in her aspect, that composure in her motion, that complacency in her manner, that if her form makes you hope, her merit makes you fear. But then again, she is such a desperate scholar, that no country gentleman can approach her without being a jest. As I was going to tell you, when I came to her house I was admitted to her presence with great civility; at the same time she placed herself to be first seen by me in such an attitude, as I think you call the posture of a picture, that she discovered new charms, and I at last came towards her with such an awe as made me speechless. This she no sooner observed but she made her advantage of it, and began a discourse to me concerning love and honour, as they both are followed by pretenders, and the real votaries to them. When she [had] discussed these points in a discourse, which I verily believe was as learned as the best philosopher in Europe could possibly make, she asked me whether she was so happy as to fall in with my sentiments on these important particulars. Her confidant sat by her, and upon my being in the last confusion and silence, this malicious aid of hers, turning to her, says, I am very glad to observe Sir Roger pauses upon this subject, and seems resolved to deliver all his sentiments upon the matter when he pleases to speak. They both kept their countenances, and after I had sat half an hour meditating how to behave before such profound casuists, I rose up and took my leave. Chance has since that time thrown me very often in her way, and she as often has directed a discourse to me which I do not understand. This barbarity has kept me ever at a distance from the most beautiful object my eyes ever beheld. It is thus also she deals with all mankind, and you must make love to her, as you would conquer the sphinx, by posing her. But were she like other women, and that there were any talking to her, how constant must the pleasure of that man be who could converse with a creature- But, after all, you may be sure her heart is fixed on some one or other; and yet I have been credibly informed,-but who can believe half that is said! After she had done speaking to me she put her hand to her bosom and adjusted her tucker. Then she cast her eyes a little down upon my beholding her too earnestly. They say she sings excellently: her voice in her ordinary speech has something in it inexpressibly sweet. You must know I dined with her at a public table the day after I first saw her, and she helped me to some tansy in the eye of all the gentle men in the country: she has certainly the finest hand of any woman in the world. I can assure you, sir, were you to behold her, you would be in the same condition; for as her speech is music, her form is angelic. But I find I grow irregular while I am talking of her; but, indeed, it would be stupidity to be unconcerned at such perfection. Oh the excellent creature, she is as inimitable to all women, as she is inaccessible to all men." I found my friend begin to rave, and insensibly led him towards the house, that we might be joined by some other company; and am convinced that the widow is the secret cause of all that inconsistency which appears in some parts of my friend's discourse; though he has so much command of himself as not directly to mention her, yet according to that of Martial, which one knows not how to render in English, Dum tacet hanc loquitur. I shall end this paper with that whole epigram, which represents with much humour my honest friend's condition. Quicquid agit Rufus nihil est nisi Nævia Rufo, Si gaudet, si flet, si tacet, hanc loquitur: Cœnat, propinat, poscit, negat, annuit, una est Nævia; si non sit Nævia mutus erit. Scriberet hesterna Patri cum Luce Salutem, Nævia lux, inquit, Nævia lumen, ave. Let Rufus weep, rejoice, stand, sit, or walk, CHARITY.1 Charity is a virtue of the heart and not of the hands, says an old writer. Gifts and alms are the expressions, not the essence of this virtue. A man may bestow great sums on the poor and indigent without being charitable, and may be charitable when he is not able to bestow anything. Charity is therefore a habit of good-will or benevolence in the soul, which disposes us to the love, assistance, and relief of mankind, especially of those who stand in need of it. The poor man who has this excellent frame of mind is no less intituled to the reward of this virtue than the man who founds a college. For my own part, I am charitable to an extravagance this way. I 1 Number 166 of The Guardian. never saw an indigent person in my life, with- | thoughts of mending all the highways on this out reaching out to him some of this imaginary side the Tweed, and of making all the rivers relief. I cannot but sympathize with every in England navigable. one I meet that is in affliction; and if my abilities were equal to my wishes, there should be neither pain nor poverty in the world. To give my reader a right notion of myself in this particular, I shall present him with the secret history of one of the most remarkable parts of my life. I was once engaged in search of the philosopher's stone. It is frequently observed of men who have been busied in this pursuit, that though they have failed in their principal design, they have however made such discoveries in their way to it as have sufficiently recompensed their inquiries. In the same manner, though I cannot boast of my success in that affair, I do not repent of my engaging in it, because it produced in my mind such an habitual exercise of charity, as made it much better than perhaps it would have been, had II never been lost in so pleasing a delusion. As I did not question but I should soon have a new Indies in my possession, I was perpetually taken up in considering how to turn it to the benefit of mankind. In order to it I employed a whole day in walking about this great city, to find out proper places for the erection of hospitals. I had likewise entertained that project, which has since succeeded in another place, of building churches at the court-end of the town, with this only difference, that instead of fifty, I intended to have built a hundred, and to have seen them all finished in less than one year. I had with great pains and application got together a list of all the French Protestants; and by the best accounts I could come at, had calculated the value of all those estates and effects which every one of them had left in his own country for the sake of his religion, being fully determined to make it up to him, and return some of them the double of what they had lost. As I was one day in my laboratory, my operator, who was to fill my coffers for me, and used to foot it from the other end of the town every morning, complained of a sprain in his leg that he had met with over against St. Clement's Church. This so affected me, that as a standing mark of my gratitude to him, and out of compassion to the rest of my fellow-citizens, I resolved to new pave every street within the liberties, and entered a memorandum in my pocket-book accordingly. About the same time I entertained some | But the project I had most at heart was the settling upon every man in Great Britain three pounds a year (in which sum may be comprised, according to Sir William Pettit's observations, all the necessities of life), leaving to them, whatever else they could get by their own industry to lay out on superfluities. I was above a week debating in myself what I should do in the matter of impropriations; but at length came to a resolution to buy them all up, and restore them to the Church. As I was one day walking near St. Paul's I took some time to survey that structure, and not being entirely satisfied with it, though I could not tell why, I had some thoughts of pulling it down, and building it up anew at my own expense. For my own part, as I have no pride in me, intended to take up with a coach and six, half a dozen footmen, and live like a private gentleman. It happened about this time that public matters looked very gloomy, taxes came hard, the war went on heavily, people complained of the great burdens that were laid upon them. This made me resolve to set aside one morning to consider seriously the state of the nation. I was the more ready to enter on it, because I was obliged, whether I would or no, to sit at home in my morning gown, having, after a most incredible expense, pawned a new suit of clothes and a full-bottomed wig for a sum of money which my operator assured me was the last he should want to make all our matters to bear. After having considered many projects, I at length resolved to beat the common enemy at his own weapons, and laid a scheme which would have blown him up in a quarter of a year, had things succeeded to my wishes. As I was in this golden dream somebody knocked at my door. I opened it and found it was a messenger that brought me a letter from the laboratory. The fellow looked so miserably poor that I was resolved to make his fortune before he delivered his message. But seeing he brought a letter from my operator, I concluded I was bound to it in honour, as much as a prince is to give a reward to one that brings him the first news of a victory. I knew this was the long-expected hour of projection, and which I had waited for with great impatience above half a year before. In short, I broke open my letter in a transport of joy, and found it as follows: "Sir,-After having got out of you every- | fop, that's fit for nothing, except it hangs there thing you can conveniently spare, I scorn to to be ready for your master's hand, when you trespass upon your generous nature, and there- are impertinent. fore must ingenuously confess to you that I know no more of the philosopher's stone than you do. I shall only tell you for your comfort that I never yet could bubble a blockhead out of his money. They must be men of wit and parts who are for my purpose. This made me apply myself to a person of your wealth and ingenuity. How I have succeeded you yourself can best tell.-Your humble servant to command, "THOMAS WHITE. "I have locked up the laboratory and laid the key under the door." Tom. Uncle Humphrey, you know my master scorns to strike his servants; you talk as if the world was now just as it was when my old master and you were in your youth— when you went to dinner because it was so much o'clock, when the great blow was given in the hall at the pantry door, and all the family came out of their holes in such strange dresses and formal faces as you see in the pictures in our long gallery in the country. Humph. Why, you wild rogue! Tom. You could not fall to your dinner, till a formal fellow in a black gown said some I was very much shocked at the unworthy thing over the meat, as if the cook had not made it ready enough. treatment of this man, and not a little mortified at my disappointment, though not so much for what I myself, as what the public suffered by it. I think, however, I ought to let the world know what I designed for them, and hope that such of my readers who find they had a share in my good intentions will accept of the will for the deed. THE OLD STYLE AND THE NEW. (FROM "THE CONSCIOUS LOVERS.") Humphrey. O, here's the prince of poor coxcombs, the representative of all the better fed than taught!-Ho, ho, Tom! whither so gay and so airy this morning? Enter Toм, singing. Tom. Sir, we servants of single gentlemen are another kind of people than you domestic ordinary drudges that do business; we are raised above you: the pleasures of board wages, tavern dinners, and many a clear gain, vails, alas! you never heard or dreamt of. Humph. Thou hast follies and vices enough for a man of ten thousand a year, though it is but as t'other day that I sent for you to town to put you into Mr. Sealand's family, that you might learn a little before I put you to my young master, who is too gentle for training such a rude thing as you were into proper obedience.You then pulled off your hat to every one you met in the street, like a bashful, great, awkward cub, as you were. But your great oaken cudgel, when you were a booby, became you much better than that dangling stick at your button, now you are a Humph. Sirrah, who do you prate after?— despising men of sacred characters! I hope you never heard my young master talk so like a profligate. Tom. Sir, I say you put upon me when I the doctrine of wearing shams, to make linen first came to town about being orderly, and last clean a fortnight, keeping my clothes fresh, and wearing a frock within doors. Humph. Sirrah, I gave you those lessons, because I supposed at that time your master and you might have dined at home every day, and cost you nothing; then you might have made you a good family servant; but the gang you have frequented since, at chocolate houses and taverns, in a continual round of noise and extravagance Tom. I don't know what you heavy inmates call noise and extravagance; but we gentlemen, who are well fed, and cut a figure, sir, think it a fine life, and that we must be very pretty fellows, who are kept only to be looked at. Humph. Very well, sir-I hope the fashion of being lewd and extravagant, despising of decency and order, is almost at an end, since it is arrived at persons of your quality. Tom. Master Humphrey, ha! ha! you were an unhappy lad, to be sent up to town in such queer days as you were. Why now, sir, the lackeys are the men of pleasure of the age; the top gamesters, and many a laced coat about town, have had their education in our party-coloured regiment.-We are false lovers, have a taste of music, poetry, billet doux, dress, politics, ruin damsels; and when we are weary of this lewd town, and have a mind to take up, whip into our masters' clothes, and marry fortunes. Humph. Play with the little wanton! what will this world come to! Humph. Sirrah, there is no enduring your ❘ know I love to fret and play with the little extravagance; I'll hear you prate no longer: wantonI wanted to see you, to inquire how things go with your master, as far as you understand them: I suppose he knows he is to be married to-day. Tom. Ay, sir, he knows it, and is dressed as gay as the sun; but between you and I, my dear, he has a very heavy heart under all that gaiety. As soon as he was dressed I retired, but overheard him sigh in the most heavy manner. He walked thoughtfully to and fro in the room, then went into his closet: when he came out, he gave me this for his mistress, whose maid, you know Tom. I met her this morning in a new gown, not a bit the worse for her lady's wearing, and she has always new thoughts and new airs with new clothes-then she never fails to steal some glance or gesture from every visitant at their house, and is indeed the whole town of coquettes at second hand- -But here she comes; in one motion she speaks and describes herself better than all the words in the world can. Humph. Then I hope, dear sir, when your Humph. Is passionately fond of your fine own affair is over, you will be so good as to mind your master's with her. person. Tom. The poor fool is so tender, and loves to hear me talk of the world, and the plays, operas, and masquerades; and lard! says she, you are so wild-but you have a world of humour. Humph. Coxcomb! Well, but why don't you run with your master's letter to Mrs. Lucinda, as he ordered you? Tom. Because Mrs. Lucinda is not so easily come at as you think for. Humph. Not easily come at? why, sir, are not her father and my old master agreed that she and Mr. Bevil are to be one flesh before to-morrow morning? Tom. It's no matter for that: her mother, it seems, Mrs. Sealand, has not agreed to it; and you must know, Mr. Humphrey, that in that family the gray mare is the better horse. Humph. What dost thou mean ? Tom. In one word, Mrs. Sealand pretends to have a will of her own, and has provided a relation of hers, a stiff starched philosopher and a wise fool, for her daughter; for which reason, for these ten days past, she has suffered no message nor letter from my master to come near her. A ROMANTIC YOUNG LADY. (FROM 'THE TENDER HUSBAND.") [Aunt, who desires her niece to marry her cousin Humphrey Gubbin; she loves a Captain Clerimont, and determines to cut her cousin.] Enter Aunt and Niece. Niece. Was it not my gallant that whistled so charmingly in the parlour before we went out this morning? He's a most accomplished cavalier! Aunt. Come, niece, come; you don't do well to make sport of your relations, especially with a young gentleman that has so much kindness for you. Niece. Kindness for me! What a phrase is there to express the darts and flames, the sighs Humph. And where had you this intelli- and languishings of an expecting lover! gence? Tom. From a foolish fond soul, that can keep nothing from me-one that will deliver this letter too, if she is rightly managed. Humph. What, her pretty handmaid, Mrs. Phillis? Tom. Even she, sir. This is the very hour, you know, she usually comes hither, under a pretence of a visit to our housekeeper, forsooth, but in reality to have a glance at Humph. Your sweet face, I warrant you. Aunt. Pray, niece, forbear this idle trash, and talk like other people. Your cousin Humphrey will be true and hearty in what he Niece. Good madam, don't wound my ears with such expressions; do you think I can ever love a man that's true and hearty? Pray, aunt, endeavour a little at the embellishment of your style. Aunt. Alack-a-day! cousin Biddy, these idle romances have quite turned your head. Niece. How often must I desire you, madam, to lay aside that familiar name, cousin Biddy? I never hear it without blushing. Did you ever meet with a heroine, in those idle romances, as you call 'em, that was termed Biddy? Aunt. Ah! cousin, cousin, these are mere vapours, indeed; nothing but vapours. Niece. No; the heroine has always something soft and engaging in her name; something that gives us a notion of the sweetness of her beauty and behaviour. A name that glides through half-a-dozen tender syllables, as Elismunda, Clidamira, Deidamia, that runs upon vowels of the tongue, not hissing through one's teeth, or breaking them with consonants. Tis strange rudeness, those familiar names they give us, when there is Aurelia, Saccharissa, Gloriana, for people of condition, and Cella, Chloris, Corinna, Mopsa, for their maids and those of lower rank. Aunt. Lookye! Biddy, this is not to be supported; I know not where you have learned this nicety; but I can tell you, forsooth, as much as you despise it, your mother was a Bridget afore you, and an excellent housewife. Niece. Good madam, don't upbraid me with my mother Bridget, and an excellent housewife. Aunt. Yes, I say, she was; and spent her time in better learning than ever you did; not in reading of fights and battles of dwarfs and giants, but in writing out receipts for broths, possets, caudles, and surfeit-waters, as became a good country gentlewoman. Niece. My mother, and a Bridget! Aunt. Yes, niece; I say again-your mother, my sister, was a Bridget. The daughter of her mother Margery, of her mother Cicely, of her mother Alice Aunt. Then, a cloud, this morning, had a flying dragon in it. Niece. What eyes had you that you could see nothing? For my part I look upon it as a prodigy, and expect something extraordinary will happen to me before night. But you have a gross relish of things. What noble descriptions in romances had been lost if the writers had been persons of your gout! Aunt. I wish the authors had been hanged, and their books burnt, before you had seen them. Niece. Simplicity! Aunt. A parcel of improbable lies— Niece. Indeed, madam, your raillery is coarse. Aunt. Fit only to corrupt young girls, and turn their heads with a thousand foolish dreams of I don't know what. Niece. Nay, now, madam, you grow extravagant. Aunt. What I say is not to vex, but advise you for your good. Niece. What, to burn Philocles, Artaxerxes, Oroondates, and the rest of the heroic lovers; and take my country booby, cousin Humphrey, for a husband. Aunt. Oh, dear! oh, dear! Biddy, pray, good dear, learn to act and speak like the rest of the world; come, come, you shall marry your cousin, and live comfortably. Niece. Live comfortably! What kind of life is that? A great heiress live comfortably! Pray, aunt, learn to raise your ideas. What is, I wonder, to live comfortably? Aunt. To live comfortably is to live with prudence and frugality, as we do in Lombard Street. Niece. As we do! That's a fine life, indeed! with one servant of each sex. Let us see how many things our coachman is good for. He Niece. Have you no mercy? Oh, the bar- rubs down his horses, lays the cloth, whets the barous genealogy! Aunt. Of her mother Winifred, of her mother Joan Niece. Since you will run on, then, I must needs tell you I am not satisfied in the point of my nativity. Many an infant has been placed in a cottage with obscure parents, till, by chance, some ancient servant of the family has known it by its marks. Aunt. Ay, you had best be searched. That's like your calling the winds the fanning gales, before I don't know how much company; and the tree that was blown by them had, forsooth, a spirit imprisoned in the trunk of it. Niece. Ignorance! VOL. I. knives, and sometimes makes beds. Aunt. A good servant should turn his hand to everything in a family. Niece. Nay, there's not a creature in our family that has not two or three different duties as John is butler, footman, and coachman, so Mary is cook, laundress, and chambermaid. Aunt. Well, and do you laugh at that? Niece. No, not I; nor at the coach-horses, though one has an easy trot for my uncle's riding, and t'other an easy pace for your sidesaddle. Aunt. And so you jeer at the good management of your relations, do you? 10 |