NUMB. 50. SATURDAY, Sept 8, 1750. Credebant hoc grande nefas, et morte piandum, Si juvenis vetulo non affurrexerat, atque Plura domi fraga, et majores glandis acervos. Juv. And had not men the hoary head rever'd, I And boys paid rev'rence when a man appear'd, CREECH. HAVE always thought it the business of thofe who turn their speculations upon the living world, to commend the virtues, as well as to expofe the faults of their contemporaries, and to confute a false as well as to fupport a just accusation; not only because it is peculiarly the bufinefs of a monitor to keep his own reputation untainted, left those who can once charge him with partiality, fhould indulge themselves afterwards in difbelieving him at pleafure; but because he may find real crimes fufficient to give full employment to caution or repentance, without distracting the mind by needlefs fcruples and vain folicitudes. There are certain fixed and ftated reproaches that one part of mankind has in all ages thrown upon another, which are regularly tranfmitted through continued fucceffions, and which he that has once fuffered them is certain to ufe with the fame undiftinguishing vehemence, when he has changed his ftation, and gained the prescriptive right of inflicting on others, what he had formerly endured himfelf. Τα To these hereditary imputations, of which no man fees the justice, till it becomes his intereft to fee it, very little regard is to be fhewn; fince it does not appear that they are produced by ratiocination or enquiry, but received implicitly, or caught by a kind of instantaneous contagion, and fupported rather by willingness to credit than ability to prove them. It has been always the practice of thofe who are defirous to believe themselves made venerable by length of time, to cenfure the new comers into life, for want of respect to grey hairs and fage experience, for heady confidence in their own understandings, for hafty conclufions upon partial views, for difregard of counsels, which their fathers and grandfires are ready to afford them, and a rebellious impatience of that fubordination to which youth is condemned by nature, as neceffary to its fecurity from evils into which it would be otherwife precipitated, by the rashness of paffion, and the blindness of ignorance. Every old man complains of the growing depravity of the world, of the petulance and infolence of the rifing generation. He recounts the decency and regularity of former times, and celebrates the difcipline and fobriety of the age in which his youth was paffed; a happy age which is now no more to be expected, fince confufion has broken in upon the world, and thrown down all the boundaries of civility and reverence. It is not fufficiently confidered how much he affumes who dares to claim the privilege of complaining for as every man has, in his own opinion, a full fhare of the miferies of life, he is inclined to confider confider all clamorous uneasiness, as a proof of impatience rather than of affliction, and to afk, What merit has this man to fhow, by which he has acquired a right to repine at the diftributions of nature? Or, why does he imagine that exemptions fhould be granted him from the general condition of man? We find ourselves excited rather to captioufnefs than pity, and inftead of being in hafte to footh his complaints by fympathy and tendernefs, we enquire, whether the pain be proportionate to the lamentation; and whether, fuppofing the affliction real, it is not the effect of vice and folly, rather than calamity. The querulousness and indignation which is observed fo often to disfigure the laft fcene of life, naturally leads us to enquiries like thefe. For furely it will be thought at the firft view of things, that if age be thus contemned and ridiculed, infulted and neglected, the crime must at least be equal on either part. They who have had opportunities of establishing their authority over minds ductile and unrefifting, they who have been the protectors of helpleffness, and the instructors of ignorance, and who yet retain in their own hands the power of wealth, and the dignity of command, muft defeat their influence by their own mifconduct, and make use of all these advantages with very little skill, if they cannot fsecure to themselves an appearance of refpect, and ward off open mockery, and declared contempt. The general ftory of mankind will evince, that lawful and fettled authority is very feldom refifted when it is well employed. Gross corruption, or evident imbecility, is neceffary to the fuppreffion of VOL. IV. Y that that reverence with which the majority of mankind look upon their governors, and on thofe whom they fee furrounded by fplendour, and fortified by power. For though men are drawn by their paffions into forgetfulness of invifible rewards and punishments, yet they are easily kept obedient to those who have temporal dominion in their hands, till their veneration is diffipated by fuch wickedness and folly as can neither be defended nor concealed. It may, therefore, very reasonably be fufpected that the old draw upon themfelves the greatest part of thofe infults which they fo much lament, and that age is rarely defpifed but when it is contemptible. If men imagine that excefs of debauchery can be made reverend by time, that knowledge is the confequence of long life, however idly or thoughtlessly employed, that priority of birth will fupply the want of fteadiness or honefty, can it raife much wonder that their hopes are disappointed, and that they fee their pofterity rather willing to trust their own eyes in their progress into life, than enlist themselves under guides who have loft their way ? There are, indeed, many truths which time neceffarily and certainly teaches, and which might, by those who have learned them from experience, be communicated to their fucceffors at a cheaper rate: but dictates, though liberally enough bestowed, are generally without effect, the teacher gains few profelytes by inftruction which his own behaviour contradicts; and young men mifs the benefit of counsel, because they are not very ready to believe that those who fall below them in practice, can much excel them in theory. Thus the progrefs of knowledge is retarded, the world is kept long in the fame ftate, and every new race is to gain the prudence of their predeceffors by committing and redreffing the fame mifcarriages. To fecure to the old that influence which they are willing to claim, and which might fo much contribute to the improvement of the arts of life, it is abfolutely neceffary that they give themselves up to the duties of declining years; and contentedly refign to youth its levity, its pleafures, its frolicks, and its fopperies. It is a hopeless endeavour to unite the contrarieties of spring and winter; it is unjust to claim the privileges of age, and retain the playthings of childhood. The young always form magnificent ideas of the wisdom and gravity of men, whom they confider as placed at a distance from them in the ranks of existence, and naturally look on those whom they find trifling with long beards, with contempt and indignation, like that which women feel at the effeminacy of men. If dotards will contend with boys in those performances in which boys must always excel them; if they will drefs crippled limbs in embroidery, endeavour at gaiety with faultering voices; and darken affemblies of pleasure with the ghaftliness of disease, they may well expect those who find their diverfions obftructed will hoot them away; and that if they defcend to competition with youth, they must bear the infolence of fuccefsful rivals. Lufifti fatis, edifti fatis atque bibifti: Tempus abire tibi eft. You've had your share of mirth, of meat and drink; |