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tween them, and can occasionally rebound | with which he treats his neighbours, and her love and hatred from one to the other, in such a manner as to keep her at a distance from all the rest of the world, and cast lots for the conquest.

N. B. I have many other secrets which concern the empire of love; but I consider, that, while I alarm my women, I instruct T.

my men.

No.424.] Monday, July 7, 1712.
Est Ulubris, animus si te non deficit æquus.

Hor. Ep. xi. Lib. 1. 30.

"Tis not the place disgust or pleasure brings: From our own mind our satisfaction springs.

'London, June 24.

'MR. SPECTATOR,-A man who has it in his power to choose his own company, would certainly be much to blame, should he not, to the best of his judgment, take such as are of a temper most suitable to his own; and where that choice is wanting, or where a man is mistaken in his choice, and yet under a necessity of continuing in the same company, it will certainly be his interest to carry himself as easily as possible.

every one, even the meanest of his own family! and yet how seldom imitated! Instead of which we commonly meet with ill-natured expostulations, noise, and chidings.-And this I hinted, because the humour and disposition of the head is what chiefly influences all the other parts of a family.

'An agreement and kind correspondence between friends and acquaintance is the greatest pleasure of life. This is an undoubted truth; and yet any man who judges from the practice of the world will be almost persuaded to believe the contrary; for how can we suppose people should be so industrious to make themselves uneasy? What can engage them to entertain and foment jealousies of one another upon every or the least occasion? Yet so it is, there are people who (as it should scem) delight in being troublesome and vexatious, who (as Tully speaks) Mira sunt alacritate ad litigandum, have a certain cheerfulness in wrangling.' And thus it happens, that there are very few families in which there are not feuds and animosities; though it is every one's interest, there more particularly, to avoid them, because there (as I In this I am sensible I do but repeat would willingly hope) no one gives another what has been said a thousand times, at uneasiness without feeling some share of which however I think nobody has any it. But I am gone beyond what I designed, title to take exception, but they who never and had almost forgot what I chiefly profailed to put this in practice.-Not to use posed: which was, barely to tell you how any longer preface, this being the season hardly we, who pass most of our time in of the year in which great numbers of all town, dispense with a long vacation in the sorts of people retire from this place of country, how uneasy we grow to ourselves, business and pleasure to country solitude, and to one another, when our conversation I think it not improper to advise them to is confined; insomuch that, by Michaeltake with them as great a stock of good-mas, it is odds but we come to downright humour as they can; for though a country life is described as the most pleasant of all others, and though it may in truth be so, yet it is so only to those who know how to enjoy leisure and retirement.

·

As for those who cannot live without the constant helps of business or company, let them consider, that in the country there is no Exchange, there are no playhouses, no variety of coffee-houses, nor many of those other amusements which serve here as so many reliefs from the repeated occurrences in their own families; but that there the greatest part of their time must be spent within themselves, and consequently it behoves them to consider how agreeable it will be to them before they leave this dear town.

'I remember, Mr. Spectator, we were very well entertained last year with the advices you gave us from Sir Roger's country-seat; which I the rather mention, because it is almost impossible not to live pleasantly, where the master of the family is such a one as you there describe your friend, who cannot therefore (I mean as to his domestic character,) be too often recommended to the imitation of others. How amiable is that affability and benevolence

squabbling, and make as free with one an-
other to our faces as we do with the rest of
the world behind their backs. After I
have told you this, I am to desire that you
would now and then give us a lesson of
good-humour, a family-piece, which, since
we are all very fond of you, I hope may
have some influence
upon us.

'After these plain observations, give me leave to give you a hint of what a set of company of my acquaintance, who are now gone into the country, and have the use of an absent nobleman's seat, have settled among themselves, to avoid the inconveniences above mentioned. They are a collection of ten or twelve of the same good inclination towards each other, but of very different talents and inclinations: from hence they hope that the variety of their tempers will only create variety of pleasures. But as there always will arise, among the same people, either for want of diversity of objects, or the like causes, a certain satiety, which may grow into ill-humour or discontent, there is a large wing of the house which they design to employ in the nature of an infirmary. Whoever says a peevish thing, or acts any thing which betrays a sourness or indisposition to company, is im

mediately to be conveyed to his chambers
in the infirmary; from whence he is not to
be relieved, till by his manner of submis-
sion, and the sentiments expressed in his
petition for that purpose, he appears to the
majority of the company to be again fit for
society. You are to understand, that all
ill-natured words or uneasy gestures are
sufficient cause for banishment; speaking
impatiently to servants, making a man re-
peat what he says, or any thing that betrays
inattention or dishumour, are also criminal
without reprieve. But it is provided, that
whoever observes the ill-natured fit coming
upon himself, and voluntarily retires, shall
be received at his return from the infirmary
with the highest marks of esteem. By these
and other wholesome methods, it is ex-
pected that if they cannot cure one another,
yet at least they have taken care that the
ill-humour of one shall not be troublesome
to the rest of the company. There are
many other rules which the society have
established for the preservation of their
ease and tranquillity, the effects of which,
with the incidents that arise among them,
shall be communicated to you from time to
time, for the public good, by, sir, your most
humble servant,
R. O.'

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'MR. SPECTATOR,-There is hardly any thing gives me a more sensible delight than the enjoyment of a cool still evening after the uneasiness of a hot sultry day. Such a one I passed not long ago, which made me rejoice when the hour was come for the sun to set, that I might enjoy the freshness of the evening in my garden, which then affords me the pleasantest hours I pass in the whole four and twenty. I immediately rose from my couch, and went down into it. You descend at first by twelve stone steps into a large square divided into four grassplots, in each of which is a statue of white marble. This is separated from a large parterre by a low wall; and from thence, through a pair of iron gates, you are led into a long broad walk of the finest turf, set on each side with tall yews, and on either hand bordered by a canal, which on the right divides the walk from a wilderness parted into variety of alleys and arbours, and on the left from a kind of amphitheatre, which is the receptacle of a great number of oranges and myrtles. The moon shone bright, and seemed then most agreeably to supply the place of the sun, obliging me

with as much light as was necessary to dis-
cover a thousand pleasing objects, and at
the same time divested of all power of heat.
The reflection of it in the water, the fan-
ning of the wind rustling on the leaves, the
singing of the thrush and nightingale, and
the coolness of the walks, all conspired to
make me lay aside all displeasing thoughts,
and brought me into such a tranquillity of
mind, as is, I believe, the next happiness
to that of hereafter. In this sweet retire-
ment I naturally fell into the repetition of
some lines out of a poem of Milton's, which
he entitles Il Penseroso, the ideas of which
were exquisitely suited to my present wan-
derings of thought.

"Sweet bird! that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical! most melancholy!
Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among,
I woo to hear thy ev'ning song:
And missing thee I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven green,
To behold the wand'ring moon,
Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that hath been led astray,
Through the heaven's wide pathless way,
And oft, as if her head she bow'd,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.

"Then let some strange mysterious dream
Wave with its wings in airy stream
Of lively portraiture display'd
Softly on my eyelids laid:

And as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,

Sent by spirits to mortals' good,

Or the unseen genius of the wood."

'I reflected then upon the sweet vicissitudes of night and day, on the charming disposition of the seasons, and their return again in a perpetual circle: and oh! said I, that I could from these my declining years return again to my first spring of youth and vigour; but that, alas! is impossible; all that remains within my power is to soften the inconveniences I feel; with an easy contented mind, and the enjoyment of such delights as this solitude affords me. In this thought I sat me down on a bank of flowers, and dropt into a slumber, which, whether it were the effect of fumes and vapours, or my present thoughts, I know not; but methought the genius of the garden stood before me, and introduced into the walk where I lay this drama and different scenes of the revolution of the year, which, whilst I then saw, even in my dream, I resolved to write down, and send to the Spectator.

"The first person whom I saw advancing towards me was a youth of a most beautiful air and shape, though he seemed not yet arrived at that exact proportion and symmetry of parts which a little more time would have given him; but, however, there was such a bloom in his countenance, such satisfaction and joy, that I thought it the most desirable form that I had ever seen. He was clothed in a flowing mantle of green silk, interwoven with flowers; he had a chaplet of roses on his head, and a narcissus in his hand; primroses and violets sprang up under his feet, and all nature was cheered at his approach. Flora was on one hand,

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and Vertumnus on the other, in a robe of faint, whilst for half the steps he took, the changeable silk. After this I was surprised dog-star levelled his rays full at his head. to see the moon-beams reflected with a sud- They passed on, and made way for a perden glare from armour, and to see a man son that seemed to bend a little under the completely armed, advancing with his weight of years; his beard and hair, which sword drawn. I was soon informed by the were full grown, were composed of an equal genius it was Mars, who had long usurped number of black and gray; he wore a robe a place among the attendants of the Spring. which he had girt round him, of a yellowish He made way for a softer appearance. It cast, not unlike the colour of fallen leaves, was Venus, without any ornament but her which he walked upon. I thought he hardly own beauties, not so much as her own ces- made amends for expelling the foregoing tus, with which she had encompassed a scene by the large quantity of fruits which globe, which she held in her right hand, he bore in his hands. Plenty walked by his and in her left hand she had a sceptre of side with a healthy fresh countenance, gold. After her followed the Graces, with pouring out from a horn all the various pro arms entwined within one another; their ducts of the year. Pomona followed with a girdles were loosed, and they moved to the glass of cider in her hand, with Bacchus in sound of soft music, striking the ground a chariot drawn by tigers, accompanied by alternately with their feet. Then came up a whole troop,of satyrs, fauns, and sylvans. the three Months which belong to this sea- September, who came next, seemed in his son. As March advanced towards me, looks to promise a new Spring, and wore there was, methought in his look a lower- the livery of those months. The succeeding ing roughness, which ill-befitted a month month was all soiled with the juice of which was ranked in so soft a season; but grapes, as he had just come from the wineas he came forwards, his features became press. November, though he was in this insensibly more mild and gentle; he smooth- division, yet, by the many stops he made, ed his brow, and looked with so sweet a seemed rather inclined to the Winter which countenance, that I could not but lament followed close at his heels. He advanced in his departure, though he made way for the shape of an old man in the extremity April. He appeared in the greatest gaiety of age; the hair he had was so very white, imaginable, and had a thousand pleasures it seemed a real snow; his eyes were red to attend him: his look was frequently and piercing, and his beard hung with great clouded, but immediately returned to its first quantity of icicles; he was wrapt up in furs, composure, and remained fixed in a smile. but yet so pinched with excess of cold, that Then came May, attended by Cupid, with his limbs were all contracted, and his body his bow strung, and in a posture to let fly bent to the ground, so that he could not an arrow: as he passed by, methought I have supported himself had it not been for heard a confused noise of soft complaints, Comus, the god of revels, and Necessity, gentle ecstacies, and tender sighs of lovers; the mother of Fate, who sustained him on vows of constancy, and as many complain- each side. The shape and mantle of Comus ings of perfidiousness; all which the winds was one of the things that most surprised wafted away as soon as they had reached me: as he advanced towards me, his counmy hearing. After these I saw a man ad- tenance seemed the most desirable I had vance in the full prime and vigour of his ever seen. On the fore part of his mantle age; his complexion was sanguine and was pictured joy, delight, and satisfaction, ruddy, his hair black, and fell down in with a thousand emblems of merriment, beautiful ringlets beneath his shoulders; a and jests with faces looking two ways at mantle of hair-coloured silk hung loosely once; but as he passed from me I was upon him: he advanced with a hasty step amazed at a shape so little correspondent after the Spring, and sought out the shade to his face: his head was bald, and all the and cool fountains which played in the gar- rest of his limbs appeared old and deformed. den. He was particularly well pleased On the hinder part of his mantle was rewhen a troop of Zephyrs fanned him with presented Murder* with dishevelled hair their wings. He had two companions, who and a dagger all bloody, Anger in a robe of walked on each side, that made him appear scarlet, and Suspicion squinting with both the most agreeable; the one was Aurora eyes; but above all, the most conspicuous with figures of roses, and her feet dewy, was the battle of Lapitha and the Centaurs. attired in gray; the other was Vesper, in a I detested so hideous a shape, and turned robe of azure beset with drops of gold, my eyes upon Saturn, who was stealing whose breath he caught while it passed away behind him, with a scythe in one over a bundle of honeysuckles and tuberoses hand and an hour-glass in the other, unobwhich he held in his hand. Pan and Ceres served. Behind Necessity was Vesta, the followed them with four reapers, who goddess of fire, with a lamp that was perdanced a morrice to the sound of oaten-pipes petually supplied with oil, and whose flame and cymbals. Then came the attendant was eternal. She cheered the rugged brow Months. June retained still some small of Necessity, and warmed her so far as allikeness of the Spring; but the other two seemed to step with a less vigorous tread, especially August, who seemed almost to

*The English are branded, perhaps unjustly, with being addicted to suicide about this time of the year.

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A VERY agreeable friend of mine the other day, carrying me in his coach into the country to dinner, fell into a discourse concerning the care of parents due to their children,' and the piety of children towards their parents. He was reflecting upon the succession of particular virtues and qualities there might be preserved from one generation to another, if these regards were reciprocally held in veneration: but as he never fails to mix an air of mirth and good-humour with his good sense and reasoning, he entered into the following relation.

to help her; just as long as an infant is in the womb of its parent, so long are these medicines of revivification in preparing. Observe this small phial and this little gallipot-in this an ungent, in the other a liquor. In these, my child, are collected such powers, as shall revive the springs of lite when they are yet but just ceased, and give new strength, new spirits, and, in a word, wholly restore all the organs and senses of the human body to as great a duration as it had before enjoyed from its birth to the day of the application of these my medicines. But, my beloved son, care must be taken to apply them within ten hours after the breath is out of the body, while yet the clay is warm with its late life, and yet capable of resuscitation. I find my frame grown crazy with perpetual toil and meditation; and I conjure you, as soon as I am dead, anoint me with this ungent; and when you see me begin to move, pour into my lips this inestimable liquor, else the force of the ointment will be ineffectual. By this means you will give me life as I gave you, and we will from that hour mutually lay aside the authority of having bestowed life on each other, live as brethren, and prepare new medicines against such another period of time as will demand another application of the same restoratives." In a few days, after these wonderful ingre

'I will not be confident in what century, or under what reign it happened, that this want of mutual confidence and right under-dients were delivered to Alexandrinus, Bastanding between father and son was fatal silius departed this life. But such was the to the family of the Valentines in Germany. pious sorrow of the son at the loss of so exBasilius Valentinus was a person who had cellent a father, and the first transports of arrived at the utmost perfection in the her- grief had so wholly disabled him from all metic art, and initiated his son Alexandri- manner of business, that he never thought nus in the same mysteries: but, as you of the medicines till the time to which his know they are not to be attained but by the father had limited their efficacy was expainful, the pious, the chaste, and pure of pired. To tell the truth, Alexandrinus heart, Basilius did not open to him, because was a man of wit and pleasure, and consiof his youth, and the deviations too natural dered his father had lived out his natural to it, the greatest secrets of which he was time; his life was long and uniform, suita master, as well knowing that the operation ble to the regularity of it; but that he himwould fail in the hands of a man so liable to self, poor sinner, wanted a new life to reerrors in life as Alexandrinus. But be- pent of a very bad one hitherto; and, in lieving, from a certain indisposition of mind the examination of his heart, resolved to as well as body, his dissolution was draw-go on as he did with this natural being of ing nigh, he called Alexandrinus to him, and as he lay on a couch, over against which his son was seated, and prepared by sending out servants one after another, and admonition to examine that no one overheard them, he revealed the most important of his secrets with the solemnity and language of an adept. "My son," said he, "many have been the watchings, long the lucubrations, constant the labours of thy father, not only to gain a great and plentiful estate to his posterity, but also to take care that he should have no posterity. Be not amazed my child: I do not mean that thou shalt be taken from me, but that I will never leave thee, and consequently cannot be said to have posterity. Behold, my dearest Alexandrinus, the effect of what was propagated in nine months. We are not to contradict nature, but to follow and

his, but repent very faithfully, and spend very piously the life to which he should be restored by application of these rarities, when time should come to his own person.

'It has been observed, that Providence frequently punishes the self-love of men, who would do immoderately for their own offspring, with children very much below their characters and qualifications; insomuch that they only transmit their names to be borne by those who give daily proofs of the vanity of the labour and ambition of their progenitors.

"It happened thus in the family of Basilius; for Alexandrinus began to enjoy his ample fortune in all the extremities of household expense, furniture, and insolent equipage; and this he pursued till the day of his own departure began, as he grew sensible, to approach. As Basilius was

punished with a son very unlike him, "Well, Alexandrinus died, and the heir Alexandrinus was visited by one of his of his body (as our term is) could not forown disposition. It is natural that ill men bear, in the wantonness of his heart, to should be suspicious; and Alexandrinus, measure the length and breadth of his bebesides that jealousy, had proofs of the loved father, and cast up the ensuing value vicious disposition of his son Renatus, for of him before he proceeded to the operation. that was his name. When he knew the immense reward of his 'Alexandrinus, as I have observed, hav- pains, he began the work: but, lo! when he ing very good reason for thinking it unsafe had anointed the corpse all over, and beto trust the real secret of his phial and gal-gan to apply the liquor, the body stirred, lipot to any man living, projected to make and Renatus, in a fright, broke the phial.' sure work, and hope for his success depending from the avarice, not the bounty of his benefactor.

T.

No. 427.] Thursday, July 10, 1712. Quantum a rerum turpitudine abes, tantum te a verborum libertate sejungas. Tull. We should be as careful of our words, as our actions; and as far from speaking, as from doing ill.

With this thought he called Renatus to his bed-side, and bespoke him in the most pathetic gesture and accent. "As much, my son, as you have been addicted to vanity and pleasure, as I also have been before you, you nor I could escape the fame or It is a certain sign of an ill heart to be inthe good effects of the profound knowledge clined to defamation. They who are harmof our progenitor, the renowned Basilius. less and innocent can have no gratification His symbol is very well known in the phi- that way; but it ever arises from a neglect losophic world; and I shall never forget the of what is laudable in a man's self, and an venerable air of his countenance, when he impatience in seeing it in another. Else let me into the profound mysteries of the why should virtue provoke? Why should smaragdine tables of Hermes. "It is true," beauty displease in such a degree, that a said he, "and far removed from all colour man given to scandal never lets the menof deceit; that which is inferior is like that tion of either pass by him, without offering which is superior, by which are acquired something to the diminution of it? A lady and perfected all the miracles of a certain the other day at a visit, being attacked work. The father is the sun, the mother somewhat rudely by one whose own chathe moon, the wind is the womb, the earth racter has been very rudely treated, anis the nurse of it, and mother of all perfec-swered a great deal of heat and intempertion. All this must be received with mo-ance very calmly, "Good madam, spare desty and wisdom." The chymical people me, who am none of your match; Í speak carry, in all their jargon, a whimsical sort ill of nobody, and it is a new thing to me to of piety which is ordinary with great lovers be spoken ill of." Little minds think fame of money, and is no more but deceiving themselves, that their regularity and strictness of manners, for the ends of this world, has some affinity to the innocence of heart which must recommend them to the next. Renatus wondered to hear his father talk so like an adept, and with such a mixture of piety; while Alexandrinus, observing his attention fixed, proceeded. "This phial, child, and this little earthen pot, will add to thy estate so much as to make thee the richest man in the German empire. I am going to my long home, but shall not return to common dust." Then he resumed a countenance of alacrity, and told him, that if within an hour after his death he anointed his whole body, and poured down his throat that liquor which he had from old Basilius, the corpse would be converted into pure gold. I will not pretend to express to you the unfeigned tenderness that passed between these two extraordinary persons; but if the father recommended the care of his remains with vehemence and affection, the son was not behind hand in professing that he would not cut the least bit off him, but upon the utmost extremity, or to provide for his younger brothers and sisters.

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consists in the number of votes they have on their side among the multitude, whereas it is really the inseparable follower of good and worthy actions. Fame is as natural a follower of merit, as a shadow is of a body. It is true, when crowds press upon you, this shadow cannot be seen; but when they separate from around you, it will again appear. The lazy, the idle, and the froward, are the persons who are most pleased with the little tales which pass about the town to the disadvantage of the rest of the world. Were it not for the pleasure of speaking ill, there are numbers of people who are too lazy to go out of their own houses, and too ill-natured to open their lips in conversation. It was not a little diverting the other day to observe a lady reading a postletter, and at these words, After all her airs, he has heard some story or other, and the match is broken off,' gives orders in the midst of her reading, 'Put to the horses.' That a young woman of merit had missed an advantageous settlement was news not to be delayed, lest somebody else should have given her malicious acquaintance that satisfaction before her. The unwillingness to receive good tidings is a quality as inseparable from a scandal-bearer, as the readiness to divulge bad. But, alas! how wretchedly low and contemptible is that

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