He Thefe temptations cannot but be owned to have fome force. It is fo little pleafing to any man to fee himself wholly overlooked in the mafs of things, that he may be allowed to try a few expedients for procuring fome kind of fupplemental dignity, and use some endeavour to add weight, by the violence of his temper, to the lightness of his other powers. But this has now been long practifed, and found, upon the most exact estimate, not to produce advantages equal to its inconveniencies; for it appears not that a man can by uproar, tumult, and blufter, alter any one's opinion of his understanding, or gain influence except over those whom fortune or nature have made his dependents. may, by a steady perfeverance in his ferocity, fright his children, and harafs his fervants, but the rest of the world will look on and laugh; and he will have the comfort at last of thinking, that he lives only to raise contempt and hatred, emotions to which wisdom and virtue would be always unwilling to give occafion. He has contrived only to make thofe fear him, whom every reasonable being is endeavouring to endear by kindness, and must content himself with the pleasure of a triumph obtained by trampling on them who could not refift. He muft perceive that the apprehenfion which his prefence caufes is not the awe of his virtue, but the dread of his brutality, and that he has given up the felicity of being loved, without gaining the honour of being reverenced. But this is not the only ill confequence of the frequent indulgence of this blustering paffion, which a man, by often calling to his affiftance, will teach, in a fhort time, to intrude before the fummons, to rush upon him with refiftless violence, and without any previous notice of its approach. He will find himself liable to be inflamed at the firft touch of provocation, and unable to retain his refentment, till he has a full conviction of the offence, to proportion his anger to the cause, or to regulate it by prudence or by duty. When a man has once fuffered his mind to be thus vitiated, he becomes one of the most hateful and unhappy beings. He can give no fecurity to himself that he fhall not, at the next interview, alienate by fome sudden transport his dearest friend; or break out, upon fome flight contradiction, into fuch terms of rudeness as can never be perfectly forgotten. Whoever converfes with him, lives with the fufpicion and folicitude of a man that plays with a tame tiger, always under a neceffity of watching the moment in which the capricious favage fhall begin to growl. It is told by Prior, in a panegyrick on the Duke of Dorset, that his fervants used to put themselves in his way when he was angry, because he was fure to recompenfe them for any indignities which he made them fuffer. This is the round of a pasfionate man's life; he contracts debts when he is furious, which his virtue, if he has virtue, obliges him to discharge at the return of reafon. fpends his time in outrage and acknowledgment, injury and reparation. Or, if there be any who hardens himself in oppreffion, and juftifies the wrong, because he has done it, his infenfibility can make small part of his praife, or his happiness; he only adds deliberate to hafty folly, aggravates petu F 4 He lance lance by contumacy, and deftroys the only plea that he can offer for the tenderness and patience of mankind. Yet, even this degree of depravity we may be content to pity, because it seldom wants a punishment equal to its guilt. Nothing is more defpicable or more miferable than the old age of a paffionate man, When the vigour of youth fails him, and his amusements pall with frequent repetition, his occafional rage finks by decay of ftrength into peevishness; that peevishness, for want of novelty and variety, becomes habitual; the world falls off from around him, and he is left, as Homer expresses it, qúown pínov xng, to devour his own heart in folitude and contempt. ~ NUMB. 12. SATURDAY, April 28, 1750. ·Miferum parvá ftipe focilat, ut pudibundos Afperitate carens, pofitoque per omnia faftu, Lucanus ad Pifonem. Unlike the ribald whose licentious jeft No focial care the gracious lord disdains; Love prompts to love, and rev'rence rev'rence gains. SIR, As To the RAMBLER. S you feem to have devoted your labours to virtue, I cannot forbear to inform you of one fpecies of cruelty with which the life of a man of letters perhaps does not often make him acquainted; and which, as it seems to produce no other advantage to those that practise it than a short gratification of thoughtless vanity, may become lefs common when it has been once expofed in its various forms, and its full magnitude. I am the daughter of a country gentleman, whose family is numerous, and whofe eftate, not at first fufficient fufficient to fupply us with affluence, has been lately fo much impaired by an unfuccefsful law-fuit, that all the younger children are obliged to try fuch means as their education affords them, for procuring the neceffaries of life. Diftrefs and curiofity con curred to bring me to London, where I was received by a relation with the coldnefs which misfortune generally finds. A week, a long week, I lived with my coufin, before the moft vigilant enquiry could procure us the leaft hopes of a place, in which time I was much better qualified to bear all the vexations of fervitude. The first two days fhe was content to pity me, and only wished I had not been quite fo well-bred; but people muft comply with their circumstances. This lenity, however, was foon at an end; and, for the remaining part of the week, I heard every hour of the pride of my family, the obftinacy of my father, and of people better born than myfelf that were common fervants. At laft, on Saturday noon, fhe told me, with very vifible fatisfaction, that Mrs. Bombafine, the great filk-mercer's lady, wanted a maid, and a fine place it would be, for there would be nothing to do but to clean my mistress's room, get up her linen, dress the young ladies, wait at tea in the morning, take care of a little mifs just come from nurse, and then fit down to my needle. But madam was a woman of great spirit, and would not be contradicted, and therefore I fhould take care, for good places were not eafily to be got. With these cautions I waited on madam Bombafine, of whom the first fight gave me no ravishing ideas. She was two yards round the waift, her voice |