beautiful as any which have been made fince that time. Nathan's fable of the poor man and his lamb is likewife more ancient than any that is extant, befides the abovementioned, and had fo good an effect, as to convey inftruction to the ear of a king without offending it, and to bring the man after God's own heart to a right fenfe of his guilt and his duty. We find Æfop in the most diftant ages of Greece; and if we look into the very beginnings of the commonwealth of Rome, we fee a mutiny among the common people appeafed by a fable of the belly and the limbs, which was indeed very proper to gain the attention of an incenfed rabble, at a time when perhaps they would have torn to pieces any man who had preached the fame doctrine to them in an open and direct manner. As fables took their birth in the very infancy of learning, they never flourished more than when learning was at its greateft height. To justify this affertion, I fhall put my reader in mind of Horace, the greatest wit and critic in the Auguftan age; and of Boileau, the moft correct poet among the moderns: not to mention La Fontaine, who by this way of writing is come more into vogue than any other author of our times. The fables I have here mentioned are raised altogether upon brutes and vegetables, with fome of our own fpecies mixt among them, when the moral hath so required. But befides this kind of fable, there is another in which the actors are paffions, virtues, vices, and other imaginary perfons of the like nature. Some of the ancient critics will have it, that the Iliad and Odyffey of Homer are fables of this nature; and that the feveral names of gods and heroes are nothing elfe but the affections of the mind in a vifible fhape and character. Thus they tell us, that Achilles, in the firft Iliad, reprefents anger, or the irafcible part of human nature; that upon drawing his fword against his fuperior in a full affembly, Pallas is only another name for reason, which checks and advises him upon that occafion; and at her first appearance touches him upon the head, that part of the man being looked upon as the feat of reafon. And thus of the reft of the poem. As for the Odyffey, I think it is plain that Horace confidered it as one of these allegorical fables, by the moral which he has given us of feveral parts of it. The greatest Italian wits have applied themselves to the writing of this latter kind of fables: as Spenfer's Fairy Queen is one continued feries of them from the beginning to the end of that admirable work. If we look into the fineft profe-authors of antiquity, fuch as Cicero, Plato, Xenophon, and many others, we shall find that this was likewife their favourite kind of fable. I fhall only farther obferve upon it, that the firft of this fort that made any confiderable figure in the world was that of Hercules meeting with pleasure and virtue; which was invented by Prodicus, who lived before Socrates, and in the first dawnings of philofophy. He used to travel through Greece by virtue of this fable, which procured him a kind reception in all the market-towns, where he never failed telling it as foon as he had gathered an audience about him. After this fhort preface, which I have made up of fuch materials as my memory does at prefent fuggeft to me, before I prefent my reader with a fable of this kind, which I defign as the entertainment of the prefent paper, I muft in a few words open the occafion of it. In the account which Plato gives us of the converfation and behaviour of Socrates, the morning he was to die, he tells the following circumftance. When Socrates his fetters were knocked off (as was ufual to be done on the day that the condemned perfon was to be executed) being feated in the midft of his difciples, and laying one of his legs over the other, in a very unconcerned pofture, he began to rub it where it had been galled by the iron: and whether it was to fhew the indifference with which he entertained the thoughts of his approaching death, or (after his ufual manner) to take every occafion of philofophifing upon fome useful fubject, he obferved the pleafure of that fenfation which now arose in those very parts of his leg, that just before had been fo much pained by the fetter. Upon this he reflected on the nature of pleasure and pain in general, and how conftantly they fucceed one another. To this he added, that if a man of good genius for a fable were to reprefent the nature of pleasure and pain in that way of writing, he would probably join them together after fuch a manner, that it would be impoffible for the one to come into any place, without being followed by the other. It is poffible, that if Plato had thought it proper at fuch a time to defcribe Socrates launching out into a difcourse which was not of a piece with the bufinefs of the day, he would have enlarged upon this hint, and have drawn it out into fome beautiful allegory or fable. But fince he has not done it, I fhall attempt to write one myfelf in the spirit of that divine author. "There were two families which from the beginning "of the world were as oppofite to each other as light "and darkness. The one of them lived in Heaven, and "the other in Hell. The youngest descendant of the "firft family was pleafure, who was the daughter of hap"pinefs, who was the child of virtue, who was the off fpring of the gods. Thefe, as I faid before, had their "habitation in heaven. The youngest of the oppofite fa66 mily was pain, who was the fon of mifery, who was "the child of vice, who was the offspring of the furies. "The habitation of this race of beings was in hell. 66 66 "The middle ftation of nature between these two oppofite extremes was the earth, which was inhabited by creatures of a middle kind, neither fo virtuous as the one, nor fo vicious as the other, but partaking of the good and bad qualities of these two oppofite families. Jupiter confidering that this fpecies commonly called 16 man, was too virtuous to be miferable, and too vicious to be happy; that he might make a diftinction between "the good and the bad, ordered the two youngest of the "above-mentioned families, pleafure who was the daughter of happiness, and pain who was the son of mifery, "to meet one another upon this part of nature which lay in the half-way between them, having promifed to fettle "it upon them both, provided they could agree upon the "divifion of it, fo as to share mankind between them. "Pleasure and pain were no fooner met in their new "habitation, but they immediately agreed upon this point, that pleasure should take poffeflion of the virtuous, and pain of the vicious part of that fpecies "which was given up to them. But upon examining to "which of them any individual they met with belonged, they found each of them had a right to him; for that, contrary to what they had feen in their old places of refidence, there was no perfon fo vicious who had not 44 No 184. "fome good in him, nor any perfon fo virtuous who had not in him fome evil. The truth of it is, they ge "nerally found upon fearch, that in the most vicious man pleasure might lay a claim to an hundredth part, "and that in the moft virtuous man pain might come in "for at leaft two-thirds. This they faw would occa"fion endless disputes between them, unless they could come to fome accommodation. To this end there was a marriage proposed between them, and at length concluded by this means it is that we find pleasure "and pain are fuch conftant yoke-fellows, and that they either make their vifits together, or are never far "afunder. If pain comes into an heart, he is quickly "followed by pleasure; and if pleasure enters, you may be fure pain is not far off. 66 "But notwithstanding this marriage was very conve"nient for the two parties, it did not feem to answer the "intention of Jupiter in fending them among mankind. "To remedy therefore this inconvenience, it was ftipu"lated between them by article, and confirmed by the "confent of each family, that notwithstanding they here ་་ poffeffed the fpecies indifferently; upon the death of every single perfon, if he was found to have in him a "certain proportion of evil, he should be dispatched into "the infernal regions by a paffport from pain, there to "dwell with mifery, vice, and the furies. Or on the con"trary, if he had in him a certain proportion of good, "he fhould be dispatched into heaven by a paffport "from pleasure, there to dwell with happinefs, virtue, "and the gods.' N° 184. Monday, October 1. -Opere in longo fas eft obrepere fomnum. L. HOR. Ars Poet. ver. 360. -In long works fleep will fometimes surprise. ROSCOMMON. WHEN a man has difcovered a new vein of hu mour, it often carries him much farther than he expected from it. My correfpondents take the hint I give them, and purfue it into fpeculations which I never thought of at my first starting it. This has been the fate of my paper on the match of grinning, which has already produced a fecond paper on parallel fubjects, and brought me the following letter by the laft poft. I fhall not premife any thing to it farther, than that it is built on matter of fact, and is as follows. SIR, YOU have already obliged the world with a difcourfe upon grinning, and have fince proceeded to whiftling, from whence you at length came to yawning; from this, I think, you may make a very natural 'tranfition to fleeping. I therefore recommend to you ' for the subject of a paper the following advertisement, ⚫ which about two months ago was given into every body's hands, and may be feen with fome additions in "the Daily Courant of Auguft the ninth. "Nicholas Hart, who flept laft year at St. Bartho"lomew's hofpital, intends to fleep this year at the "Cock and Bottle in Little Britain." Having fince inquired into the matter of fact, I find ⚫ that the above-mentioned Nicholas Hart is every year ⚫ feized with a periodical fit of fleeping, which begins upon the fifth of Auguft, and ends on the eleventh of the fame month: that On the first of that month he grew dull; On the fourth, began to nod; 'On the fifth, dropped asleep; 'On the fixth, was heard to fnore ; On the feventh, turned himself in his bed; On the eighth, recovered his former posture; On the tenth about midnight, awaked; On the eleventh in the morning, called for a little • fmall-beer. This account I have extracted out of the journal of this fleeping worthy, as it has been faithfully kept by a gentleman of Lincoln's-Inn, who has undertaken |