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which is not at all necessary for the continuance of the species: nor indeed in reasonable creatures does it rise in any proportion, as it spreads itself downward; for in all family affection, we find protection granted and favours bestowed, are greater motives to love and tenderness, than safety, benefits, or life received.

One would wonder to hear sceptical men disputing for the reason of animals, and telling us it is only our pride and prejudices that will not allow them the use of that faculty.

other species; and when the birth appears of never so different a bird, will cherish it for her own. In all these circumstances, which do not carry an immediate regard to the subsistence of herself or her species, she is a very idiot.

There is not, in my opinion, any thing/ more mysterious in nature than this instinct in animals, which thus rises above reason and falls infinitely short of it. It cannot be accounted for by any properties in matter, and at the same time works after so odd a manner, that one cannot think Reason shows itself in all occurrences of it the faculty of an intellectual being. For life; whereas the brute makes no discovery my own part, I look upon it as upon the of such a talent, but in what immediately principle of gravitation in bodies, which is regards his own preservation or the con-not to be explained by any known qualities tinuance of his species. Animals in their generations are wiser than the sons of men; but their wisdom is confined to a few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass. Take a brute out of his instinct, and you find him wholly deprived of understanding. To use an instance that comes often under observation.

inherent in the bodies themselves, nor from
the laws of mechanism, but, according to
the best notions of the greatest philoso-
phers, is an immediate impression from the
first mover, and the divine energy acting
in the creatures.
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-Jovis omnia plena.

-All things are full of Jove.

L.

Virg. Ecl. iii. 60.

With what caution does the hen provide No. 121.] Thursday, July 19, 1711. herself a nest in places unfrequented, and free from noise and disturbance! When she has laid her eggs in such a manner that she can cover them, what care does she take in turning them frequently that all parts may partake of the vital warmth! When she leaves them, to provide for her necessary sustenance, how punctually does she return before they have time to cool, and become incapable of producing an animal! In the summer you see her giving herself greater freedoms, and quitting her care for above two hours together; but in winter, when the rigour of the season would chill the principles of life, and destroy the young one, she grows more assiduous in her attendance, and stays away but half the time. When the birth approaches, with how much nicety and attention does she help the chick to break its prison! not to take notice of her covering it from the injuries of the weather, providing it proper nourishment, and teaching it to help itself; nor to mention her forsaking the nest, if after the usual time of reckoning the young one does not make its appearance. A chymical operation could not be followed with greater art or diligence than is seen in the hatching of a chick; though there are many other birds that show an infinitely greater sagacity in all the forementioned particulars.

As I was walking this morning in the great yard that belongs to my friend's country-house, I was wonderfully pleased to see the different workings of instinct in a hen followed by a brood of ducks. The young upon the sight of a pond, immediately ran into it; while the step-mother, with all imaginable anxiety, hovered about the borders of it, to call them out of an element that appeared to her so dangerous and destructive. As the different principle which acted in these different animals cannot be termed reason, so, when we call it. Instinct, we mean something we have no knowledge of. To me, as I hinted in my last paper, it seems the immediate direction of Providence, and such an operation of the supreme Being, as that which determines all the portions of matter to their proper centres. A modern philosopher, quoted by Monsieur Bayle in his learned Dissertation on the Souls of Brutes, delivers the same opinion, though in a bolder form of words, where he says, Deus est anima brutonum,- "God himself is the soul of brutes.' Who can tell what to call that seeming sagacity in animals, which directs them to such food as is proper for them, and makes them naturally avoid whatever But at the same time the hen, that has is noxious or unwholesome? Tully has oball this seeming ingenuity (which is indeed served that a lamb no sooner falls from its absolutely necessary for the propagation mother, but immediately and of its own of the species,) considered in other re- accord it applies itself to the teat. Damspects, is without the least glimmering of pier, in his Travels, tells us, that when thought or common sense. She mistakes seamen are thrown upon any of the una piece of chalk for an egg, and sits upon known coasts of America, they never venit in the same manner. She is insensible ture upon the fruit of any tree, how temptof any increase or diminution in the num-ing soever it may appear, unless they obber of those she lays. She does not distin-serve that it is marked with the pecking guish between her own and those of an- of birds; but fall on without any fear or

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But notwithstanding animals have nothing like the use of reason, we find in them all the lower parts of our nature, the passions and senses, in their greatest strength and perfection. And here it is worth our observation, that all beasts and birds of prey are wonderfully subject to anger, malice, revenge and all the other violent passions that may animate them in search of their proper food; as those that are incapable of defending themselves, or annoying others, or whose safety lies chiefly in their flight, are suspicious, fearful, and apprehensive of every thing they see or hear: whilst others that are of assistance and use to man, have their natures softened with something mild and tractable, and by that means are qualified for a domestic life. In this case the passions generally correspond with the make of the body. We do not find the fury of a lion in so weak and defenceless an animal as a lamb; nor the meekness of a lamb in a creature so armed for battle and assault as the lion. In the same manner, we find that particular animals have a more or less exquisite sharpness and sagacity in those particular senses which most turn to their advantage, and in which their safety and welfare is the most concerned.

placed it, and there receive the afflux of colder or warmer, clean or foul water, as it happens to come to it?"

I shall add to this instance out of Mr. 5 Locke another out of the learned Dr. More, who cites it from Cardan, in relation to another animal which Providence has left defective, but at the same time has shown its wisdom in the formation of that organ in which it seems chiefly to have failed. 'What is more obvious and ordinary than a mole? and yet what more palpable argument of Providence than she? The members of her body are so exactly fitted to her nature and manner of life: for her dwelling being under ground, where nothing is to be seen, nature has so obscurely fitted her with eyes, that naturalists can scarce agree whether she have any sight at all, or no. But for amends, what she is capable of for her defence and warning of danger, she has very eminently conferred upon her; for she is exceeding quick of hearing. And then her short tail and short legs, but broad fore-feet armed with sharp claws; we see by the event to what purpose they are, she so swiftly working herself under ground, and making her way so fast in the earth, as they that behold it cannot but admire it. Her legs therefore are short, that she need dig no more than will serve the mere thickness of her body; and her fore-feet are Nor must we here omit that great variety broad, that she may scoop away much of arms with which nature has differently earth at a time; and little or no tail she has, fortified the bodies of several kinds of aní- because she courses it not upon the ground mals, such as claws, hoofs, horns, teeth, like the rat or mouse, of whose kindred she and tusks, a tail, a sting, a trunk, or a pro- is; but lives under the earth, and is fain to boscis. It is likewise observed by natural-dig herself a dwelling there. And she ists, that it must be some hidden principle, distinct from what we call reason, which instructs animals in the use of these their arms, and teaches them to manage them to the best advantage; because they naturally defend themselves with that part in which their strength lies, before the weapon be formed in it; as is remarkable in lambs, which, though they are bred within doors, and never saw the actions of their own species, push at those who approach them with their foreheads, before the first budding of a horn appears.

I shall add to these general observations an instance, which Mr. Locke has given us, of Providence even in the imperfections of a creature which seems the meanest and the most despicable in the whole animal world. 'We may,' says he, from the make of an oyster or cockle, conclude that it has not so many nor so quick senses as a man, or several other animals; nor if it had, would it, in that state and incapacity of transferring itself from one place to another, be bettered by them. What good would sight and hearing do to a creature, that cannot move itself to or from the object, wherein at a distance it perceives good or evil? And would not quickness of sensation be an inconvenience to an animal that must be still where chance has once

making her way through so thick an element, which will not yield easily as the air or the water, it had been dangerous to have drawn so long a train behind her; for her enemy might fall upon her rear, and fetch her out before she had completed or got full possession of her works?'

I cannot forbear mentioning Mr. Boyle's remark upon this last creature, who I remember somewhere in his works observes, that though the mole be not totally blind (as it is commonly thought) she has not sight enough to distinguish particular objects. Her eye is said to have but one humour in it, which is supposed to give her the idea of light, but of nothing else, and is so formed that this idea is probably painful to the animal. Whenever she comes up into broad day she might be in danger of being taken, unless she were thus affected by a light striking upon her eye, and immediately warning her to bury herself in her proper element. More sight would be useless to her, as none at all might be fatal.

I have only instanced such animals as seem the most imperfect works of nature; and if Providence shows itself even in the blemishes of these creatures, how much more does it discover itself in the several endowments which it has variously bestowed upon

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such creatures as are more or less finished and completed in their several faculties, according to the condition of life in which they are posted.

I could wish our Royal Society would compile a body of natural history, the best that could be gathered together from books and observations. If the several writers among them took each his particular species, and gave us a distinct account of its original, birth, and education, its policies, hostilities, and alliances, with the frame and texture of its inward and outward parts, and particularly those that distinguish it from all other animals, with their peculiar aptitudes for the state of being in which Providence has placed them, it would be one of the best services their studies could do mankind, and not a little redound to the glory of the all-wise Contriver.

It is true, such a natural history, after all the disquisitions of the learned, would be infinitely short and defective. Seas and deserts hide millions of animals from our observation. Innumerable artifices and stratagems are acted in the 'howling wilderness' and in the 'great deep,' that can never come to our knowledge. Besides that there are infinitely more species of creatures which are not to be seen without nor indeed with the help of the finest glasses, than of such as are bulky enough for the naked eye to take hold of. However, from the consideration of such animals as lie within the compass of our knowledge, we might easily form a conclusion of the rest, that the same variety of wisdom and goodness runs through the whole creation and puts every creature in a condition to provide for its safety and subsistence in its proper station.

Tully has given us an admirable sketch of natural history in his second book concerning the Nature of the Gods; and that in a style so raised by metaphors and descriptions, that it lifts the subject above raillery and ridicule, which frequently fall on such nice observations when they pass through the hands of an ordinary writer.

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and confirmed by the opinion of all that know him.

My worthy friend, Sir Roger, is one of those who is not only at peace within himself, but beloved and esteemed by all about him. He receives a suitable tribute for his universal benevolence to mankind, in the returns of affection and good-will, which are paid him by every one that lives within his neighbourhood. I lately met with two or three odd instances of that general respect which is shown to the good old knight. He would needs carry Will Wimble and myself with him to the county assizes. As we were upon the road Will Wimble joined a couple of plain men who rid before us, and conversed with them for some time; during which, my friend Sir Roger acquainted me with their characters.

The first of them,' says he, 'that has a spaniel by his side, is a yeoman of about an hundred pounds a year, an honest man. He is just within the game-act, and qualified to kill a hare or a pheasant. He knocks down his dinner with his gun twice or thrice a week; and by that means lives much cheaper than those who have not so good an estate as himself. He would be a good neighbour if he did not destroy so many partridges. In short, he is a very sensible man; shoots flying; and has been several times foreman of the petty-jury.

'The other that rides along with him is Tom Touchy, a fellow famous for "taking the law" of every body. There is not one in the town where he lives that he has not sued at a quarter sessions. The rogue had once the impudence to go to law with the Widow. His head is full of costs, damages, and ejectments. He plagued a couple of honest gentlemen so long for a trespass in breaking one of his hedges, till he was forced to sell the ground it enclosed to defray the charges of the prosecution; his father left him fourscore pounds a year; but he has cast and been cast so often, that he is not now worth thirty. I suppose he is going upon the old business of the willow-tree.'

As Sir Roger was giving me this account of Tom Touchy, Will Wimble and his two companions stopped short till we came up to them. After having paid their respects to Sir Roger, Will told him that Mr. Touchy and he must appeal to him upon a dispute that arose between them. Will, it seems, had been giving his fellow-traveller an account of his angling one day in such a hole: when Tom Touchy, instead of hearing out his story, told him that Mr. Sucha-One, if he pleased, might take the law of him' for fishing in that part of the river. My friend Sir Roger heard them both, upon a round trot; and after having paused some time, told them, with the air of a man who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be said on both sides.' They were neither of them dissatisfied with the knight's determination,

because neither of them found himself in | face, and by a little aggravation of the feathe wrong by it. Upon which we made tures to change it into the Saracen's Head. the best of our way to the assizes. I should not have known this story, had not The court was sat before Sir Roger came; the innkeeper, upon Sir Roger's alighting, but notwithstanding all the justices had told him in my hearing, that his honour's taken their places upon the bench, they head was brought back last night with the made room for the old knight at the head alterations that he had ordered to be made of them; who for his reputation in the coun- in it. Upon this, my friend, with his usual try took occasion to whisper in the judge's cheerfulness, related the particulars aboveear, that he was glad his lordship had mentioned, and ordered the head to be met with so much good weather in his cir- brought into the room. I could not forbear cuit.' I was listening to the proceeding of discovering greater expressions of mirth the court with much attention, and infinitely than ordinary upon the appearance of this pleased with that great appearance of so- monstrous face, under which, notwithstandfemnity which so properly accompanies ing it was made to frown and stare in a such a public administration of our laws; most extraordinary manner, I could still when after about an hour's sitting, I ob- discover a distant resemblance of my old served, to my great surprise, in the midst friend. Sir Roger, upon seeing me laugh, of a trial, that my friend Sir Roger was desired me to tell him truly if I thought it getting up to speak. I was in some pain possible for people to know him in that disfor him, until I found he had acquitted guise. I at first kept my usual silence; but himself of two or three sentences, with a upon the knight's conjuring me to tell him look of much business and great intrepidity. whether it was not still more like himself Upon his first rising the court was hushed, than a Saracen, I composed my counteand a general whisper ran among the coun-nance in the best manner I could, and retry people, that Sir Roger was up. " The plied, that much might be said on both speech he made was so little to the pur- sides.' pose, that I shall not trouble my readers with an account of it; and I believe was not so much designed by the knight himself to inform the court, as to give him a figure in my eye, and keep up his credit in the country.

These several adventures, with the knight's behaviour in them, gave me as pleasant a day as ever I met with in any of my travels. L.

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Doctrina sed vim promovet insitam,
Rectique cultus pectora roborant;
Utcunque defecere mores,
Dedecorant bene nata culpæ.

I was highly delighted when the court No. 123.] Saturday, July 21, 1711. rose to see the gentlemen of the country gathering about my old friend, and striving who should compliment him most; at the same time that the ordinary people gazed upon him at a distance, not a little admiring his courage that was not afraid to speak to the judge.

In our return home we met with a very odd accident; which I cannot forbear relating, because it shows how desirous all who know Sir Roger, are of giving him marks of their esteem. When we arrived upon the verge of his estate, we stopped at a little inn to rest ourselves and our horses. The man of the house had, it seems, been formerly a servant in the knight's family; and to do honour to his old master, had, some time since, unknown to Sir Roger, put him up in a sign-post before the door; so that the knight's head had hung out upon the road about a week before he himself knew any thing of the matter. As soon as Sir Roger was acquainted with it, finding that his servant's indiscretion proceeded wholly from affection and good-will, he only told him that he had made him too high a compliment; and when the fellow seemed to think that could hardly be, added with a more decisive look, that it was too great an honour for any man under a duke; but told him at the same time, that it might be altered by a very few touches, and that he himself would be at the charge of it. Accordingly they got a painter by the knight's directions to add a pair of whiskers to the

Hor. Lib. 4. Od. iv. 33.

Yet the best blood by learning is refin'd, And virtue arms the solid mind; Whilst vice will stain the noblest race, And the paternal stamp efface.-Oldisworth. As I was yesterday taking the air with my friend, Sir Roger, we were met by a fresh-coloured ruddy young man who rid by us full speed, with a couple of servants behind him. Upon my inquiry who he was, Sir Roger told me that he was a young gentleman of considerable estate, who had been educated by a tender mother that lived not many miles from the place where we were. She is a very good lady, says my friend, but took so much care of her son's health that she has made him good for nothing. She quickly found that reading was bad for his eyes, and that writing made his head ache. He was let loose among the woods as soon as he was able to ride on horseback, or to carry a gun upon his shoulder. To be brief, I found, upon my friend's account of him, that he had got a great stock of health, but nothing else; but that if it were a man's business only to live, there would not be a more accomplished young fellow in the whole country.

The truth of it is, since my residing in these parts I have seen and heard innume rable instances of young heirs and elder

brothers, who, either from their own reflecting upon the estates they are born to, and therefore thinking all other accomplishments unnecessary, or from hearing these notions frequently inculcated to them by the flattery of their servants and domestics, or from the same foolish thought prevailing in those who have the care of their education, are of no manner of use but to keep up their families, and transmit their lands and houses in a line to posterity.

This makes me often think on a story I have heard of two friends, which I shall give my reader at large, under feigned The moral of it may, I hope, be useful, though there are some circumstances which make it rather appear like a novel, than a true story.

names.

had not he been comforted by the daily visits and conversation of his friend. As they were one day talking together with their usual intimacy, Leontine, considering how incapable he was of giving his daughter a proper education in his own house, and Eudoxus reflecting on the ordinary behaviour of a son who knows himself to be the heir of a great estate, they both agreed upon an exchange of children, namely, that the boy should be bred up with Leontine as his son, and that the girl should live with Eudoxus as his daughter, until they were each of them arrived at years of discretion. The wife of Eudoxus, knowing that her son could not be so advantageously brought up as under the care of Leontine, and considering at the same Eudoxus and Leontine began the world time that he would be perpetually under with small estates. They were both of them her own eye, was by degrees prevailed men of good sense and great virtue. They upon to fall in with the project. She thereprosecuted their studies together in their fore took Leonilla, for that was the name earlier years, and entered into such a friend- of the girl, and educated her as her own ship as lasted to the end of their lives. daughter. The two friends on each side Eudoxus, at his first setting out in the had wrought themselves to such an habitual world, threw himself into a court, where tenderness for the children who were unby his natural endowments and his acquired der their direction, that each of them had abilities he made his way from one post to the real passion of a father, where the title another, until at length he had raised a very was but imaginary. Florio, the name of considerable fortune. Leontine on the con- the young heir that lived with Leontine, trary sought all opportunities of improving though he had all the duty and affection his mind, by study, conversation, and travel. imaginable for his supposed parent, was He was not only acquainted with all the taught to rejoice at the sight of Eudoxus, sciences, but with the most eminent pro- who visited his friend very frequently, and fessors of them throughout Europe. He was dictated by his natural affection, as knew perfectly well the interest of its well as by the rules of prudence, to make princes, with the customs and fashions of himself esteemed and beloved by Florio. their courts, and could scarce meet with The boy was now old enough to know his the name of an extraordinary person in the supposed father's circumstances, and that Gazette whom he had not either talked to therefore he was to make his way in the or seen. In short, he had so well mixed and world by his own industry. This consideradigested his knowledge of men and books, tion grew stronger in him every day, and that he made one of the most accomplished produced so good an effect, that he applied persons of his age. During the whole course himself with more than ordinary attention of his studies and travels he kept up a punc- to the pursuit of every thing which Leontual correspondence with Eudoxus, who tine recommended to him. His natural often made himself acceptable to the prin- abilities, which were very good, assisted cipal men about court by the intelligence by the directions of so excellent a counwhich he received from Leontine. When sellor, enabled him to make a quicker prothey were both turned of forty, (an age in gress than ordinary through all the parts which, according to Mr. Cowley, there is of his education. Before he was twenty no dallying with life,') they determined, years of age, having finished his studies pursuant to the resolution they had taken and exercises with great applause, he was in the beginning of their lives, to retire, removed from the university to the inns of and pass the remainder of their days in the court, where there are very few that make country. In order to this, they both of them themselves considerable proficients in the married much about the same time. Leon- studies of the place, who know they shall tine, with his own and wife's fortune, bought arrive at great estates without them. This a farm of three hundred a year, which lay was not Florio's case; he found that three within the neighbourhood of his friend Eu- hundred a year was but a poor estate for doxus, who had purchased an estate of as Leontine and himself to live upon, so that many thousands. They were both of them he studied without intermission till he gainfathers about the same time, Eudoxus hav-ed a very good insight into the constitution ing a son born to him, and Leontine, a and laws of his country. daughter; but to the unspeakable grief of the latter, his young wife (in whom all his happiness was wrapt up,) died in a few days after the birth of her daughter. His affliction would have been insupportable,

I should have told my reader, that whilst Florio lived at the house of his foster-father, he was always an acceptable guest in the family of Eudoxus, where he became acquainted with Leonilla from her infancy.

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