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when he declares, "that were there no God to see or punish vice, he would not commit it, because it is of so mean, so base, and so vile a nature."

I shall conclude this head with the description of honour in the part of young Juba:

Honour's a sacred tie, the law of kings,
The noble mind's distinguishing perfection,
That aids and strengthens virtue when it meets
her,

And imitates her actions where she is not;
It ought not to be sported with.

CATO.

In the second place, we are to consider those who have mistaken notions of honour. And these are such as establish any thing to themselves for a point of honour, which is contrary either to the laws of God, or of their country; who think it more honourable to revenge, than to forgive, an injury; who make no scruple of telling a lie, but would put any man to death that accuses them of it; who are more careful to guard their reputation by their courage than by their virtue. True fortitude is indeed so becoming in human nature,that he who wants it scarce deserves the name of a man; but we find several who so much abuse this notion, that they place the whole idea of honour in a kind of brutal courage: by which means we have bad many among us, who have called themselves men of honour, that would have been a disgrace to a gibbet. In a word, the man who sacrifices any duty of a reasonable creature to a prevailing mode or fashion; who looks upon any thing as honourable that is displeasing to his Maker, or destructive to society; who thinks himself obliged by this principle to the practice of some virtues, and not of others, is by no means to be reckoned among true men of honour.

like a man of honour, disposed of all the money he could make of it, in paying off his play debts, or, to speak in his own language, his debts of honour.

In the third place, we are to consider those persons, who treat this principle as chimerical, and turn it into ridicule. Men who are professedly of no honour, are of a more profligate and abandoned nature than even those who are actuated by false notions of it; as there is more hope of an heretic than of an atheist. These sons of infamy consider honour, with old Syphax in the play before-mentioned, as a fine imaginary notion that leads astray young unexperienced men, and draws them into real mischiefs, while they are engaged in the pursuit of a shadow. These are generally persons who, in Shakspeare's phrase," are worn and hackneyed in the ways of men;" whose imaginations are grown callous, and have lost all those delicate sentiments which are natural to minds that are innocent and undepraved. Such old battered miscreants ridicule every thing as romantic that comes in competition with their present interest; and treat those persons as visionaries, who dare to stand up, in a corrupt age, for what has not its immediate reward joined to it. The talents, interest, or experience of such men, make them very often useful in all parties, and at all times. But whatever wealth and dignities they may arrive at, they ought to consider that every one stands as a blot in the annals of his country, who arrives at the temple of honour by any other way than through that of virtue. Guardian.

§ 85. On Modesty.

I know no two words that have been more abused, by the different and wrong Timogenes was a lively instance of one interpretations which are put upon them, actuated by false honour. Timogenes would than these two, Modesty and Assurance. smile at a man's jest who ridiculed his Ma-To say such a one is a modest man, someker, and at the same time run a man through times indeed passes for a good character; the body that spoke ill of his friend. Ti- but at present is very often used to signify mogenes would have scorned to have be- a sheepish, awkward fellow, who has neitrayed a secret that was intrusted with him, ther good breeding, politeness, nor any though the fate of his country depended knowledge of the world. upon the discovery of it. Timogenes took away the life of a young fellow in a duel for having spoken ill of Belinda, a lady whom he himself had seduced in her youth, and betrayed into want and ignominy. To close his character, Timogenes, after having ruined several poor tradesmen's families who had trusted him, sold his estate to satisfy his creditors; but,

Again: A man of assurance, though at first it only denoted a person of a free and open carriage, is now very usually applied to a profligate wretch, who can break through all the rules of decency and morality without a blush.

I shall endeavour, therefore, in this essay, to restore these words to their true meaning, to prevent the idea of Modesty

from being confounded with that of Sheepishness, and to hinder Impudence from passing for Assurance.

If I was put to define Modesty, I would call it, The reflection of an ingenuous mind, either when a man has committed an action for which he censures himself, or fancies that he is exposed to the censure of others.

For this reason a man, truly modest, is as much so when he is alone as in company; and as subject to a blush in his closet as when the eyes of the multitude are upon him.

I do not remember to have met with any instance of modesty with which I am so well pleased, as that celebrated one of the young Prince, whose father, being a tributary king to the Romans, had several complaints laid against him before the senate, as a tyrant and oppressor of his subjects. The Prince went to Rome to defend his father; but coming into the senate, and hearing a multitude of crimes proved upon him, was so oppressed when it came to his turn to speak, that he was unable to utter a word. The story tells us, that the fathers were more moved at this instance of modesty and ingenuity, than they could have been by the most pathetic oration; and, in short, pardoned the guilty father for this early promise of virtue in his son.

I take Assurance to be, The faculty of possessing a man's self, or of saying and doing indifferent things without any uneasiness or emotion in the mind. That which generally gives a man assurance, is a moderate knowledge of the world; but above all, a mind fixed and determined in itself to do nothing against the rules of honour and decency. An open and assured behaviour is the natural consequence of such a resolution. A man thus armed, if his words or actions are at any time misinterpreted, retires within himself, and from a consciousness of his own integrity, assumes force enough to despise the little censures of ignorance or malice.

Every one ought to cherish and encou rage in himself the modesty and assurance I have here mentioned.

A man without assurance is liable to be made uneasy by the folly or ill nature of every one he converses with. A man with out modesty is lost to all sense of honour and virtue.

It is more than probable, that the Prince above mentioned, possessed both those

qualifications in a very eminent degree. Without assurance, he would never have undertaken to speak before the most august assembly in the world; without modesty, he would have pleaded the cause he had taken upon him, though it had appeared ever so scandalous.

From what has been said, it is plain that modesty and assurance are both amiable, and may very well meet in the same person. When they are thus mixed and blended together, they compose what we endeavour to express, when we say, a modest assurance; by which we understand, the just mean between bashfulness and impudence.

I shall conclude with observing, that as the same man may be both modest and assured, so it is also possible for the same person to be both impudent and bashful.

We have frequent instances of this odd kind of mixture in people of depraved minds and mean education; who, though they are not able to meet a man's eyes or pronounce a sentence without confusion, can voluntarily commit the greatest villanies or most indecent actions.

Such a person seems to have made a resolution to do ill, even in spite of himself, and in defiance of all those checks and restraints his temper and complexion seem to have laid in his way.

Upon the whole, I would endeavour to establish this maxim, That the practice of virtue is the most proper method to give a man a becoming assurance in his words and actions. Guilt always seeks to shelter itself in one of the extremes; and is sometimes attended with both. Spectator.

§ 86. On disinterested Friendship. I am informed that certain Greek writers (Philosophers, it seems, in the opinion of their countrymen) have advanced some very extraordinary positions relating to friendship; as, indeed, what subject is there, which these subtle geniuses have not tortured with their sophistry?

The authors to whom I refer, dissuade their disciples from entering into any strong attachments, as unavoidably creating supernumerary disquietudes to those who engage in them; and, as every man has more than sufficient to call forth his solicitude in the course of his own affairs, it is a weakness, they contend, anxiously to involve himself in the concerns of others. They recommend it also, in all connexions of this kind, to hold the bands of union extremely loose; so as always to have it

in one's power to straiten or relax them, as circumstances and situations shall render most expedient. They add, as a capital article of their doctrine, that "to live exempt from care is an essential ingredient to constitute human happiness: but an ingredient, however, which he, who voluntarily distresses himself with cares in which he has no necessary and personal interest, must never hope to possess."

I have been told likewise, that there is another set of pretended philosophers, of the same country, whose tenets, concerning this subject, are of a still more illiberal and ungenerous cast.

The proposition they attempt to establish, is, that "friendship is an affair of selfinterest entirely, and that the proper motive for engaging in it, is, not in order to gratify the kind and benevolent affections, but for the benefit of that assistance and support which is to be derived from the connexion." Accordingly they assert, that those persons are most disposed to have recourse to auxiliary alliances of this kind, who are least qualified, by nature or fortune, to depend upon their own strength and powers: the weaker sex, for instance, being generally more inclined to engage in friendships than the male part of our species; and those who are depressed by indigence, or labour ng under misfortunes, than the wealthy and the prosperous.

Excellent and obliging sages, these, undoubtedly! To strike out the friendly affections from the moral world, would be like extinguishing the sun in the natural; each of them being the source of the best and most grateful satisfactions that Heaven has conferred on the sons of men. But I should be glad to know what the real value of this boasted exemption from care, which they promise their disciples, justly amounts to? an exemption flattering to self-love, I confess; but which, upon many occurrences in human life, should be rejected with the utmost disdain. For nothing, surely, can be more inconsistent with a well poised and manly spirit, than to decline engaging in any laudable action, or to be discouraged from persevering in it, by an apprehension of the trouble and solicitude with which it may probably be attended. Virtue herself, indeed, ought to be totally renounced, if it be right to avoid every possible means that may be productive of uneasiness: for who, that is actuated by her principles, can observe the conduct of an opposite character, without

being affected with some degree of secret dissatisfaction? Are not the just, the brave, and the good, necessarily exposed to the disagreeable emotions of dislike and aversion, when they respectively meet with instances of fraud, of cowardice, or of villany? It is an essential property of every well-constituted mind, to be affected with pain, or pleasure, according to the nature of those moral appearances that present themselves to observation.

If sensibility, therefore, be not incompatible with true wisdom (and it surely is not, unless we suppose that philosophy deadens every finer feeling of our nature) what just reason can be assigned, why the sympathetic sufferings which may result from friendship, should be a sufficient inducement for banishing that generous affection from the human breast? Extinguish all emotions of the heart, and what difference will remain, I do not say between man and brute, but between man and a mere inanimate clod? Away then with those austere philosophers, who represent virtue as hardening the soul against all the softer impressions of humanity! The fact, certainly, is much otherwise: a truly good man is, upon many occasions, extremely susceptible of tender sentiments; and his heart expands with joy, or shrinks with sorrow, as good or ill fortune accompanies his friend. Upon the whole, then, it may fairly be concluded, that, as in the case of virtue, so in that of friendship, those painful sensations, which may sometimes be produced by the one, as well as by the other, are equally insufficient grounds for excluding either of them from taking possession of our bosom.

They who insist that "utility is the first and prevailing motive, which induces mankind to enter into particular friendships,' appear to me to divest the association of its most amiable and engaging principle. For, to a mind rightly disposed, it is not so much the benefits received, as the affectionate zeal from which they flow, that gives them their best and most valuable recommendation. It is so far indeed from being verified by fact, that a sense of our wants is the original cause of forming these amicable alliances; that, on the contrary, it is observable, that none have been more distinguished in their friendships than those whose power and opulence, but, above all, whose superior virtue (a much firmer support) have raised them above every necessity of having recourse to the assistance of others,

The true distinction, then, in this question is, that “although friendship is certainly productive of utility, yet utility is not the primary motive of friendship." Those selfish sensualists, therefore, who, fulled in the lap of luxury, presume to maintain the reverse, have surely no claim to attention; as they are neither qualified by reflection, nor experience, to be competent judges of the subject.

Good Gods! is there a man upon the face of the earth, who would deliberately accept of all the wealth and all the affluence this world can bestow, if offered to him upon the severe terms of his being unconnected with a single mortal whom he could love, or by whom he should be beloved? This would be to lead the wretched life of a detested tyrant, who, amidst perpetual suspicions and alarms, passes his miserable days a stranger to every tender sentiment, and utterly precluded from the heart-felt satisfactions of friendship.

Melmoth's Translation of Cicero's Lælius.

§ 87. The Art of Happiness. Almost every object that attracts our notice has its bright and its dark side. He who habituates himself to look at the displeasing side, will sour his disposition, and consequently impair his happiness; while he, who constantly beholds it on the bright side, insensibly meliorates his temper, and, in consequence of it, improves his own happiness, and the happiness of all about him.

Arachne and Melissa are two friends. They are, both of them, women in years, and alike in birth, fortune, education, and accomplishments. They were originally alike in temper too: but by different management, are grown the reverse of each other. Arachne has accustomed herself to look only on the dark side of every object. If a new poem or play makes its appearance, with a thousand brilliances, and but one or two blemishes, she slightly skims over the passages that should give her pleasure, and dwells upon those only that fill her with dislike.--If you shew her a very excellent portrait, she looks at some part of the drapery which has been neglected, or to a hand or finger which has been left unfinished. Her garden is a very beautiful one, and kept with great neatness and elegancy; but if you take a walk with her in it, she talks to you of nothing but blights and storms, of snails and caterpillars, and how impossible it is to keep it from the

litter of falling leaves and worm-casts.--If you sit down in one of her temples, to enjoy a delightful prospect, she observes to you, that there is too much wood, or too little water; that the day is too sunny, or too gloomy; that it is sultry, or windy; and finishes with a long harangue upon the wretchedness of our climate.-When you return with her to the company, in hope of a little cheerful conversation, she casts a gloom over all, by giving you the history of her own bad health, or of some melancholy accident that has befallen one of her daughter's children. Thus she insensibly sinks her own spirits, and the spirits of all around her; and, at last, discovers, she knows not why, that her friends are grave.

Melissa is the reverse of all this. By constantly habituating herself to look only on the bright side of objects, she preserves a perpetual cheerfulness in herself, which, by a kind of happy contagion, she communicates to all about her. If any misfortune has befallen her, she considers it might have been worse, and is thankful to Providence for an escape. She rejoices in solitude, as it gives her an opportunity of knowing herself; and in society, because she can communicate the happiness she enjoys. She opposes every man's virtue to his failings, and can find out something to cherish and applaud in the very worst of her acquaintance. She opens every book with a desire to be entertained or instructed, and therefore seldom misses what she looks for. Walk with her, though it be on a heath or a common, and she will discover numberless beauties, unobserved before, in the hills, the dales, the blooms, brakes, and the variegated flowers of weeds and poppies. She enjoys every change of weather and of season, as bringing with it something of health or convenience. In conversation, it is a rule with her, never to start a subject that leads to any thing gloomy or disagreeable. You therefore never hear her repeating her own grievances or those of her neighbours; or (what is worst of all) their faults and imperfections. If any thing of the latter kind be mentioned in her hearing, she has the address to turn it into entertainment, by changing the most odious railing into a pleasant raillery. Thus Melissa, like the bee, gathers honey from every weed; while Arachne, like the spider, sucks poison from the fairest flowers. The consequence is, that, of two tempers

once very nearly allied, the one is ever sour and dissatisfied, the other always gay and cheerful; the one spreads an universal gloom, the other a continual sunshine.

There is nothing more worthy of our attention, than this art of happiness. In conversation, as well as life, happiness very often depends upon the slightest incidents. The taking notice of the badness of the weather, a north-east wind, the approach of winter, or any trifling circumstance of the disagreeable kind, shall insensibly rob a whole company of its good humour, and fling every member of it into the vapours. If, therefore, we would be happy in ourselves, and are desirous of communicating that happiness to all about us, these minutiæ of conversation ought carefully to be attended to. The brightness of the sky, the lengthening of the day, the increasing verdure of the spring, the arrival of any little piece of good news, or whatever carries with it the most distant glimpse of joy, shall frequently be the parent of a social and happy conversation. Good-manners exact from us this regard to our company. The clown may repine at the sunshine that ripens the harvest, because his turnips are burnt up by it; but the man of refinement will extract pleasure from the thun der-storm to which he is exposed, by remarking on the plenty and refreshment which may be expected from the succeeding shower.

Thus does politeness, as well as good sense, direct us to look at every object on the bright side; and, by thus acting, we cherish and improve both. By this practice it is that Melissa is become the wisest and best bred woman living; and by this practice, may every person arrive at that agreeableness of temper, of which the natural and never-failing fruit is Happi

ness.

Harris.

§ 88. The Choice of Hercules. When Hercules was in that part of his youth, in which it was natural for him to consider what course of life he ought to pursue, he one day retired into a desert, where the silence and solitude of the place very much favoured his meditations. As he was musing on his present condition, and very much perplexed in himself on the state of life he should choose, he saw two women, of a larger stature than ordinary, approaching towards him. One of them had a very noble air, and graceful deport

ment; her beauty was natural and easy, her person clean and unspotted, her eyes cast towards the ground with an agreeable reserve, her motion and behaviour full of modesty, and her raiment as white as snow. The other had a great deal of health and floridness in her countenance, which she had helped with an artificial white and red; and she endeavoured to appear more graceful than ordinary in her mien, by a mixture of affectation in all her gestures. She had a wonderful confidence and assurance in her looks, and all the variety of colours in her dress, that she thought were the most proper to shew her complexion to advantage. She cast her eyes upon herself, then turned them on those that were present, to see how they liked her, and often looked on the figure she made in her own shadow. Upon her nearer approach to Hercules, she stepped before the other lady, who came forward with a regular, composed carriage, and running up to him, accosted him after the following manner:

"My dear Hercules," says she, "I find you are very much divided in your thoughts upon the way of life that you ought to choose: be my friend and follow me; I will lead you into the possession of pleasure, and out of the reach of pain, and remove you from all the noise and disquietude of business. The affairs of either war or peace shall have no power to disturb you. Your whole employment shall be to make your life easy, and to entertain every sense with its proper gratifications. Sumptuous tables, beds of roses, clouds of perfumes, concerts of music, crowds of beauties, are all in readiness to receive you. Come along with me into this region of delights, this world of pleasure, and bid farewell for ever to care, to pain, to business." Hercules hearing the lady talk after this manner, desired to know her name: to which she answered, "My friends, and those who are well acquainted with me, call me Happiness; but my enemies, and those who would injure my reputation, have given me the name of Pleasure."

By this time the other lady was come up, who addressed herself to the young hero in a very different manner:-" Hercules," says she, "I offer myself to you, because I know you are descended from the Gods, and give proofs of that descent, by your love to virtue, and application to the studies proper for your age. This

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