sembly be naked on that day they shall have forgotten to laugh." Men like him opposed ridicule, because they knew it to be a most formidable antagonist, and preached up gravity, to conceal their own want of importance.

Ridicule has ever been the most powerful enemy of enthusiasm, and properly the only antagonist that can be opposed to it with success. Persecution only serves to propagate new religions; they acquire fresh vigour beneath the executioner and the axe; and, like some vivacious insects, multiply by dissection. It is also impossible to combat enthusiasm with reason, for though it makes a show of resistance, it soon eludes the pressure, refers you to distinctions not to be understood, and feelings which it cannot explain.-A man who would endeavour to fix an enthusiast by argument, might as well attempt to spread quicksilver with his fingers. The only way to conquer a visionary is to despise him; the stake, the fagot, and the disputing doctor, in some measure ennoble the opinions they are brought to oppose they are harmless against innovating pride; contempt alone is truly dreadful. Hunters generally know the most vulnerable part of the beasts they pursue, by the care which every animal takes to defend the side which is weakest; on what side the enthusiast is most vulnerable, may be known by the care which he takes in the beginning to work his disciples into gravity, and guard them against the power of ridicule.

LETTER CXI.

FROM THE SAME.

THE English are at present employed in cele. brating a feast which becomes general every seventh year; the parliament of the nation being then dissolved, and another appointed to be chosen. This solemnity falls infinitely short of our feast of the Lanthorns in magnificence and splendour; it is also surpassed by others of the east in unanimity and pure devotion; but no festival in the world can compare with it for eating. Their eating, indeed, amazes me; had I five hundred heads, and were each head furnished with brains, yet would they all be insufficient to compute the number of cows, pigs, geese, and turkeys, which upon this occasion die for the good of their country!

To say the truth, eating seems to make a grand ingredient in all English parties of zeal, business, or amusement. When a church is

to be built, or an hospital endowed, the direc tors assemble, and instead of consulting upon it, they eat upon it, by which means the business goes forward with success. When the poor are to be relieved, the officers appointed to dole out public charity, assemble and eat upon it. Nor has it ever been known that they filled the bellies of the poor, till they had previously satisfied their own. But in the election of magistrates, the people seem to exceed all bounds: the merits of a candidate are often measured by the number of his treats; his constituents assemble, eat upon him, and lend their applause, not to his integrity or sense, but to the quantities of his beef and brandy.

When Philip the Second was king of Spain, there was a contest in Salamanca between two orders of friars for superiority. The legend of one side contained more extraordinary miracles, but the legend of the other was reckoned most authentic. They reviled each other, as is usual in disputes of divinity, the And yet I could forgive this people their people were divided into factions, and a civil plentiful meals on this occasion, as it is exwar appeared unavoidable.-In order to pre-tremely natural for every man to eat a great vent such an imminent calamity, the combatants were prevailed upon to submit their legends to the fiery trial, and that which came forth untouched by the fire was to have the victory, and to be honoured with a double share of reverence. Whenever the people flock to see a miracle, it is a hundred to one but they see a miracle; incredible, therefore, were the numbers that were gathered round upon this occasion.-The friars on each side approached, and confidently threw their respective legends into the flames, when lo! to the utter disappointment of all the assembly, instead of a miracle, both legends were consumed. Nothing but thus turning both parties into contempt, could have prevented the effusion of blood. The people now laughed at their former folly, and wondered why they fell out. Adieu.

deal when he gets it for nothing; but what amazes me is, that all this good living no way contributes to improve their good-humour. On the contrary, they seem to lose their temper as they lose their appetites; every morsel they swallow, and every glass they pour down, serves to increase their animosity.—Many an honest man, before as harmless as a tame rabbit, when loaded with a single election dinner, has become more dangerous than a charged culverin. Upon one of these occasions, I have actually seen a bloody-minded man milliner sally forth at the head of a mob, determined to face a desperate pastry cook, who was general of the opposite party.

But you must not suppose they are without a pretext for thus beating each other. On the contrary, no man here is so uncivilized as to beat his neighbour without producing very sufficient reasons. One candidate, for instance, treats with gin, a spirit of their own manufac ture; another always drinks brandy, imported from abroad.-Brandy is a wholesome liquor; gin, a liquor wholly their own. This then

furnishes an obvious cause of quarrel, whether it be most reasonable to get drunk with gin, or get drunk with brandy?-The mob meet upon the debate; fight themselves sober; and then draw off to get drunk again, and charge for another encounter. So that the English may now properly be said to be engaged in war; since, while they are subduing their enemies abroad, they are breaking each other's heads at home.

I lately made an excursion to a neighbouring village, in order to be a spectator of the ceremonies practised upon this occasion. I left town in company with three fiddlers, nine dozen of hams, and a corporation poet, which were designed as reinforcements to the gindrinking party. We entered the town with a very good face; the fiddlers, no way intimidated by the enemy, kept handling their arms up the principal street. By this prudent manoeuvre they took peaceable possession of their head-quarters, amidst the shouts of multitudes, who seemed perfectly rejoiced at hearing their music, but above all, at seeing their bacon.

I must own, I could not avoid being pleased to see all ranks of people on this occasion levelled into an equality, and the poor, in some measure, enjoying the primitive privileges of nature. If there was any distinction shown, the lowest of the people seemed to receive it from the rich. I could perceive a cobbler with a levee at his door, and a haberdasher giving audience from behind his counter. But my reflections were soon interrupted by a mob, who demanded whether I was for the distillery or the brewery? As these were terms with which I was totally unacquainted, I chose at first to be silent; however, I know not what might have been the consequence of my reserve, had not the attention of the mob been called off to a skirmish between a brandydrinker's cow and a gin-drinker's mastiff, which turned out, greatly to the satisfaction of the mob, in favour of the mastiff.

ties as natural, but soon found the fellow so drunk that he could not stand; another made his appearance to give his vote, but though he could stand, he actually lost the use of his tongue, and remained silent; a third who, though excessively drunk, could both stand and speak, being asked the candidate's name for whom he voted, could be prevailed upon to make no other answer but" tobacco and brandy." In short, an election hall seems to be a theatre, where every passion is seen without disguise; a school, where fools may readily become worse, and where philosophers may gather wisdom. Adieu.

LETTER CXII.

FROM THE SAME.

THE disputes among the learned here are now carried on in a much more compendious manner than formerly. There was a time when folio was brought to oppose folio, and a champion was often listed for life under the banners of a single sorites. At present, the controversy is decided in a summary way; an epigram or an acrostic finishes the debate, and the combatant, like the incursive Tartar, advances and retires with a single blow.

An important literary debate at present engrosses the attention of the town. It is carried on with sharpness, and a proper share of this epigrammatical fury. An author, it seems, has taken an aversion to the faces of several players, and has written verses to prove his dislike; the players fall upon the author, and assure the town he must be dull, and their faces must be good, because he wants a dinner : a critic comes to the poet's assistance, asserting that the verses were perfectly original, and so smart that he could never have written them without the assistance of friends; the friends, upon this, arraign the critic, and plainly prove the versThis spectacle, which afforded high enter-es to be all the author's own. So at it they are, tainment, was at last ended by the appearance of one of the candidates, who came to harangue the mob he made a very pathetic speech upon the late excessive importation of foreign drams, and the downfall of the distillery; I could see some of the audience shed tears. He was accompanied in his procession by Mrs Deputy and Mrs Mayoress. Mrs Deputy was not in the least in liquor; and as for Mrs Mayoress, one of the spectators assured me in my ear, that she was a very fine woman before she had the small-pox.

Mixing with the crowd, I was now conducted to the hall where the magistrates are chosen but what tongue can describe this scene of confusion! the whole crowd seemed equally inspired with anger, jealousy, politics, patriotism, and punch.-I remarked one figure that was carried up by two men upon this occasion. I at first began to pity his infirmi

all four together by the ears; the friends at the critic, the critic at the players, the players at the author, and the author at the players again. It is impossible to determine how this many-sided contest will end, or which party to adhere to. The town, without siding with any, views the combat in suspense, like the fabled hero of antiquity, who beheld the earth-born brothers give and receive mutual wounds, and fall by indiscriminate destruction.

This is in some measure, the state of the present dispute; but the combatants here differ in one respect from the champions of the fable. Every new wound only gives vigour for another blow; though they appear to strike, they are in fact mutually swelling themselves into consideration, and thus advertising each other into fame. "To day," says one, "my name shall be in the Gazette, the next day my rival's ; people will naturally inquire about us; thus we

shall at least make a noise in the streets, though we have got nothing to sell." I have read of a dispute of a similar nature, which was managed here about twenty years ago. Hildebrand

But, pitying his distress, let virtue shine,
And, giving each your bounty,† let him dine;
For, thus retain'd, as learned counsel can,
Each case, however bad, he'll new japan:
And, by a quick transition, plainly show
"Twas no defect of yours, but pocket low,
That caus'd his putrid kennel to o'erflow."

* Charity.

+ Settled at one shilling, the price of the poem.

Jacob, as I think he was called, and Charles Johnson, were poets, both at that time possessed of great reputation; for Johnson had written eleven plays, acted with great success; and Jacob, though he had written but five, had five times thanked the town for their unmerited ap- The last lines are certainly executed in a plause. They soon became mutually enamour- very masterly manner. It is of that species of ed of each other's talents; they wrote, they argumentation, called the perplexing. It effecfelt, they challenged the town for each other. tually flings the antagonist into a mist; there is Johnson assured the public, that no poet no answering it; the laugh is raised against him, alive had the easy simplicity of Jacob, and while he is endeavouring to find out the jest. Jacob exhibited Johnson as a masterpiece in At once he shows, that the author has a kenthe pathetic. Their mutual praise was not nel, and that his kennel is putrid, and that his without effect; the town saw their plays, were putrid kennel overflows. But why does it in raptures, read, and, without censuring them, overflow? It overflows, because the author forgot them. So formidable a union, how-happens to have low pockets!

To G. C. and R. L.

ever, was soon opposed by Tibbald. Tibbald There was also another new attempt in this asserted that the tragedies of the one had faults, way; a prosaic epigram which came out upon and the comedies of the other substituted wit this occasion. This is so full of matter that for vivacity: the combined champions flew at a critic might split it into fifteen epigrams, him like tigers, arraigned the censurer's judg- each properly fitted with its sting. You shall ment, and impeached his sincerity. It was a see it. long time a dispute among the learned, which was in fact the greatest man, Jacob, Johnson, or Tibbald; they had all written for the stage with great success, their names were seen in almost every paper, and their works in every This I believe, between us great or small, coffee-house. However, in the hottest of the dis-You, I, he, wrote it not 'twas Churchill's all.” pute, a fourth combatant made his appearance, and swept away the three combatants, tragedy, comedy, and all, into undistinguished ruin.

From this time they seemed consigned into the hands of criticism; scarcely a day passed in which they were not arraigned as detested writers. The critics, those enemies of Dryden and Pope, were their enemies. So Jacob and Johnson, instead of mending by criticism, called it envy; and, because Dryden and Pope were censured, they compared themselves to Dryden and Pope.

""Twas you, or I, or he, or altogether,
'Twas nne, both, three of them, they know not whether.

There, there's a perplex! I could have wished, to make it quite perfect, the author, as in the case before, had added notes. Almost every word admits a scholium, and a long one too." I, YOU, HE! Suppose a stranger should ask, "and who are you?" Here are three obscure persons spoken of, that may in a short time be utterly forgotten. Their names should have consequently been mentioned in notes at the bottom. But, when the reader comes to the words great and small, the maze is inextricable.

Here the stranger may dive for a mystery, without ever reaching the bottom. Let him know, then, that small is a word purely introduced to make good rhyme, and great was a very proper word to keep small

company.

But to return. The weapon chiefly used in the present controversy is epigram; and certainly never was a keener made use of. They have discovered surprising sharpness on both sides. The first that came out upon this occasion was a new kind of composition in this way, Yet, by being thus a spectator of others' danand might more properly be called an epigram-gers, I must own I begin to tremble in this matic thesis, than an epigram. It consists, literary contest for my own. I begin to fear first, of an argument in prose; next follows a that my challenge to Doctor Rock was unadmotto from Roscommon; then comes the epi-vised, and has procured me more antagonists gram; and, lastly, notes serving to explain the epigram. But you shall have it with all its decorations.

AN EPIGRAM,

than I had at first expected. I have received private letters from several of the literati here, that fill my soul with apprehension. I may safely aver, that I never gave any creature in this good city offence, except only my rival Doctor Rock; yet by the letters I every day

Addressed to the gentlemen reflected on in the receive, and by some I have seen printed, I am ROSCIAD, a poem, by the Author.

Worried with debts, and past all hopes of bail,
His pen he prostitutes t'avoid a gaol.-Roscom.

"Let not the hungry Bavius' angry stroke Awake resentment, or your rage provoke;

arraigned at one time as being a dull fellow, at another as being pert; I am here petulant, there I am heavy. By the head of my ancestors, they treat me with more inhumanity than a flying fish. If I dive and run my nose to the bottom, there a devouring shark is ready to