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continue their courfe with the fame ftrength and facility as before, but floated along timorously and feebly, endangered by every breeze, and shattered by every ruffle of the water, till they funk, by flow degrees, after long ftruggles, and innumerable expedients, always repining at their own folly, and warning others against the firft approach of the gulph of INTEMPERANCE.

There were artists who profeffed to repair the breaches and stop the leaks of the veffels which had been shattered on the rocks of PLEASURE. Many appeared to have great confidence in their skill, and fome, indeed, were preferved by it from finking, who had received only a fingle blow; but I remarked that few veffels lafted long which had been much repaired, nor was it found that the artists themselves continued afloat longer than thofe who had leaft of their affiftance.

The only advantage which, in the voyage of life, the cautious had above the negligent, was, that they funk later, and more fuddenly; for they paffed forward till they had fometimes feen all thofe in whofe company they had iffued from the freights of infancy, perish in the way, and at last were overfet by a crofs breeze, without the toil of refiftance, or the anguish of expectation. But fuch as had often fallen against the rocks of PLEASURE, commonly fubfided by fenfible degrees, contended long with the encroaching waters, and haraffed themselves by labours that scarce HOPE herfelf could flatter with fuccefs.

As I was looking upon the various fate of the multitude about me, I was fuddenly alarmed with an admonition from fome unknown Power, "Gaze "not idly upon others when thou thyself art fink

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ing. Whence is this thoughtlefs tranquillity, "when thou and they are equally endangered ?” I looked, and feeing the gulph of INTEMPERANCE before me, started and awaked.

C

NUMB. 103. TUESDAY, March 12, 1751.

Scire volunt fecreta domus, atque inde timeri.

They fearch the secrets of the house, and so

Are worshipp'd there, and fear'd for what they know.

Juv.

DRYDEN.

URIOSITY is one of the permanent and ceftain characteristicks of a vigorous intellect. Every advance into knowledge opens new profpects, and produces new incitements to further progrefs. All the attainments poffible in our prefent ftate are evidently inadequate to our capacities of enjoyment; conqueft ferves no purpose but that of kindling ambition, difcovery has no effect but of railing expectation; the gratification of one defire encourages another; and after all our labours, ftudies, and enquiries, we are continually at the fame diftance from the completion of our schemes, have ftill fome with importunate to be fatisfied, and fome faculty restlefs and turbulent for want of its enjoyment.

The defire of knowledge, though often animated by extrinfick and adventitious motives, feems on many occafions to operate without fubordination to any other principle; we are eager to fee and hear, without intention of referring our obfervations to a farther end; we climb a mountain for a profpect of the plain; we run to the

ftrand

ftrand in a storm, that we may contemplate the agitation of the water; we range from city to city, though we profefs neither architecture nor fortification; we cross feas only to view nature in nakedness, or magnificence in ruins; we are equally allured by novelty of every kind, by a desert or a palace, a cataract or a cavern, by every thing rude and every thing polifhed, every thing great and every thing little; we do not fee a thicket but with fome temptation to enter it, nor remark an infect flying before us but with an inclination to pursue it.

This paffion is, perhaps, regularly heightened in proportion as the powers of the mind are elevated and enlarged. Lucan therefore introduces Cafar fpeaking with dignity fuitable to the gran- · deur of his defigns and the extent of his capacity, when he declares to the high-prieft of Egypt, that he has no defire equally powerful with that of finding the origin of the Nile, and that he would quit all the projects of the civil war for a fight of those fountains which had been fo long concealed. And Homer, when he would furnish the Sirens with a temptation, to which his hero, renowned for wifdom, might yield without difgrace, makes them declare, that none ever departed from them but with increafe of knowledge.

There is, indeed, fcarce any kind of ideal acquirement which may not be applied to fome use, or which may not at least gratify pride with occafional fuperiority; but whoever attends the motions of his own mind will find, that upon the first appearance of an object, or the firft ftart of a queftion, his inclination to a nearer view, or more accurate difcuffion, precedes all thoughts of profit,

or

or of competition; and that his defires take wing by instantaneous impulfe, though their flight may be invigorated, or their efforts renewed, by fubfequent confiderations. The gratification of curiofity rather frees us from uneafinefs than confers pleasure; we are more pained by ignorance than delighted by instruction. Curiofity is the thirft of the foul; it inflames and torments us, and makes us tafte every thing with joy, however otherwise infipid, by which it may be quenched.

It is evident that the earlieft fearchers after knowledge must have propofed knowledge only as their reward; and that Science, though perhaps the nurfling of Intereft, was the daughter of Curiosity: for who can believe that they who firft watched the course of the ftars, forefaw the ufe of their discoveries to the facilitation of commerce, or the menfuration of time? They were delighted with the. fplendour of the nocturnal fkies, they found that the lights changed their places; what they admired they were anxious to understand, and in time traced their revolutions.

There are, indeed, beings in the form of men, who appear fatisfied with their intellectual poffeffions, and seem to live without defire of enlarging their conceptions; before whom the world paffes without notice, and who are equally unmoved by nature or by art.

This negligence is fometimes only the temporary effect of a predominant paffion; a lover finds no inclination to travel any path, but that which leads to the habitation of his miftrefs; a trader can fpare little attention to common occurrences, when his fortune is endangered by a ftorm. It is frequently the confequence of a total immerfion in fenfuality:

VOL. IL

corporeal

corporeal pleasures may be indulged till the memory of every other kind of happiness is obliterated; the mind, long habituated to a lethargick and quiefcent ftate, is unwilling to wake to the toil of thinking; and though the may fometimes be disturbed by the obtrufion of new ideas, fhrinks back again to ignorance and rest.

But, indeed, if we except them to whom the continual task of procuring the supports of life denies all opportunities of deviation from their own narrow track, the number of fuch as live without the ardour of enquiry is very fmall, though many content themselves with cheap amufements, and wafte their lives in researches of no importance.

There is no fnare more dangerous to busy and excurfive minds, than the cobwebs of petty inquifitivencfs, which entangle them in trivial employ-, ments and minute ftudies, and detain them in a middle ftate, between the tedioufnefs of total inactivity, and the fatigue of laborious efforts, enchant them at once with cafe and novelty, and vitiate them with the luxury of learning. The neceffity of doing fomething, and the fear of undertaking much, finks the hiftorian to a genealogift, the philofopher to a journalist of the weather, and the mathematician to a conftructer of dials.

It is happy when thofe who cannot content themselves to be idle, nor resolve to be industrious, are at least employed without injury to others; but it feldom happens that we can contain ourfelves long in a neutral state, or forbear to fink into vice, when we are no longer foaring towards virtue.

Nugaculus

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