember that Aristotle has said anything expressly concerning the unity of place. 'Tis true, implicitly he has said enough in the rules which he has laid down for the chorus. For, by making the chorus an essential part of tra- gedy, and by bringing it on the stage immediately after the open- ing of the scene, and retaining it till the very catastrophe, he has so determined and fixed the place of action that it was im- possible for an author on the Grecian stage to break through that unity. I am of opinion that if a modern tragic poet can preserve the unity of place without destroying the probability of the incidents, 't is always best for him to do it ; because, by the preserving of that unity, as we have taken notice above, he adds grace and clearness and comeliness to the representation. But since there are no express rules about it, and we are under no compulsion to keep it, since we have no chorus as the Grecian poet had, if it cannot be preserved without rendering the greater part of the incidents unreasonable and absurd, and per- haps sometimes monstrous, 'tis certainly better to break it. . . . But now let us sum up all these absurdities together. Sem- pronius goes at noonday, in Juba's clothes and with Juba's guards, to Cato's palace, in order to pass for Juba, in a place where they were both so very well known ; he meets Juba there, and resolves to murder him with his own guards. Upon the guards appearing a little bashful, he threatens them : — • Hah! Dastards, do you tremble! Or act like men, or, by yon azure heaven — But the guards still remaining restive, Sempronius himself attacks Juba, while each of the guards is representing Mr. REMARKS UPON CATO 219 Spectator's sign of the Gaper, awed, it seems, and terrified by Sempronius's threats. Juba kills Sempronius, and takes his own army prisoners, and carries them in triumph away to Cato. Now I would fain know if any part of Mr. Bayes's tragedy ' is so full of absurdity as this? Upon hearing the clash of swords, Lucia and Marcia come in. The question is, why no men come in upon hearing the noise of swords in the governor's hall? Where was the governor him- self? Where were his guards? Where were his servants? Such an attempt as this, so near the person of a governor of a place of war, was enough to alarm the whole garrison; and yet, for almost half an hour after Sempronius was killed, we find none of those appear who were the likeliest in the world to be alarmed ; and the noise of swords is made to draw only two poor women thither, who were most certain to run away from it. Upon Lucia and Marcia's coming in, Lucia appears in all the symptoms of an hysterical gentlewoman : — Sure 't was the clash of swords! my troubled heart Is so cast down, and sunk amidst its sorrows, It throbs with fear, and aches at every sound' And immediately her old whimsy returns upon her: — Marcia, should thy brothers, for my sake — 1 die away with horror at the thought. She fancies that there can be no cutting of throats but it must be for her. If this is tragical, I would fain know what is comi- cal. Well ! upon this they spy the body of Sempronius ; and Mar- cia, deluded by the habit, it seems, takes him for Juba; for says she, — The face is muffled up within the garment. Now, how a man could fight and fall with his face muffled up in his garment is, I think, a little hard to conceive. Besides, Juba, before he killed him, knew this to be Sempronius. It was not by his garment that he knew this; it was by his face then: his face therefore was not muffled. Upon seeing this man with his muffled face, Marcia falls a-raving; and, owning her passion for the supposed defunct, begins to make his funeral oration. Upon which Juba enters listening, — I suppose on tiptoe; for I cannot imagine how any one can enter listening in any other posture. * Described in The Rehearsal (a burlesque of Dryden's Conquest of Granada). 220 JOHN DENNIS I would fain know how it comes to pass that during all this time he had sent nobody, no, not so much as a candle-snuffer, to take away the dead body of Sempronius. Well ! but let us regard him listening. Having left his apprehension behind him, he at first applies what Marcia says to Sempronius. But finding at last, with much ado, that he himself is the happy man, he quits his eavesdropping, and discovers himself just time enough to pre- vent his being cuckolded by a dead man, of whom the moment before he had appeared so jealous, and greedily intercepts the bliss which was fondly designed for one who could not be the better for it. But here I must ask a question: how comes Juba to listen here, who had not listened before throughout the play? Or how comes he to be the only person of this tragedy who lis- tens, when love and treason were so often talked in so pubHc a place as a hall? I am afraid the author was driven upon all these absurdities only to introduce this miserable mistake of Marcia, which, after all, is much below the dignity of tragedy, as anything is which is the effect or result of trick. But let us come to the scenery of the fifth act. Cato appears first upon the scene, sitting in a thoughtful posture, in his hand Plato's treatise on the Immortahty of the Soul, a drawn sword on the table by him. Now let us consider the place in which this sight is presented to us. The place, forsooth, is a long hall. Let us suppose that any one should place himself in this posture in the midst of one of our halls in London; that he should ap- pear solus in a sullen posture, a drawn sword on the table by him; in his hand Plato's treatise on the Immortality of the Soul, translated lately by Bernard Lintot: I desire the reader to consider whether such a person as this would pass with them who beheld him for a great patriot, a great philosopher, or a general, or some whimsical person who fancied himself all these? and whether the people who belonged to the family would think that such a person had a design upon their midriffs or his own? In short, that Cato should sit long enough in the aforesaid posture, in the midst of this large hall, to read over Plato's treatise on the Immortality of the Soul, which is a lecture of two long hours; that he should propose to himself to be private there upon that occasion ; that he should be angry with his son for intruding there; then, that he should leave this hall upon REMARKS UPON CATO 221 the pretence of sleep, give himself the mortal wound in his bed- chamber, and then be brought back into that hall to expire, purely to show his good breeding and save his friends the trouble of coming up to his bed-chamber, — all this appears to me to be improbable, incredible, impossible. . . . -'<\^ti>-