35. Whatever tends neither to the improvement of your reason nor the benefit of society, think it below you; and when you have done any considerable service to mankind, don't lessen it by your folly, in gaping after reputation and requital. 36. When you find yourself sleepy in a morning, rouse yourself, and consider that you are born to business, and that in doing good in your generation, you answer your character and act like a man; whereas sleep and idleness do but degrade you, and sink you down to a brute. 37. A mind that has nothing of hope, or fear, or aversion, or desire, to weaken and disturb it, is the most impregnable security. Hither we may with safety retire and defy our enemies; and he that sees not this advantage must be extremely ignorant, and he that forgets it unhappy. 38. Don't disturb yourself about the faults of other people, but let everybody's crimes be at their own door. Have always this great maxim in your remembrance, that to play the knave is to rebel against religion; all sorts of injustice being no less than high treason against Heaven itself. 39. Don't contemn death, but meet it with a decent and religious fortitude, and look upon it as one of those things which Providence has ordered. If you want a cordial to make the apprehensions of dying go down a little the more easily, consider what sort of world and what sort of company you'll part with. To conclude, do but look seriously into the world, and there you'll see multitudes of people preparing for funerals, and mourning for their friends and acquaintances; and look out again a little afterwards, and you'll see others doing the very same thing for them. 40. In short, men are but poor transitory things. To-day they are busy and harassed with the affairs of human life, and to-morrow life itself is taken from them, and they are returned to their original dust and ashes. PART III. Containing prophetic observations relating to the affairs of Europe and of Great Britain, more particularly from 1720 to 1729. 1. In the latter end of 1720, an eminent old lady shall bring forth five sons at a birth; the youngest shall live and grow up to maturity, but the four eldest shall either die in the nursery or be all carried off by one sudden and unexpected accident. 2. About this time a man with a double head shall arrive in Britain from the south. One of these heads shall deliver messages of great importance to the governing party, and the other to the party that's opposite to them. The first shall believe the monster, but the last shall discover the impostor, and so happily disengage themselves from a snare that was laid to destroy them and their posterity. After this the two heads shall unite, and the monster shall appear in his proper shape. a pretended secret for the transmutation of metals. Under the umbrage of this mighty secret he shall pass upon the world for some time; but at length he shall be detected, and proved to be nothing but an empiric and a cheat, and so forced to sneak off, and leave the people he has deluded, either to bemoan their loss or laugh at their own folly. N. B. This will be the last of his sect that will ever venture in this part of the world upon the same errand. 4. In this year great endeavours will be used for procuring a general peace, which shall be so near a conclusion that public rejoicings shall be made at the courts of several great potentates upon that account; but just in the critical juncture, a certain neighbouring prince shall come to a violent death, which shall occasion new war and commotion all over Europe; but these shall continue but for a short time, and at last terminate in the utter destruction of the first aggres sors. 5. Towards the close of this year of mysteries, a person that was born blind shall have his sight restored, and shall see ravens perch upon the heads of traitors, among which the head of a notorious prelate shall stand upon the highest pole. 6. In the year 1722, there shall be a grand congress, and new overtures of peace offered by most of the principal parties concerned in the war, which shall have so good effect that a cessation of arms shall be agreed upon for six months, which shall be kept inviolable till a certain general, either through treachery or inadvertency, shall begin hostilities before the expiration of the term; upon which the injured prince shall draw his sword, and throw the scabbard into the sea, vowing never to return it till he shall obtain satisfaction for himself, and done justice to all that were oppressed. 7. At the close of this year, a famous bridge shall be broken down, and the water that runs under it shall be tinctured with the blood of two notorious malefactors, whose unexpected death shall make mighty alterations in the present state of affairs, and put a stop to the ruin of a nation, which must otherwise have been unavoidable. 8. 1723 begins with plots, conspiracies, and intestine commotions in several countries; nor shall Great Britain itself be free from the calamity. These shall continue till a certain young prince shall take the reins of government into his own hands; and after that, a marriage shall be proposed, and an alliance concluded between two great potentates, who shall join their forces, and endeavour, in good earnest, to set all matters upon a right foundation. 9. This year several cardinals and prelates shall be publicly censured for heretical principles, and shall narrowly escape from being torn to pieces by the common people, who still look upon them as the grand disturbers of the public tranquillity, perfect incendiaries, and the chief promoters of their former, present, and future calamities. 10. In 1724-5 there will be many treaties and 3. In the year 1721, a philosopher from Lower negociations, and Great Britain, particularly, will Germany shall come, first to Amsterdam in Hol-be crowded with foreign ministers and ambassaland, and afterwards to London. He will bring dors from remote princes and states. Trade and with him a world of curiosities, and among them commerce will begin to flourish and revive, and everything will have a comfortable prospect, until || some desperadoes, assisted by a monster with many heads, shall start new difficulties, and put the world again into a flame; but these shall be but of short duration. 11. Before the expiration of 1725, an eagle from the north shall fly directly to the south, and perch upon the palace of a prince, and first unravel the bloody projects and designs of a wicked set of people, and then publicly discover the murder of a great king, and the intended assassination of another greater than he. 12 In 1726, three princes will be born that will grow up to be men, and inherit the crowns of three of the greatest monarchies in Europe. || pelled to disgorge what they have unjustly pillaged either from the crown or the public. 17. About this time a new scaffold will be erected upon the confines of a certain great city, where an old count of a new extraction, that has been of all parties and true to none, will be doomed by his peers to make his first appearance. After this an old lady, who has often been exposed to danger and disgrace, and sometimes brought to the very brink of destruction, will be brought to bed of three daughters at once, which they shall call Plenty, Peace, and Union; and these glory of their mother, and the comfort of posthree shall live and grow up together, be the terity for many generations. This is the substance of what he either writ or extracted from his papers in the interval between the loss of his speech and the return of his fit, which happened exactly at the time he had com 13. About this time the Pope will die, and after a great many intrigues and struggles, a Spanish cardinal shall be elected, who shall decline the dignity, and declare his marriage with|puted. a great lady, heiress of one of the chief principalities in Italy, which may occasion new troubles in Europe, if not timely prevented. 14. In 1727, new troubles shall break out in the north, occasioned by the sudden death of a certain prince, and the avarice and ambition of another. Poor Poland seems to be pointed at; but the princes of the south shall enter into a confederacy to preserve her, and shall at length restore her peace, and prevent the perpetual ruin of her constitution. Upon the approach of his fit, he made signs to be put to bed, which was no sooner done but he was seized with extreme agonies, which he bore up under with the greatest steadfastness, and after a severe conflict that lasted near eight hours, he expired. Thus lived and thus died this extraordinary person; a person, though of mean extraction and fully and truly known, it will be read with pleaobscure life, yet when his character comes to be sure, profit, and admiration. His perfections at large would be the work of a 15. Great endeavours will be used about this volume, and inconsistent with the intention of time for a comprehension in religion supported these papers. I will therefore only add, for a by crafty and designing men, and a party of mis- conclusion, that he was a man of uncommon taken zealots, which they shall artfully draw in thought and judgment, and always kept his apto join with them; but as the project is ill-petites and inclinations within their just limits." concerted and will be worse managed, it will come to nothing; and soon afterwards an effectual mode will be taken to prevent the like attempt for the future. 16. 1728 will be a year of inquiry and retrospection. Many exorbitant grants will be reassumed, and several persons who thought themselves secure will be called before the senate, and com His reason was strong and manly, his understanding sound and active, and his temper so easy, equal, and complaisant, that he never fell out, either with men or accidents. He bore all things with the highest affability, and computed justly upon their value and consequence, and then applied them to their proper uses. A LETTER FROM OXFORD. SIR,-Being informed that you speedily intend to publish some memoirs relating to our dumb countryman, Dickory Cronke, I send you herewith a few lines, in the nature of an Elegy, which I leave you to dispose of as you think fit. I knew and admired the man, and if I were capable, his character should be the first thing I would attempt. Your's, &c. AN ELEGY, IN MEMORY OF DICKORY CRONKE, THE DUMB PHILOSOPHER. Vitiis nemo sine nascitur; op Qui minimis urgetur.-HORACE. If virtuous actions emulation raise, No gainful views his bounded hopes could sway, Exeter College, August 25th, 1719. J. P. EPITAPH. THE occasion of this Epitaph was briefly thus:-A gentleman, who had heard much in commendation of this dumb man, going accidentally to the churchyard where he was buried, and finding his grave without a tomb-stone, or any manner of memorandum of his death, he pulled out his pencil, and writ as follows: Pauper ubique jacet. Near to this lonely unfrequented place, Mixed with the common dust, neglected lies, What, though he wants a monumental stone, Oh, had I power but equal to my mind, A decent tomb should soon this place adorn, A man, though dumb, yet he was nature's care, |