What have I been doing? What have I left undone, which I ought to have done? Begin thus from the first act, and proceed; and in conclufion, at the ill which thou hast done be troubled, and rejoice for the good. Our thoughts on prefent things being determined by the objects before us, fall not under thofe indulgences, or excurfions, which I am now confidering. But I cannot forbear, under this head, to caution pious and tender minds, that are difturbed by the irruptions of wicked imaginations, againft too great dejection, and too anxious alarms; for thoughts are only criminal, when they are first chofen, and then voluntarily continued. Evil into the mind of god or man May come and go, Jo unapprov'd, and leave MILTON. In futurity chiefly are the fnares lodged, by which the imagination is intangled. Futurity is the proper abode of hope and fear, with all their train and progeny of fubordinate apprehenfions and defires. In futurity events and chances are yet floating at large, without apparent connexion with their caufes, and we therefore eafily indulge the liberty of gratifying ourselves with a pleafing choice. To pick and cull among poffible advantages is, as the civil law terms it, in vacuum venire, to take what belongs to nobody; but it has this hazard in it, that we fhall be unwilling to quit what we have feized, though an owner fhould be found. It is easy to think on that which may be gained, till at last we refolve to gain it, and to image the happinefs of particular conditions till we can be eafy in no other. We ought, at leaft, to let our defires fix upon nothing in another's power for the fake of our quiet, or in another's poffeffion for the fake of our innocence. When a man finds himself led, though by a train of honeft fentiments, to a wifh for that to which he has no right, he fhould start back as from a pitfal covered with flowers. He that fancies he fhould benefit the publick more in a great station than the man that fills it, will in time imagine it an act of virtue to fupplant him; and, as oppofition readily kindles into hatred, his eagerness to do that good, to which he is not called, will betray him to crimes, which in his original scheme were never purpofed. He therefore that would govern his actions by the laws of virtue, muft regulate his thoughts by thofe of reafon; he must keep guilt from the receffes of his heart, and remember that the pleafures of fancy and the emotions of defire are more dangerous as they are more hidden, fince they escape the awe of obfervation, and operate equally in every fituation, without the concurrence of external opportunities. 25 25 25 25 25 25 25 SUS US US US US 25. NUMB. 9. TUESDAY, April 17, 1750. Quod fis effe velis, nibilque malis. Chufe what you are; no other state prefer. MART, ELPHINSTON. T is juftly remarked by Horace, that, howsoever every man may complain occafionally of the hardfhips of his condition, he is feldom willing to change it for any other on the fame level: for whether it be that he, who follows an employment, made choice of it at first on account of its fuitablenefs to his inclination; or that when accident, or the determination of others, have placed him in a particular station, he, by endeavouring to reconcile himself to it, gets the custom of viewing it only on the faireft fide; or whether every man thinks that clafs to which he belongs belongs the moft illuftrious, merely because he has honoured it with his name; it is certain that, whatever be the reafon, moft men have a very ftrong and active prejudice in favour of their own vocation, always working upon their minds, and influencing their behaviour. This partiality is fufficiently vifible in every rank of the human species; but it exerts itself more frequently and with greater force among those who have never learned to conceal their fentiments for reafons of policy, or to model their expreffions by the laws of politenefs; and therefore the chief contefts of wit among artificers and handicraftsmen arise from a mutual endeavour to exalt one trade by depreciating another. From the fame principle 'are derived many confolations to alleviate the inconveniences to which every calling is peculiarly expofed. A blacksmith was lately pleafing himfelf at his anvil, with obferving that, though his trade was hot and footy, laborious and unhealthy, yet he had the honour of living by his hammer, he got his bread like a man, and if his fon fhould rife in the world, and keep his coach, no body could reproach him that his father was a taylor. A man, truly zealous for his fraternity, is never fo irrefiftibly flattered, as when fome rival calling is mentioned with contempt. Upon this principle a linen-draper boafted that he had got a new cuftomer, whom he could fafely truft, for he could have no doubt of his honefty, fince it was known, from unquestionable authority, that he was now filing a bill in chancery to delay payment for the clothes which he had worn the laft feven years; and he himself had heard him declare, in a publick coffeehouse, that he looked upon the whole generation of woollen-drapers to be fuch defpicable wretches, that no gentleman ought to pay them. It It has been obferved that phyficians and lawyers are no friends to religion; and many conjectures have been formed to difcover the reafon of such a combination between men who agree in nothing else, and who seem lefs to be affected, in their own provinces, by religious opinions, than any other part of the community. The truth is, very few of them have thought about religion; but they have all feen a parfon, feen him in a habit different from their own, and therefore declared war against him. A young ftudent from the inns of court, who has of-ten attacked the curate of his father's parish with such arguments as his acquaintances could furnish, and returned to town without fuccefs, is now gone down with a refolution to deftroy him; for he has learned at laft how to manage a prig, and if he pretends to hold him again to fyllogifm, he has a catch in referve, which neither logick nor metaphyficks can refift. I laugh to think how your unshaken Cato The malignity of foldiers and failors against each other has been often experienced at the coft of their country; and, perhaps, no orders of men have an enmity of more acrimony, or longer continuance. When, upon our late fucceffes at fea, fome new regulations were concerted for establishing the rank of the naval commanders, a captain of foot very acutely remarked, that nothing was more abfurd than to give any honorary rewards to feamen," for honour, fays he, ought only to be won by bravery; and all the world knows that in a fea-fight "there is no danger, and therefore no evidence "of courage." But although this general defire of aggrandizing themselves by raifing their profeffion, betrays men to * a thou 47 a thousand ridiculous and mifchievous acts of fupplantation and detraction, yet as almoft all paffions have their good as well as bad effects, it likewife excites ingenuity, and fometimes raises an honeft and useful emulation of diligence. It may be observed in general that no trade had ever reached the excellence to which it is now improved, had its profeffors looked upon it with the eyes of indifferent fpectators; the advances, from the firft rude eflays, muft have been made by men who valued themselves for performances, for which scarce any other would be perfuaded to esteem them. It is pleafing to contemplate a manufacture rifing gradually from its firft mean ftate by the fucceffive labours of innumerable minds; to confider the first hollow trunk of an oak, in which, perhaps, the fhepherd could fcarce venture to cross a brook fwelled with a fhower, enlarged at laft into a fhip of war, attacking fortreffes, terrifying nations, fetting. ftorms and billows at defiance, and vifiting the remoteft parts of the globe. And it might contribute to difpofe us to a kinder regard for the labours of one another, if we were to confider from what unpromifing beginnings the moft ufeful productions of art have probably arifen. Who, when he faw the firft fand or afhes, by a cafual intenseness of heat melted into a metalline form, rugged with excrefcences, and clouded with impurities, would have imagined, that in this fhapeless lump lay concealed fo many conveniences of life, as would-in time conftitute a great part of the happiness of the world? Yet by fome fuch fortuitous liquefaction was mankind taught to procure a body at once in a high degree folid and tranfparent, which might admit the light of the fun, and exclude the violence of the wind; which might extend the fight of the philofopher to new ranges of exiftence, and charm him at one time with the unbounded extent of the material crea |