guilt, and taught temptation fweeter notes, fofter blandishments, and stronger allurements. It has been apparently the fettled purpose of some writers, whose powers and acquifitions place them high in the rank of literature, to fet fashion on the fide of wickednefs; to recommend debauchery and lewdnefs, by affociating them with qualities most likely to dazzle the difcernment, and attract the af fections; and to fhow innocence and goodness with fuch attendant weakneffes as neceffarily expofe them to contempt and derision. Such naturally found intimates among the corrupt, the thoughtless, and the intemperate; paffed their lives amidst the levities of fportive idlenefs, or the warm profeffions of drunken friendship; and fed their hopes with the promises of wretches, whom their precepts had taught to fcoff at truth. But when fools had laughed away their sprightlinefs, and the languors of excefs could no longer be relieved, they faw their protectors hourly drop away, and wondered and ftormed to find themfelves abandoned. Whether their companions perfifted in wickedness, or returned to virtue, they were left equally without affiftance; for debauchery is felfifh and negligent, and from virtue the virtuous only can expect regard. It is faid by Florus of Catiline, who died in the midst of flaughtered enemies, that his death had been illuftrious, had it been fuffered for his country. Of the wits who have languifhed away life under the preffures of poverty, or in the restleffnefs of fufpenfe, careffed and rejected, flattered and defpifed, as they were of more or lefs ufe to those who ftiled them felves their patrons, it might be observed, that their miferies would enforce compaffion, had they been brought upon them by honefty and religion, The wickedness of a loofe or profane author is more atrocious than that of the giddy libertine, or drunken ravisher, not only because it extends its effects wider, as a peftilence that taints the air is more destructive than poifon infused in a draught, but because it is committed with cool deliberation. By the inftantaneous violence of defire, a good man may fometimes be furprised before reflection can come to his rescue; when the appetites have ftrengthened their influence by habit, they are not eafily refifted or fuppreffed; but for the frigid villany of ftudious lewdnefs, for the calm malignity of laboured impiety, what apology can be invented? What punishment can be adequate to the crime of him who retires to folitudes for,the refinement of debauchery; who tortures his fancy, and ranfacks his memory, only that he may leave the world lefs virtuous than he found it; that he may intercept the hopes of the rifing generation; and spread fnares for the foul with more dexterity? What were their motives, or what their excufes, is below the dignity of reafon to examine. If having extinguished in themselves the diftinction of right and wrong, they were infenfible of the mischief which they promoted, they deferved to be hunted down by the general compact, as no longer partaking of focial nature; if influenced by the corruption of patrons, or readers, they facrificed their own convictions to vanity or intereft, they were to be abhorred with more acrimony than he that mur ders ders for pay; fince they committed greater crimes without greater temptations. Of him, to whom much is given, much shall be required. Thofe, whom God has favoured with fuperior faculties, and made eminent for quickness of intuition, and accuracy of diftinctions, will cer tainly be regarded as culpable in his eye, for defects and deviations which, in fouls lefs enlightened, may be guiltless. But, furely, none can think without horror on that man's condition, who has been more wicked in proportion as he had more means of excelling in virtue, and used the light imparted from heaven only to embellish folly, and shed lustre upon crimes, NUMB. 78. SATURDAY, December 15, 1750. -Mors fola fatetur Quantula fint hominum corpufcula. Death only this myfterious truth unfolds, COR Jur. DRYDEN. ORPORAL sensation is known to depend fo much upon novelty, that custom takes away from many things their power of giving pleasure or pain. Thus a new dress becomes cafy by wearing it, and the palate is reconciled by degrees to dishes which at first difgufted it. That by long habit of carrying a burden, we lose, in great part, our fenfibility of its weight, any man may be convinced by putting on for an hour the armour of our ancestors; for he will scarcely believe that men would have had much inclination to marches and battles, encumbered and oppreffed, as he will find himself, with the ancient panoply. Yet the heroes that over-run regions, and ftormed towns in iron accoutrements, he knows not to have been bigger, and has no reafon to imagine them ftronger than the prefent race of men; he therefore must conclude, that their peculiar powers were conferred only by peculiar habits, and that their fa miliarity with the drefs of war enabled them to move in it with ease, vigour, and agility. Yet it feems to be the condition of our present ftate, that pain fhould be more fixed and permanent than pleasure. Uneafiness gives way by flow degrees, and is long before it quits its poffeffion of the fenfory; but all our gratifications are volatile, vagrant, and eafily diffipated. The fragrance of the jeffamine bower is loft after the enjoyment of a few moments, and the Indian wanders among his native fpices without any fenfe of their exhalations. It is, indeed, not neceffary to fhew by many inftances what all mankind confefs, by an inceffant call for variety, and restless pursuit of enjoyments, which they value only because unpoffeffed. Something fimilar, or analogous, may be observed in effects produced immediately upon the mind; nothing can ftrongly ftrike or affect us, but what is rare or fudden. The most important events, when they become familiar, are no longer confidered with wonder or folicitude, and that which at firft filled up our whole attention, and left no place for any other thought, is foon thrust aside into fome remote repofitory of the mind, and lies among other lumber of the the memory, overlooked and neglected. Thus far the mind resembles the body, but here the fimilitude is at an end. The manner in which external force acts upon the body is very little fubject to the regulation of the will; no man can at pleasure obtund or invigorate his fenfes, prolong the agency of any impulfe, or continue the prefence of any image traced upon the eye, or any found infufed into the ear. But our ideas are more fubjected to choice; we can call them before us, and command their stay, we can facilitate and promote their recurrence, we can either repress their intrufion, or haften their retreat. It is there. fore the business of wisdom and virtue, to select among numberless objects ftriving for our notice, fuch as may enable us to exalt our reason, extend our views, and fecure our happiness. But this choice is to be made with very little regard to rareness or frequency; for nothing is valuable merely because it is either rare or common, but because it is adapted to fome useful purpose, and enables us to fupply fome deficiency of our nature. . Milton has judiciously reprefented the father of mankind, as feized with horror and aftonishment at the fight of death, exhibited to him on the mount of vifion. For furely, nothing can fo much disturb the paffions, or perplex the intellects of man, as the difruption of his union with visible nature; a feparation from all that has hitherto delighted or engaged him; a change not only of the place, but the manner of his being; an entrance into a state not fimply which he knows not, but which perhaps he has not faculties to know; an immediate and perceptible com |