the value, but of which, though we are not able to tell the least amount, we know, with fufficient certainty, the greateft, and are convinced that the greatest is not much to be regretted.

But, if any paffion has fo much ufurped our understanding, as not to fuffer us to enjoy advantages with the moderation prescribed by reafon, it is not too late to apply this remedy, when we find ourfelves finking under forrow, and inclined to pine for that which is irrecoverably vanished. We may then usefully revolve the uncertainty of our own condition, and the folly of lamenting that from which, if it had ftayed a little longer, we should ourselves have been taken away.

With regard to the sharpest and most melting forrow, that which arifes from the lofs of those whom we have loved with tenderness, it may be observed, that friendship between mortals can be contracted on no other terms, than that one must some time mourn for the other's death: And this grief will always yield to the furvivor one confolation proportionate to his affliction; for the pain, whatever it be, that he himself feels, his friend has escaped,

Nor is fear, the most overbearing and refiftlefs of all our passions, lefs to be temperated by this univerfal medicine of the mind. The frequent contemplation of death, as it fhows the vanity of all human good, discovers likewife the lightness of all terrestrial evil, which certainly can last no longer than the subject upon which it acts; and according to the old observation, must be shorter, as it is more violent, The most cruel calamity which misfortune can produce, muft, by the neceffity of nature, be quickly at VOL. IV.

an

an end. The foul cannot long be held in prifon, but will fly away, and leave a lifeless body to human malice,

-Ridetque fui ludibria trunci.

And foaring mocks the broken frame below.

. The utmost that we can threaten to one another is that death, which, indeed, we may precipitate, but cannot retard, and from which, therefore, it cannot become a wife man to buy a reprieve at the expence of virtue, fince he knows not how fmall a portion of time he can purchase, but knows, that whether short or long, it will be made less valuable by the remembrance of the price at which it has been obtained. He is fure that he deftroys his happiness, but is not fure that he lengthens his life.

The known fhortness of life, as it ought to mo derate our paffions, may likewife, with equal pro+ priety, contract our defigns. There is not time for the most forcible genius, and most active industry, to extend its effects beyond a certain sphere. To project the conqueft of the world, is the madnefs of mighty princes; to hope for excellence in every fcience, has been the folly of literary heroes; and both have found at laft, that they have panted for a height of eminence denied to humanity, and have loft many opportunities of making themselves useful and happy, by a vain ambition of obtaining a species of honour, which the eternal laws of providence have placed beyond the reach of man.

The mifcarriages of the great defigns of princes are recorded in the hiftories of the world, but are of

little use to the bulk of mankind, who feem very little interested in admonitions against errors which they cannot commit. But the fate of learned ambition is a proper fubject for every fcholar to confider; for who has not had occafion to regret the diffipation of great abilities in a boundless multiplicity of purfuits, to lament the fudden defertion of excellent defigns, upon the offer of fome other fubject made inviting by its novelty, and to observe the inaccuracy and deficiencies of works left unfinished by too great an extenfion of the plan?

It is always pleasing to obferve, how much more our minds can conceive, than our bodies can perform; yet it is our duty, while we continue in this complicated state, to regulate one part of our compofition by fome regard to the other. We are not to indulge our corporeal appetites with pleasures that impair our intellectual vigour, nor gratify our minds with schemes which we know our lives must fail in attempting to execute. The uncertainty of our duration ought at once to fet bounds to our défigns, and add incitements to our industry; and when we find ourfelves inclined either to immenfity in our fchemes, or fluggishness in our endeavours, we may either check, or animate, ourselves, by recollecting, with the father of phyfick, that art is long, and life is bort.

NUMB. 18. SATURDAY, May 19, 1750.

Illic matre carentibus,
Privignis muliere temperat innocens,

Nec dotata regit virum

Conjunx, nec nitido fidit adultero:

Dos eft magna parentum

Virtus, et metuens alterius tori

Certo fædere caftitas.

Not there the guiltless ftep-dame knows
The baleful draught for orphans to compofe;
No wife high-portion'd rules her spouse,
Or trufts her effenc'd lover's faithlefs vows:
The lovers there for dow'ry claim
The father's virtue, and the spotless fame
Which dares not break the nuptial tie.

HOR ACE.

FRANCIS.

HERE is no obfervation more frequently

TH

made by such as employ themselves in surveying the conduct of mankind, than that marriage, though the dictate of nature, and the inftitution of providence, is yet very often the cause of mifery, and that those who enter into that state can seldom forbear to exprefs their repentance, and their envy of those whom either chance or caution hath withheld from it.

This general unhappiness has given occafion to many fage maxims among the ferious, and fmart remarks among the gay; the moralift and the writer of epigrams have equally fhown their abilities upon it, fome have lamented, and fome have ridiculed

it; but as the faculty of writing has been chiefly a mafculine endowment, the reproach of making the world miferable has been always thrown upon the women, and the grave and the merry have equally thought themselves at liberty to conclude either with declamatory complaints, or fatirical cenfures, of female folly or fickleness, ambition or cruelty, extravagance or luft.

Led by fuch number of examples, and incited by my share in the common intereft, I fometimes venture to confider this univerfal grievance, having endeavoured to diveft my heart of all partiality, and place myself as a kind of neutral being between the fexes, whofe clamours, being equally vented on both fides with all the vehemence of diftress, all the apparent confidence of justice, and all the indignation of injured virtue, feem intitled to equal regard. The men have, indeed, by their fuperiority of writing, been able to collect the evidence of many ages, and raise prejudices in their favour by the venerable teftimonies of philofophers, hiftorians, and poets; but the pleas of the ladies appeal to passions of more forcible operation than the reverence of antiquity. If they have not fo great names on their fide, they have ftronger arguments; it is to little purpose, that Socrates, or Euripides, are produced against the fighs of foftnefs, and the tears of beauty. The most frigid and inexorable judge would, at least, stand fufpended between equal powers, as Lucan was perplexed in the determination of the cause, where the deities were on one fide, and Cato on the other.