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Thus Aglaus (a man unknown to men,
But the gods knew, and therefore lov'd him then)
Thus liv'd obscurely then without a name,
Aglaus, now consign'd t' eternal fame.
For Gyges, the rich king, wicked and great,
Presum'd at wise Apollo's Delphic seat,
Presum'd to ask, O thou, the whole world's eye,
Seest thou a man that happier is than I?
The god, who scorn'd to flatter man, reply'd,
Aglaus happier is. But Gyges cry'd,

In a proud rage, Who can that Aglaus be?
We've heard as yet of no such king as he.

And true it was, through the whole earth around,
No king of such a name was to be found.
Is some old hero of that name alive,
Who his high race does from the gods derive?
Is it some mighty gen'ral that has done
Wonders in fight, and godlike honours won?
Is it some man of endless wealth? said be.
None, none of these. Who can this Aglaus be?
After long search, and vain inquiries past,
In an obscure Arcadian vale at last,
(Th' Arcadian life has always shady been)
Near Sopho's town, which, he but once had seen,
This Aglaus, who monarchs' evy drew,
Whose happiness the gods stood witness to,
This mighty Aglaus was lab'ring found,
With his own hands, in his own little ground.
So, gracious God, if it may lawful be
Among those foolish gods to mention thee,
So let me act, on such a private stage,
The last dull scenes of my declining age;
After long toils and voyages in vain,
This quiet port let my toss'd vessel gain;
Of heavn'ly rest this earnest to me lend,
Let my life sleep, and learn to love her end.'

No. 611.] Monday, October 25, 1714.
Perfide! sed duris genuit te cautibus horrens
Caucasus, Hyrcanæque admorunt ubera tigres.
Virg. Æn. iv. 366.

Perfidious man! thy parent was a rock,
And fierce Hyrcanian tigers gave thee suck.

I AM willing to postpone every thing, to do any the least service for the deserving and unfortunate. Accordingly I have caused the following letter to be inserted in my paper the moment that it came to my hands, without altering one tittle in an account which the lady relates so handsomely

herself.

MR. SPECTATOR,-I flatter myself you will not only pity, but, if possible, redress a misfortune myself and several others of my sex lie under. I hope you will not be offended, nor think I mean by this to justify my own imprudent conduct, or expect you should. No: I am sensible how severely, in some of your former papers, you have reproved persons guilty of the like mismanagement. I was scarce sixteen, and I may say, without vanity, handsome, when courted by a false perjured man; who, upon promise of marriage, rendered me the most unhappy of women. After he had deluded me from my parents, who were people of very good fashion, in less than three months he left me. My parents would not see nor hear from me; and, had it not been for a servant who had lived in our family, I must certainly have perished for want of bread. However, it pleased Providence, in a very short time, to alter my miserable condition. A gentleman saw me, liked me, and married me. My parents were reconciled; and I might be as

happy in the change of my condition, as I was before miserable, but for some things, that you shall know, which are insupportable to me; and I am sure you have so much honour and compassion as to let those persons know, in some of your papers, how much they are in the wrong. I have been married near five years, and do not know that in all that time I ever went abroad without my husband's leave and approbation. I am obliged, through the importunities of several of my relations, to go abroad oftener than suits my temper. Then it is. I labour under insupportable agonies. That man, or rather monster, haunts every place I go to. Base villain! by reason I will not admit his nauseous wicked visits and appointments, he strives all the ways he can to ruin me. He left me destitute of friend or money, nor ever thought me worth inquiring after, until he unfortunately happened to see me in a front-box sparkling with jewels. Then his passion returned. Then the hypocrite pretended to be a penitent. Then he practised all those arts that helped before to undo me. I am not to be deceived a second time by him. I hate and abhor his odious passion; and as he plainly perceives it, either out of spite or diversion he makes it his business to expose me. I never fail seeing him in all public company, where he is always most industriously spiteful. He hath, in short, told all his acquaintance of our unhappy affair; they tell theirs; so that it is no secret among his companions, which are numerous. They to be very familiar. If they bow to me, to whom he tells it, think they have a title am pestered with freedoms that are no and I out of good manners return it, then I ways agreeable to myself or company. If I ed, they sour upon it, and whisper the next turn my eyes from them, or seem displeas

person; he his next; until I have at last the eyes of the whole company upon me. Nay they report abominable falsehoods, under that mistaken notion, "She that will grant favours to one man will to a hundred." I beg you will let those who are guilty know how ungenerous this way of proceeding is. I am sure he will know himself the person aimed at, and perhaps put a stop to the insolence of others. Cursed is the fate of unhappy women! that men may boast and glory in those things that we must think of with shame and horror! You have the art of making such odious customs appear detestable. For my sake, and, I am sure, for the sake of several others who dare not own it, but, like me, lie under the same misfortunes, make it as infamous for a man to boast of favours, or expose our sex, as it is to take the lie, or a box on the ear, and not resent it. Your constant reader and admirer, LESBIA.

'P. S. I am the more impatient under this misfortune, having received fresh provocation, last Wednesday, in the Abbey."

I entirely agree with the amiable and unfortunate Lesbia, that an insult upon a woman in her circumstances is as infamous in a man, as a tame behaviour when the lie or a buffet is given: which truth I shall beg leave of her to illustrate by the following observation.

was surprised to find it open, and a glimmering light in the church. He had the courage to advance towards the light; but was terribly startled at the sight of a woman in white, who ascended from a grave with a bloody knife in her hand. The phantom marched up to him, and asked him what he did there. He told her the truth, without reserve, believing that he had met a ghost; upon which she spoke to him in the following manner: 'Stranger,

It is a mark of cowardice passively to forbear resenting an affront, the resenting of which would lead a man into danger; it is no less a sign of cowardice to affront a creature that hath not power to avenge it-thou art in my power: I am a murderer as self. Whatever name therefore this ungenerous man may bestow on the helpless lady he hath injured, I shall not scruple to give him, in return for it, the appellation of

coward.

A man that can so far descend from his dignity, as to strike a lady, can never recover his reputation with either sex, because no provocation is thought strong enough to justify such treatment from the powerful towards the weak... In the circumstances in which poor Lesbia is situated, she can appeal to no man whatsoever to avenge an insult more grievous than a blow. If she could open her mouth, the base man knows that a husband, a brother, a generous friend, would die to see her righted.

A generous mind, however enraged against an enemy, feels its resentments sink and vanish away when the object of its wrath falls into its power. An estranged friend, filled with jealousy and discontent towards a bosom acquaintance, is apt to overflow with tenderness and remorse, when a creature that was once dear to him undergoes any misfortune. What name then shall we give to his ingratitude, (who forgetting the favours he solicited with eagerness, and received with rapture) can insult the miseries that he himself caused, and make sport with the pain to which he owes his greatest pleasure? There is but one being in the creation whose province it is to practise upon the imbecilities of frail creatures, and triumph in the woes which his own artifices brought about; and we well know those who follow his example

will receive his reward.

thou art. Know then that I am a nun of a noble family. A base perjured man undid me, and boasted of it. I soon had him despatched; but not content with the murder, I have bribed the sexton to let me enter his grave, and have now plucked out his false heart from his body; and thus I use a traitor's heart.' At these words she tore it in pieces and trampled it under her feet.

No. 612.]
Wednesday, October 27, 1714.
Murranum hic, atavos et avorum antiqua sonantem
Nomina, per regesque actum genus omne Latinos,
Præcipitem scopulo, atque ingentis turbine saxi
Excutit effunditque solo- Virg. Æn. xii. 529.
Murranus, boasting of his blood, that springs
From a long royal race of Latin kings,
Is by the Trojan from his chariot thrown,
Crush'd with the weight of an unwieldy stone.

Dryden.

IT is highly laudable to pay respect to men who are descended from worthy ancestors, not only out of gratitude to those who have done good to mankind, but as it is an encouragement to others to follow their example. But this is an honour to be received, not demanded, by the descendants of great men; and they who are apt to remind us of their ancestors only put us upon making comparisons to their own disadvantage. There is some pretence for boasting of wit, beauty, strength, or wealth, because the communication of them may give pleasure or profit to others; but we can have no merit, nor ought we to claim any respect, because our fathers acted well, whether we would or no.

The following letter ridicules the folly I have mentioned in a new, and I think, not disagreeable light.

Leaving my fair correspondent to the direction of her own wisdom and modesty; and her enemy, and his mean accomplices, 'MR. SPECTATOR,-Were the genealogy to the compunction of their own hearts; I of every family preserved, there would shall conclude this paper with a memora-probably be no man valued or despised on ble instance of revenge, taken by a Spanish lady upon a guilty lover, which may serve to show what violent effects are wrought by the most tender passion, when soured into hatred; and may deter the young and unwary from unlawful love. The story, however romantic it may appear, I have heard affirmed for a truth.

account of his birth. There is scarce a beggar in the streets, who would not find himself lineally descended from some great man; nor any one of the highest title, who would not discover several base and indigent persons among his ancestors. It would be a pleasant entertainment to see one pedigree of men appear together, under the Not many years ago an English gentle- same characters they bore when they acted man, who, in a rencounter by night in the their respective parts among the living. streets of Madrid, had the misfortune to Suppose, therefore, a gentleman, full of his kill his man, fled into a church-porch for illustrious family, should in the same mansanctuary. Leaning against the door, helner Virgil makes Æneas look over his de

ing sheep. The expectations of my good cousin were wonderfully raised by a match into the family of a knight; but unfortunately for us this branch proved barren: on the other hand, Margery the milk-maid, being twined round a bough, it flourished

scendants, see the whole line of his progenitors pass in review before his eyeswith how many varying passions would he behold shepherds and soldiers, statesmen and artificers, princes and beggars, walk in the procession of five thousand years! How would his heart sink or flutter at the seve-out into so many shoots, and bent with so ral sports of fortune, in a scene so diversified with rags and purple, handicraft tools and sceptres, ensigns of dignity, and emblems of disgrace! And how would his fears and apprehensions, his transports and mortifications, succeed one another, as the line of his genealogy appeared bright or obscure!

much fruit, that the old gentleman was quite out of countenance. To comfort me under this disgrace, he singled out a branch ten times more fruitful than the other, which he told me he valued more than any in the tree, and bade me be of good comfort. This enormous bough was a graft out of a Welsh heiress, with so many Ap's 'In most of the pedigrees hung up in old upon it, that it might have made a little mansion-houses, you are sure to find the grove by itself. From the trunk of the pedifirst in the catalogue a great statesman, or gree, which was chiefly composed of laa soldier with an honourable commission.bourers and shepherds, arose a huge sprout The honest artificer that begot him, and all of farmers: this was branched out into yeohis frugal ancestors before him, are torn man, and ended in a sheriff of the county, off from the top of the register; and you who was knighted for his good service to are not left to imagine that the noble the crown in bringing up an address. Sevefounder of the family ever had a father. ral of the names that seemed to disparage Were we to trace many boasted lines farther the family, being looked upon as mistakes, backwards, we should lose them in a mob were lopped off as rotten or withered; as, of tradesmen, or a crowd of rustics, with- on the contrary, no small number appearout hope of seeing them emerge again: noting without any titles, my cousin, to supply unlike the old Appian way, which, after the defects of the manuscript, added esq. having run many miles in length, loses it- at the end of each of them. self in a bog.

'I lately made a visit to an old country gentleman, who is very far gone in this sort of family madness. I found him in his study perusing an old register of his family, which he had just then discovered as it was branched out in the form of a tree, upon a skin of parchment. Having the honour to have some of his blood in my veins, he permitted me to cast my eyes over the boughs of this venerable plant; and asked my advice in the reforming of some of the superfluous branches.

This tree, so pruned, dressed and cultivated, was, within a few days, transplanted into a large sheet of vellum, and placed in the great hall, where it attracts the veneration of his tenants every Sunday morning, while they wait until his worship is ready to go to church; wondering that a man who had so many fathers before him should not be made a knight, or at least a justice of the peace.'

No. 613.]

Friday, October 29, 1714. -Studiis florentem ignobilis oti. Virg. Georg. iv. 564. Affecting studies of less noisy praise.-Dryden. It is reckoned a piece of ill-breeding for one man to engross the whole talk to himself. For this reason, since I keep three visiting-days in the week, I am content now and then to let my friends put in a word. There are several advantages hereby accruing both to my readers and myself. As first, young and modest writers have an opportunity of getting into print; again, the town enjoys the pleasures of variety; and posterity will see the humour of the present age, by the help of these lights into private and domestic life. The benefits I receive from thence are such as these: I gain more time for future speculations: pick up hints which I improve for the public good; give advice; redress grievances; and, by leav ing commodious spaces between the several letters that I print, furnish out a Spectator, with little labour and great ostentation.

We passed slightly over three or four of our immediate forefathers, whom we knew by tradition, but were soon stopped by an alderman of London, who I perceived made my kinsman's heart go pit-a-pat. His confusion increased when he found the alderman's father to be a grazier; but he recovered his fright upon seeing justice of the quorum at the end of his titles. Things went on pretty well as we threw our eyes occasionally over the tree, when unfortunately he perceived a merchant-tailor perched on a bough, who was said greatly to have increased the estate; he was just going to cut him off if he had not seen gent. after the name of his son; who was recorded to have mortgaged one of the manors his honest father had purchased. A weaver, who was burnt for his religion in the reign of queen Mary, was pruned away without mercy; as was likewise a yeoman, who died of a fall from his own cart. But great was our triumph in one of the blood who was beheaded for high treason: which nevertheless was not a little allayed by another 'MR. SPECTATOR---I was mightily pleasof our ancestors who was hanged for steal-ed with your speculation of Friday. Your

sentiments are noble, and the whole worked up in such a manner as cannot but strike upon every reader. But give me leave to make this remark; that while you write so pathetically on contentment, and a retired life, you sooth the passion of melancholy, and depress the mind from actions truly glorious. Titles and honours are the reward of virtue; we therefore ought to be affected with them; and though light minds are too much puffed up with exterior pomp, yet I cannot see why it is not as truly philosophical to admire the glowing ruby, or the sparkling green of an emerald, as the fainter and less permanent beauties of a rose or a myrtle. If there are men of extraordinary capacities, who lie concealed from the world, I should impute it to them as a blot in their characters, did not I believe it owing to the meanness of their fortune rather than of their spirit. Cowley, who tells the story of Aglaus with so much pleasure, was no stranger to courts, nor insensible of praise.

"What shall I do to be for ever known,

And make the age to come my own?"

was the result of a laudable ambition. It was not until after frequent disappointments that he termed himself the melancholy Cowley; and he praised solitude when he despaired of shining in a court. The soul of man is an active principle. He, therefore, who withdraws himself from the scene before he has played his part, ought to be hissed off the stage, and cannot be deemed virtuous, because he refuses to answer his end. I must own I am fired with an honest ambition to imitate every illustrious example. The battles of Blenheim and Ramilies have more than once made me wish myself a soldier. And, when I have seen those actions so nobly celebrated by our poets, I have secretly aspired to be one of that distinguished class. But in vain I wish, in vain I pant with the desire of action. I am chained down in obscurity, and the only pleasure I can take is in seeing so many brighter geniuses join their friendly lights to add to the splendour of the throne. Farewell, then, dear Spec, and believe me to be with great emulation, and no envy, your professed admirer,

'WILL HOPELESS,'

'Middle-Temple, Oct. 26, 1714. 'SIR,-Though you have formerly made eloquence the subject of one or more of your papers, I do not remember that you ever considered it as possessed by a set of people, who are so far from making Quintilian's rules their practice, that, I dare say for them, they never heard of such an author, and yet are no less masters of it than Tully or Demosthenes among the ancients, or whom you please among the moderns. The persons I am speaking of are our common beggars about this town; and, that what I say is true, I appeal to any VOL. II.

52

man who has a heart one degree softer than a stone. As for my part, who do not pretend to more humanity than my neighbours, I have oftentimes gone from my chambers with money in my pocket, and returned to them not only pennyless, but destitute of a farthing, without bestowing of it any other way than on these seeming objects of pity. In short, I have seen more eloquence in a look from one of these despicable creatures than in the eye of the fairest she I ever saw, yet no one a greater admirer of that sex than myself. What I have to desire of you is, to lay down some directions in order to guard against these powerful orators, or else I know nothing to the contrary but I must myself be forced to leave the profession of the law, and endeavour to get the qualifications necessary to that more profitable one of begging. But, in whichsoever of these two capacities I shine, I shall always desire to be your constant reader, and ever will be your most humble servant,

'J. B.'

'SIR,-Upon reading a Spectator last week, where Mrs. Fanny Fickle submitted the choice of a lover for life to your decisive determination, and imagining I might claim the favour of your advice in an affair of the like, but much more difficult nature, I called for pen and ink, in order to draw the characters of seven humble servants, whom I have equally encouraged for some time. But, alas! while I was reflecting on the agreeable subject, and contriving an advantageous description of the dear person I was most inclined to favour, I happened to look into my glass. The sight of the smallpox, out of which I am just recovered, tor mented me at once with the loss of my captivating arts and my captives. The confusion I was in, on this unhappy, unseasonable discovery, is inexpressible. Believe me, sir, I was so taken up with the thoughts of your fair correspondent's case, and so intent on my own design, that I fancied myself as triumphant in my conquests as ever.

'Now, sir, finding I was incapacitated to amuse myself on that pleasing subject, I resolved to apply myself to you, or your casuistical agent, for advice in my present circumstances. I am sensible the tincture of my skin, and the regularity of my features, which the malice of my late illness has altered, are irrecoverable; yet do not despair but that that loss by your assistance, may, in some measure, be repairable, if you will please to propose a way for the recovery of one only of my fugitives.

'One of them is in a more particular manner beholden to me than the rest; he, for some private reasons, being desirous to be a lover incognito, always addressed me with a billet-doux, which I was so careful of in my sickness, that I secured the key of my love magazine under my head, and, hearing a noise of opening a lock in my chamber, endangered my life by getting out

of bed, to prevent, if it had been attempted, | promise of marriage to Philander, made the discovery of that amour. during her husband's life?

'Cleora asks me, whether she be obliged to continue single according to a vow made to her husband at the time of his presenting her with a diamond necklace; she being informed by a very pretty young fellow, of a good conscience, that such vows are in their nature sinful?

I have formerly made use of all those Q. Whether Sempronia, having faith artifices which our sex daily practise over fully given a promise to two several persons yours, to draw, as it were, undesignedly, during the last sickness of her husband, is the eyes of a whole congregation to my not thereby left at liberty to choose which pew; I have taken a pride in the number of of them she pleases, or to reject them both admirers at my afternoon levee; but am for the sake of a new lover? now quite another creature. I think, could I regain the attractive influence I once had, if I had a legion of suitors, I should never be ambitious of entertaining more than one. I have almost contracted an antipathy to the trifling discourses of impertinent lovers; though I must needs own I have thought it very odd of late to hear gentlemen, instead of their usual complaisances, fall into disputes before me of politics, or else weary me with the tedious repetition of how thankful I ought to be, and satisfied with my recovery out of so dangerous a distemper: this, though I am very sensible of the blessing, yet I cannot but dislike, because such advice from them rather seems to insult than comfort me, and reminds me too much of what I was: which melancholy consideration I cannot yet perfectly surmount, but hope your sentiments on this head will make it supportable.

To show you what a value I have for your dictates, these are to certify the persons concerned, that unless one of them returns to his colours, if I may so call them now, before the winter is over, I will voluntarily confine myself to a retirement, where I will punish them all with my needle. I will be revenged on them by decyphering them on a carpet, humbly begging admittance, myself scornfully refusing it. If you disapprove of this, as savouring too much of malice, be pleased to acquaint me with a draught you like better, and it shall be faithfully performed, by the unfortunate

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-Were I not resolved against the yoke
Of hapless marriage; never to be curs'd
With second love, so fatal was the first,
To this one error I might yield again.-Dryden.
THE following account hath been trans-
mitted to me by the love casuist.

Another inquires, whether she hath not the right of widowhood, to dispose of herself to a gentleman of great merit, who presses very hard; her husband being irrecoverably gone in a consumption?

'An unreasonable creature hath the confidence to ask, whether it be proper for her to marry a man who is younger than her eldest son?

'A scrupulous well-spoken matron, who gives me a great many good words, only doubts whether she is not obliged, in conscience, to shut up her two marriageable daughters, until such time as she hath comfortably disposed of herself?

'Sophronia, who seems by her phrase and spelling to be a person of condition, sets forth, that whereas she hath a great estate, and is but a woman, she desires to be informed whether she would not do prudently to marry Camillus, a very idle tall young fellow, who hath no fortune of his own, and consequently hath nothing else to do but to manage hers?'

Before I speak of widows, I cannot but observe one thing, which I do not know how to account for; a widow is always more sought after than an old maid of the same age. It is common enough among ordinary people, for a stale virgin to set up a shop in a place where she is not known; where the large thumb-ring, supposed to be given by her husband, quickly recommends her to some wealthy neighbour, who takes a liking to the jolly widow, that would have overlooked the venerable spinster.

The truth of it is, if we look into this set of women, we find, according to the dif ferent characters or circumstances wherein they are left, that widows may be divided into those who raise love and those who raise compassion.

husband, and the care of her children; to which may be added a third, arising out of the former, such a prudent conduct as may do honour to both.

But, not to ramble from this subject, there are two things in which consists chiefly the 'MR. SPECTATOR,-Having in some for-glory of a widow-the love of her deceased mer papers taken care of the two states of virginity and marriage, and being willing that all people should be served in their turn, I this day draw out my drawer of widows, where I met with several cases, to each whereof I have returned satisfactory answers by the post. The cases are as follow:

A widow possessed of all these three qualities makes not only a virtuous but a sublime character.

There is something so great and so gener'Q. Whether Amoret be bound by alous in this state of life, when it is accom

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